The Sumerians [antikvár]

PREFACE The year 1956 saw the pubhcation of my book From the Tablets of Sumer,'^since revised, reprinted, and translated into numerous languages under the title history Begins at Sumer. It consisted of twenty-odd disparate essays united by a common theme—"firsts" in man's recorded history and culture. The book did not treat the political history of the Sumerian people or the nature of their social and economic institutions, nor did it give the reader any idea of the manner and method by which the Sumerians and their language were discovered and "resurrected." It is primarily to fill these gaps that the present book was conceived and composed. The first chapter is introductory in character; it sketches briefly the archeological and scholarly efforts which led to the decipherment of the cuneiform script, with special reference to the Sumerians and their language, and does so in a way which, it is hoped, the interested layman can follow with understanding and insight. The second chapter deals with the history of Sumer from the prehistoric days of the fifth millennium to the early second millennium B.C., when the Sumerians ceased to exist as a political entity. As far as I know, it presents the fuUest and most detailed treatment of Sumer s political history available to date. Because of the fragmentary, elusive, and at times far from trustworthy character of the sources, not a few of the statements in this chapter are based on conjecture and surmise, and may turn out to be true vii