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Ziusudra (also Zi-ud-sura and Zin-Suddu; Hellenized Xisuthros: "found long life" or "life of long days") of Shuruppak is listed in the WB-62 Sumerian king list recension as the last king of Sumer prior to the deluge. He is subsequently recorded as the hero of the Sumerian flood epic. He is also mentioned in other ancient literature, including The Death of Gilgamesh[1] and The Poem of Early Rulers,[2] and a late version of The Instructions of Shuruppak[3] refers to Ziusudra.[4] Akkadian Atrahasis ("extremely wise") and Utnapishtim("he found life"), as well as biblical Noah ("rest") are similar heroes of flood legends of the ancient Near East.
Although each version of the flood myth has distinctive story elements, there are numerous story elements that are common to two, three, or four versions. The earliest version of the flood myth is preserved fragmentarily in the Eridu Genesis, written in Sumerian cuneiform and dating to the 17th century BC, during the 1st Dynasty of Babylon when the language of writing and administration was still Sumerian. Strong parallels are notable with other Near Eastern flood legends, such as the biblical account of Noah.
Ziusudra[edit]
Sumerian king list[edit]
Main article: Sumerian king list
In the WB-62 Sumerian king list recension, Ziusudra, or Zin-Suddu of Shuruppak is recorded as having reigned as both king and gudug priest for 10sars, or periods of 3,600.[5] In this version, Ziusudra inherited rulership from his father Šuruppak (written SU.KUR.LAM) who ruled for 10 sars.[6] The line following Ziusudra in WB-62 reads: Then the flood swept over. The next line reads: After the flood swept over, kingship descended from heaven; the kingship was in Kish. The city of Kish flourished in the Early Dynastic period soon after an archaeologically attested river flood in Shuruppak (modern Tell Fara, Iraq) and various other Sumerian cities. This flood has been radiocarbon dated to ca. 2900 BCE.[7] Polychrome pottery from the Jemdet Nasr period (ca. 3000–2900 BCE) was discovered immediately below the Shuruppak flood stratum,[8] and the Jemdet Nasr period immediately preceded the Early Dynastic I period.[9]
The significance of Ziusudra's name appearing on the WB-62 king list is that it links the flood mentioned in the three surviving Babylonian deluge epics of Ziusudra (Eridu Genesis), Utnapishtim (Epic of Gilgamesh), and Atrahasis (Epic of Atrahasis) to river flood sediments in Shuruppak, Uruk, Kish et al. that have been radiocarbon dated to ca. 2900 BC. This has led some scholars to conclude that the flood hero was king of Shuruppak at the end of the Jemdet Nasr period (ca. 3000–2900) which ended with the river flood of 2900 BC.[10]
Ziusudra being a king from Shuruppak is supported by the Gilgamesh XI tablet (see below) making reference to Utnapishtim (Akkadian translation of the Sumerian name Ziusudra) with the epithet "man of Shuruppak" at line 23.
Sumerian flood myth[edit]
Main article: Sumerian creation myth
The tale of Ziusudra is known from a single fragmentary tablet written in Sumerian, datable by its script to the 17th century BC (Old Babylonian Empire), and published in 1914 by Arno Poebel.[11] The first part deals with the creation of man and the animals and the founding of the first cities Eridu, Bad-tibira, Larsa, Sippar, and Shuruppak. After a missing section in the tablet, we learn that the gods have decided to send a flood to destroy mankind. The god Enki (lord of the underworld sea of fresh water and Sumerian equivalent of Babylonian god Ea) warns Ziusudra, the ruler of Shuruppak, to build a large boat; the passage describing the directions for the boat is also lost. When the tablet resumes, it is describing the flood. A terrible storm raged for seven days, "the huge boat had been tossed about on the great waters," then Utu (Sun) appears and Ziusudra opens a window, prostrates himself, and sacrifices an ox and a sheep. After another break, the text resumes, the flood is apparently over, and Ziusudra is prostrating himself before An (Sky) andEnlil (Lordbreath), who give him "breath eternal" and take him to dwell in Dilmun. The remainder of the poem is lost. (text of Ziusudra epic)
The Epic of Ziusudra adds an element at lines 258–261 not found in other versions, that after the river flood[12] "king Ziusudra ... they caused to dwell in the land of the country of Dilmun, the place where the sun rises". Dilmun is usually identified as Bahrain, an island in the Persian Gulf on the east side of the Arabian peninsula. In this version of the story, Ziusudra's boat floats down the Euphrates river into the Persian Gulf (rather than up onto a mountain, or up-stream to Kish).[13] The Sumerian word KUR in line 140 of the Gilgamesh flood myth was interpreted to mean "mountain" in Akkadian, although in Sumerian, KUR did not mean "mountain" but rather "land", especially a foreign country.
