Akkadian language

Akkadian ( ; ) is an extinct East Semitic language that is attested in ancient Mesopotamia (Akkad, Assyria, Isin, Larsa, Babylonia) from the mid-third millennium BC until its gradual replacement in common use by Old Aramaic among Mesopotamians by the 8th century BC.

Akkadian, which is the earliest documented Semitic language, is named after the city of Akkad, a major centre of Mesopotamian civilization during the Akkadian Empire (–2154 BC). It was written using the cuneiform script, originally used for Sumerian, but also used to write multiple languages in the region including Eblaite, Hurrian, Elamite, Old Persian and Hittite. The influence of Sumerian on Akkadian went beyond just the cuneiform script; owing to their close proximity, a lengthy span of contact and the prestige held by the former, Sumerian significantly influenced Akkadian phonology, vocabulary and syntax. This mutual influence of Akkadian and Sumerian has also led scholars to describe the languages as a sprachbund.

Akkadian proper names are first attested in Sumerian texts in the mid-3rd millennium BC, and inscriptions ostensibly written in Sumerian but whose character order reveals that they were intended to be read in East Semitic (presumably early Akkadian) date back to as early as . From about the 24th century BC, texts fully written in Akkadian begin to appear. By the 20th century BC, two variant forms of the same language were in use in Assyria and Babylonia, known as Assyrian and Babylonian respectively. The bulk of preserved material is from this later period, corresponding to the Near Eastern Iron Age. In total, hundreds of thousands of texts and text fragments have been excavated, covering a vast textual tradition of religious and mythological narrative, legal texts, scientific works, personal correspondence, political, civil and military events, economic tracts and many other examples.

Centuries after the fall of the Akkadian Empire, Akkadian, in its Assyrian and Babylonian varieties, was the native language of the Mesopotamian empires (Old Assyrian Empire, Babylonia, Middle Assyrian Empire) throughout the later Bronze Age, and became the lingua franca of much of the Ancient Near East by the time of the Bronze Age collapse . However, its decline began in the Iron Age, during the Neo-Assyrian Empire, by about the 8th century BC (Tiglath-Pileser III), in favour of Old Aramaic. By the Hellenistic period, the language was largely confined to scholars and priests working in temples in Assyria and Babylonia. The last known Akkadian cuneiform document dates from the 1st century AD.

Mandaic and Suret are two (Northwest Semitic) Neo-Aramaic languages that retain some Akkadian vocabulary and grammatical features.

Akkadian is a fusional language with grammatical case. Like all Semitic languages, Akkadian uses the system of consonantal roots. The Kültepe texts, which were written in Old Assyrian, include Hittite loanwords and names, which constitute the oldest record of any Indo-European language.

Classification

Akkadian is a Semitic language of the East Semitic branch. Its relatives in the East Semitic branch include Eblaite. This group differs from the Northwest Semitic languages (such as Aramaic) and South Semitic languages (such as Geʽez) in its subject–object–verb word order, while the other Semitic languages usually have either a verb–subject–object or subject–verb–object order.

In contrast to most other Semitic languages, Akkadian has only one non-sibilant fricative: ḫ . Akkadian lost both the glottal and pharyngeal fricatives, which are characteristic of the other Semitic languages. Until the Old Babylonian period, the Akkadian sibilants were exclusively affricated.

Old Akkadian, 2500–1950 BC
Old Babylonian and Old Assyrian, 1950–1530 BC
Middle Babylonian and Middle Assyrian, 1530–1000 BC
Neo-Babylonian and Neo-Assyrian, 1000–600 BC
Late Babylonian, 600 BC100 AD

One of the earliest known Akkadian inscriptions was found on a bowl at Ur, addressed to the very early pre-Sargonic king Meskiagnunna of Ur (–2450 BC) by his queen Gan-saman, who is thought to have been from Akkad. The Akkadian Empire, established by Sargon of Akkad, introduced the Akkadian language (the "language of Akkad") as a written language, adapting Sumerian cuneiform orthography for the purpose. During the Middle Bronze Age (Old Assyrian and Old Babylonian period), the language virtually displaced Sumerian, which is assumed to have been extinct as a living language by the 18th century BC.

