What type of writing did the ancient Sumerians use? Sumerian writing (invention of cuneiform)
MHC. GRADE 10. ARTISTIC CULTURE OF ANCIENT FOREIGN ASIA
In the IV-I millennia BC. in the lower reaches of two large rivers Tiger And Euphrates (Mesopotamia , or Mesopotamia , or Mesopotamia ), as well as throughout the entire territory of Western Asia lived peoples of high culture, to whom we owe the basics of mathematical knowledge and the division of the clock dial into twelve parts. Here they learned to calculate with great accuracy the movement of the planets and the time of revolution of the Moon around the Earth. The architects of Western Asia knew how to erect the highest towers, where brick was used as a building material. Here they drained swampy areas, laid canals and irrigated fields, planted orchards, invented the wheel and built ships, knew how to spin and weave, forged tools and weapons from copper and bronze. The peoples of Ancient Western Asia achieved great success in the field of political theory and practice, military affairs and state law. We still use many of their inventions and scientific discoveries to this day.
In the fertile valley of Mesopotamia such major city-states were formed as Sumer, Akkad, Babylon , and Assyrian power And Persian state and many others. Here, over the centuries, states arose and died, nationalities replaced each other, ancient communities disintegrated and were revived.
The art of Ancient and Western Asia is based on a clear understanding of the general picture of the world, a clear idea of the world structure. Its main theme is the glorification of human strength and power.
The emergence of writing
Book-tablets from the library of King Ashurbanipal
By the 3rd millennium BC. in the southern valleys of Mesopotamia many city-states arose, the main one of which was Sumer. The Sumerians entered the history of world culture primarily thanks to the invention of writing.
Initially it was a pictographic (pictorial) letter, gradually replaced by complex geometric signs. Triangles, diamonds, stripes, and stylized palm branches were applied to the surface of the vessels. Each combination of signs told about the most important activities and events for a person.
Complex pictographic writing, which did not allow one to convey the ambiguous meaning of a particular word or concept, soon had to be abandoned. For example, a sign or drawing to indicate a leg began to be read as a sign conveying movement: “stand”, “walk”, “run”. That is, one and the same sign acquired several completely different meanings, each of which had to be selected depending on the context.
They wrote on “tablets” of soft clay, carefully cleaned of all impurities. For this purpose, reed or wooden sticks were used, sharpened in such a way that when pressed into wet clay they left a wedge-shaped mark. The tablets were then fired. In this form they could be stored for a long time. At first they wrote from right to left, but it was inconvenient, since their own hand covered what was written. Gradually we moved to more rational writing - from left to right. Thus, pictography, known to primitive man, turned into cuneiform, which was later borrowed and transformed by many peoples. Clay tablets revealed a lot of interesting things about the life of the Sumerians, the deciphering and reading of which required a lot of effort and time from scientists. It is known, for example, that the Sumerians had schools that were called “houses of tablets.” Using clay tablets, students learned the basics of reading and writing. From the surviving written monuments we can learn about how the educational process was structured in these unique schools. In all likelihood, the teachers kept their students in great severity and obedience, and therefore the tablets contain numerous complaints from the students.
The overseer made signs in the house
remark to me: “Why are you late?”
I was scared, my heart was racing
started pounding
I approached the teacher and bowed.
to the ground.
The father of the house begged for signs
my sign
He was unhappy with her and hit me.
Then I was diligent with the lesson,
I was struggling with the lesson...
The class supervisor ordered us:
“Rewrite!”
I took my sign in my hands,
Wrote on it
But there was also something on the sign that I
did not understand,
What I couldn't read...
I'm sick of the scribe's fate,
I hated the scribe's fate...
Translation by L. Shargina
Studying in the “house of tablets” opened up great opportunities for students: they subsequently occupied leading positions in workshops and construction, supervised land cultivation, and resolved the most important state issues and disputes.
IN Nineveh The famous library of the king of Assyria Ashurbanipal (669 - ca. 633 BC) was discovered, which is the world's first systematic collection, where tablet books were selected by series, had titles, serial numbers and were placed according to branches of knowledge. The king valued his treasure very much, and therefore kept the “books” in boxes in a dry room on the second floor. Since the contents of the book could not be placed on one tablet, other tablets served as its continuation and were stored in a special box.