A Sumerian document known as The Instructions of Shuruppak dated by Kramer to about 2500 BC, refers in a later version to Ziusudra. Kramer concluded that "Ziusudra had become a venerable figure in literary tradition by the middle of the third millennium B.C."[14]
Xisuthros[edit]
Xisuthros (Ξισουθρος) is a Hellenization of Sumerian Ziusudra, known from the writings of Eusebius of Caesarea, an attendee at the First Council of Nicaea and early historian of the Christian Church. Eusebius was quoting Alexander Polyhistor, a Pontic historian living in Rome. Alexander was himself translating the writings of Berossus, a priest of Marduk in Babylon, on whom Alexander relied heavily for information on Mesopotamia. Among the interesting features of this version of the flood myth, are the identification, through interpretatio graeca, of the Sumerian god Enki with the Greek god Cronus, the father of Zeus; and the assertion that the reed boat constructed by Xisuthros survived, at least until Berossus' day, in the "Corcyrean Mountains" of Armenia. Xisuthros was listed as a king, the son of one Ardates, and to have reigned 18 sari. The word for 3600 was sari (shar in Akkadian) and hence 18 sari was mistranslated as 64,800 years. This resulted from confusing the archaic U4 sign meaning year and the shar sign (3600) which both have a 4-sided diamond shape.[15] Xisuthros reigned 18 years. The reigns of other kings were also mistranslated in the surviving king list of Berossus.
Atrahasis[edit]
Main article: Atrahasis
The Akkadian Atrahasis Epic tells how the god Enki warns the hero Atrahasis ("Extremely Wise") to build a boat to escape a flood. The Epic of Ziusudra does not make it absolutely clear whether the flood was a river flood or something else, although it does state that mankind, along with all of the antediluvian cities, will be destroyed. According to one scholar, the Epic of Atrahasis tablet III iv, lines 6–9 identifies the flood as a local river flood: "Like dragonflies they [dead bodies] have filled the river. Like a raft they have moved in to the edge [of the boat]. Like a raft they have moved in to the riverbank."[16]
It should be noted, however, that most other authorities interpret the Atrahasis flood as universal. A. R. George, and Lambert and Millard make it clear that the gods' intention in Atrahasis is to "wipe out mankind".[17] The flood destroys "all of the earth".[18] In the context of the larger story, it is difficult to see how a local river flood could accomplish these purposes. The use of a comparable metaphor in the Gilgamesh epic suggests that the reference to "dragonflies [filling] the river" is simply an evocative image of death rather than a literal description of the flood[19] Moreover, the very preceding line in Atrahasis mentions "the sea".
The Epic of Atrahasis provides additional information on the flood and flood hero that is omitted in Gilgamesh XI and other versions of the Ancient Near East flood myth. Likewise, the Gilgamesh XI flood text provides additional information that is missing in damaged portions of the Atrahasis tablets.
