The Drumbeat Forever After

Guest: Annika We've never been more back! We start off this new miniseries on Presargonic Lagash with a series of hymns to Nanshe, patron goddess of Ningen near the Gulf Coast and sister of Ningirsu, patron goddess of the kingdom of Lagash. Then, we take a boat trip up the "Going-to-Ningen canal" from the coastal town of Gu-abba, past Nanshe's hometown of Ningen, to the major Early Dynastic city o...

Guest: Sheila We're so back! First, a Sumerian poem about Gilgamesh which mentions his trip to see Ziusudra (also known as Atrahasis, Utnapishtim, and/or Noah), which some have interpreted as evidence for the kind of mass human sacrifice we see in these tombs. Then, the famous Royal Tombs of Ur, first excavated a century ago, with their famous treasures and aforementioned mass human sacrifice! For...

Check out episodes 17-28, most of which I re-recorded and reuploaded recently. New episodes on Early Dynastic Sumer coming soon.

Guest: Stacy First, a story about Enlil, the Sumerian god of kingship, and his future wife Ninlil; he sees her bathing in a canal in their hometown of Nippur, and the narrative isn't especially concerned how consensual the resulting sexual encounter is.  Then, we visit Nippur, a temple center which one scholar called the "Mesopotamian Vatican", starting with a cylinder seal from a very early level...

Guests: Lily, Annika First: a literary debate between two women (much of its meaning hidden beneath several layers of abstraction). It tells us a lot about public expectations of Sumerian housewives, but one could argue that it tells us more about their private anxieties (as envisioned by their husbands): sex, property, and enslaved women. Then, we visit Abu Salabikh, the first major city downrive...

(Sorry I disappeared for three months! I burned myself out working on rewriting old episodes and had to focus on other stuff for a couple months. I'm back in the saddle now, with episodes written up to the end of the Sargonic / Old Akkadian period! Also, I switched my scripts from bullet-point outlines to full paragraphs written out, in hopes that it will take less time to edit audio. Let me know...

Two interviews with three Iraqi academics! I interviewed Karrar Sabah Al Ramahi, then a PhD student at Baghdad University, about his research on the city of Eridu! Furqan Salam helped with the translation. We talk about its earliest settlement during the Ubaid period, its prominence as a temple town, the building projects of the kings of Ur, and the reason for its primacy in the Sumerian King List...

Guest: Lily First: the world's oldest known wisdom literature, in the form of a series of proverbs delivered from the eponymous Shuruppak (king of Shuruppak) to his son Zi-ud-sura (alias Utnapishtim, the Noah figure from the Sumerian flood myth). Only insults and stupid speaking receive the attention of the Land! Then we visit the city of Shuruppak, in central Sumer. After a quick look at its earl...

Guest: Annika First, a classic sitcom setup: Ningishzida plans to sail a boat to hell with his friend (an ill-intentioned demon), but his sister Ama-shilama wants to tag along! Then, we visit the construction site of Mari, a city built from scratch in the middle of nowhere around 2900 BCE, along with 150 km (90 mi) of canals to connect it to both the Euphrates and the Khabur river. You can do the...

(Re-recorded as of December 3, 2022) Guest: Victoria First: Having insulted Ereshkigal (queen of the Sumerian underworld) by offending her messenger's honor at a dinner party in heaven, Nergal (god of war, plague, and death) has to travel down to the underworld to apologize to her in person. Will he be able to restrain his overweening libido? Then, we tour Çatalhöyük (in modern south-central Turke...

Guests: Kelten, James First, Gilgamesh ignores the branch of the government standing between him and a unilateral declaration of war on King Aga of Kish, the mightiest kingdom in the Mesopotamian alluvium at the time. Infrastructure is boring, kings are always right, and war is always glorious! Then, we look at the city of Kish during the Archaic period (2900-2600 BCE), which was apparently the se...

Guest: James First: To punish Gilgamesh, Inanna sends the massive Bull of Heaven to ravage Unug. But, as it destroys farmland and drinks the rivers dry, Gilgamesh sits idle, drinking beer and listening to music! Then, we visit Ur during the Archaic period (2900-2600 BCE) and finally take a look at the first certainly Sumerian writing. Administrative texts record a complex economy centered on the t...

Guest: Lily First, we finally meet Gilgamesh! Cherished in Unug, heroic bearer of a scepter of wide-ranging power, noble glory of the gods, angry bull standing ready for a fight, etc. We read one of two Sumerian poems dealing with Gilgamesh's conquest of the remote Mountains of Cedar-felling and his fight against the mighty Ḫuwawa, the demigod who rules the mountains at the edge of the world! Then...