The tablet books in Ashurbanipal's library were copied from older ones kept in different countries. That is why the king sent the most experienced scribes there, who were supposed to select the most interesting and significant “books” and then rewrite their text. Sometimes the tablets were so old, with chipped edges, that they could not be restored. In this case, the scribes made a note: “Erased, I don’t know.” It was a very painstaking work, requiring a good knowledge of the ancient Sumerian language and simultaneous translation into Babylonian.
What did the ancient scribes translate first? Textbooks on language and grammar, books on the basics of science: mathematics, astronomy, medicine and mineralogy. Signs with hymns and prayers, tales and legends were in particular demand.
IN 612 BC Under the onslaught of enemies, these clay books almost died. They were saved by the fact that during fires the clay became even stronger from firing and was not afraid of dampness. Of course, many of the book-tablets broke, scattering into many small pieces, but what was preserved, lying under layers of sand, ash and earth, after 2500 years told scientists amazing information about the life and culture of the peoples of Mesopotamia.
An outstanding monument of world literature "The Epic of Gilgamesh" (“About the one who has seen everything”, III millennium BC) - the ruler of the Sumerian city Uruk - preserved on clay tablets dating back to the beginning of the 2nd millennium BC. e.
Architecture
Time has preserved very few architectural structures, most often only the foundations of buildings. They were built from unfired raw clay and quickly collapsed in conditions of high humidity. Numerous wars did not spare them either.
In a country of turbulent rivers and swampy plains, temple structures were raised onto high embankments to protect them from floods. An important part of architectural ensembles were stairs and ramps (inclined planes replacing stairs). Along them, city residents or priests climbed to the sanctuary. The cities of Mesopotamia were protected by defensive structures with powerful and high fortress walls, towers and fortified gates.
Ziggurat in the city of Ur. 21st century BC
The most important achievement of architecture was the construction of the so-called ziggurats - stepped tower-shaped temples intended for religious rites, and later for astronomical observations. They rose high to the sky, were massive and stood firmly on the ground, reminding people of mountains. On the upper platform of the ziggurat there was a sanctuary, that is, the “home of God,” where the deity descended. Ordinary people were never allowed into the sanctuary; only kings and priests who observed the heavenly bodies could be there.
The most famous ziggurat in the city Ure , which was partially excavated from under the layers of sand that had covered it. It was a structure of three truncated pyramids placed one on top of the other. (Currently, only two floors of its original three terraces have survived.) The bottom was painted black, the first pyramid was red, the middle one was white, the top one with the sanctuary was lined with blue glazed bricks. The protruding terraces were planted with ornamental trees and shrubs. The plan of the building allows us to make the assumption that the sanctuary of the deity was located behind thick, impenetrable walls, and the cramped rooms available were of a closed nature. The three-color mosaic preserved in the lower part, imitating bundles of reeds and reed weaving, testifies to the exquisite decorative decoration of the ziggurat.
Gate of the goddess Ishtar. VI century BC. Pergamon Museum, Berlin
No less remarkable are the architectural structures Babylon. The path to the city went through a gate dedicated to the goddess of fertility and agriculture Ishtar . They were lined with glazed dark blue bricks depicting sacred golden-yellow bulls and rows of white and yellow dragons - fantastic creatures with the head of a snake, eagle hind legs and lion front paws. These symbolic defenders of the city give the gates an extraordinary decorative and spectacular appearance. The blue background color was not chosen by chance; it was considered a magical remedy against the evil eye. The colors of the glaze, which have not yet faded, make a particularly strong impression.
art
The fine art of Mesopotamia is represented mainly by reliefs that decorated the interior walls of the state rooms in the palaces of the Assyrian rulers. It’s hard to even imagine how many carvers and sculptors were required to complete such work! The reliefs depict battle scenes: advancing troops, fast chariots, galloping horsemen, fearless warriors storming a fortress, climbing steep walls on rope ladders, or swimming across stormy rivers, driving countless herds and crowds of prisoners. And all this is accomplished for the glory of one person - the king!
A significant part of the reliefs and mosaics are dedicated to the court life of the king and his entourage. The main place is occupied by solemn processions. The king (his figure, as a rule, is much larger than the others) sits on a throne, surrounded by many armed bodyguards. To the right and left, captives with tied hands and peoples of conquered countries with generous offerings stretch towards the king in an endless ribbon. Or the king reclines on a lush bed in the garden under shady palm trees. The servants bring coolness to him with fans and amuse him by playing the harp.
