SUMERIAN

LESSON 6
(92) The victory of Utu-hegal 29 (ETCSL 2.1.6)
gu-ti-um ki d en-lil₂-le ma-an-šum₂
gutium=ø enlil=e S4 m- S7 a- S11 n- S12 šum- S14 ø
GN=ABS DN=ERG VEN-DAT-3.SG.H.A-give-3.SG.P
“Enlil has given Gutium to me.”
iii) The locative1 prefix /ni/ in S10 has no composite form, only simple form:
it always occurs without a pronominal prefix, and always cross-references a 3rd
ps. non-human participant.
The adverbial cases and their verbal markers are discussed in detail in Lessons
12–14. The ventive prefix in S4, the 3rd ps. sg. non-human pronominal prefix
in S5, and the initial pronominal prefixes in S6 are discussed in Lesson 11.
The structure and functioning of the adverbial prefixes impose restrictions
on their co-occurrences. Some of these restrictions will be discussed in later
lessons. 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 will be discussed in Lesson 14, sections 14.3 and 14.4. Co-occurrence
restrictions circumvented by changing one of the incompatible adverbial
prefixes into a dative prefix will be discussed in Lesson 15, section 15.4.
6.4 The prefixes of S1–5
The first slot of the finite verbal form contains the prefix of negation and the
modal prefix /ḫa/-. Their function is discussed in the last lesson of the textbook,
Lesson 16. The prefix of anteriority of S1 is involved in indicating the relative
time of the verbal event in Sumerian, it is discussed in Lesson 9, section 9.2.
S2 may contain all the modal prefixes, except for /ḫa/-, and the finite
prefixes. The modal prefixes will be treated in Lesson 16, section 16.2 below,
together with the prefix /ḫa/-.
The finite-marker prefix has a complicated history that is obscured by the
phenomenon that in many morphological environments it went lost. In the
Sumerian texts we know, in many verbal forms it only indicates that the verbal
form functions as the predicate of the clause and not as a modifier of a noun.
The coordinator prefix in S3 functions as a clause coordinator. The main
function of the ventive or cislocative prefix in S4 is to indicate a motion towards
a deictic centre that may be the location of the speech event or one of the
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