SumerianGrammar

174 CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
*Pre-Sumerian
Semitic
Sumerian
Akkadian
(0
)|| ù ù ||
wa
(usage restricted,
not productive)
(usage restricted as
compared with other
Semitic languages)
Note: Common Semitic wa “and”, “and also”, often used as a “sentence opener”
(Satzweiser, see Richter 1970, 39.84), is still attested in its full set of functions in
Ebla Akkadian. In Mesopotamian proper, its usage is restricted, and as a connector
of phrases it has mainly been replaced by enclitic -ma. Akkadian wa in its
(pronunciation and) spelling ù has been borrowed into Sumerian where it is
mainly used to connect nouns (see 14.1.1). Sumerian itself lacks a connecting particle
“and”. The relatively rare usage of ù in Sumerian then most probably had
its reverse effect on Akkadian where ù is of limited application as compared to
the usage of wa in the other Semitic languages. This, then, may be called a real
areal feature.
We will enumerate a number of other such features attesting to the
Sumero-Akkadian “convergence area”.
17.2.
The subject-object-verb (SOV) word order is common to both
Sumerian and Mesopotamian Akkadian as against more traditional
Eblaite Akkadian where we often encounter VOS (cf. Edzard 1984,
115 f.). The older V(O)S order is still found—as an ‘archaism’—in
Ur III and OB personal names, e.g., iddin-Sin “the Moongod gave
(the child)”. When, however, the Akkadian verbal form of a PN is
set in the ventive, the word order S(O)V prevails: Sin-iddinam “the
Moongod gave me (the child)”.
The SOV word order is also maintained in Akkadian when the
subject is extended by the addition of a relative clause, this leading
to veritable “Schachtelsatz” constructions (see Poebel 1947, 23–42).
The same holds for the insertion of infinitive constructions which
stand between S and V. Therefore, most probably Akkadian word
order was influenced by Sumerian.