"Standard of Ur". Fragment. Mid-3rd millennium BC British Museum, London
Among such objects of art, special mention should be made of the “standard of Ur” - a three-tiered mosaic slab illustrating the theme of a military battle and victory. War chariots with devices harnessed for throwing projectiles pave the way. The wheels of war chariots have the shape of a solid disk without spokes and are made up of two halves. Animals move from left to right, first at a walk, then at a trot and gallop. Under their hooves are the bodies of defeated enemies. They are followed by numerous infantry wearing leather helmets with earphones and leather capes with metal plaques. The warriors hold their spears horizontally, pushing them towards the prisoners in front. In the center of the upper tier is a large figure of the king. From the left, a procession with the royal chariot, a squire and a servant boy is heading towards her. On the right, warriors carry trophies and lead undressed and disarmed prisoners.
Big lion hunt. Fragment of a bas-relief. 9th century BC. British Museum, London
Many Assyrian reliefs have survived depicting hunting wild animals, which was considered excellent training for military operations. In composition "The Great Lion Hunt" the artist chose one of the most intense moments of the lion hunt. The figures of people and animals are conveyed in expressive movement. The hunt has already begun. The chariot rushes quickly. A wounded animal writhes in agony under the horses' hooves. The driver holds the reins with force, spurring the horses. At this time, the king draws his bow, preparing to hit the animal. The enraged wild lion stood with his front feet on the chariot. With great precision, the artist depicts the roaring head of a lion, defending itself from the threat of imminent death. With exceptional realism, he reproduces the terrible pain experienced by a wounded animal. The artist cannot be denied the skill of conveying details: the strength of the king’s muscles, the rigidity of the driver’s hands, the careful drawing of the horse’s mane and bridle.
Stele of King Naramsin. XXIII century BC. Louvre, Paris
The constant struggle for power between cities and the need to commemorate military victories led to the emergence of a new type of relief - memorial relief . We are talking about stone slabs with a rounded surface, on which religious scenes or historical events are symbolically depicted. On victorious stele king Naramsin depicts the king's campaign against hostile tribes. From above, a procession of warriors with spears and standards on high shafts unfolds along the mountain paths. Their gaze is turned upward to the victorious King Naramsin, who has risen to the very tops of the mountains, above which the Moon and the Sun, symbols of the gods, shine. The king has just thrown a dart at one of his opponents and is preparing to fight the last enemy. However, the warrior no longer resists, raises his hands and covers his face, as if blinded by the greatness of the winner. The battle is over. Naramsin generously grants him life and pulls back his hand with the arrow. The corpses of killed enemies fall from under his feet into a deep abyss.
The composition of the stele is interesting. On a relatively small surface, the master successfully placed the figure of the king, towering above everyone, and many warriors. On the right side, figures of enemies fleeing are visible: their spears are broken, there is horror on their faces and a plea for mercy. The landscape is also skillfully used: trees twisted by the wind, sculpted along the steep paths of a mountain gorge.
Stele of King Hammurabi. XVIII century BC. Louvre, Paris
No less famous Stela of King Hammurabi. Babylonian king Hammurabi (1792-1750 BC), creator of the code of laws, approaches in a prayer position sun god Shamash . The king's head is covered with a cap with a folded edge, and his long robe falls in soft, loose folds to his feet, leaving his right arm bare. Shamash sits majestically on a throne that looks like a Babylonian temple with niches and projections. The deity’s feet rest on the towering mountains, because of which he comes to earth every day to people. Shamash's head is crowned with four pairs of horns - a sign of greatness, he has a long curled beard, and sheaves of sun rays burst out from behind his shoulders. With his right hand, Shamash hands Hammurabi the symbols of power - a ring and a rod, as if instructing the king to administer justice.
The art of Ancient Western Asia made a significant contribution to the development of small plastic arts. Some of the earliest works are small (up to 30 cm) figurines of people performing a rite of veneration of a deity, the so-called adorants (Latin for “worship”, “adoration”). They have reverently folded hands, lush and carefully curled beards; huge eyes turned upward, as if frozen in amazement; ears intensely catching any desire of the deity. They forever froze in poses of humility and submission. On the shoulder of each figurine is the name of the one whom it should represent in
Dignitary Ebikh-Il. III millennium BC Louvre, Paris
temple. Here's the manager Ebikh-Il
(III millennium BC). He sits on a wicker stool with his hands crossed in prayer on his chest. Where is his intense, expectant gaze directed? Noteworthy is the refined elaboration of the details of the clothing - skirts made of sheep wool with finely minted strands. The beard with curly curls is beautifully carved. Rounded shapes hide the muscles of the body, soft arms have lost strength and rigidity.