At lines 6 and 7 of tablet RS 22.421 we are told "I am Atrahasis. I lived in the temple of Ea [Enki], my Lord." Prior to the Early Dynastic period, kings were subordinate to priests, and often lived in the same temple complex where the priests lived.
Tablet III,ii lines 55–56 of the Atrahasis Epic state that "He severed the mooring line and set the boat adrift." This is consistent with a river flood, but does not require it. If Atrahasis severed the mooring lines, the runaway boat might go down the river into the Persian Gulf. However, it is difficult to reconcile this suggestion with the information in Gilgamesh that the craft came to rest upon a mountain.
Atra-Hasis ("exceedingly wise") is the protagonist of an 18th-century BCE Akkadian epicrecorded in various versions on clay tablets. The Atra-Hasis tablets include both a creation myth and a flood account, which is one of three surviving Babylonian deluge stories. The name "Atra-Hasis" also appears on one of the Sumerian king lists as king of Shuruppak in the times before a flood.
The oldest known copy of the epic tradition concerning Atrahasis[1] can be dated by colophon (scribal identification) to the reign of Hammurabi’s great-grandson, Ammi-Saduqa(1646–1626 BCE), but various Old Babylonian fragments exist; it continued to be copied into the first millennium BCE. The Atrahasis story also exists in a later fragmentary Assyrian version, having been first rediscovered in the library of Ashurbanipal, but, because of the fragmentary condition of the tablets and ambiguous words, translations had been uncertain. Its fragments were assembled and translated first by George Smith as The Chaldean Account of Genesis; the name of its hero was corrected to Atra-Hasis by Heinrich Zimmernin 1899.
In 1965 W. G. Lambert and A. R. Millard[2] published many additional texts belonging to the epic, including an Old Babylonian copy (written around 1650 BCE) which is our most complete surviving recension of the tale. These new texts greatly increased knowledge of the epic and were the basis for Lambert and Millard’s first English translation of the Atrahasis epic in something approaching entirety.[3] A further fragment has been recovered in Ugarit.Walter Burkert[4] traces the model drawn from Atrahasis to a corresponding passage, the division by lots of the air, underworld and sea among Zeus, Hades and Poseidon in the Iliad, in which “a resetting through which the foreign framework still shows”.
In its most complete surviving version, the Atrahasis epic is written on three tablets in Akkadian, the language of ancient Babylon.[5]
Synopsis[edit]
Tablet I contains a creation myth about the Sumerian gods Anu, Enlil, and Enki, gods of sky, wind, and water, “when gods were in the ways of men” according to its incipit. Following the Cleromancy(casting of lots), sky is ruled by Anu, earth by Enlil, and the freshwater sea by Enki. Enlil assigned junior divines[6] to do farm labor and maintain the rivers and canals, but after forty years the lesser gods or dingirs rebelled and refused to do strenuous labor. Instead of punishing the rebels, Enki, who is also the kind, wise counselor of the gods, suggested that humans be created to do the work. The mother goddess Mami is assigned the task of creating humans by shaping clay figurines mixed with the flesh and blood of the slain god Geshtu-E, “a god who had intelligence” (his name means “ear” or “wisdom”).[7] All the gods in turn spit upon the clay. After ten months, a specially made womb breaks open and humans are born. Tablet I continues with legends about overpopulation and plagues. Atrahasis is mentioned at the end of Tablet I.
Tablet II begins with more overpopulation of humans and the god Enlil sending first famine and drought at formulaic intervals of 1200 years to reduce the population. In this epic Enlil is depicted as a nasty capricious god while Enki is depicted as a kind helpful god, perhaps because priests of Enki were writing and copying the story. Tablet II is mostly damaged, but ends with Enlil's decision to destroy humankind with a flood and Enki bound by an oath to keep the plan secret.
