Detail: Lyre inlay which depicts some rather fanciful scenes and characters. Note the bearded bullmen in the top panel.
Notes:
1. Verification: Every sign and its definition has been verified through the ePSD, the ETCSL, the CDLI, the Sumerian Lexicon, and other resources (see the Links page for the meanings of these abbreviations). My criteria for using a sign definition was it had to appear at least twice in the ePSD, ETCSL, or the SL (and in the proper context). These are well-attested, commonly accepted definitions that are correct for the period when the tablet was written.
2. Sign recognition: The scribe uses a "compressed" writing style (the signs are simplified to make them easier to write and some of them are shortened to save space on the line). Therefore many of the signs look different than the classic cuneiform script. Every sign on this tablet has been matched with multiple examples from other known tablets. I do not point out all of the compressed signs on this tablet because there are 44 occurrences. Basically, if a sign doesn't look like the ePSD font, then it's compressed, and it can be found on the CDLI's UR III and Old Babylonian tablets. Click here to see some examples of the compressed signs.
3. Strings: For the sake of word separation, not all the word strings are connected.
4. Pronunciation: Š is pronounced "sh", as in shepherd. Ĝ is pronounced "ng", as in sing. The "H" sound in Sumerian ("ḫ") is pronounced as in the word, "loch". The numerical subscript of a sign (for example, ĝe26) is a modern convention used to delineate the different meanings of the sign. It is not pronounced when the word is said aloud.
For first time readers: Written Sumerian doesn't have a direct word-for-word correlation with verbal speech. For instance, where we would write, "I went to the store to buy some bread", in Sumerian it would probably be written as "store go bread buy". The reader is often left to infer such things as articles (a, an, the), verb tense (go, going, has gone), and personal pronouns (I, you, they go. . . ). All of this would depend on the context of the surrounding sentences. These details would be supplied by the reader when the sentence is read aloud. In a way, Sumerian writing "just hits the high spots", so it can sound somewhat telegraphic. Note, too, that written Sumerian has a "backwards" way of expressing things, in terms of word formation (bull fatted) and syntax (bull to food send). This artificial construction applied only to written Sumerian, in an atttempt to make it more readable. When the sentence was read aloud, it was converted to the natural patterns of verbal speech. The first time through, to get a feel for the actual writing on this tablet, you may want to skip the notes, which are rather voluminous, especially at the beginninng.
This is a "pre-final" translation. There may be some very minor changes to the details or wording of the text, but the story will remain essentially the same.
Clicked on the underscored line number to magnify the drawing of the line.
Transliteration of Tablet #36 in the Library of Congress Cuneiform Collection by: Jerald Jack Starr
The enigmatic mahX (AL, al, mah2, mah, etc.)
Obverse:
[x-x] = missing or damaged text {... } = prefix or suffix
mahX = AL = mah2 = mah: A pun, used throughout the text as “great” (see also:
o7, o8, o11, r7, r10, r11, r14). This one sign (mahX) is the lock, and the key,
to understanding this tablet. An explanation follows, and additional information
can be found in Appendix A at the end of this page.
AL: Whenever a sign-name is written in capital letters, it represents any and all of the possible meanings and pronunciations of the sign. In this way, AL can mean al: hoe, fence, etc.; and it can also mean mah2: cow. It can also be a CVNE, or it may be just a syllable in one of 72 other Sumerian words listed on the ePSD. The capitalized sign-name is used when it's not known which of the meanings apply. So when this particular sign is first encountered in a line of untranslated text, it's initially called AL because it's not yet known which of its various meanings (and pronunciations) is the one being used.
AL is one of the reasons why this was such a difficult translation. Tablet #36 could
almost be subtitled, "What about AL?" The scribe uses the sign a lot, it shows up
in the most unexpected places, and none of the definitions of AL make a bit of sense
within the context of the sentences (and AL isn't being used as a Compound Verb
Nominal Element, in case you were wondering). The sign is used frequently and
intrusively throughout the text and it seems to be nonsensical in every sentence
where it appears. It's as if the scribe was deliberately over-using this sign, always
putting it "in the way" for some unknown reason. Although at first I didn't have the
slightest idea what any of the sentences said, I sensed that the sign was being used
in an unusual manner. It also seemed more than a coincidence that every time I
started to get a grasp on the meaning of the text, this sign would just happen to pop up,
only to create more confusion. I began to suspect that this mysterious sign was
somehow the "key" to translating this tablet.