The sculptural image of the head is a universally recognized masterpiece goddess Ishtar, anticipating many ancient examples. The empty eye sockets of the goddess were once encrusted with precious stones and gave her appearance unique grandeur. The wavy wig, made by embossing gold leaf, produced a terrifying and bewitching effect. The hair, parted, falls in semicircles on the forehead. Eyebrows fused above the bridge of the nose and a tightly compressed mouth give the face a somewhat arrogant expression.
Head of the goddess Ishtar from Uruk. Beginning of the 3rd millennium BC Iraq Museum, Baghdad
Musical art
Monuments of musical culture have not survived, but the high level of development of music can be judged from works of literature and fine art. For example, during excavations in the city of Ur, cuneiform “textbooks” on singing were discovered. From them we learn that temple musician-priests were held in high esteem in society. Their names were written down after the names of gods and kings. The chronology began with the names of the musicians. Compared to government officials, musicians were of a higher rank.
During mourning ceremonies, temple musicians-priests performed lamenting songs, and on ordinary days they were supposed to please the gods and kings with beautiful sounds. The following order from the king to the musicians has been preserved:
“The king ordered the singer to appear and sing before the lord Ningirsu, so that his heart would calm down, his soul would be pacified, his tears would be dried, his sighs would stop; for this singer is like the depths of the sea, he purifies like the Euphrates, and makes a noise like a storm.”
Thus, music was supposed to bring pleasure to gods and kings and comfort the souls of believers. Later there were large court ensembles that gave public concerts. Some of the ensembles numbered 150 people! Concerts were held during religious ceremonies, folk holidays, the return of troops from campaigns, royal receptions, feasts and solemn processions.
Of the musical instruments, the most widespread are harp, cymbals, double oboe, longitudinal flutes, lutes and lyres. Cult music also used various bells - amulets against evil and disasters. The rites dedicated to the cult of the Moon and the star Ishtar (planet Venus) involved copper drums of enormous size. Even sacrifices were made in honor of musical instruments.
During excavations of one of the royal tombs in the city of Ur, a harp with the head of a bull was discovered. On the front of the harp, under the bull's chin, there is a tablet depicting Gilgamesh fighting two bulls with human faces. This is a plot from a myth according to which the gods
Harp with a bull's head. Around 2600 BC
Iraq Museum, Baghdad
Nya Ishtar, who wooed Gilgamesh and was refused by him, decided to take revenge on him. She demanded that the sky god Anu create a “heavenly bull” and a thundercloud, which were supposed to destroy Gilgamesh.
The ancient Eastern harp had a narrow resonator and strings of different lengths, which were stretched diagonally. Among the many varieties of harps, differing in the number of strings, size and method of performance, the most popular were Assyrian horizontal harps. They were played with mediator (thin long stick). If they were vertical harps , then when playing music they used only their fingers.
Some terms denoting musical intervals, modes and genres have also come down to us from Mesopotamia. And although scientists are still arguing about their real sound, one thing is certain: in Mesopotamia they not only performed music, but also composed it, and also developed musical theory.
Questions and tasks
1. Tell us about the outstanding cultural achievements of the peoples of Ancient Western Asia. Which of them have not lost their significance today? What influence did natural conditions and the most important historical events have on the general nature of cultural development?
2.How and why was Sumerian writing invented? What are its characteristic features? What did the clay tablets tell us? What do you know about the creation of the world's first library of King Ashurbanipal in Nineveh?
3. What are the characteristic features of the architecture of Ancient Mesopotamia? Tell us about the masterpieces of temple and urban architecture.
4. Identify the leading themes in the visual arts of Mesopotamia. What circumstances caused them? Look at the reliefs depicting animals (“The Great Lion Hunt” and “The Wounded Lioness”). What has changed in the depiction of the beast compared to the painting of primitive man?