Tablet III of the Atrahasis Epic contains the flood story. This is the part that was adapted in the Epic of Gilgamesh, tablet XI. Tablet III of Atrahasis tells how the god Enki warns the hero Atrahasis (“Extremely Wise”) of Shuruppak, speaking through a reed wall (suggestive of an oracle) to dismantle his house (perhaps to provide a construction site) and build a boat to escape the flood planned by the god Enlil to destroy humankind. The boat is to have a roof “like Apsu” (a subterranean, fresh water realm presided over by the god Enki), upper and lower decks, and to be sealed with bitumen. Atrahasis boards the boat with his family and animals and seals the door. The storm and flood begin. Even the gods are afraid. After seven days the flood ends and Atrahasis offers sacrifices to the gods. Enlil is furious with Enki for violating his oath. But Enki denies violating his oath and argues: “I made sure life was preserved.” Enki and Enlil agree on other means for controlling the human population.
Atrahasis in History[edit]
A few general histories can be attributed to the Mesopotamian Atrahasis by ancient sources; these should generally be considered mythology but they do give an insight into the possible origins of the character. The Epic of Gilgamesh labels Atrahasis as the son ofUbara-Tutu, king of Shuruppak, on tablet XI, ‘Gilgamesh spoke to Utnapishtim (Atrahasis), the Faraway… O man of Shuruppak, son of Ubara-Tutu’.[8] The Instructions of Shuruppak instead label Atrahasis (under the name Ziusudra) as the son of the eponymous Shuruppak, who himself is labelled as the son of Ubara-Tutu.[9] At this point we are left with two possible fathers: Ubara-Tutu or Shuruppak. Many available tablets comprising The Sumerian King Lists support The Epic of Gilgamesh by omitting Shuruppak as a ruler of Shuruppak. These lists imply an immediate flood after or during the rule of Ubara-Tutu. These lists also make no mention of Atrahasis under any name.[10] However WB-62 lists a different and rather interesting chronology – here Atrahasis is listed as a ruler of Shuruppak and gudug priest, preceded by his father Shuruppak who is in turn preceded by his father Ubara-Tutu. WB-62 would therefore lend support to The Instructions of Shuruppak and is peculiar in that it mentions both Shuruppak and Atrahasis. In any event it seems that Atrahasis was of royal blood; whether he himself ruled and in what way this would affect the chronology is debatable.
Literary inheritance[edit]
The Epic of Atrahasis provides additional information on the flood and flood hero that is omitted in Gilgamesh XI and other versions of the Ancient Near East flood story. According to Atrahasis III ii.40–47 the flood hero was at a banquet when the storm and flood began: “He invited his people…to a banquet… He sent his family on board. They ate and they drank. But he (Atrahasis) was in and out. He could not sit, could not crouch, for his heart was broken and he was vomiting gall.”
The flood story in the standard edition of the Epic of Gilgamesh, Chapter XI may have been paraphrased or copied verbatim from a non-extant, intermediate version the Epic of Atrahasis.[11] But editorial changes were made, some of which had long-term consequences. The sentence quoted above from Atrahasis III iv, lines 6–7: “Like dragonflies they have filled the river.” was changed in Gilgamesh XI line 123 to: “Like the spawn of fishes, they fill the sea.” However, see comments above.
Other editorial changes were made to the Atrahasis text. In the Epic of Gilgamesh, anthropomorphic descriptions of the gods are weakened. For example, Atrahasis OB III, 30–31 “The Anunnaki (the senior gods) [were sitt]ing in thirst and hunger.” was changed in Gilgamesh XI, 113 to “The gods feared the deluge.” Sentences in Atrahasis III iv were omitted in Gilgamesh, e.g. “She was surfeited with grief and thirsted for beer” and “From hunger they were suffering cramp.”[12]
See also[edit]
Utnapishtim[edit]
Main article: Gilgamesh flood myth
In the eleventh tablet of the Babylonian Epic of Gilgamesh, Utnapishtim "the faraway" is the wise king of the Sumerian city state of Shuruppak who, along with his unnamed wife, survived a flood sent by Enlil to drown every living thing on Earth. Utnapishtim was secretly warned by the water god Ea of Enlil's plan and constructed a great boat or ark to save himself, his family and representatives of each species of animal. When the flood waters subsided, the boat was grounded on the mountain of Nisir. When Utnapishtim's ark had been becalmed for seven days, he released a dove, who found no resting place and returned. A swallow was then released who found no perch and also returned, but the raven which was released third did not return. Utnapishtim then made a sacrifice and poured out a libation to Ea on the top of mount Nisir. Utnapishtim and his wife were granted immortalityafter the flood. Afterwards, he is taken by the gods to live forever at "the mouth of the rivers" and given the epithet "faraway".
