Notes on the Name Written DINGIR I EL KU U in Hittite Texts

Author(s): Charles Carter

Source: Journal of Near Eastern Studies, Vol. 39, No. 4 (Oct., 1980), pp. 313-314
Published by: The University of Chicago Press
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/544335 .
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NOTES ON THE NAME WRITTEN DINGIR -1 EL
KU U9 IN HITTITE TEXTS
CHARLES
CARTER,
The
University of
North
Dakota,
Grand Forks
ONE
of the
problems
encountered in
reading
cuneiform
tablets,
particularly
those from
Mesopotamia,
arises from the fact that a
given sign
can have more than one
phonetic
value. In
antiquity,
this
gave
occasional
opportunity
to scribal creative
impulses, whimsey,
and, sometimes,
mischievousness. When we look at Hittite and the
Hittite scribal
practices,
we note a
tendency
for one
sign
to have one
phonetic
value
when used in
writing
Hittite,
as distinct from
non-Hittite,
words. The
problem
of
reading
a text in
Hittite, then,
is
likely
to be
simpler
than
reading
a text in
Akkadian,
given equal facility
with both
languages.
Because Hittite exhibits a
tendency
to
simplify
the matter of
reading by limiting
the
phonetic
value or values of
signs,
a
grouping
of
signs
into a word or words can
pose
a
problem,
in that one
expects
those
signs
to
represent
sounds
that,
for one or the other
reason,
seem not to
ring
true. I believe that the divine name found in KUB
XII 2 i 20 and
written with the
signs
DINGIR
I9
EL KU U9 is a case in
point.
What little has been
published
on this name
shows,
more than
anywhere
else to
my knowledge,
the
tendency
to read the name in accordance with the
first,
or
normal,
Hittite values of the
signs
and
to
interpret
it
accordingly.
Thus,
Laroche claims that it is
"necessary"
to call to mind
Akkadian ILKU = Hittite
8ahhan-, "tribute,"
and the divine name gahha'ara-
(a
goddess).1
He reads the name as
DINGIR-iv El-ku-uv,
and notes the
incomplete DEl-ku[
in XII 61 iii
10,
which is now to be restored
to DElkunirsa
according
to the
duplicate,
CTH 242.2.
Questions
about the
reading proposed by
Laroche were raised
by
Sommer in
Ahhiyava-
Urkunden
2
before Laroche made his
suggestion. Moreover,
Laroche was aware
of Sommer's
critique,
as the footnote in
Recherches
shows. Sommer had
already
and
quite correctly pointed
out that the
layout
of the text
predisposes
one to
"expect"
that
the DINGIR
sign
is a determinative. In
addition,
Sommer noted
that,
if indeed the
DINGIR
sign
is a
logogram,
we should
expect DINGIR-LIM-iX ,
not
DINGIR-it.3
Again,
if,
as we have reason to
expect,
DINGIR is a
determinative,
then the
sign
iv
cannot
normally
be
thought
to be a
part
of
it,
but must be a
part
of the divine name
following
that determinative. Another
objection
to Laroche's
reading
has to do with
the last three
signs
of the
name,
which he reads ELK US. Laroche treats it as
Akkadian,
but
ELKUS
is not an Akkadian
form,
nor can it be read as Laroche
states,
ELKU-uv
for
vahhanuv;
-uv is not a Hittite
phonetic complement
for
vahhan-. Thus,
at this
point,
it would seem that we have the
determinative, DINGIR,
plus
the
name,
Iselku-,
which
apparently
is neither Hittite nor Akkadian.
[JNES
39 no. 4
(1980)]
?
1980 by The University of Chicago.
All
rights
reserved.
0022-2968/80/3904-0005$01.00.
1
E.
Laroche, Recherches sur les noms des dieux
hittites (RHA 7/46 [1946-47]), pp.
80.
2 F. Sommer,
Die
Ahhijavd-
Urkunden
(Munich,
1932), p. 340, with n. 1.
3
Ibid. and
idem,
in
Kleinasiatische
Forschung 1
(1930):
341.
