I'll tell you all my secrets, but I lie about my past

And occasionally I just answer the questions. An interview Geoffrey Goodwin most generously did with me last month is now online at Bookslut: read and find out what I think of the New Weird, traditional narrative, the sea, and why on earth I wrote "When You Came to Troy" in the first place. I may even be reasonably coherent this time around.

Off to the library, to read about Gilgameš in his capacity as judge of the underworld . . .

Akkadian!

After innumerable delays (i.e., severe procrastination on my part), I present the last portion of Ištar's Descent to the Underworld. Of course, it is at this point that the text goes all to pieces. Sorry about that. The basics are clear: that Ištar's lover Dumuzi is the ransom paid to the Anunnaki, the gods of the underworld, for her freedom. But why him? In the Sumerian text, the reason seems clear enough: when Inanna comes up under guard of demons to locate a substitute, the only one of the major figures in her life whom she does not find properly mourning her in tears and rags is Dumuzi. Richly dressed as he is and playing his shepherd's flute as though he couldn't care less about his lost lover, Inanna promptly consigns him to the underworld in her stead. (So much for that whole Orpheus-Eurydike paradigm. Admittedly, it may still say something about Inanna that when it comes to a choice between her lover and her hairdresser, she chooses to ditch Dumuzi.) Here, Ainsley Dicks has made a very good case that the Anunnaki themselves set Dumuzi up. Bathe him, anoint him, cheer him up . . . He actually seems to have been observing the mourning rites for Ištar: but the instructions of the Anunnaki to Namtar ensure that she will find him otherwise. So the women mourn him—not the faithless lover, but the victim. There's a fall guy in every mythology.

šumma naptirīša lā taddinakamma šašama terraši
ana ^dDumuzi hāmir sehrū[tiša]
mê ellūti ramik šamnu tābu l[apit]
subātu huššû lubbissu GI.GÍD uqnî limhas . . .
šamhatê lina'â kabta[ssu]
^dBelili šukattaša . . .
īnātê malâ . . .
ikkil ahiša tašme tamhas ^dBelili šukuttaša ša zumrīša
īnātê ša undallâ pān . . .
ahi ēdu lā tahabbilanni
ina ūmê ^dDumuzi ellanni GI.GÍD uqnî šemer sāmti ittišu ellanni
ittišu ellanni bakkû u bakkātu
ša mītū lilūnimma qutrīn lissinū

"If she does not pay you her ransom, return her to that woman.
As for Dumuzi, the companion of her youth,
bathe him with pure water, anoint him with good oil,
dress him in a red garment, let him strike up the lapis flute . . .
let prostitutes change his mood."
Belili . . . her jewelry,
her lap filled with eyestones . . .
Belili heard the mourning for her brother, she struck the jewelry of her body,
the eyestones with which she filled . . .
"Do not rob me of my only brother!"
On the day when Dumuzi comes up, with him will come up the lapis flute, the carnelian ring,
with him will come up the mourning men and women,
let the dead come up, let them smell the incense.

(Lines 126—138 of Ištar's Descent to the Underworld, manuscript from Nineveh)

[edited 2005-04-05 21:59] In my current interview-fueled good mood, I've discovered that I mostly feel like posting more random Assyriologica. So here are seventeen lines of incantation also from the library of Aššurbanipal at Nineveh, experimentally presented in a different format: transliteration (cuneiform values, sign by sign), normalization (so it looks something like the linguistic forms an Akkadian speaker might actually recognize), translation (self-explanatory). Yeah, it's fragmentary at the end. This is chronic with cuneiform texts. Hope you like. If you have a cold, or need to win a lawsuit, I recommend.

(Cut for the sheer amount of space that a score transliteration takes up.)
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