Old Akkadian, which was used until the end of the 3rd millennium BC, differed from both Babylonian and Assyrian, and was displaced by these dialects. By the 21st century BC Babylonian and Assyrian, which were to become the primary dialects, were easily distinguishable. Old Babylonian, along with the closely related dialect Mariotic, is clearly more innovative than the Old Assyrian dialect and the more distantly related Eblaite language. For this reason, forms like lu-prus ('I will decide') were first encountered in Old Babylonian instead of the older la-prus.

While generally more archaic, Assyrian developed certain innovations as well, such as the "Assyrian vowel harmony". Eblaite was even more so, retaining a productive dual and a relative pronoun declined in case, number and gender. Both of these had already disappeared in Old Akkadian. Over 20,000 cuneiform tablets in Old Assyrian have been recovered from the Kültepe site in Anatolia.

Most of the archaeological evidence is typical of Anatolia rather than of Assyria, but the use both of cuneiform and the dialect is the best indication of Assyrian presence.

The Middle Babylonian period started in the 16th century BC. The division is marked by the Kassite invasion of Babylonia around 1550 BC. The Kassites, who reigned for 300 years, gave up their own language in favor of Akkadian, but they had little influence on the language. At its apogee, Middle Babylonian was the written language of diplomacy of the entire Ancient Near East, including Egypt (Amarna Period). During this period, a large number of loan words were included in the language from Northwest Semitic languages and Hurrian. However, the use of these words was confined to the fringes of the Akkadian-speaking territory.

From 1500 BC onwards, the Assyrian language is termed Middle Assyrian. It was the language of the Middle Assyrian Empire. However, the Babylonian cultural influence was strong and the Assyrians wrote royal inscriptions, religious and most scholarly texts in Middle Babylonian, whereas Middle Assyrian was used mostly in letters and administrative documents.

thumb|A Neo-Babylonian inscription of Nebuchadnezzar IIDuring the first millennium BC, Akkadian progressively lost its status as a lingua franca. In the beginning, from around 1000 BC, Akkadian and Aramaic were of equal status, as can be seen in the number of copied texts: clay tablets were written in Akkadian, while scribes writing on papyrus and leather used Aramaic. From this period on, one speaks of Neo-Babylonian and Neo-Assyrian.

Neo-Assyrian experienced an upswing in popularity in the 10th century BC when the Assyrian kingdom became a major power with the Neo-Assyrian Empire. During the existence of that empire, however, Neo-Assyrian began to turn into a chancellery language, being marginalized by Old Aramaic. The dominance of the Neo-Assyrian Empire under Tiglath-Pileser III over Aram-Damascus in the middle of the 8th century led to the establishment of Aramaic as a lingua franca of the empire, rather than it being eclipsed by Akkadian. Texts written 'exclusively' in Neo-Assyrian disappear within 10 years of Nineveh's destruction in 612 BC. Under the Achaemenids, Aramaic continued to prosper, but Assyrian continued its decline. The language's final demise came about during the Hellenistic period when it was further marginalized by Koine Greek, even though Neo-Assyrian cuneiform remained in use in literary tradition well into Parthian times.

Neo-Assyrian was used in some surviving tablets containing poetry and also more prominently in surviving letters of royal correspondence. Because of the multilingual nature of the empire, many loan words are attested as entering the Assyrian language during the Neo-Assyrian period. The number of surviving documents written in cuneiform grew considerably fewer in the late reign of Ashurbanipal, which suggests that the language was declining since it is probably attributable to an increased use of Aramaic, often written on perishable materials like leather scrolls or papyrus. The Neo-Assyrian Akkadian language did not disappear completely until around the end of the 6th century BC however, well into the subsequent post-imperial period.

