Notes to Chapter 6. The Nuclear Territorial States

April 2024

6.1 The City-State as a Nuclear Territorial State
6.2 The Territorial Foundation of Solidarity
6.3 The Role of the Temple
6.4 Politics and Religion
6.5 State and People
6.6 A Universe of States
6.7 The Politicization of the Pantheon
6.8 Political Imagination
6.9 Differentiated Homogeneity
6.10 The Fourth Millennium
      6.10.1 Uruk – The Largeness of the Settlement
      6.10.2 Nippur – The Navel of the World
      6.10.3 Kish – The Structural Bases of Hegemony
      6.10.4 Ur – Luxury as a Correlative to Power
      6.10.5 Lagash – Temple Administration and Populism
      6.10.6 Nagar – At the Center of the 'High Country'
6.11 The Early Third Millennium
      6.11.1 Eshnunna – A Study of the Territory
      6.11.2 Mari – The Hinge Between Teo Worlds
      6.11.3 Tell Chuera – The Urban Fabric
      6.11.4 Ebla – The Last Frontier

ERRORS in databases:

"Boson1918Assiriologia.d": duplicate bibliography "Boson1918Assiriologia" for site "Akk-lg".
"Bottero1992Reasoning.d": duplicate bibliography "Bottero1992Reasoning" for site "Mes-rel".
"Buccellati1972Teodicea.d": duplicate bibliography "Buccellati1972Teodicea" for site "Mes-lit".
"Cauvin2000Birth.d": duplicate bibliography "Cauvin2000Birth" for site "Mes-rel".
"DMB.d": duplicate bibliography "DMB" for site "Mes-rel".
"Edzard2003Sumerian.d": duplicate bibliography "Edzard2003Sumerian" for site "Mes-rel".
"Oshima2014Sufferers.d": duplicate bibliography "Oshima2014Sufferers" for site "Mes-rel".
"Trinkaus1983Shanidar.d": duplicate bibliography "Trinkaus1983Shanidar" for site "Mes-rel".

6.2 The Territorial Foundation of Solidarity

The sense of deep emotional attachment to the city is developed in the Greek world from the perspective of the polis. See for example Euripides’ Medea, where the situation of the protagonist, abandoned by her husband, is made even more tragic by the fact that she finds herself isolated from her humus , her homeland. So for example in the choir stanzas in verses 644-658:
- O my country, O my own dear home! God grant I may never be an outcast from my city, leading that cruel helpless life, whose every day is misery. Ere that may I this life complete and yield to death, ay, death; for there is no misery that doth surpass the loss of fatherland.
- I have seen with mine eyes, nor from the lips of others have I the lesson learnt; no city, not one friend doth pity thee in this thine awful woe...
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
See, e.g., the “Temple Terrace” at Urkesh, for which cf. Buccellati Kelly Buccellati 2005 Hurrian and Buccellati Kelly Buccellati 2009 Temple).
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]
Compare this term, referring to a countriside/peripheral district, with the aforementioned (cf. Chapter 5.18) babtum, “the whole of doors”, probably referring to a city/central district.
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]
About kingship and its relationships to religion, see e.g. Frankfort 1948 Kingship.
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]

6.3 The Role of the Temple

For integration, see Spineto 2008 Integrazione.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]

6.4 Politics and Religion

About the relationship between politics (or, more generally, power) and religion, see e.g. Yildirim 2017 Political; cf. also Berlin 1996 Religion and Brisch 2008 Religion.
– [ Marco De Pietri, March 2024]

6.5 State and People

“GN” stands here for the abbreviation of “Geographical Name”.
– [ Marco De Pietri, February 2024]

6.6 A Universe of States

The three terms usually translated as “king” more precisily refers to three different roles or features of the “king”: en is the “king as lord“; ensi refers to the “king as interpreter“; lugal is the “king as ruler” (on this topic, see Rd Aonline, under entry “Herrscher A.” (by G. Frantz-Szabó); furthermore, it seems there was a geographical pattern of distribution in the use of these three terms: for instance, at Lagash it is more common to find the word “ensi” (cf. above), while at Uruk “en” is more frequent; we do also have to keep into consideration that some Sumerograms could be read in languages other than Sumerian: e.g., at Urkesh/Tell Mozan, in the cuneiform inscriptions of Atal-šen (r1) we find the Sumerogram LUGAL, while in the inscription of Tiš-atal (r2, as on the glyptics of king Tupkish) we can read the Hurrian term for “leader/ruler”, written phonetically as en-da-an (for which see e.g. Laroche 1980 Glossaire, p. 80, with reference to the term entanni, on p. 82).
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]
For the texts about this war (fought ca. 2346 BC), see e.g. Barton 1929 R I S A, pp. 48-67 (some excerpts are available here); the conflict is also visually and textually told on the “Stele of the Vultures”, today at the Louvre (cf. also on C D L I, RIME 1.09.03.01).
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]
On the Sumerian terms referring to leadership/lordship, cf. Chapter 8.7.2.
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]
The discussion of the “coexistence” of states that “contributed to create a truly international order” caused us to think, if we can speak in general about “international” and (logically deducing) “national order” in ancient societies. Interesting attempt was done by Anthony D. Smith who described protonational communities as “etnicies” (Smith 1989 Origins). He described the features of such communities: “1. a common name for the unit of population included; 2. a set of myths of common origins and descent for that population; 3. some common historical memories of things experienced together; 4. a common ‘historic territory’ or ‘homeland’, or an association with one; 5. one or more elements of common culture – language, customs, or religion; 6. a sense of solidarity among most members of the community”.
– [ Anatolii Viktorov, March 2024]
The idea to ascribe to ancient communities the tendency to divide the neighbours between those who shares culture and those that are considered as barbarians let us to remember examples in other eras connected with appear and development of barbarian label. The main question that can appear is on which level of relations between two or more cultures one of them became a barbarian in view of the others.