To make a long story short, it took me a long, long time to figure it out. Then one day,
finally, it occurred to me. I realized that AL is really mah2, a pun for mah:
mah2: "cow".
One of the meanings of AL is mah2, an adjective for a dairy cow. I had briefly
considered it as a possible translation for the sign, but I had immediately discarded it
because it was bound to be completely nonsensical in any sentence where it appeared.
However, the important thing about this sign is that it's pronounced like mah:
mah: "great".
On this tablet, the sign mah2 (cow) is written to mean mah (great, supreme, large,
majestic, etc.). Because the numerical subscripts of a sign are "silent", mah and mah2
are pronounced the same. Throughout the text, in all eight sentences where it appears,
the sign mah2, "cow", is used exactly as if it were the sign mah, meaning "great". The
consistent use of the sign in this particular way requires a new designation for the sign.
It is called:
mahX: = AL = mah2 = mah = "great".
The "X" in mahX stands for an unknown subscript number. As a subscript number, it is unpronounced when the word is said aloud. MahX, mah, and mah2 are pronounced exactly the same.
This at first might not seem like a big deal. It may be clever enough as wordplay, but
it seemed that the scribe had gone through an awful lot of trouble, only to bring forth
this one little pun. There is, however, a method to his madness. This sign is used
to obscure the meaning of the text, to make the tablet difficult to read, because of the
volatile contents of the story. As soon will be shown, this sign (pun) is also used
as a hint to the hidden context of the story.
When I decoded mahX, the confusion in the sentences disappeared. At least now the
sentences no longer seemed so "nonsensical". Now at least they could be translated.
Which leads us to the crux of the problem: Even after this big breakthrough, I had not
as yet translated a single complete sentence. Various words and phrases hinted at
many possible meanings for the story, but I still couldn't read the tablet. The reason
I was having so much difficulty translating this tablet was the "missing context"
of the story.
In Sumerian, context is everything – because all of the signs have multiple meanings.
I therefore needed to know the context (subject) of the writing, in order to eliminate the
many alternative meanings of the signs, so I could concentrate only on the meanings
that might actually make some sense within the context of the story. In other words,
I needed to know what I was "reading to". Without a known context it is difficult to read
even a simple Sumerian sentence (not even another Sumerian could easily read it).
Trying to read Tablet #36 without knowing the context of the story was something of a
Catch-22: I had to know the context of the writing in order to read the signs, but I had to
read the signs in order to know the context (!) It is very difficult to read a tablet with an
unknown context (and Tablet #36 has two unknown contexts; more on that later). The
missing context(s) of the story is one of the reasons why this tablet seems so
incomprehensible.
The context of a story is usually given in the first few opening lines of a tablet.
Unfortunately, the opening lines of the story are missing due to damage on the tablet.
It seemed that the context may never be known. Fortunately, as luck (or Fate)
would have it, the tablet had broken off at just the right place. Here, in the first
two signs of the first readable fragment of a line, is a hint to the "hidden context"
of the story: lu2-mahX. As per the pun meaning of mahX, the signs lu2-mahX
can be translated as "man-great". On this tablet, lu-mah (big man, great man) is
synonymous with the sign lu-gal (big man, great man) meaning "lord or king". This is
the secret, hidden context of the story: lu-mah = "man-great" = lu-gal = king.
gal-lu2
Lugal isthe Sumerian sign for "king". It is two signs joined together. It's written as gal-lu2, but it's pronounced "lu-gal" (man-great). It is one of the oldest and most recognizable of the Sumerian signs. Unlike most of the other signs, which have multiple meanings, this sign means little else besides its usual definition of "king, lord, master". The scribe doesn't use this symbol because it's too unmistakable, too unambiguous. If the sign lugal was on this tablet, then everyone would know what it's written about.
lu2 mah
Lu-mah, literally "man-great", like the above lugal. Mah and gal both mean "great".
lu2 mah2 (mahX)
Lu-mah2, as it appears on Tablet #36. It literally means "man-dairy cow", which is nonsensical, but it's pronounced the same as the above lu-mah (man-great). This pun is a hint to the secret "hidden context" of the story: lu-mah = "man-great" = lu-gal = king. Lu-mah is the name of The Great Fatted Bull.