Similarly, the Persian conquest of the Mesopotamian kingdoms contributed to the decline of Babylonian, from that point on known as Late Babylonian, as a popular language. However, the language was still used in its written form. Even after the Greek invasion under Alexander the Great in the 4th century BC, Akkadian was still a contender as a written language, but spoken Akkadian was likely extinct by this time, or at least rarely used. The last positively identified Akkadian text comes from the 1st century AD. The latest known text in cuneiform Babylonian is an astronomical almanac dated to 79/80 AD. However, the latest cuneiform texts are almost entirely written in Sumerian logograms. Iamblichus, a 2nd century Syrian novelist, may have been one of the last known people to know Babylonian.

Decipherment

thumb|150px|[[Georg Friedrich Grotefend]]

The Akkadian language began to be rediscovered when Carsten Niebuhr in 1767 was able to make extensive copies of cuneiform texts and published them in Denmark. The deciphering of the texts started immediately, and bilinguals, in particular Old Persian-Akkadian bilinguals, were of great help. Since the texts contained several royal names, isolated signs could be identified, and were presented in 1802 by Georg Friedrich Grotefend. By this time it was already evident that Akkadian was a Semitic language, and the final breakthrough in deciphering the language came from Edward Hincks, Henry Rawlinson and Jules Oppert in the middle of the 19th century.

In the early 21st century it was shown that automatic high-quality translation of Akkadian can be achieved using natural language processing methods such as convolutional neural networks.

right|thumb|200px|The [[deluge (mythology)|Deluge tablet of the Gilgamesh epic in Akkadian]]

Dialects

The following table summarises the dialects of Akkadian identified with certainty so far.

{| class="wikitable"

|+ Known Akkadian dialects

! Dialect !! Location

| Assyrian || Northern Mesopotamia

| Babylonian || Central and Southern Mesopotamia

| Mariotic || Central Euphrates (in and around the city of Mari)

| Nuzi || Northern Tigris (in and around the city of Nuzi)

| Tell Beydar || Northern Syria (in and around Tell Beydar)

Some researchers (such as W. Sommerfeld 2003) believe that the Old Akkadian variant used in the older texts is not an ancestor of the later Assyrian and Babylonian dialects, but rather a separate dialect that was replaced by these two dialects and which died out early.

Eblaite, formerly thought of as yet another Akkadian dialect, is now generally considered a separate East Semitic language.

Phonology

Because Akkadian as a spoken language is extinct and no contemporary descriptions of the pronunciation are known, little can be said with certainty about the phonetics and phonology of Akkadian. Some conclusions can be made, however, due to the relationship to the other Semitic languages and variant spellings of Akkadian words.

Consonants

The following table presents the consonants of the Akkadian language, as distinguished in Akkadian cuneiform. The reconstructed phonetic value

| rowspan="3" |

! emphatic

! voiced

! rowspan="2" | Fricative

!voiceless

| colspan="2" |

!voiced

| colspan="2" |

! colspan="2" | Approximant

Reconstruction

thumb|The first known Sumerian-Akkadian bilingual tablet dates from the reign of [[Rimush. Louvre Museum AO 5477. The top column is in Sumerian; the bottom column is its translation in Akkadian.]]

Akkadian emphatic consonants are typically reconstructed as ejectives, which are thought to be the oldest realization of emphatics across the Semitic languages. One piece of evidence for this is that Akkadian shows a development known as Geers's law, where one of two emphatic consonants dissimilates to the corresponding non-emphatic consonant. For the sibilants, traditionally has been held to be postalveolar , and , , analyzed as fricatives; but attested assimilations in Akkadian suggest otherwise. For example, when the possessive suffix -šu is added to the root awat ('word'), it is written awassu ('his word') even though šš would be expected.

The most straightforward interpretation of this shift from tš to ss, is that form a pair of voiceless alveolar affricates , is a voiceless alveolar sibilant , and is a voiced alveolar affricate or fricative . The assimilation is then [awat+su] > . In this vein, an alternative transcription of is , with the macron below indicating a soft (lenis) articulation in Semitic transcription. Other interpretations are possible. could have been assimilated to the preceding , yielding , which would later have been simplified to .

