Chinese and Sumerian

INTRODUCTION XVII

and beyond dispute. It might possibly figure a sort of priestly tiara or mitre (cf. the symbol D, 91, which it somewhat resembles); but the head-dress of the priests as portrayed on the seals is usually pointed, not truncated at the top like this character; and a mitre does not seem a particularly appropriate symbol for a present or offering to the gods. The same objection would lie against any other article of priestly attire. A hand presenting something would suit both meanings better ; cf the archaic form of the hand published by Barton in the Y¥ournal of the American Oriental Society, xxiii. 19, and the Egyptian symbols for giving and offering (Erman, Gr. p. 176, Breasted’s Trans., 1894). What the hand holds in the Sumerian symbol may be (or have been) a libatory vessel, the cross-lines representing the rim and bottom of the cup. This would account for the association and ultimate confusion of the character with others expressing the idea of fouring in various applications. Thus the priest is symbolized by his function of making offerings (libations); and the same symbol naturally serves for that which he offers, whether it be a drinkoffering or other gift (cf. nzg#, Trankopfer ; Opfer; Opferlamm).

Tt might be suggested that the entire symbol originally represented a libatorium of peculiar shape. The point of importance, however, is that the priest appears to have been figured in this symbol as one who offers or presents something; and that the something was an owlpouring or ‘ drink-offering’ is rendered yet more probable by the features of resemblance between this character and others, the essential idea of which is the act of powrzng out. Thus the linear form of the character FIN< LAG, LUG, ‘to wash ritually or ceremonially’, ‘to cleanse’, to purify’ (mzs#), ‘a servant or minister ’, especially of the gods (sw&kallu), looks like a pictogram of water pouring down on something and flowing away (D. 102). To pour water on the hands was a characteristic function of personal attendants (6 2 Kings iii. rr: ‘Elisha... who poured water on the hands of Elijah’)! Another symbol suggestive of the same idea

of pouring or being poured in a heap is tt the linear form of JJ, read ISH (GISH), MIL (=MISH), SA-GAR, with the meanings ‘dust’ or ‘earth’, ‘soil’, and ‘hill’, It seems to depict earth or soil pouring down on a heap or mound which in form resembles the contemporary equivalents of <JEJ, ‘the Earth’. It must be remembered that the Earth itself was a huge ‘mound’ or ‘mountain’ in Babylonian belief, Dust, earth, soil, is therefore visualized in the written character as that which is poured in heaps, whether in the mounds of cities, or the banks of canals, or in natural hills and hillocks. (See D. 97; 254.) The use of the same symbol for ISH, ‘to

1 The same ideogram was also used phonetically last meaning and, moreover, finds some analogy in for LUG, ‘to fear’, ‘to revere’, and /rans. ‘to Chinese usage, where the Net-character (R. 122) frighten’ ; fear or reverence being the natural atti- with the Determinative Aear/ means ‘perturbed’ tude of inferiors toward superiors (see Lex. LAG, (P. 488). Cf also the Hebrew play on np, mes, and

LUG). The symbol of an Lnverted Net, which is sna, fear, Isa. xxiv. 17 f. another linear form of the character, would suit this

1501 Cc