One could say that language can be seen the central factor in distinguishing foreigners, and barbarians as well. Those who do not understand people with a shared language are often considered less developed. German word “slawo” (one, who is mute) and gothic “slawan” (to be silent) later became the core for the name of Slavs. At the same time, in modern russian language we find in the language the name for a foreigner “не́мец” (nemets) had the meaning “mute”, “one, who can not speak”. In modern Russian the word is used to describe Germans. See Fedorov & Filiushkin 2016 Istoriya; Gschnitzer &etal 1992 Volk.

Trying to underline the origins of national identity in Early modern Europe, B. Anderson noted the ability of newspapers to consolidate groups of people that could understand each other with their special language (Anderson 2006 Imagined). At the same time we see doubts of M. Billig that language can be seen as tool for the develop of self-identity (see Billig 1995 Banal).
– [ Anatolii Viktorov, March 2024]
For a Sumerian grammar, see e.g. Edzard 2003 Sumerian.
– [ Marco De Pietri, April 2024]
S.A. Ivanov, in his work on the Byzantine missionaries (Ivanov 2003 Vizantijskoe), traces the vitality of Ancient Greek division between barbarians and non-barbarians in the Later Roman Empire, despite the birth of the Christian idea of internationality, that all people are equal to each other. Christian apologetic writers continued to describe other people with the word βάρβᾰρος (using as well the word οίκουμένη, meaning not just ‘world”, but specifically ‘Roman world’), as there was no equivalent in the Ancient Greek language to describe a foreigner (and, therefore, the world outside the Empire itself).
– [ Anatolii Viktorov, April 2024]

6.7 The Politicization of the Pantheon

Icon of Inanna: I refer to the cuneiform sign representing the pillar of reeds at the entrance to the mudhif, as a symbol of the entrance to the inner room; see Jacobsen 1970 Towards.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
On “pantheon”, cf. Mes-Rel.
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]

6.8 Political Imagination

City seals: see Aruz 2003 Art, p. 54, with reference to two Steinkeller’s articles; another website gives a useful summary of Steinkeller: pre-Kengir league situation, with Uruk at the receiving end of income from various cities.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
Origin of Sumerians linked to question of city names in fourth millennium BC.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]

6.10.4 Ur – Luxury as a Correlative to Power

Not to be forgotten the fact that, traditionally and according to the Old Testament, Ur was the motherland of the patriarch Abraham (see, e.g. de Pury 2000 Abraham; cf. also Buccellati 2007 Yahweh, pp. 296-297 [Excerpts (MES-REL)]): see Gen. 11:28ff.; on this very topic cf. Mes-Rel; for possible, even if difficult to prove, connection with Urkesh, see .
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]

6.10.5 Lagash – Temple Administration and Populism

On the concept of “emplacement”, see the Grammar of the Urkesh website; cf. also CAR.
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]
About Lagash and Girsu, cf. also Chapter 8.7.1.
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]
An example of temople corporation can be found in Sterba 1976 Management.
– [ Marco De Pietri, February 2024]

6.10.6 Nagar – At the Center of the 'High Country'

See Liverani 2014 History, cited in the Wikipedia page on Tepe Gawra, (quoted according to 2009 Italian edition of his volume).
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
See Oates on Uruk date for eye temple in Ebla, in Matthiae 1995 Ebla, p. 55.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
On Tell Brak see Gadd 1940 Brak, Mallowan 1947 Brak, Michalowski 2003 Brak, and Oates 1997 Brak.
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]

6.11 The Early Third Millennium

On Qraya, an important site for production and trade of salt, see Buccellati Kelly Buccellati 1988 Qraya; Buccellati 1990 Qraya, Buccellati 1990 Salt, and Hopkinson Buccellati 2023 Qraya.
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]
The precise identification of Tell Chuera with an ancient site is still debated; it has been proposed (see Pfeifer 2014 Jakob) to equate it to the ancient Ḫarbe, known in the second millennium BC by Middle Assyrian texts; as for the toponym used in the third millennium BC, it has been advanced the possibility of identifying it with Abarsal (see Archi 2021 Wars).
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]

6.11.1 Eshnunna – A Study of the Territory

See Jacobsen 1970 Towards and Adams.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
See the Diy Ar Da.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
On the problem of salinization of soils, see e.g. Liverani 2018 Paradiso, ch. 4.7.
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]

6.11.2 Mari – The Hinge Between Teo Worlds

On Qraya, see Reimer and Simpson; cf. also the relataed entries on Urkesh.org/eL.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
About Ramadi, see Geyer Montchambert 1987 Prospection, p. 318, figs 8-10.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
Mari originated from trade: see Margueron 2003 Art.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]

6.11.3 Tell Chuera – The Urban Fabric

Kranzhügel: see Wilkinson; cf. also Crawford.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
On Kranzhügel city structure in the Jazirah, see also Smith 2022 Kranzhugel.
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]

6.11.4 Ebla – The Last Frontier

It is also important to recall here that Ebla had strong and continuous contacts with Egypt (known as dugurasu in the Eblaite documentation; see Biga Roccati 2022 Place; cf. also Biga 2024 Byblos), already in the third millennium BC; of this topic, cf. Matthiae 2018 Egypt. Furthermore, it is worth mentioning that, concerning the geographical mindset of Ebla, Urkesh is never mentioned in the Ebla archives.
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]