5. Tell us about the musical culture of Ancient Western Asia. What musical instruments were especially popular?
Creative workshop
· Read the poem by V.Ya. Bryusov "Assargadon". How did the poet of his 20th century see the Assyrian despot king? Is there a similarity between this poem and the victory steles of the Ancient East (the Naramsin stele)?
I am the leader of the kings of the earth and the king, Assargadon.
As soon as I took power, Sidon rebelled against us.
I overthrew Sidon and threw stones into the sea.
To Egypt my speech sounded like a law,
Elam read fate in my single gaze,
I built my powerful throne on the bones of my enemies.
Lords and leaders, I say to you: woe!
Who will surpass me? who will be equal to me?
The actions of all people are like a shadow in a crazy dream,
The dream of exploits is like child's play.
I have exhausted you to the bottom, earthly glory!
And here I stand alone, intoxicated with greatness,
I, the leader of the kings of the earth and the king - Assargadon.
· Get acquainted with the “Epic of Gilgamesh” - an outstanding monument of world literature. What philosophical and moral problems are reflected in this work? Present your impressions in the form of a short essay.
· Try to design an exhibition stand that would present the main types of art of Ancient Western Asia.
Related information.
In the south of modern Iraq, between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, a mysterious people, the Sumerians, settled almost 7,000 years ago. They made a significant contribution to the development of human civilization, but we still do not know where the Sumerians came from or what language they spoke.
Mysterious language
The Mesopotamian valley has long been inhabited by tribes of Semitic herders. It was they who were driven north by the Sumerian aliens. The Sumerians themselves were not related to the Semites; moreover, their origins are still unclear to this day. Neither the ancestral home of the Sumerians nor the linguistic family to which their language belonged is known.
Fortunately for us, the Sumerians left many written monuments. From them we learn that neighboring tribes called these people “Sumerians”, and they themselves called themselves “Sang-ngiga” - “black-headed”. They called their language a “noble language” and considered it the only one suitable for people (in contrast to the not so “noble” Semitic languages spoken by their neighbors).
But the Sumerian language was not homogeneous. It had special dialects for women and men, fishermen and shepherds. What the Sumerian language sounded like is unknown to this day. A large number of homonyms suggests that this language was a tonal language (like, for example, modern Chinese), which means that the meaning of what was said often depended on intonation.
After the decline of the Sumerian civilization, the Sumerian language was studied for a long time in Mesopotamia, since most religious and literary texts were written in it.
The ancestral home of the Sumerians
One of the main mysteries remains the ancestral home of the Sumerians. Scientists build hypotheses based on archaeological data and information obtained from written sources. 
This Asian country, unknown to us, was supposed to be located on the sea. The fact is that the Sumerians came to Mesopotamia along river beds, and their first settlements appeared in the south of the valley, in the deltas of the Tigris and Euphrates. At first there were very few Sumerians in Mesopotamia - and this is not surprising, because the ships can only accommodate so many settlers. Apparently, they were good sailors, since they were able to climb up unfamiliar rivers and find a suitable place to land on the shore.
In addition, scientists believe that the Sumerians come from mountainous areas. It’s not for nothing that in their language the words “country” and “mountain” are spelled the same. And the Sumerian temples “ziggurats” resemble mountains in appearance - they are stepped structures with a wide base and a narrow pyramidal top, where the sanctuary was located.
Another important condition is that this country had to have developed technologies. The Sumerians were one of the most advanced peoples of their time; they were the first in the entire Middle East to use the wheel, create an irrigation system, and invent a unique writing system.
According to one version, this legendary ancestral home was located in the south of India.
Flood survivors
It was not for nothing that the Sumerians chose the Mesopotamia Valley as their new homeland. The Tigris and Euphrates originate in the Armenian Highlands, and carry fertile silt and mineral salts to the valley. Because of this, the soil in Mesopotamia is extremely fertile, with fruit trees, grains and vegetables growing in abundance. In addition, there were fish in the rivers, wild animals flocked to watering holes, and in the flooded meadows there was plenty of food for livestock. 
But all this abundance had a downside. When the snow began to melt in the mountains, the Tigris and Euphrates carried streams of water into the valley. Unlike the Nile floods, the Tigris and Euphrates floods could not be predicted; they were not regular.
Heavy floods turned into a real disaster; they destroyed everything in their path: cities and villages, fields, animals and people. It was probably when they first encountered this disaster that the Sumerians created the legend of Ziusudra.