The rhotic has traditionally been interpreted as a voiced alveolar trill but its pattern of alternation with suggests it was a fricative (either uvular or velar ). In the Hellenistic period, Akkadian was transcribed using the Greek ρ, indicating it was pronounced similarly as an alveolar sound (though Greeks may also have perceived a uvular trill as ρ). The following table shows Proto-Semitic phonemes and their correspondences among Akkadian, Modern Standard Arabic and Tiberian Hebrew:

thumb|An inscription in Babylonian, in the [[Xerxes I inscription at Van, 5th century BC]]

{| class="wikitable" style="text-align:center;" align="center"

! | Proto-Semitic

! | Akkadian

! colspan="2" | Arabic

! colspan="2" |Aramaic

! colspan="2" | Hebrew

| '

| ب ||

|𐡁

| ב ||

| '

| د ||

|𐡃

| ד ||

| '

| ج ||

|𐡂

| ג ||

| '

| ف ||

|𐡐

| פ ||

| '

| ت ||

|𐡕

| ת ||

| '

| ك ||

|𐡊

| כ ||

| (∅)/ <big></big>

| ء || <big></big>

|𐡀

|<big></big>

| א || <big></big>

| '

| ط ||

|𐡈

| ט ||

| '

| ق ||

|𐡒

| ק ||

| rowspan="2" valign="center" | '

| ذ ||

|',

| rowspan="2" | ז || rowspan="2" |

| ز ||

|𐡆

| rowspan="3" valign="center" | '

| ث ||

|',

| rowspan="2" |שׁ || rowspan="2" |

| س ||

|𐡔

| ش ||

|',

| שׂ

| '

| س ||

|𐡎

| ס

| rowspan="3" valign="center" | '

| ظ ||

|',

| rowspan="3" |צ || rowspan="3" |

| ص ||

|𐡑

| ض ||

|', <big></big>

| '

| غ ||

| rowspan="2" |

|', <big></big>

| rowspan="2" |ע || rowspan="2" | <big></big>

| ' / (e)

| ع || <big></big>

|<big></big>

| '

| خ ||

| rowspan="2" |

|',

| rowspan="2" |ח || rowspan="2" |

| (e) There is limited contrast between different u-signs in lexical texts, but this scribal differentiation may reflect the superimposition of the Sumerian phonological system (for which an /o/ phoneme has also been proposed), rather than a separate phoneme in Akkadian.

All consonants and vowels appear in long and short forms. Long consonants are transliterated as double consonants, and inconsistently written as such in cuneiform. Long vowels are transliterated with a macron (ā, ē, ī, ū) or a circumflex (â, ê, î, û), the latter being used for long vowels arising from the contraction of vowels in hiatus. The distinction between long and short is phonemic, and is used in the grammar; for example, iprusu ('that he decided') versus iprusū ('they decided').

Stress

There is broad agreement among most Assyriologists about Akkadian stress patterns. The rules of Akkadian stress were originally reconstructed by means of a comparison with other Semitic languages, and the resulting picture was gradually amended using internal linguistic evidence from Akkadian sources, especially deriving from so-called plene spellings (spellings with an extra vowel).

| šarr-īn || šarr-at-īn

! rowspan="2" |Plural

! Nominative

| šarr-ū || šarr-āt-um || dann-ūt-um || dann-āt-um

! Oblique

| šarr-ī || šarr-āt-im || dann-ūt-im || dann-āt-im

As is clear from the above table, the adjective and noun endings differ only in the masculine plural. Certain nouns, primarily those referring to geography, can also form a locative ending in -um in the singular and the resulting forms serve as adverbials. These forms are generally not productive, but in the Neo-Babylonian the um-locative replaces several constructions with the preposition ina.

In the later stages of Akkadian, the mimation (word-final -m) and nunation (dual final -n) that occurred at the end of most case endings disappeared, except in the locative. Later, the nominative and accusative singular of masculine nouns collapsed to -u and in Neo-Babylonian most word-final short vowels were dropped. As a result, case differentiation disappeared from all forms except masculine plural nouns. However, many texts continued the practice of writing the case endings, although often sporadically and incorrectly. As the most important contact language throughout this period was Aramaic, which itself lacks case distinctions, it is possible that Akkadian's loss of cases was an areal as well as phonological phenomenon.

