Sumerian Addenda · Signs
born
| Name | TU |
|---|---|
| Reads | [tu] (fuller form tud) |
| Means | to be born (tu-ud) |
| Taught in | 15 · Born a hero |
Where it comes from
Tu, fully tu-ud: “to be born, to give birth.” The royal hymns run on it — kings in that genre are always being born magnificently, of goddesses, of dragons, since the day itself. Everyone else is simply born, with the same sign.
How to remember it
Born: the smallest door in the script, and everyone comes through it. When a hymn wants a hero’s origin story, this sign opens the account — since I was born…
In the wild
urn:nabu:cdli:p100034:obverse:2 ·
license: attribution. Name translations are approximate by
nature.
Piece by piece:
- ki … -ta — “from (the place of) …”: place plus the ablative, the standard transfer formula
- a-tu — the man’s name, Atu — this sign closing it
Goods change hands, and the record names their source. The hymn where this sign does its birth-work is read in 102’s chapter 15.