Footnotes

It is important to realize that the term “Sumerian,” strictly speaking, can be used only for this language. There is no physical type which can be called by that name. From Al Ubaid times until the present day, the population of Mesopotamia has consisted of men predominantly belonging to the Mediterranean or Brown race, with a noticeable admixture of broad-headed mountaineers from the north-east. This is, for instance, true of the Early Dynastic period, as the skulls from Al Ubaid and Kish show. Skeletons of the earliest known inhabitants of the plain, found at Eridu and Hassuna, have been briefly discussed by C. S. Coon in Sumer, V (1949), 103-6; VI (1950), 93-6. They represent “rather heavy-boned prognathous and large-toothed mediterraneans.” The much-discussed problem of the origin of the Sumerians may well turn out to be the chase of a chimera.

The second register from below shows the grain being cut—one of the labourers takes a swig from a water jar handed him by a girl who stands in front, a basket hanging from her shoulder. Farther to the right the grain is carried away in hampers (underneath one of these, two girl gleaners are fighting and tearing each other’s hair); and, on the far right, it is forked out in readiness for threshing. The threshing is done by bullocks who trample the grain—this is shown at the extreme right of the third register from below. To the left women winnow the grain, their hair wrapped in white cloth against the dust. The tomb owner watches in a kiosk and receives two water jars. Behind the kiosk squat the scribes who note the yield of the harvest while the grain is shovelled into heaps.

The upper register shows the deceased in his function as “Scribe of the fields of the Lord of the Two Lands.” On the left are shown a group of his officials, dressed in white, pencase in hand, busy measuring the grain on the stalk; their attendants (with bare bodies) hold the measuring cord. A peasant (followed by his wife who carries a basket on her head with further gifts) offers something to the tax officials, to propitiate them. But on the right, before the kiosk of the tomb owner and near the mooring-place of the boat which brought his subordinates to the scene, a peasant, who apparently defaulted, is beaten, while another kneels and prays for grace.

Some of the phonetic signs of Egyptian consist of only one consonant. In a discussion concerned with Egyptian writing there would be no reason why they should be mentioned in particular, since they do not differ in principle from the other signs. But in a wider historical context the signs with the value of a single consonant are of unique importance: they seem to be the distant ancestors of the alphabet.

(a) The cylinder seals found in Egypt all belong to the “Jamdat Nasr” style and do not include any of the earlier style, known from seal impressions found in Archaic Layer IV at Erech. Likewise absent are examples of the brocade style which succeeds the Jamdat Nasr style in Early Dynastic I. Thus the upper and lower limits of the period during which contact took place are defined.

(b) The small bricks used in recessing at Naqada and Saqqara (Fig. 46) are predominant in the later part of the Protoliterate period in Mesopotamia. In the earlier part larger bricks are commonly used; in the subsequent Early Dynastic period the bricks are plano-convex.

(c) During the Protoliterate period Mesopotamian buildings were decorated all around with elaborate recesses (Figs. 45, 48); and this is the decoration found in the earliest monumental buildings in Egypt, the tombs at Naqada, Abydos, Saqqara, etc. In Early Dynastic Mesopotamia simplified recessing all around became the style; and the multiple recessing was reserved for towers flanking temple entrances (Fig. 19). These towers are introduced in Mesopotamia in the later half of the Protoliterate period as a seal impression shows (Fig. 42 right). The abbreviated renderings of recessed buildings in Egypt show both flat buildings and buildings with towers (Fig. 42, left; 43, 44), a combination which corresponds neither with the earlier part of the Protoliterate period nor with the Early Dynastic period in Mesopotamia but only with the later part of the Protoliterate period. Again, the upper and lower limits of the period of contact are defined.

139