Johnson 2004 - CDLI - UCLA

(33) Textual witnesses to Dumuzi’s Dream, line 139
Synthetic text u 4 ul ? .la 2.ta a.ba.a igi mi.ni.in.du 8.a
a = UET 6, 18 (Ur) […] ≠igi± mu.ni.in.du 8
e = UET 6, 187 (Ur) […] gim.mu.ni […]
f = A 30256 (Nippur) u 4.≠ul.la 2± [...]
i = UM 29-15-236+ (Nippur) [...] ŒA 2 ba.ta mu.ni.in [...]
E' = 3N-T 908, 289 (Nippur) [...].a mi.ni.in.du 8.a
In his original edition, Alster restores the beginning of the line on the basis of line 155 of
Gilgamesh and Huwawa, version B [1.8.1.5.1] (corresponding to line 143 of Edzard’s
edition [1993, 33]); lines 154 and 155 read as follows: gudu 4 dab 5.ba ˙i.li.ße 3
gur.ra.am 3 / u 4 ul.li 2.a.ta a.ba.a igi im.mi.in.du 8, “A captured gudu-priest restored to his
wig! Who has ever seen such a thing?” The verbal form igi im.mi.in.du 8 also appears in a
passage from The Death of Gilgamesh in column 6, line 15a of Cavigneaux and Al-
Rawi’s edition (2000a, 17): u 4.ul.li 2.a.ta [a].ba.a igi ≠im.mi±.in.du 8.a. Apparently the
sequence igi im.mi was something of a tongue-twister: because of the prosody of the
/iCi-iCi/ pattern as well as the alternation between /g/ and /b/ in Emesal and Emegir (in
slightly different contexts), problems of dissimilation and resyllabification may have
been in play. Note in particular the orthography of witness “e” of Dumuzi’s Dream,
where igi has been, at least in phonological terms, incorporated into the verb, gim.mu.ni.
At the same time, the subtle morphosyntactic distinction between a.ba.a igi im.mi.in.du 8
and a.ba.a igi mi.ni.in.du 8 probably comes down to a difference between an indirect
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