Umma

This article is about the Sumerian city. For the Islamic term, see Ummah. For other uses, see Umma (disambiguation).
Umma
Umma is located in Iraq
Umma
Umma
Shown within Iraq
LocationDhi Qar Province, Iraq
RegionMesopotamia
Coordinates31°40′02″N 45°53′15″E / 31.66722°N 45.88750°E / 31.66722; 45.88750
TypeSettlement
Site notes
Excavation dates1854, 1885, 1999-2002, 2017-2019
ArchaeologistsWilliam Loftus, John Punnett Peters, Nawala Ahmed Al-Mutawalli, Drahoslav Hulínek
Location of the city of Umma in Sumer

Umma (Sumerian: 𒄑𒆵𒆠 ummaKI;[1] in modern Dhi Qar Province in Iraq, was an ancient city in Sumer. There is some scholarly debate about the Sumerian and Akkadian names for this site.[2] Traditionally, Umma was identified with Tell Jokha. More recently it has been suggested that it was located at Umm al-Aqarib, less than 7 km (4.3 mi) to its northwest or was even the name of both cities.[3][4] One or both were the leading city of the Early Dynastic kingdom of Gišša, with the most recent excavators putting forth that Umm al-Aqarib was prominent in EDIII but Jokha rose to preeminence later. The town of KI.AN was also nearby.[5] KI.AN, which was destroyed by Rimush, a ruler of the Akkadian Empire. There are known to have been six gods of KI.AN including Gula KI.AN and Sara KI.AN.[6]

The tutelary gods of Umma were Sara and Ninura. It is known that the ED ruler Ur-Lumma built a temple to the god Enki-gal and one to the god Nagar-pa'e at Umma.[7]

In the early Sumerian literary composition Inanna's descent to the netherworld, Inanna dissuades demons from the netherworld from taking Shara, patron of Umma, who was living in squalor.[8]

  1. ^ "ORACC – Umma".
  2. ^ Lambert, W. G. (1990). "The Names of Umma". Journal of Near Eastern Studies. 49 (1): 75–80. doi:10.1086/373421. ISSN 0022-2968. JSTOR 544410. S2CID 162374749.
  3. ^ Bartasch, Vitali (2015). "On the Sumerian City UB-meki, the Alleged "Umma"". Cuneiform Digital Library Bulletin. 2. ISSN 1540-8760.
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference Almamori2014 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  5. ^ Marek Stępień, "The Economic Status of Governors in Ur III Times: An Example of the Governor of Umma", Journal of Cuneiform Studies, vol. 64, pp. 17–30, 2012
  6. ^ Peat, J. A., "An Offering - List from the Third Dynasty of Ur", Revue d’Assyriologie et d’archéologie Orientale, vol. 69, no. 1, pp. 19–22, 1975
  7. ^ Cite error: The named reference Frayne2008 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  8. ^ "Inana's descent to the nether world". Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature. Retrieved 2021-07-22.