Guest: Sheila First, strong Copper casts his legitimate insults, insults of a miserable dog, against Silver. In my delusional hubris, I've arbitrarily pieced this particular debate text together from disparate fragments and granted it unnatural life beyond death via galvanic abominations beyond the comprehension of its original creator. As usual, I'm using the ETCSL translation. Then, we track the...

Guests: Jojo, Sami First, at the dawn of cosmic time, Sheep and Grain descend from the abode of the gods, get drunk, and start a fight. Then, after a quick historical introduction, we take a thorough look at the Uruk-period wool industry, from gathering sheep in one place for shearing to spinning thread to weaving (on various types of loom) to dyeing, fulling, sewing, and so on. Then, we look at s...

Guest: Kelten First: Anzu, the mythical bird guarding the mountains at the edge of the world, comes home to find that Lugalbanda has treated his beloved chick with the utmost generosity. In return, he makes several attempts to grant Lugalbanda his destiny. Another fully new (as of Nov 2024) episode, which I’ve been waiting to post since summer 2022. This one is about the Proto-Elamite period, Iran...

Guest: Kelten First, we continue the story of Lugalbanda as he leaves his mountain cave. After he submits to the country of oppression, Zangara, the god of dreams, asks him for a space knife and goats of varying quality. Then, we head up to central Mesopotamia to visit the land of Akkad during the Jemdet Nasr period, starting with the eponymous town of Jemdet Nasr, which produced over 200 tablets....

Guest: Kelten First, the fragile peace has collapsed, and the virtuous king Enmerkar leads the army of fair Unug in an invasion of the faraway mountain kingdom of Aratta. However, en route to otherwise certain victory, the king's mightiest warrior, Lugalbanda, falls sick! His fellow soldiers, unable to help him and fearing the worst, lay him in a cave in the mountain wilderness as if it were his t...

Guest: Kelten First, a familiar story that just happens to involve monumental construction projects, clay bricks, and universal language. Behold! Then, we take a look at Unug around the 3200s BCE, when the Uruk expansion came to a close and the city center underwent another monumental renovation. Was this city ruled by the so-called “priest-king” depicted conducting rituals, leading troops in batt...

Guest: Liyan First, another debate poem! Hoe, child of the poor, bereft even of a loincloth, starts a quarrel with the Plow. A surprising amount of Sumerian literature boils down to the logistical complexity of various tasks facing early state institutions, not least among them the upkeep of various agricultural tools. Then, we look at the Late Uruk state from the perspective of its labor force. T...

Guest: Kirra First, we sing the praises of Inanna, patron goddess of the city of Unug, whose home temple complex was the epicenter of the Uruk-period world system. Which god compares with her? Then, we finally visit the namesake of the Uruk period, the city of Unug (or Uruk) itself. We continue our look at urbanization in Sumer with the Late Uruk period, as local networks of small villages arrayed...

Guests: Kirra, Jojo First, Ensuhkeshdanna, the haughty lord of faraway Aratta, demands the submission of our hero Enmerkar, the wise king of noble Unug. When Enmerkar refuses to so debase himself, the lord of Aratta plots a campaign of economic sabotage by means of dark sorcery. We finish up our tour of the Uruk world in Susiana, in southwestern Iran, picking up right after the end of the Susa 1 p...

Guest: Kelten First: the lord of Aratta devises a series of challenges to demonstrate his superiority over our hero Enmerkar, the august king of Unug, who casually invents written language two-thirds of the way through the story. Can he outsmart his nemesis in the mountains? Or, at the very least, ignore his specifications and send him something else entirely? Then, we continue our mini-series on...

Guest: Kelten First: Our hero Enmerkar, grandson of the sun-god Utu, demands tribute (in the form of labor and precious minerals) from the anonymous lord of faraway Aratta, with the blessing of his lover (and Utu's sister), the goddess Inanna. Then, we kick off our mini-series on the Uruk expansion, a process of intensive economic and cultural interaction between the Sumerian plain and its neighbo...

Guest: Annika First, Antigone gets caught burying her brother, a foolish judge arraigns her folly, and we wonder whether the good might actually desire a like portion with the evil. Then, we visit Tell Brak in northeastern Syria (most famous for its "eye idols"), as it becomes southwest Asia's first city and the world's largest settlement (130 hectares, maybe as many as 24,000 people) in the early...