[SunkenCiv]

Not a proper GGG topic, just thought you'd like to unwind a bit before bed.

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The EPIC OF GILGAMESH is the earliest great work of literature that we know of, and was first written down by the Sumerians around 2100 B.C.

Ancient Sumer was the land that lay between the two rivers, the Tigris and Euphrates, in Mesopotamia. The language that the Sumerians spoke was unrelated to the Semitic languages of their neighbors the Akkadians and Babylonians, and it was written in a syllabary (a kind of alphabet) called "cuneiform". By 2000 B.C., the language of Sumer had almost completely died out and was used only by scholars (like Latin is today). No one knows how it was pronounced because it has not been heard in 4000 years.

What you hear in this video are a few of the opening lines of part of the epic poem, accompanied only by a long-neck, three-string, Sumerian lute known as a "gish-gu-di". The instrument is tuned to G - G - D, and although it is similar to other long neck lutes still in use today (the tar, the setar, the saz, etc.) the modern instruments are low tension and strung with fine steel wire. The ancient long neck lutes (such as the Egyptian "nefer") were strung with gut and behaved slightly differently. The short-neck lute known as the "oud" is strung with gut/nylon, and its sound has much in common with the ancient long-neck lute although the oud is not a fretted instrument and its strings are much shorter (about 25 inches or 63 cm) as compared to 32 inches (82 cm) on a long-neck instrument.

For anyone interested in these lutes, I highly recommend THE ARCHAEOMUSICOLOGY OF THE ANCIENT NEAR EAST by Professor Richard Dumbrill.

The location for this performance is the courtyard of Nebuchadnezzar's palace in Babylon. The piece is four minutes long and is intended only as a taste of what the music of ancient Sumer might have sounded like.

The Epic Of Gilgamesh In Sumerian | June 9, 2014 | Peter Pringle

[proud American in Canada]

THANK YOU!

I majored in Ancient, Medieval and Renaissance history. Had to read it, IIRC. But college was a long time ago. :)

Thanks for posting this!

[COBOL2Java]

Very cool. I’m an amateur musicologist (B.A). I love these kinds of stories - thanks for posting.

[Openurmind]

What can be done with only three strings? Hand this guy that lute and he will show you... :)

https://youtu.be/V9-ltPsbw9g

[flaglady47]

Thank you for the treat of The Epic of Gilgamesh and Peter Pringle. There was lots of interesting videos at the link. Love reading about the old instruments. I bookmarked the page for further perusal when I have more time. As it was, I was on it quite a lot this first time.

[SunkenCiv]

Well, that went pretty well:

https://freerepublic.com/focus/chat/3987846/posts?page=78#78