MahX is the main reason why I think the scribe deliberately disguised the meaning
of the text. This is not just clever wordplay. The sign is introduced early in the story,
creating some confusion: "Lu2 = man. Okay, that was easy enough. So far, so good.
Then, mahX = al; a hoe? fence? Surely it's not mah2; a cow??" Mah2 actually means
a "mature, milk producing" cow, which is the opposite of a bull in all regards (mah2 can
refer to any female animal that has given birth and therefore capable of producing milk).
So even if mah2 is initially considered as a possible translation for the sign, it would be
immediately discarded as nonsensical (man-milk cow?), so the pun would be lost,
and along with it, the hint to the secret context of the tablet. The sign is then used
many times throughout the text in a manner for which it was never intended, creating
confusion in every sentence where it appears. If mahX is just a pun, why bother?
Why not use it once, and then use a simple, easily recognizable sign like gal (or mah!)
for all other occurrences of the word "great"? The scribe uses the same kind of pun
for Su-ba, "the shepherd" (see o18), but he doesn't alter the meaning of those signs
in other parts of the story, as he does with mahX – and no writer would create
so much confusion in his own composition just to pound on one single pun
eight different times. No, there's something different about mahX. It just keeps getting
"in the way". It seems that the sign pops up every time one starts to get a grasp on
the meaning of the text. Which begs the question: why does the scribe deliberately
use a sign that's nonsensical in every sentence where it appears? What's his purpose?
To put it simply, mahX is used to obscure the context of the story, and without a known
context, it is difficult, if not impossible, to read the other signs on this tablet. So,
in a way, mahX is both the lock and the key to this tablet. It obscures the true
meaning of the text (the lock), but once it's understood it reveals the hidden context
of the story (the key), which makes it possible to read the other signs on the tablet.
The repeated use of mahX is like the tumblers of the lock. A key doesn't work until
all of the tumblers are in place. When one single word fits in all eight sentences, then,
and only then, the tablet finally opens up and it's true meaning is revealed.
With "Lu-mah", the scribe: 1) gives the bull a name, 2) names him for his character,
3) obscures his identity, and 4) gives a hint to the tablet's true context. It's also a
wry comment on the fatted bull's waistline (mah also means "to be or make large").
It has to be the greatest name ever given to a fictional character.
The pronunciation of the Sumerian "ḫ" not withstanding, in this translation, the
Anglicized pronunciation of Lu-mah is the preferred form. "Maḫ" is pronounced
the way it's spelled in English (it rhymes with "ah"). In this way, one isn't required
to pronounce the word with a Sumerian accent.
In the translation, I added the word "lord" because it's implied in "Lu-mah". For notes
on ḫi-li, see line o4.
An experienced Sumerologist might have already noticed that the sign for bull (gu4)
is "miswritten" here at the beginning of the tablet where the reader would be looking
for the context of the story. Gu4 (bull) is the second hidden context of this tablet.
For notes on gu4, see line o6.
A summary of the other different ways the meaning of the text is obscured can be
The unusual syntax of this sentence illustrates why this tablet was such a difficult
translation. Gal-niga, "great fatted", is an adjective, so it should always be attached
to a noun (e.g., great fatted bull, great fatted sheep, etc.) Gal-niga occurs twice in this
sentence, but it isn't attached to anything. It just hovers there. Since it occurs at the
beginning of both sentences, where the subject/noun of the sentences should be,
it is used as if it were a Proper Noun. Gal Niga (Great Fatted) is meant to be
the mock "lordly address" for the Great Fatted Bull. Some readers may object to my
translating it as "Great Fatso" because "fatso" is clearly a modern term. I translated it
this way because: 1) I'm willing to bet that if a Sumerian wanted to call someone a
"big fatso", they'd call him gal-niga, "great fatted", and, 2) it conveys the obvious
sarcastic intention of the scribe (you can hear it in his voice). I would suggest that
anyone who thinks niga should be limited to "fatted" (Lord Fatted, or The Great Fatted)
for some purely pedantic reason, is simply being too literal. I believe that within the
context of the sentences, "fatso" (Lord Fatso, The Great Fatso) is exactly the way
the scribe would say it, if translating it into modern English. There would be different
words for it in different languages, but they would all mean the same thing.
