Johnson 2004 - CDLI - UCLA

half of line 4 to be the first of a pair of epithets preceding the mention of Ur-Namma at
the end of line 4, which also characterizes the relationship that holds between Enlil and
Ur-Namma. The use of a topicalized indefinite relative as an epithet is not particularly
surprising, but the same construction is also used to form relative clauses which cannot
be characterized as epithets such as the following.
(21) Lugalbanda II [ETCSL 1.8.2.2], ll. 207-208
207. [mußen.e an].ta igi mi.ni.in.il 2
217
As for the Bird, who was looking from
erin 2.e igi bi 2.in.du 8.ru above, she saw the troops,
208. [lugal].≠ban 3±.da ki.ta igi As for Lugalbanda, who was looking from
mi.ni.in.il 2 sa˙ar erin 2.e du 8.a below, he saw the troops enveloped
igi bi 2.in.du 8.ru in dust,
A literal interpretation of line 207, for example, would need to include the causative
semantics of non-BNBV inal *bi-√ prefix verbs, yielding “The bird, whose eye was raised
up, saw the troops.” But since igi is an inalienable noun, we can reasonably infer that it
was the bird who raised his own eyes and translate accordingly (note that the causative
semantics of the non-BNBV inal predicate is preserved, however, indicating that there is an
agent/causer of the action, which is not true of BNBV inal predicates—this corresponds to
the fact that verbs of attempted perception such as “look” and “listen” tend to be agentive
cross-linguistically, whereas verbs of achieved perception such as “see” and “hear” do
not). Manuscript QQ (3 N-T 824), interestingly, offers a different form of the first verb in