Noun states and nominal sentences

As is also the case in other Semitic languages, Akkadian nouns may appear in a variety of "states" depending on their grammatical function in a sentence. The basic form of the noun is the status rectus (the governed state), which is the form as described above, complete with case endings. In addition to this, Akkadian has the status absolutus (the absolute state) and the status constructus (construct state). The latter is found in all other Semitic languages, while the former appears only in Akkadian and some dialects of Aramaic.

The status absolutus is characterised by the loss of a noun's case ending (e.g. awīl < awīlum, šar < šarrum). It is relatively uncommon, and is used chiefly to mark the predicate of a nominal sentence, in fixed adverbial expressions, and in expressions relating to measurements of length, weight, and the like.

The status constructus is more common by far, and has a much wider range of applications. It is employed when a noun is followed by another noun in the genitive, a pronominal suffix, or a verbal clause in the subjunctive, and typically takes the shortest form of the noun which is phonetically possible. In general, this amounts to the loss of case endings with short vowels, with the exception of the genitive -i in nouns preceding a pronominal suffix, hence:

but

There are numerous exceptions to this general rule, usually involving potential violations of the language's phonological limitations. Most obviously, Akkadian does not tolerate word-final consonant clusters, so nouns like kalbum (dog) and maḫrum (front) would have illegal construct state forms *kalb and *maḫr unless modified. In many of these instances, the first vowel of the word is simply repeated (e.g. kalab, maḫar). This rule, however, does not always hold true, especially in nouns where a short vowel has historically been elided (e.g. šaknum < *šakinum "governor"). In these cases, the lost vowel is restored in the construct state (so šaknum yields šakin).

A genitive relation can also be expressed with the relative preposition ša, and the noun that the genitive phrase depends on appears in status rectus.

The same preposition is also used to introduce true relative clauses, in which case the verb is placed in the subjunctive mood.

Verbal morphology

Verb aspects

The Akkadian verb has six finite verb aspects (preterite, perfect, present, imperative, precative, and vetitive (the negative form of precative)) and three infinite forms (infinitive, participle and verbal adjective). The preterite is used for actions that are seen by the speaker as having occurred at a single point in time. The present is primarily imperfective in meaning and is used for concurrent and future actions as well as past actions with a temporal dimension. The final three finite forms are injunctive where the imperative and the precative together form a paradigm for positive commands and wishes, and the vetitive is used for negative wishes. The periphrastic prohibitive, formed by the present form of the verb and the negative adverb lā, is used to express negative commands.

The infinitive of the Akkadian verb is a verbal noun, and in contrast to some other languages the Akkadian infinitive can be declined in case. The verbal adjective is an adjectival form and designates the state or the result of the action of the verb, and consequently the exact meaning of the verbal adjective is determined by the semantics of the verb itself. The participle, which can be active or passive, is another verbal adjective and its meaning is similar to the English gerund.

The following table shows the conjugation of the G-stem verbs derived from the root PRS ("to decide") in the various verb aspects of Akkadian:

{| class="wikitable" align="center"

! colspan="3" |

! Preterite

! Perfect

! Present

! Imperative

! Stative

! Infinitive

! Participle (active)

! Verbal adjective

! rowspan="2" | 1st person

! colspan="2" | singular

|aprus||aptaras||aparras||rowspan=2 bgcolor='gray'| ||parsāku|| rowspan=8|parāsum ||rowspan=8|pārisum (masc.) / pāristum (fem.) || rowspan=8|parsum (masc.) / paristum (fem.)

! colspan="2" | plural

|niprus||niptaras||niparras||parsānu

! rowspan="3" | 2nd person

! rowspan="2" | singular

! masc.

|taprus||taptaras||taparras||purus||parsāta

! fem.

|taprusī||taptarsī (< *taptarasī)||taparrasī||pursi||parsāti

! colspan="2" | plural

|taprusā||taptarsā||taparrasā||pursa||parsātunu (masc.) / parsātina (fem.)

