A praise poem of Shulgi (Shulgi V): translation

^1-6Enlil, the beaming light, ......, whose utterance is immutable, the most powerful of the Anuna gods, ......, looked (?) favourably (?) at Culgi, the fearsome dragon ......, the king, the creation of his hands. He granted (?) him great stength. His roar fills (?) the whole extent (?) of heaven and earth.

^7-12In the E-kur, the great snake of the deep, ......, in Dur-an-ki, which lavishly ...... the eternal divine powers, ......, Enlil determined a great fate from the womb for the long-enduring sapling of the brickwork founded by the princely one, Culgi, who was born for a prosperous reign: "Make the people obedient, you enduring king of the multitudes!"

^13-21The swift runner, a hurricane -- the strength of his loins is never ending, who emerges victorious from the race among the settlements; the terrifying one, who is furious in his running, the strongest among those selected from the people, ....... When he stretches his arms out, ...... at his sides. Culgi, ...... from the horizon. Because of his being most powerful, in his vigour ....... He, the tireless one, ...... the road. No king ever cared so much for the black-headed people; he established justice on a grand scale.

^22-29On a day that dawned for prosperity, that was destined for rain-clouds, he ran from the Ki-ur of Nibru to the shrine of Urim, the E-temen-ni-guru; and provided the princely bowls of Nanna, set up in the morning dining-hall, with a copious ration. On that day, prosperity was decreed for him. In a violent storm, a whirlwind that broke out, Utu ......; Culgi returned to the lustrous E-kur.

^30-35 In order that the heroes for ever praise Culgi's great exaltedness, he made his ...... enduring statue of everlasting fame brilliant like the heavenly stars, and set it up in majesty before the good eyes, filled with generosity (?), of the immutably eminent father Enlil.

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Revision history

17.v.1998-18.v.1998 : GZ : adapting translation
23.vii.1998 : JAB : proofreading
05.v.1999 : GZ : minor corrections
05.v.1999 : GZ : SGML tagging
14.v.1999 : ER : proofreading SGML
14.v.1999 : ER : converting to HTML 4.0
7.ix.2001 : ER : header and footer reformatted; substantive content of file not changed