At a meeting of all the gods, a terrible decision was made - to destroy all of humanity. Only one god, Enki, took pity on the people. He appeared in a dream to King Ziusudra and ordered him to build a huge ship. Ziusudra fulfilled the will of God; he loaded his property, family and relatives, various craftsmen to preserve knowledge and technology, livestock, animals and birds onto the ship. The doors of the ship were tarred on the outside.
The next morning a terrible flood began, which even the gods were afraid of. The rain and wind raged for six days and seven nights. Finally, when the water began to recede, Ziusudra left the ship and made sacrifices to the gods. Then, as a reward for his loyalty, the gods granted Ziusudra and his wife immortality.
This legend not only resembles the legend of Noah's Ark; most likely, the biblical story is borrowed from Sumerian culture. After all, the first poems about the flood that have reached us date back to the 18th century BC.
King-priests, king-builders
The Sumerian lands were never a single state. In essence, it was a collection of city-states, each with its own law, its own treasury, its own rulers, its own army. The only things they had in common were language, religion and culture. City-states could be at enmity with each other, could exchange goods or enter into military alliances. 
Each city-state was ruled by three kings. The first and most important was called “en”. This was the king-priest (however, the enom could also be a woman). The main task of the king was to conduct religious ceremonies: solemn processions and sacrifices. In addition, he was in charge of all temple property, and sometimes the property of the entire community.
An important area of life in ancient Mesopotamia was construction. The Sumerians are credited with the invention of baked brick. City walls, temples, and barns were built from this more durable material. The construction of these structures was supervised by the priest-builder ensi. In addition, the ensi monitored the irrigation system, because canals, locks and dams made it possible to at least somewhat control irregular spills.
During the war, the Sumerians elected another leader - a military leader - lugal. The most famous military leader was Gilgamesh, whose exploits are immortalized in one of the most ancient literary works, the Epic of Gilgamesh. In this story, the great hero challenges the gods, defeats monsters, brings a precious cedar tree to his hometown of Uruk, and even descends into the afterlife.
Sumerian gods
Sumer had a developed religious system. Three gods were especially revered: the sky god Anu, the earth god Enlil and the water god Ensi. In addition, each city had its own patron god. Thus, Enlil was especially revered in the ancient city of Nippur. The people of Nippur believed that Enlil gave them such important inventions as the hoe and the plow, and also taught them how to build cities and build walls around them. 
Important gods for the Sumerians were the sun (Utu) and the moon (Nannar), which replaced each other in the sky. And, of course, one of the most important figures of the Sumerian pantheon was the goddess Inanna, whom the Assyrians, who borrowed the religious system from the Sumerians, would call Ishtar, and the Phoenicians - Astarte.
Inanna was the goddess of love and fertility and, at the same time, the goddess of war. She personified, first of all, carnal love and passion. It is not for nothing that in many Sumerian cities there was a custom of “divine marriage”, when kings, in order to ensure fertility for their lands, livestock and people, spent the night with the high priestess Inanna, who embodied the goddess herself.
Like many ancient gods, Inannu was capricious and fickle. She often fell in love with mortal heroes, and woe to those who rejected the goddess!
The Sumerians believed that the gods created people by mixing their blood with clay. After death, souls fell into the afterlife, where there was also nothing but clay and dust, which the dead ate. To make the life of their deceased ancestors a little better, the Sumerians sacrificed food and drink to them.
Cuneiform
Sumerian civilization reached amazing heights, even after being conquered by its northern neighbors, the culture, language and religion of the Sumerians were borrowed first by Akkad, then by Babylonia and Assyria.
The Sumerians are credited with inventing the wheel, bricks, and even beer (although they most likely made barley drink using a different technology). But the main achievement of the Sumerians was, of course, a unique writing system - cuneiform.
Cuneiform got its name from the shape of the marks that a reed stick left on wet clay, the most common writing material. 
Sumerian writing came from a system of counting various goods. For example, when a man counted his flock, he made a clay ball to represent each sheep, then put these balls in a box, and left marks on the box indicating the number of these balls. But all the sheep in the herd are different: different sexes, different ages. Marks appeared on the balls according to the animal they represented. And finally, the sheep began to be designated by a picture - a pictogram. Drawing with a reed stick was not very convenient, and the pictogram turned into a schematic image consisting of vertical, horizontal and diagonal wedges. And the last step - this ideogram began to denote not only a sheep (in Sumerian “udu”), but also the syllable “udu” as part of compound words.