If dib2 is dab5 (the same sign, but with different meanings and pronunciations) the line
could be interpreted as "the workmen sieze", suggesting conscript labor. Because of
the missing portion of the line, it's impossible to know which of the meanings apply.
For additional notes on dib2/dab5, see line r5.
o6. gu3 gu4-še3 de6 ba šag4-gal gu4-še3 nin [x] dib2
Voice (bellow) bull-to bring allotment food/fodder, bull-to lady [x] send
Ba = allotment/rations; see line o9 below.
A missing mark on a sign can mean everything --- or it may mean nothing. It can
actually change the definition of the sign, or it may be just a scribal error, a "typo".
Like in English, if you don't cross the "t" in the word "take", it becomes the word "lake"
Here, and in lines o3 and r7, the sign for bull (gu4) is shown without the vertical stroke.
It is written correctly at the end of line o8. As written, the sign could be interpreted as
2(eše3) or as the OB version of bi. 2(eše3) is two of a particular unit of measure
and is meaningless within the context of the sentences. The Babylonian version of bi
is a sign that has been stripped of most of its identifying structure as part of the
process of simplifying the signs. It didn't appear until late in the Old Babylonian period
(or as I call it, Severe Babylonian) when lots of other signs were simplified almost
beyond recognition, which is not the case on this tablet. I doubt that it's a scribal error.
I believe it''s a deliberate effect to obscure the meaning of the text. I call the sign
"the half hidden bull" because it looks like a bull hiding in the writing of the text,
with just his horns showing, as a hint to the context of the tablet:
Gu4, "bull", normal: It looks like a bull's head.
compressed: The large triangle is replaced by two smaller triangles (reverse cunei) facing in the opposite direction, and the vertical line is moved into the horn area.
as written: In the crowded lettering of the tablet, this looks like a bull "hiding" in the writing of the text, with just his horns showing.
In any case, gu4 fits perfectfly within the context of the sentences. In this sentence
especially (voice + bull + repetitive processing = the bellowing of a bull) the meaning
of the sign is clear. Since the sign occurs twice in the sentence, in an obvious
bull context, it would be a natural place to obscure the appearance of the sign.
It's interesting to note that the one place where the sign is written correctly (line o8)
is where it is written the smallest. It is a tiny little sign, written in its compresssed form,
that is placed in a crowded margin on the side of the tablet. It is therefore inconspicuous
and difficult to read. It cannot be seen when looking at the front or the back of the tablet,
and it can only be read when the tablet is being held edgewise. See line o8 below
for instructions on how to find the sign on the original tablet.
Bull? What bull?
Gu4 (bull) is one half of the context of the story, and yet it's miswritten four times
out of five. Which seems rather odd. Of the 362 complicated signs on the tablet, this
one very simple sign is the only one that's consistently "misspelled". It's unlikely that
the scribe, who is clearly an accomplished writer, would make such a stupid mistake
(I doubt that even I would have made such an amateurish mistake). There can be
little doubt that the scribe did it intentionally to obscure the meaning of the text,
to make it difficult to read the tablet. If this was indeed his purpose, it worked exactly
as planned: Early in the translation I had seen that gu4 was written correctly in line o8,
so I knew that a bull was at least mentioned in the story. But I didn't think it could be
the context of the tablet because the bull is never mentioned again (it's as if you can
catch a glimpse of the bull on the tablet, and then he disappears.) Even after I began
to suspect that the story may actually be about a bull (because of the many references
to grain that I was seeing) I still resisted the idea because nowhere else on the tablet
is the sign for bull (gu4) clearly written. I suspected that the other four signs might
possibly be gu4 (miswritten, the bull "hidden" in the writing of the text) but I couldn't
be sure. So I ended up wasting a lot of time trying decipher the bull context of the story,
which would have been rather obvious had the signs been written correctly. I swear,
it was just like playing a Sumerian version of the game, "Where's Waldo?"
I have gone on about this at some length to demonstrate the kind of challenges
this tablet represents. Gu4, pronounced "gud", is one of the simplest of the
Sumerian signs. It remained virtually unchanged for 1,500 years, since its earliest
pictograph form (it looks like a bull's head). Then it gets compressed, then miswritten.
