Sumerian Addenda · Signs

go

Name	DU
Reads	[du], tum₂
Means	to go; a foot/leg in origin
Taught in	04 · The verbal chain, lightly

Where it comes from

A foot and leg, by the classic reading of the picture — a person’s own legs, doing the going. It writes du, “to go”; in administrative lines the same sign regularly means “delivered, brought,” and it carries the further reading tum₂, “to bring.” Motion in every direction, one leg.

How to remember it

Go: a leg mid-stride, heel up. Whether a person goes or a jar of oil is walked to the palace, the script sends the same foot to do it.

In the wild

𒉌 𒂍 𒃲 𒁺i₃ e₂-gal DU"oil — (to the) palace — delivered"

FTP 100, ED IIIa (ca. 2600–2500 BCE), Šuruppak (mod. Fara), University of Pennsylvania Museum. CDLI P010016 via Nabu, urn:nabu:cdli:p010016 · license: attribution.

Piece by piece:

i₃ — oil
e₂-gal — the palace, the “big house”
DU — delivered: the foot-sign as the receipt’s whole verb

Three signs, a complete delivery record. The line is read in 102’s chapter 04.