SUMERIAN

LESSON 15
The German translation of ex. (461) is shown here to demonstrate how easily
the sentence may be translated into German, which itself knows external
possession: “Die Mutter wusch dem Kind die Haare” = “The mother washed the
child’s hair.
15.4 The dative promotion
The structure and functioning of the verbal prefix-chain impose restrictions on
the co-occurrence of adverbial prefixes. The restriction on the co-occurrence of
the composite 3rd ps. sg. human dative prefix and the simple locative2 or locative3
prefix in transitive preterite verbal forms was discussed in Lesson 14, sections 14.3
and 14.4 above. Because of this co-occurrence restriction, there is no simple
locative2 or locative3 prefix in transitive preterite verbal forms containing a 3rd
ps. sg. human dative prefix; see, e.g., ex. (387) or ex. (428) in Lesson 14 above.
This section discusses co-occurrence restrictions which are solved
differently by the language, namely by changing one of the incompatible
adverbial prefixes into a dative prefix. This change will be labelled with the
term “dative promotion”. The use of the dative is probably due to its function
to denote the participant affected by the verbal activity.
Two types of co-occurrence restriction bypassed with dative promotion are
attested in our texts. The more common type occurs when the construction of
a clause would require the presence of both a locative1 and a locative2 or
locative3 prefix in the finite verbal form. In transitive preterite verbal forms
all these prefixes should occur in S10, but only one of them may “use” this slot.
This restriction can be circumvented by promoting the participant in the
locative2 or locative3 to the status of indirect object and marking it with
a dative prefix in the verbal prefix chain, as in exx. (463) and (465) below.
The compound verb nam “fate” — tar “to cut” = “to determine a fate” casemarks
the participant whose fate is determined with the locative2, see ex. (462)
below. The same participant is in the dative in ex. (463), where a participant in
the locative1 is also cross-referenced in the verbal form.
(462) Ninazu A 26 (ETCSL 4.17.1)
[an]-ne₂ nam dug₃ mu-ri-in-tar
an=e nam dug-ø=ø S4 mu- S6 r- S10 i- S11 n- S12 tar- S14 ø
DN=ERG fate good-TL=ABS VEN-2.SG-L2-3.SG.H.A-cut-3.SG.P
“The god An has determined a good destiny for you.”
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