It's supposed to be one of the "easy" signs.
Tablet #36 is the only known tablet in the world that has two simultaneous contexts
(bull and king) and both of the contexts are deliberately "disguised"! Tablet #36
has to be one of the most challenging tablets ever written, but notice how the scribe
doesn't attempt to make the tablet completely unreadable. That would be too easy.
He could have simply substituted a bunch of signs for other signs (of which only he
would know their intended meaning) or he could've made up his own signs. Instead,
he leaves the clues that are necessary to solve the mysteries that he has created.
The clue to the hidden "king" context of the story is the repeated use of the sign mahX.
The clue to the hidden "bull" context of the story is the fact that the sign for bull (gu4)
is written correctly only once (and very inconspicuously). It really is rather clever.
In my opinion, this scribe is the best writer in all of Sumerian literature.
o7. na-aĝ2 (ES, nam) -ḫi-li -ĝu10 eš3-maḫX ĝa2-ĝa2-ĝa2 an
Fate- abundant- my shrine-majestic accumulate (3x) heaven
In the Translation, I added the words "Lu-mah declares". The Sumerian language didn't
have a lot of conventions (such as commas, quotation marks, capital letters, etc.)
that separated the spoken word from the rest of the story. Nor does the scribe
often introduce dialogue with phrases such as "he said" or "she said" (which can be
quite disconcerting: you're reading along, and before you know it, someone's talking).
I therefore added to the story this kind of signal to the spoken word (e.g., line r11:
His mother says, ". . .") which is sometimes necessary when translating Sumerian.
I did not enclose these additions in brackets, for example, "[His mother says]",
to delineate my words from those of the author, which is the proper form, because it's
too intrusive and it interferes with the narrative flow.
The sign mu/ĝu10, "he/my", is written with only two pairs of reverse cunei instead of
the usual three. I was able to find only one other example on the CDLI where the sign
was written in this way. The horizontal stroke of the sign is very short (to save space)
and any attempt to crowd all three pairs of reverse cunei onto such a short sign
would make it almost illegible.
Eš3-mahX (shrine-great) may be a reference to the Magnificent Shrine in the city of
Nippur, or it may be just a generic term for a "great shrine". Perhaps a shrine is actually
being built by the workers mentioned in line o5. The main reason "Majestic Shrine"
is capitalized in the translation is to convey some of the obvious hyperbole of the
sentence. The reason "Majestic Shrine" was chosen rather than the usual
"Magnificent Shrine" is because Lu-mah is more "majestic" than he is "magnificent".
ĝa2-ĝa2-ĝa2 = ĝar-ĝar-ĝar = "to accumulate". A (non-numeric) Sumerian sign is
seldom written three times in a row. It happens, but it's relatively rare. It happens three
different times on this tablet. Here it is used as deliberate exaggeration (hyperbole).
The scribe could have witten the sign once, or even twice, and it would have meant
the same thing (to accumulate). Instead, he writes it three times; this from someone
who otherwise uses a great economy of language.
The strings of three signs in-a-row, and the fact that it seems like half of the other signs
are "doubled up" (usually to indicate plural) is another reason why this tablet is such
a difficult translation. The writing looks wild on the page. Visually, it looks out of control;
su-ba = su8-ba. A pun like lu2-mahX, and also the name of the hero. One other
instance attested, A Praise Poem for Shulgi X (ETCSL). Even if there was no other
instance, it would still be su-ba, "shepherd". I believe that Lu-mah and Su-ba are
the names of the protagonists, even though they are not so-named anywhere else
in the text. It's more than a coincidence that these are the only places on the tablet
where the scribe "puns" at the sign level.
Sipad, the usual sign for "shepherd".
Su8-ba (sub-ba): This is the lesser known Emesal form of sipad, "shepherd". It is one of the "stacked" Sumerian signs. The lines of a tablet usually had to be drawn wider than normal in order to accommodate it. To try to write this sign within the narrow lines of Tablet #36 would make it illegible. The scribe, who uses every square millimeter of this tablet, wouldn't draw an entire line wider just to fit a single word. Nor would he want to call attention to this very distinctive sign.
Su-ba, as written; it's pronounced like the above su8-ba, but it's unrecognizable as a "shepherd".
Su-ba shesh, the shepherd brother.
