Welcome to the Royal Display Room

Many ancient kings left to posterity, including us, records of their sovereignty, piety, and accomplishments. During the course of building projects sponsored by the king at religious and political locations, workers inscribed the king's name, titles, and activities on bricks, decorative cones forming facades, massive stone door-sockets, and foundation deposits of tablets and figurines. Large and small free-standing monuments were also carved (or cast) and set on display. Vases holding votive offerings for the major deities of the realm were also eligible for inscribing of names, status, and activity.

Since the Enlil temple at Nippur was a focus of worship and veneration throughout Sumer and Akkad for many centuries, it attracted sponsorship and donations from many powerful and not so powerful kings and high officials. Examples of royal and noble interest in Nippur are presented here. To discover more resources on royal inscriptions, visit the Reading Room.

Shar-kali-sharri, Akkadian King

The powerful Akkadian kings ruling Sumer and Akkad from the city of Agade in northern Babylonia took a strong interest in Nippur and its patron deity Enlil, the Sumerian high god who bestowed kingship. Kings Naram-Sin (2254-2218 B.C.) and his son and successor Shar-kali-sharri (2217-2193 B.C.) devoted attention to construction work on Ekur, Enlil's temple on the east side of Nippur. You can study Shar-kali-sharri's cuneiform inscription on a door-socket in two ways. Both provide detailed explanation of the inscription.

Photograph of Shar-kali-sharri's door-socket.
Hand-copy of cuneiform of Shar-kali-sharri's door-socket.

Ur-Nammu, King of Ur

After a period of foreign intrusion and political fragmentation, Ur-Nammu (2112-2095 B.C.) succeeded in unifying Sumer and Akkad again, from his capital at Ur, located far in the south of Mesopotamia. Sumerian writing was emphasized. He and his successors built up a complex and far-reaching bureaucracy which maintained strict control over the realm. Ur-Nammu was a devoted builder of temples and constructed ziggurats (enormous stepped towers) in several important cities of the kingdom. The ziggurat for Enlil at Nippur owes its original founding to Ur-Nammu. How he justified such an innovation at such an ancient sacred site is unknown. The presentation here of his door-socket inscription in the Ekur provides the opportunity to explain a little Sumerian grammar and vocabulary. Let Dubsar know what you think!

Hand-copy of Ur-Nammu's door-socket inscription.

Click on these links to navigate our site:

To see Nippur through the eyes of explorer and excavator John Punnett Peters, first modern archaeologist at Nippur, visit our Earth-Moving Room.

To help visualize the location and layout of Nippur, visit the Map Room.

To learn more about ancient Nippur, discover the resources in the Reading Room, or study the bigger picture of cuneiform culture at the Reading Room's Cultural Annex.

To get an overview of Nippur, go to the Broad Vista Room.

To evaluate the specialization of labor and professionalism at ancient Nippur, take a look in the Professional Room.

After you have wandered through the rooms of Dubsar's abode, try your hand at the Nippur Quiz. JavaScript required.

Return to the home page of Dubsar, the Cuneiform Scribe.

Sign My Guestbook

View My Guestbook

This page was edited on 17 January 1999. If you have cuneiform questions or comments, please email Dubsar, the Cuneiform Scribe. If I do not respond promptly, the vendor supplying Fortune City's email service may be eating your mail for lunch. In that case, you can give a shout over to Dubsar's Sand Dune to get my attention. Thanks! � Erasmus Compositor, P.O. Box 25958, Baltimore, MD 21224.