The Babylonian myth of Utnapishtim (meaning "He found life", presumably in reference to the gift of immortality given him by the gods) is matched by the earlier Epic of Atrahasis, and by the Sumerian version, the Epic of Ziusudra. In fact, we now know that Utnapishtim and Atrahasis are one and the same. Atrahasis' name was simply changed to Utnapishtim after he was granted immortality. This explains why the name Atrahasis occurs in the Gilgamesh flood story even though the character is introduced as Utnapishtim.
Noah[edit]
Main article: Noah
The similarities between the story of Noah's Ark, the Sumerian story of Ziusudra, and the Babylonian stories of Atrahasis and Utnapishtim are shown by corresponding lines in various versions:
The Hebrew flood story of Genesis 6–9 dates to at least the 5th century BC. According to the documentary hypothesis, it is a composite of two literary sources J and P that were combined by a post-exilic editor, 539–400 BC. Hans Schmid believes both the J material and the P material were products of the Babylonian exile period (6th century BC) and were directly derived from Babylonian sources (see also Panbabylonism).[20]
See also[edit]
dia
The Jemdet Nasr period is an archaeological culture in southern Mesopotamia(modern-day Iraq) that is generally dated to 3100–2900 BCE. It is named after thetype-site Jemdet Nasr, where the assemblage typical for this period was first recognized. Its geographical distribution is limited to south–central Iraq. The culture of the proto-historical Jemdet Nasr period is a local development out of the precedingUruk period and continues into the Early Dynastic I period.
Contents
[hide]History of research[edit]
In the beginning of the 20th century, clay tablets with an archaic form of thecuneiform script started to appear on the antiquities market. A collection of 36 tablets was bought by the German excavators of Shuruppak(Tell Fara) in 1903. While they thought that they came from Jemdet Nasr, it has later been shown that they probably came from nearbyTell Uqair. In 1915, similar tablets were offered for sale by a French antiquities dealer, and these were again reported to have come from Jemdet Nasr. Similar tablets, together with splendidly painted monochrome and polychrome pottery, were also shown to Stephen Langdon, then director of the excavations at Kish, by local Arabs in 1925. They told him the finds came from Jemdet Nasr, a site some 26 kilometres (16 mi) northeast of Kish. Langdon was sufficiently impressed, visited the site and started excavations in 1926. He uncovered a large mudbrick building with in it more of the distinctive pottery and a collection of 150 to 180 clay tablets bearing the proto-cuneiform script. The importance of these finds was realized immediately and the Jemdet Nasr period – named after the eponymous type site, was officially defined on a conference in Baghdad in 1930, where at the same time the Uruk and Ubaid periods were defined.[1] It has later been shown that some of the material culture that was initially thought to be unique for the Jemdet Nasr period also occurred during the preceding Uruk and the subsequent Early Dynastic period. Nevertheless, it is generally believed that the Jemdet Nasr period is still sufficiently distinct in its material culture as well as its socio-cultural characteristics to be recognized as a separate period. Since the first excavations at Jemdet Nasr, the Jemdet Nasr period has been found at numerous other sites across south–central Iraq, including Abu Salabikh, Shuruppak, Khafajah, Nippur, Tell Uqair, Ur and Uruk.[2]
Dating and periodization[edit]
Although in older literature 3200–3000 BCE can be found as the beginning and end dates of the Jemdet Nasr period, it is nowadays dated to 3100–2900 BCE based on radiocarbon dating.[3][4][5][6] The Jemdet Nasr period in south–central Iraq is contemporary with the early Ninevite V period in Upper Mesopotamia and the Proto-Elamite stage in western Iran and shares with these periods characteristics such as an emerging bureaucracy and inequality.[7]