Su-ba is just a comman man, who is a shepherd in disguise, and the shepherd is the disguise of a king. He is named for his role in the story, and yet his identity is concealed. It has to be the second-greatest name ever given to a fictional character.
Cylinder seal impression. Note the "bull/man" on the left. This character is often ascribed to be Enkidu, the companion of Gilgamesh, the Sumerian warrior-king, seen on the right. I have my doubts, as Enkidu was a man who was raised by animals, and not a hybrid bull/man. See another image of Gilgamesh and Enkidu with Enkidu portrayed as a regular man.
r1. [ki] ak kiri3 lu2 su-ub teš2 nu-zu dab5 mu lu2 nu- kal-la
[Ground] do nose man rub, pride not-wisdom seize. He man not- strong
Ki. . . su-ub: to prostrate oneself.
The first part of the sentence seems to be missing a negation (nu): "I will not bow. . . "
Perhaps it was on the damaged part of the tablet at the beginning of the line, or maybe
it was explained in the damaged portion of the previous line (o18).
In Sumerian literature, you never get to hear about a woman who is notvirtuous. The
ETCSL shows 47 entries for munus zid: woman right (and true). There are zero entries
for munus nu-zid, woman not-right (or true).
[Rest of the tablet missing]
Detail from the "Peace" side of the Standard of Ur. The king (left, drawn larger to signify his greater importance) drinks with his cronies while being attended by two servants.
Appendix A: Summary of the different ways the meaning of the text is obscured:
1) The mahX encoding of the tablet hides the main context of the story (lugal, king).
Technical Note: Of 3,271 citations, the ePSD gives one instance where mah2 is used as an alternative sign for mah; and the instance is archaic (500 - 1,000 years before this tablet was written) so it hardly counts. It may even be a scribal error, ancient or modern. The fact that mah2 is used as an alternative sign for mah only once in 2,000 years is somewhat surprising. The Sumerian language was syllabic, based on syllables, rather than individual sounds (letters), like English. If a scribe didn't know the sign for a particular word, he would "spell it out" using signs for the syllables that he already knew. In this way, signs with the same (or similar) pronunciations were often used interchangeably; so one would expect that mah would be used more often as an alternative sign for mah2, and vice versa (the PSD shows 1,000 citations for mah2 (cow) and none where mah is used as an alternative sign.) The reason these two signs were not used interchangeably is because they were both well-known signs with two very different definitions (mah=great, supreme, majestic; mah2=cow) that were not easily confused for each other. The numbers, 3,270 to 1, indicate just how unlikely it is that the sign mah2 would be given the meaning of mah, "great". To write mah2 for mah once could be a scribal error (a typo), but the sign is used consistently eight different times on this tablet. It was not done out of ignorance, by someone who didn't know any better, because the scribe is clearly a master of the language and he would not make such a careless mistake. Nor is it just wordplay, like Su-ba (shepherd), because the scribe does not alter the meanings of su and ba in the rest of the story as he does with mah(2), and he would not be so heavy-handed with one single pun. So, if it's not a scribal error, and it's not wordplay, then it must be "encoding", a deliberate attempt to obscure the meaning of the text. I would suggest that this one sign (mahX) is the main reason why this tablet couldn't be translated by the experts, even though a modern Sumerologist can translate anything written in the Sumerian language. I would further suggest that this one sign would also make the tablet difficult to read, even for another Sumerian, and for the exact same reason. Even if the sign is initially given the pronuniciation of mah, it would be assumed that it's the usual mah2 (cow) and not mah (great). Since "cow" doesn't make any sense in any of the sentences, the pronunciation would be discarded, and along with it, the hint to the secret context of the tablet (i.e.; Lu-mah = man-great = lugal = king). It's a very clever bit of encoding that allows the scribe to obscure the context of the story, which makes it difficult to read the other signs on the tablet, even though they are written in "plain Sumerian".
2) Both Lu-mah and Su-ba, the two main protagonists of the story, are written as puns at the sign level, concealing their identities.
3) The sign for bull, one half of the context, is "miswritten" four times out of five.
4) The setting of the story, Field #5, is written three different ways: field 5, the usual form, with the number following after the noun; 5 pasture, with the number written first; and field 4 (4 diš), written as a different number form. The way the number five is written is also distinctive, with a horizontal 2 2 1 combination, rather than the usual 3 2 combination. This is because the scribe puns with numbers for the same reason that he puns with words, to obscure the meaning of the text.
