Sumerian

(adjective)

Of, from, or pertaining to Sumer.

Related Terms

Examples of Sumerian in the following topics:

  • Lagash and the Third Dynasty of Ur

    • The Third Dynasty of Ur, also known as the Neo-Sumerian Empire or the Ur III refers to the twenty-first-to-twentieth century BCE Sumerian ruling dynasty based in the city of Ur.
    • During Ur III, Sumerian dominated the cultural sphere and was the language of legal, administrative, and economic documents.
    • Sumerian texts were mass produced in the Ur III period, and, although the Semitic Akkadian language became the common spoken language, Sumerian continued to dominate literature and also administrative documents.
    • Government officials learned to write at special schools that used only Sumerian literature.
    • Some scholars believe that the Uruk epic of Gilgamesh was written down during this period into its classic Sumerian form.

  • The Mesopotamian Cultures

    • The Sumerian city of Eridu, which at that time bordered the Persian Gulf, is believed to be the world's first city.
    • An early form of wedge-shaped writing called cuneiform developed in the early Sumerian period.
    • Metal also served various purposes during the early Sumerian period.
    • The later Sumerian pantheon (gods and goddesses) was likely modeled upon this political structure.
    • Example of Sumerian pictorial cuneiform writing.

  • Akkad

    • Sumerian, Hurrian, and Lullubean etymologies have been proposed instead.

  • Ceramics in Mesopotamia

    • As the Akkadian Empire overtook the Sumerian city-states, ceramists continued to produce bowls, vases, jars, and other objects in a variety of shapes and sizes.

  • Architecture in Mesopotamia

    • Sumerian culture observed a rigid division between the public sphere and the private sphere, a norm that resulted in a lack of direct view from the street into the home.
    • The first surviving ziggurats date to the Sumerian culture in the fourth millennium BCE, but they continued to be a popular architectural form in the late third and early second millennium BCE as well .

  • Babylon

    • The Amorites, unlike the Sumerians and Akkadian Semites, were not native to Mesopotamia, but were semi-nomadic Semitic invaders from the lands to the west.

  • Timeline

    • 3000 BCE: Sumerian Cuneiform emerges from the proto-literate Uruk period, allowing the codification of beliefs and creation of detailed historical religious records .

  • Polytheism

    • Some well-known historical polytheistic pantheons include the Sumerian gods and the Egyptian gods, and the classical pantheon which includes the ancient Greek religion and Roman religion.

  • Art of the Bronze Age