! rowspan="3" | 3rd person

! colspan="2" | singular

|iprus||iptaras||iparras||rowspan=3 bgcolor='gray'| ||paris (masc.) / parsat (fem.)

! rowspan="2" | plural

! masc.

|iprusū||iptarsū (< *iptarasū)||iparrasū||parsū

! fem.

|iprusā||iptarsā (< *iptarasā)||iparrasā||parsā

The table below shows the different affixes attached to the preterite aspect of the verb root PRS "to decide"; and as can be seen, the grammatical genders differ only in the second person singular and third person plural.

{| class="wikitable"

! colspan="3" |

! G-Stem

! D-Stem

! Š-Stem

! N-Stem

! rowspan="2" | 1st person

! colspan="2" | singular

| a-prus-Ø || u-parris-Ø || u-šapris-Ø || a-pparis-Ø

! colspan="2" | plural

| ni-prus-Ø || nu-parris-Ø || nu-šapris-Ø || ni-pparis-Ø

! rowspan="3" | 2nd person

! singular

! masc.

| ta-prus-Ø || tu-parris-Ø || tu-šapris-Ø || ta-pparis-Ø

! singular

! fem.

| ta-prus-ī || tu-parris-ī || tu-šapris-ī || ta-ppars-ī

! colspan="2" | plural

| ta-prus-ā || tu-parris-ā || tu-šapris-ā || ta-ppars-ā

! rowspan="3" | 3rd person

! colspan="2" | singular

| i-prus-Ø || u-parris-Ø || u-šapris-Ø || i-pparis-Ø

! plural

! masc.

| i-prus-ū || u-parris-ū || u-šapris-ū || i-ppars-ū

! plural

! fem.

| i-prus-ā || u-parris-ā || u-šapris-ā || i-ppars-ā

Verb moods

Akkadian verbs have three moods:

Indicative, used in independent clauses, is unmarked.
Subjunctive, used in dependent clauses, is marked in forms which do not end in a vowel by the suffix -u (compare Arabic and Ugaritic subjunctives) but is otherwise unmarked. In the later stages of most dialects, the subjunctive is indistinct, as short final vowels were mostly lost.
Venitive or allative, not a mood in the strictest sense, being a development of the first-person dative pronominal suffix -am/-m/-nim. With verbs of motion, it often indicates motion toward an object or person (e.g., illik, "he went" vs. illikam, "he came"). However, this pattern is not consistent, even in earlier stages of the language, and its use often appears to serve a stylistic rather than morphological or lexical function.

The following table demonstrates the verb moods of verbs derived from the root PRS ("to decide", "to separate"):

{| class="wikitable"

! Preterite.

! Stative. || -ni || -ni || -niāti || -am/-nim || -niāšim

! rowspan=2|2nd

!masculine

| -ka || -kunu || -ka || -kunūti || -kum || -kunūšim

!feminine

| -ki || -kina || -ki || -kināti || -kim || -kināšim

! rowspan=2|3rd

!masculine

| -šu || -šunu || -šu || -šunūti || -šum || -šunūšim

!feminine

| -ša || -šina || -ši || -šināti || -šim || -šināšim

Demonstrative pronouns

Demonstrative pronouns in Akkadian differ from the Western Semitic variety. The following tables show the Akkadian demonstrative pronouns according to near and far deixis:

{| class="wikitable"

|+ Proximal Demonstrative ("this", "these")

! colspan="2" |

! Masculine

! Feminine

! rowspan="3" | Singular

! Nom.

|annûm||annītum

! Acc.

|anniam||annītam

! Gen.

|annîm||annītim

! rowspan="2" | Plural

! Nom.

|annûtum||anniātum

! Acc./Gen.

|annûtim||anniātim

{| class="wikitable"

|+ Distal Demonstrative ("that", "those")

! colspan="2" |

! Masculine

! