Random Thoughts, 5 Sept. 2011

Enki Doodle Went to Sumer

In the literature of Sumer, the river Euphrates was apparently created along with the world, because the god Enki cruised along it while creating Sumer. The Tigris, on the other hand, was apparently ejaculated out of Enki's bull-sized doodle. I see how this could explain the fertility of land irrigated with the Tigris' waters, but how was anyone able to bring themself to eat anything watered from that source?

...for to make a nation;
Spilled his seed from north to south in Tigris's creation.
Enki got his doodle up;
How, it is not mentioned:
And if it gave a dubious crop
It still was well-intentioned.

Ha ha! The 5K-year ancestor of all known literature, and it took me all of 20 minutes to trivialize with a tasteless parody. Take that, Sumer!

Other interesting notes about Sumerian lit:

• There is a flood story. But it is known from all of one tablet that is so badly fragmented that really all we have are five otherwise-unconnected vignettes that each mention a flood.
  
• The Sumerian language is unrelated to any other known language. Its initial translation was made possible by a 'Rosetta Stone,' and further translation enabled by numerous Sumerian-Akkadian glossaries kept by scribes. I had thought the Rosetta Stone clue was unique to Egyptian.
  
• Mesopotamian cuneiform on clay tablets: not ceramic, clay. Air-dried, not fired. This makes sense, given the added 'cost' of firing and the ubiquity of the tablets, but still I'd always assumed they were fired. It makes their survival for 5K years all the more impressive. Also, many tablets were about hand-sized, which also makes sense given the weight of a slab of inches-thick clay; but I don't recall ever having heard a description of the tablets while in secondary school and so naturally assumed them to be about 8½ x 11".

The Awesome Power of ApplesElectricity

We had a heavy storm last weekend. It killed our power and knocked a power line to the ground. The idiots/jerks in that building didn't report it, so when the power came back on it caused a 3' dome of smoke and sparks that varied from orange to blue. The first fire engine that responded apparently wasn't properly equipped so it took a second engine and at least 90 minutes to kill it. The next morning I checked the area out; it had vitrified some of the dirt but it had also melted and bubbled the damn concrete sidewalk. I didn't know concrete was susceptible to that.