As can be seen from the above four notes: the two contexts, the two main protagonists, and the setting of the story – all are disquised in some way. It's difficult to read a story when you don't know what it's about, or who it's about, or where it's taking place.
5) In addition to lugal (king) being obscured, two other important words, "fate" and "shepherd", are used in their in their lesser known Emesal forms, na-aĝ2 and su8-ba. The ePSD shows 532 instances for nam, the usual word for fate, and 20 for na-aĝ2. (The scribe only uses nam in it's prefix form (i.e., as part of the word "fatherhood", nam-a-a)). There are 2,415 cases of sipad for shepherd, and only 25 for su8-ba. Although the Emesal words are readable enough, they are not immediately recognizable like the signs nam and sipad. So why doesn't the scribe use the standard signs for nam, lugal, and sipad? Because once he uses the signs for fate, kings, and shepherds on a tablet, then people would be interested in reading it and they'd be able to figure out the true meaning of the story. The tablet would no longer be so "inconspicuous". The same applies to modern times. I would suggest that had the scribe used these three signs, this tablet never would have been classified as "Administrative", rather than "Literature", and someone else would have translated it long before I ever saw it (translating it would have been easy enough to do since the context would be known). This tablet has been hiding in plain sight ever since it was written; all because the scribe did not use those three signs.
6) The writing often has an unusual syntax. It is not always structured in the usual "Subject Object Verb" sequence of formal writing. This wasn't done to obscure the meaning of the text; it's the result of the scribe's effort to crowd as much information as possible into every line, but it nonetheless makes the tablet difficult to read. Another unusual aspect of this tablet is the fact that almost every sign is a word, not just part of a multi-sign word, or a syllable in a longer word, but a whole word by itself.
7) The strings of three signs in-a-row, and the doubling of many of the others, makes the writing look nonsensical. Some of this is inevitable in Sumerian, where a few signs represent many words, but this tablet seems to have it in excess.
8) There are very few clarifying "grammar particles" on this tablet. If the scribe wanted to make the tablet more readable, he could have easily done so by adding some identifying prefixes and suffixes.
Any one of these factors, by itself, does not make the tablet unreadable; but all of them together make the tablet difficult (if not impossible) to read, even for another Sumerian, until mahX is decoded.
For the record, I did not use a lot of “literary license” in translating this tablet, even though it would have been perfectly justified, considering that it’s such a “literary” story. I did the transliteration (the Sumerian sign converted to the Sumerian word) according to strict CDLI standards. For the translation, however, (the translation is the Sumerian word converted to the English word) I allowed myself a little bit of latitude. Most of the literary license that I used is quite obvious, e.g., “fatso”, the use of contractions (“here’s” for “here is”) and the use of italics. Any other minor examples of poetic license that I used are denoted on this page. My criterion was to give the words of the scribe their fullest meaning without adding any meaning of my own (early in the translation I realized that nothing I could add to this great story would be an improvement). Simply put, my sole concern when translating this tablet was, “How would the scribe say it?” If he was standing in front of a modern American audience, how would he tell the story to them? This story was never meant to read, it was only meant to be spoken; so it should be spoken in the vernacular, the everyday language of the listeners. That's why the use of italics and contractions is warranted for this tablet. I hope the scholars will forgive me for using some poetic license when translating this tablet. It is a poetic story; it deserves a poetic translation.
Nisaba za3- mi2
Nisaba was the goddess who invented writing. She was the patron deity of the scribes. The scribes often signed their compositions with the words, "Nisaba zami": "Nisaba be praised!"
mah: "great".
Gu4, "bull", normal: It looks like a bull's head. 
compressed: The large triangle is replaced by two smaller triangles (reverse cunei) facing in the opposite direction, and the vertical line is moved into the horn area. 
as written: In the crowded lettering of the tablet, this looks like a bull "hiding" in the writing of the text, with just his horns showing.
Sipad, the usual sign for "shepherd". 
Su-ba, as written; it's pronounced like the above su8-ba, but it's unrecognizable as a "shepherd". 
Su-ba shesh, the shepherd brother.
dib2: To send.