Defining characteristics[edit]
The hallmark of the Jemdet Nasr period is its distinctive painted monochrome and polychrome pottery. Designs are both geometric and figurative; the latter displaying trees and animals such as birds, fish, goats, scorpions and snakes. Nevertheless, this painted pottery makes up only a small percentage of the total assemblage and at various sites it has been found in archaeological contexts suggesting that it was associated with high-status individuals or activities. In Jemdet Nasr, the painted pottery was found exclusively in the settlement's large central building, which is thought to have played a role in the administration of many economic activities. At Tell Fara and Tell Gubba, in the Hamrin, painted Jemdet Nasr pots were found in a similar context.[8]
Apart from the distinctive pottery, the period is known as one of the formative stages in the development of the cuneiform script. The oldest clay tablets come from Uruk and date to the late fourth millennium BCE, slightly earlier than the Jemdet Nasr period. By the time of the Jemdet Nasr period, the script had already undergone a number of significant changes. The script originally consisted of pictographs but by the time of the Jemdet Nasr period it was already adopting simpler and more abstract designs. It is also during this period that the script acquired its iconic wedge-shaped appearance.[9] While the language in which these tablets were written cannot be identified with certainty, it is thought to have been Sumerian.[10] The texts deal without exception with administrative matters such as the rationing of foodstuffs or listing objects and animals. Literary genres like hymns and king lists, which become very popular later in Mesopotamian history, are absent. Two different counting systems were in use: a sexagesimalsystem for animals and humans, for example, and a bisexagesimal system for things like grain, cheese and fresh fish.[11] Contemporary archives have been found at Uruk, Tell Uqair and Khafajah.[12]
Society in the Jemdet Nasr period[edit]
The centralized buildings, administrative cuneiform tablets and cylinder seals from sites like Jemdet Nasr suggest that settlements of this period were very organized, with a central administration regulating all aspects of the economy, from crafts to agriculture to the rationing of foodstuffs. The economy seems to have been primarily concerned with subsistence based on agriculture and sheep-and-goat pastoralismand small-scale trade. Very few precious stones or exotic trade goods have been found at sites of this period. However, the homogeneity of the pottery across the southern Mesopotamian plain suggests intensive contacts and trade between settlements. This is strengthened by the find of a sealing at Jemdet Nasr that lists a number of cities that can be identified, including Ur, Uruk and Larsa.
Notes[edit]
- ^ http://etcsl.orinst.ox.ac.uk/cgi-bin/etcsl.cgi?text=t.1.8.1.3# Translation of versions of The Death of Gilgamesh
- ^ http://etcsl.orinst.ox.ac.uk/cgi-bin/etcsl.cgi?text=t.5.2.5# Translation ofThe Poem of Early Rulers
- ^ http://etcsl.orinst.ox.ac.uk/cgi-bin/etcsl.cgi?text=t.5.6.1# Translation ofThe Instructions of Shuruppak
- ^ Speculated by Samuel Noah Kramer as deriving from sources from as early as 2500 BC, Kramer concluded that "Ziusudra had become a venerable figure in literary tradition by the middle of the third millennium B.C." , (Samuel Noah Kramer "Reflections on the Mesopotamian Flood,"Expedition, 9, 4, (summer 1967), pp 12-18.)
- ^ S. Langdon, "The Chaldean Kings Before the Flood," Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (1923), pp 251-259.
