The

cuneiform Cuneiform is a logo- syllabic script that was used to write several languages of the Ancient Middle East. The script was in active use from the early Bronze Age until the beginning of the Common Era. It is named for the characteristic wedg ...

sign KÁ, for ''gate'' is the

Sumerogram A Sumerogram is the use of a Sumerian cuneiform character or group of characters as an ideogram or logogram rather than a syllabogram in the graphic representation of a language other than Sumerian, such as Akkadian or Hittite. Sumerograms are no ...

logogram In a written language, a logogram, logograph, or lexigraph is a written character that represents a word or morpheme. Chinese characters (pronounced ''hanzi'' in Mandarin, ''kanji'' in Japanese, ''hanja'' in Korean) are generally logograms, as ...

) used in the Amarna letters and the

Epic of Gilgamesh The ''Epic of Gilgamesh'' () is an epic poem from ancient Mesopotamia, and is regarded as the earliest surviving notable literature and the second oldest religious text, after the Pyramid Texts. The literary history of Gilgamesh begins wit ...

; as just ''KÁ'' it means "gate" or "doorway",

Akkadian language Akkadian (, Akkadian: )John Huehnergard & Christopher Woods, "Akkadian and Eblaite", ''The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the World's Ancient Languages''. Ed. Roger D. Woodard (2004, Cambridge) Pages 218-280 is an extinct East Semitic language th ...

, "bābu"; as "Gate-Great", KÁ.GAL for City-Gate, it is from Akkadian "abullu", ("(city) gate"). Both uses are in the Epic of Gilgamesh. In the Epic, it is only used as the sumerogram, a total of 19 times, (7 times for 'abullu', city gate). In the Epic, all spellings for city gate use KÁ.GAL; for gate ('bābu') only one spelling uses the alphabetic letters for b-a-b-u; the rest use KÁ along with other added cuneiform signs (KÁ-x-x, or KÁ-x, etc.).

Amarna letters

In the Amarna letters, the topic of

Amarna letter EA 296 Amarna (; ar, العمارنة, al-ʿamārnah) is an extensive Egyptian archaeological site containing the remains of what was the capital city of the late Eighteenth Dynasty. The city was established in 1346 BC, built at the direction of the Ph ...

, ''Under the Yoke,'' is the guarding of two cities, at the city gate; also the man authoring the letter,

Yabitiri Yabitiri was a mayor/ruler of an unknown city/ city-state in southern Canaan, during the 1350–1335 BC Amarna letters correspondence. The city he represented is in proximity to the two cities mentioned in his only Amarna letter, EA 296, ( EA for ...

-(Yahtiru)-(governor?) of City? is called a "gatekeeper", lines 24 and 31:

LÚ The cuneiform sign LÚ () is the sign used for "man"; its complement is the symbol for woman: '' šal'' (). Cuneiform ''LÚ'', (or ''lú'' as rendered in some texts) is found as a Sumerogram in the ''Epic of Gilgamesh''. It also has a commo ...

. PA.KÁ.ŠU, Man-Gate-"hand".

Šu (cuneiform) The cuneiform šu sign is a common, multi-use syllabic and alphabetic sign for ''šu'', ''š'', and ''u''; it has a subsidiary usage for syllabic ''qat''; it also has a majuscule-(capital letter) Sumerogram usage for ŠU, for Akkadian language ...

, (shaped like a 'hand'), has the secondary meaning besides ''šu'', for Akkadian language ''qat'', for "qātu", 'hand' (as ŠU, a sumerogram), and used for 9 of about 15 spellings of 'qātu' in the Epic of Gilgamesh. In letter EA 296, the text is as follows: (reverse side of letter)Moran, 1987, 1992. ''The Amarna Letters,'', EA 296, ''Under the Yoke'', pp. 338-9. :"...inquire of his commissioner whether I guard the ''city gate'' of Azzatu, and the ''city gate'' of Yapu, ...." The city gate is also discussed in the Amarna letter from

Tjaru Tjaru ( egy, ṯꜣrw) was an ancient Egyptian fortress on the ''Way of Horus'' or ''Horus military road'', the major road leading out of Egypt into Canaan. It was known in Greek as Selē ( grc, Σελη), in Latin as Sile or Sele, and in Coptic ...

References

Moran, William L. William Lambert Moran (August 11, 1921 – December 19, 2000) was an American Assyriologist. He was born in Chicago, United States. In 1939, Moran joined the Jesuit order. He then attended Loyola University in Chicago, where he received his ...

1987, 1992. ''The Amarna Letters.'' Johns Hopkins University Press, 1987, 1992. 393 pages.(softcover, ) * Parpola, 1971. ''The Standard Babylonian

'', Parpola, Simo,

Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project The Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project is an international scholarly project aimed at collecting and publishing ancient Assyrian texts and studies based on them. Its headquarters are in Helsinki in Finland. State Archives of Assyria State Archives ...

, c 1997, Tablet I thru Tablet XII, Index of Names, Sign List, and Glossary-(pp. 119–145), 165 pages. ---- File:GAL-rabu Cuneiform.svg, Cuneiform GAL, gal, (a following horizontal stroke upon

Ma (cuneiform) The cuneiform ma sign, is found in both the 14th century BC Amarna letters and the ''Epic of Gilgamesh''. In the Epic it is also used as the Sumerogram MA, (for Akkadian language "mina", ''manû'', a weight measure, as MA.NA, or MA.NA.ÀM). ...

).
As KÁ.GAL, the

GAL (great Sumerogram) Gal may refer to: People Surname * Gál, a Hungarian surname * Andreas Gal (born 1976), German programmer * Dani Gal (born 1975), Israeli video artist * Dean Gal (born 1995), Israeli footballer * Edward Gal (born 1970), Dutch dressage rider * G ...

. Cuneiform signs Sumerograms {{Semitic-lang-stub

Amarna letters

See also

References