313
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314 THE NAME WRITTEN DINGIR 19 EL KU U9 IN HITTITE TEXTS
Further material
pertinent
to this matter can be found in HT 14 10, where the name,
DI kus, is found. It is not
completely
out of the
question
to think of this as a
misspelling
for
DIelkus
where the
sign
el has been omitted. To be
sure,
the
sign
read is is not a clear
is in HT 14 10. It
might
be taken as a
poorly
written
il,
in which case a
reading
DINGIR
IL-KU-I? (in HT
14
10,
the last
sign
in the name is a better
is
than
us)
is
conceivable,
and this could be the same as Laroche's DINGIR-is EL-K U- U9. Be that as it
may,
the
preceding objections
raised
against
Laroche's
reading
of the name in XII 2 i 20
remain,
and
they
cannot be
any
more
satisfactorily
answered for the material in
HT
14. The
name, DIfku', however,
is found written
as DIkun
in a number of other
places,
and was
first
published long
after the
appearance
of
HT
14
by
L. Jakob-Rost in "Zu den
hethitischen
Bildbeschreibungen,''4
and in KUB
XXXVIII.5
In her
MIO
article's
index to divine
names,
she is
apparently
inclined to think that the
names
DI
elkus
and
DI'ku'
belong together
as variant
spellings
of one
name.6
Aside from similarities in the
spelling
of the
names,
there is
nothing
substantive in terms of iconic attributes or
festival
affairs,
either in
XXXVIII,
HT 14
10,
or XII 2 i
20,
to
support
this identification.
Up
to this
point
we
might say
we have what is either two
spellings
for one divine
name,
or two different names.
_Ielkus
is not
satisfactorily explicable
in terms of either Hittite
or Akkadian.
I8kus
is not much more
satisfactory.
But,
some indication of the direction
to take in order to ease the difficulties encountered so far can be found in what at first
glance
seems to be an
out-of-the-way place,
viz.,
J. J. Stamm's Die
akkadische Namenge-
bung.7
Among many
other
things,
Stamm treats
personal
names
containing
the elements
I?KU
=
"child," "son,"
and
MILKU,
a West-Semitic word
meaning "king," "prince."
He
gives
reasons for
preferring
one element in some
cases,
and the other word in other
names.8
Moreover,
aside from the obvious merits of his conclusions in terms of Akkadian
onomastics,
Stamm has also noted
something
that
Hittitologists
have known but over-
looked
up
to now in connection with the divine name that is the
subject
of this
paper;
that
is,
that the
sign
is can be read
mil.
If we read the
sign
as
mil,
then
IJ-el-ku-us
becomes
Milel-ku-uv,
with el as
phonetic complement,
and
I-ku-uv
becomes Mil-ku-us.
Thus,
both
spellings
would,
as was earlier
suspected, represent
one name. This same
divine name is found written DMi-il-ku-uu in KUB XXXVIII 16 obv. 9. Here it is not
inappropriate
to note even that the traces in the
copy
show that the scribe
may very
well have started to write the name
as
DIv/Milil-ku-u;
there is an erasure after the
DINGIR
sign.
The traces show two horizontals
running
into the
winkelhacken
that
begins
the mi
sign.
Thus,
the scribe
may
have
begun
to write the
is/mil sign,
erased
it,
and then written what is now in the text.
So,
we have not three different divine
names,
Ivelku-,
Icku-,
and
Millcu-,
but
one, i.e.,
Millcu-,
written now
Milel-ku-u,
again
Mil-ku,
and
finally
Mi-il-ku.
4L. Jakob-Rost, "Zu den hethitischen Bild-
beschreibungen (I. Teil),"
MIO 8
(1962): 161-217;
idem,
"Zu den
hethitischen Bildbeschreibungen (II.
Teil),"
MIO 9
(1963):
175-239.
9
KUB XXXVIII 6 i
12, 15, 23;
iii
5;
iv
3, ii, 21;
10 iv 15.
6
Jakob-Rost, "Zu den hethitischen Bildbeschrei-
bungen (II. Teil)," p.
212.
7
J. J.
Stamm, Die
akkadische Namengebung
(Leipzig, 1939).
8
Ibid., p. 292,
n. 2.
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