- ^ Langdon, p. 258, note 5.
- ^ Harriet Crawford, Sumer and the Sumerians, Cambridge Univ. Press, 1991), p. 19.
- ^ Crawford, Harriet (1991). Sumer and the Sumerians. Cambridge University Press. p. 19.
- ^ Erik Schmidt, Excavations at Fara (1931), University of Pennsylvania'sMuseum Journal, 2:193–217.
- ^ M.E.L. Mallowan, "Noah's Flood Reconsidered", Iraq (1964), 26:62–82.
- ^ "The Sumerian Flood Story" in Atrahasis, by Lambert and Millard, page 138
- ^ Lambert & Millard, page 97
- ^ Best, pages 30–31
- ^ Samuel Noah Kramer, "Reflections on the Mesopotamian Flood,"Expedition, 9, 4, (summer 1967), pp 12–18.
- ^ Best, page 118
- ^ Tigay, Jeffrey H. (1982), The Evolution of the Gilgamesh Epic, University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, pages 220, 225
- ^ Andrew George, p. xliv.; Lambert and Millard p. 12
- ^ Frymer-Kensky, Tikva Simone (2006), Studies in Bible and feminist criticism, Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society. p. 354
- ^ George, Andrew (2003), The Babylonian Gilgamesh epic: introduction, critical edition and cuneiform texts, New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 506, 875-876. Apparently, the appearance of large numbers of drowned dragonflies—or mayflies according to George—was a common phenomenon associated with Mesopotamian river floods.
- ^ Hans Heinrich Schmid, The So-Called Yahwist (1976) discussed in Antony F. Campbell and Mark A. O'Brien, Sources of the Pentateuch (1993) pp 2–11, note 24.
References[edit]
- W. G. Lambert and A. R. Millard, Atrahasis: The Babylonian Story of the Flood, Eisenbrauns, 1999, ISBN 1-57506-039-6.
- R. M. Best, Noah's Ark and the Ziusudra Epic, Eisenbrauns, 1999, ISBN 0-9667840-1-4.
External links[edit]
- A comparison of equivalent lines in six ancient versions of the flood story
- Ancient Near East flood myths All texts: (Ziusudra, Atrahasis, Gilgamesh, Genesis, Berossus), commentary, and a table with parallels
- ETCSL - Text and translation of the Sumerian flood story (alternate site)
| Preceded by Ubara-Tutu or Su-Kur-Lam | King of Sumer c. legendary or 2900 BC | Succeeded by Jushur of Kish |
| Ensi of Shuruppak c. legendary or 2900 BC | City flooded according to legend |
| [hide] Notable Sumerians | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Ante-Diluvian kings | Alulim · Dumuzid the Shepherd · En-men-dur-ana · Ziusudra | 3rd Dynasty of Kish | Kubaba |
| 1st Dynasty of Kish | Etana · Enmebaragesi | 3rd Dynasty of Uruk | Lugal-zage-si |
| 1st Dynasty of Uruk | Enmerkar · Lugalbanda · Dumuzid, the Fisherman ·Gilgamesh | Dynasty of Akkad | Sargon · Tashlultum · Enheduanna · Rimush ·Manishtushu · Naram-Sin · Shar-Kali-Sharri · Dudu · Shu-turul |
| 1st Dynasty of Ur | Meskalamdug · Mesannepada · Puabi | ||
| 2nd Dynasty of Uruk | Enshakushanna | 2nd Dynasty of Lagash | Puzer-Mama · Gudea |
| 1st Dynasty of Lagash | Ur-Nanshe · Eannatum · En-anna-tum I · Entemena ·Urukagina | 5th Dynasty of Uruk | Utu-hengal |
| Dynasty of Adab | Lugal-Anne-Mundu | 3rd dynasty of Ur | Ur-Nammu · Shulgi · Amar-Sin · Shu-Sin · Ibbi-Sin |
| ||||||
