Artifact overview
CBS 12638, 12684, 12702, & 12572 is an artifact (Clay Tablet) related to the mythological story named 'Inanna's Descent to the Netherworld.' The artifact's condition is Poor and it is currently located at University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology in Philadelphia, United States of America, catalogued as record number CBS 12638 et al.. The language of the text contained is Sumerian (Sumero-Akkadian Cuneiform writing system). Its estimated date is 1900—1600 BCE, which is a range based on available data and scholarship. The mythology associated with this artifact includes the Sumerian belief system and related deities: Inanna.
About this artifact
Basic details
| Type | Tablet Clay material |
| Condition | Poor |
| Date created | 1900—1600 BCE |
| Language | Sumerian |
| Writing system | Sumero-Akkadian Cuneiform (script) |
| Location | Penn Museum University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology · Philadelphia, United States of America |
| Digital access | CDLI No. P267276 Fully digitized |
| Myth portion | Lines 1-48 |
Provenience
| Discovery | Nippur, Sumer Present-day Al-Qādisiyyah, Iraq |
Museum record data
Penn Museum
University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology · Philadelphia, United States of America
Item specifications
| Museum No. | CBS 12638 et al. |
Mythological contents
Sumerian Religion
The contents of this artifact may depict or reference the following myths and deities associated with this belief system.
Associated myths and deities
| Myths | Inanna's Descent to the Netherworld |
| Deities | Inanna |
Cuneiform Digitial Library Initiative data help_outline
Core CDLI data
| CDLI record No. | P267276 |
| Composite No. | Q000343 |
| Period | Old Babylonian (ca. 1900-1600 BC) |
| Provenience (origin) | Nippur, 2nd Exp., Box 28 (Peters) |
| Primary publication | CDLI Literary 000343, ex. 019 |
| Author/date | CDLI/2014ff |
Discovery and publication
These artifacts were discovered during the Nippur excavations in modern-day Iraq between 1899-1900. Several excavations took place jointly between the University of Pennsylvania and the Ottoman Museum in Turkey. [1] The artifacts sat in boxes at the Pennsylvania Museum until Edward Chiera (1885-1933)[2], a Sumerian scholar who did lots of work on artifacts related to "Inanna's Descent," started publishing pictures of the fragments.
Before passing away in 1933, Chiera was working on publishing his artifact discoveries at the University of Chicago's Oriental Institute. His work was posthumously published in 1934 in Sumerian Epics and Myths[3] In this publication were the first images of CBS 12638, CBS 12684, CBS 12702, and CBS 12572 (as plate number 50). Because Chiera only published sketches of the artifacts, it would take several years before other scholars would translate what they meant.
Importance for "Inanna's Descent"
CBS 12638, CBS 12684, CBS 12702, and CBS 12752 were especially important for the decipherment of "Inanna's Descent to the Netherworld." The cuneiform tablets provide a robust snapshot of the first fifty lines, which is almost fifteen percent of the entire 412 line myth. For that reason, these artifacts have been used in almost every major translated publication of Inanna's Descent. In 1942, Samuel Kramer published another translation (and collation) of "Inanna's Descent," where the line numbers were carefully mapped out for these artifacts.[4] This publication is referred to as PAPS 85 in citations, short for the Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society; however, the journal seems to have gone defunct in 2015.[5]
Kramer also published a revised translation of these artifacts in 1951 (in the Journal of Cuneiform Studies) as part of his many revisions to the myth's decipherment.[6] This 1951 version of "Inanna's Descent" would remain as the main version of the myth until William R. Sladek published a revised translation in 1974. Even through 2019, these artifacts are used in the current and most reliable versions of the afterlife myth. Additionally, more CBS 12XXX series artifacts have been added to UCLA's ongoing version of "Inanna's Descent."
Notes
Extended artifact data for CBS 12638 et al.
See detailed information about this artifact from the entity that has access to it.
Location description
- Penn Museum Philadelphia, United States of America
Full address: Penn Museum, 3260 South St., Philadelphia, PA, 19104, United States of America
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Archaeology and Anthropology
The Penn Museum is the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.
Archaeology is the study of objects made by humans. From the first traces of our earliest human ancestors to 21st...