At first, cuneiform was used to compile business documents. Extensive archives have come down to us from the ancient inhabitants of Mesopotamia. But later, the Sumerians began to write down artistic texts, and even entire libraries appeared from clay tablets, which were not afraid of fires - after all, after firing, the clay only became stronger. It was thanks to the fires in which the Sumerian cities, captured by the warlike Akkadians, perished, that unique information about this ancient civilization has reached us.
Stone Age, fourth millennium BC, people use stone tools, have the most primitive skills, almost zero skills and the most barbaric knowledge about the world around them. They live either directly in the open air or in dwellings like dugouts. No bows, no swords, no ships, no jewelry, no pyramids, no kings, no furniture - none of this chaotic set existed at that time, and could not have arisen, given the stage of human evolution.
So it seemed to scientists for a long time, until the Sumerian civilization was discovered, which with its existence created a real sensation among scientific minds. The scale of the shock was so great that few people wanted to believe in the reality of the Sumerians until the facts became too many. What so amazed and continues to amaze the most enlightened minds of humanity?
Judging by the finds discovered in the cities of the Sumerians, they were the inventors of almost everything that we use to this day. In principle, it is high time for historians and literary publishing houses to rewrite history, because much that was attributed to other peoples was invented by the mysterious Sumerians. The Sumerians came, and out of nowhere entire cities appeared with huge pyramids, ziggurats, real smooth roads covered with a substance similar in composition to modern asphalt.
So, six thousand years ago, an incomprehensible civilization either itself invented something that could not yet exist at that time, or used more ancient inventions, which means that all our ideas about this stage of the development of our planet are fundamentally incorrect. Here is the little that the Sumerians knew and used:
In those days, one could already find markets on the streets, people opened something like culinary shops where they could have a snack on the way. Sumerians walked through the streets in beautiful outfits, decorated with various jewelry. And this is not the only thing that shocks researchers. Most of all, no one understands why a nation that was supposed to develop, having achieved everything in the first centuries of its existence, then suddenly began to degrade! Assumptions have been and are being made. And the worst thing about this is that it is the scientists and romantic writers of recent generations who can become those thanks to whom the Sumerian civilization will acquire absurd legends, which will subsequently prevent our descendants from continuing the study of this most interesting mysterious people.
The Sumerian tribes of Mesopotamia in various places of the valley were engaged in draining the swampy soil and using the waters of the Euphrates and then the Tigris to create irrigation agriculture. The creation of an entire system of main canals, on which regular irrigation of fields was based, in combination with well-thought-out agricultural technology, was the most important achievement of the Uruk period.
The main occupation of the Sumerians was agriculture, based on a developed irrigation system. In urban centers, crafts were gaining strength, the specialization of which was rapidly developing. Builders, metallurgists, engravers, and blacksmiths appeared. Jewelry making became a special specialized production. In addition to various decorations, they made cult figurines and amulets in the form of various animals: bulls, sheep, lions, birds. Having crossed the threshold of the Bronze Age, the Sumerians revived the production of stone vessels, which in the hands of talented anonymous craftsmen became genuine works of art. This is the cult alabaster vessel from Uruk, about 1 m high. It is decorated with an image of a procession with gifts going to the temple. Mesopotamia did not have its own deposits of metal ores. Already in the first half of the 3rd millennium BC. The Sumerians began to bring gold, silver, copper, and lead from other regions. There was brisk international trade in the form of barter or gift exchanges. In exchange for wool, cloth, grain, dates and fish, they also received wood and stone. There may have been real trade carried on by sales agents.
The life of Sumerian society developed around the temple. The temple is the center of the area. The creation of cities was preceded by the creation of temples, which was followed by the resettlement of residents of small tribal settlements under its walls. In all the cities of Sumer there were monumental temple complexes as a kind of symbol of Sumerian civilization. Temples had important social and economic significance. At first, the high priest led the entire life of the city-state. The temples had rich granaries and workshops. They were centers for collecting reserve funds, and trade expeditions were equipped from here. Significant material assets were concentrated in the temples: metal vessels, works of art, and various types of jewelry. Here the cultural and intellectual potential of Sumer was collected, agronomic and calendar-astronomical observations were carried out. Around 3000 BC Temple households became so complex that they needed to be accounted for. They needed writing, and writing was invented at the turn of the 4th-3rd millennium BC.