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Record numbers
| No. | Unknown |
| Digitized record | CDLI No. P267276 |
| Artifact access | Other |
Full artifact data
| Museum Nos. | CBS 12XXX Series |
| Period | Old Babylonian (ca. 1900-1600 BC) |
| Material | Clay |
| Genre | Literary |
| Usable Lines | ca. 50 |
| Language | Sumerian Cuneiform |
| Provenience (Origin) | Nippur, Iraq |
Record notes
About these data
| Retrieval date | Aug. 8, 2022 |
| Copyright | Penn Museum |
Render
See a rendering of the artifact in images, text, and other form factors. Where available, a translation is included.
Digital scan
OMNIKA Reader
Good news. This original artifact is digitized and available in the OMNIKA Library.
Text: "ETCSL 1.4.1: Inana's Descent to the Nether World"
Sumerian ⟶ English a
| Line # | Translation |
|---|---|
| Source a Black et al., "ETCSL 1.4.1: Inana Netherworld." More info launch | |
All texts
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Mythological contents
This artifact contains mythological contents associated with Sumerian Religion. The main narrative mentioned may be Inanna's Descent to the Netherworld, a Afterlife myth. The deities depicted or mentioned in the artifact may be: Inanna.
Parent belief system
- Sumerian Religion · PolytheisticHeads up. This Religion belongs to the Mesopotamian collection on the basis of shared myths and deities.
Sumerian religion refers to spiritual beliefs practiced from ca. 4500-1900 BCE in Mesopotamia, or modern-day southern Iraq. Many deities were diffused into other Mesopotamian cultures.
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Associated myth
Inanna's Descent to the Netherworld Afterlife mythNuthsell
Inanna descends from the great above to the great below. She abandons several temples and heads for open country. She gives precise instructions to her companion—Ninsubur: Inanna says "if I don't return in three days, go to the temples and plead on my behalf." At the netherworld she enters and goes through seven gates before she is turned into a corpse. Ninsubur follows the instructions and tells Inanna's father Enkil what happened. He helps her by sending two a-sexual creatures to sneak in and bring her back to life. Once Inanna is alive she ascends while being escorted by demons from the netherworld. The demons allow her to trade her husband Dumuzi in her place.
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Deities depicted
CDLI data for P267276
The artifact named CBS 12638, 12684, 12702, & 12572 is listed in the CDLI database as record number P267276. It belongs to composite number Q000343 .
About the CDLI
Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative Est. 1998The Cuneiform Digitial Library Initiative (CDLI) is a collaborative project among the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), the University of Oxford, and the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (Berlin, Germany). The project is funded by various universities and donors in the hopes of cataloging, translating, and digitizing artifacts with text in cuneiform script.
Record numbers
Record notes
About these data
| Retrieval date | Aug. 8, 2022 |
| Copyright | CDLI @ UCLA |
Artifact condition
The artifact named 'CBS 12638 et al.' is appraised as being in Poor condition based on how much reliance is placed on other resources to make it complete and readable.
| Condition | Excellent | Just OK | Poor |
|---|---|---|---|
 |  |  | |
| Completeness | More than 80% | 50 - 80% | Less than 50% |
| Fragmentation | Minor | Moderate | Significant |
| Damage | Minor | Moderate | Significant |
| Legibility | Highly readable | Somewhat readable | Unintelligible |
What's a 'joined' artifact?
A joined artifact is one that was originally part of the other and was broken or fragmented at some point in time. Joins are common among clay tablets because they may get broken during discovery and transportation. The join is notated with the + sign. For example, if tablets A000 and Z999 are joined, we would express this relationship by grouping them as A000 + Z999 to indicate they are related.
If the fragments are owned, maintained, and cataloged by separate museums then classifying the join relationship is critical for accurate translations.
Cite this page
OMNIKA Foundation Contributors. "CBS 12638, 12684, 12702, & 12572 (Clay Tablets)." OMNIKA – World Mythology Index, OMNIKA Foundation, 02 May. 2019, omnika.org/stable/118. Accessed 21 Nov. 2024.
OMNIKA (2019, May 02). CBS 12638, 12684, 12702, & 12572 (Clay Tablets). Retrieved from https://omnika.org/stable/118
OMNIKA Foundation Contributors. "CBS 12638, 12684, 12702, & 12572 (Clay Tablets)." Las Vegas, NV: OMNIKA Foundation. Created May 02, 2019. Accessed November 21, 2024. https://omnika.org/stable/118.