The appearance of writing is the most important stage in the development of any civilization, in this case Sumerian. If earlier people stored and transmitted information in oral and artistic form, now they could write it down in order to store it for as long as they wanted.
Writing in Sumer first appeared as a system of drawings, as a pictogram. They drew on damp clay tablets with the corner of a sharpened reed stick. The tablet was then hardened by drying or firing. Each sign-drawing designated either the depicted object itself, or any concept associated with this object. For example, the sign of the foot meant walking, standing, fetching. This ancient form of writing was invented by the Sumerians. Around the middle of the 3rd millennium BC. they handed it over to the Akkadians. By this time, the letter had already largely acquired a wedge-shaped appearance. So, it took at least four centuries for writing to transform from purely reminder signs into an orderly system for transmitting information. The signs turned into a combination of straight lines. Moreover, each line, due to the pressure on the clay with the corner of a rectangular stick, acquired a wedge-shaped character. This type of writing is called cuneiform.
The first Sumerian records did not record historical events or milestones in the biographies of rulers, but simply economic reporting data. Perhaps that is why the oldest tablets were not large and poor in content. A few written characters of the text were scattered across the surface of the tablet. However, they soon began to write from top to bottom, in columns, in the form of vertical columns, then in horizontal lines, which significantly speeded up the writing process.
The cuneiform script used by the Sumerians contained about 800 characters, each of which depicted a word or syllable. It was difficult to remember them, but cuneiform was adopted by many neighbors of the Sumerians to write in their completely different languages. The cuneiform script created by the ancient Sumerians is called the Latin alphabet of the Ancient East.
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Sumer was a civilization with a historical site in southern Mesopotamia and occupied the territory of modern Iraq. This is the most ancient civilization known to man, the cradle of the human race. The history of Sumerian civilization spans more than 3000 years. With beginnings in the Ubaid period during the first settlement of Eridu (mid-6th millennium BC) through the Uruk period (4th millennium BC) and dynastic periods (3rd millennium BC) and until the emergence of Babylon at the beginning second millennium BC.
Sumerian civilization and features of ancient writing.
It is the birthplace of writing, the wheel and agriculture. The most important archaeological discovery made on the territory of the Sumerian civilization is undoubtedly writing. A huge number of tablets and manuscripts with records in the Sumerian language were found during the study of the Sumerian civilization. Sumerian writing is the oldest example of writing on earth. At the beginning of their history, the Sumerians used images and hieroglyphs for writing; later, symbols appeared that formed syllables, words, and sentences. Triangular or cuneiform signs were used for writing on reed paper or on wet clay. This type of writing is called cuneiform.
A huge variety of texts that the Sumerian civilization wrote in the Sumerian language have survived and survived to this day, both personal and business letters, receipts, lexical lists, laws, hymns, prayers, histories, daily reports, and even libraries have been found filled with clay tablets. Monumental inscriptions and texts on various objects, on statues or brick buildings, have become widespread in Sumerian civilization. Many texts have survived in multiple copies. The Sumerian language continued to be the language of religion and law in Mesopotamia even after the Semites took over the historical territories of the Sumerians. The Sumerian language is generally regarded as a lonely language in linguistics, since it does not belong to any of the known language families; The Akkadian language, unlike the Sumerian language, belongs to the languages of the Semito-Hamitic language family. There have been many unsuccessful attempts to connect the Sumerian language with any language group. Sumerian is an agglutinative language; in other words, morphemes ("units of meaning") are joined together to create words, unlike analytical languages where morphemes are simply added to create sentences.
Sumerians, their oral and written language.
Understanding Sumerian texts today can be challenging even for experts. The most difficult ones are the early ones 
time texts. In many cases Sumerians and their texts cannot be fully grammatically assessed, that is, they have not yet been completely deciphered. During the third millennium BC, a very close cultural symbiosis developed between the Sumerians and Akkadians. The influence of Sumerian on Akkadian (and vice versa) is evident in all areas, from lexical borrowing on a large scale, to syntactic and morphological, phonological convergence. Akkadian gradually replaced the language spoken by the Sumerians (around the 2nd-3rd centuries BC; exact dating is a matter of debate), but Sumerian continued to be used as a sacred, ceremonial, literary and scientific language in Mesopotamia until the first century ad.
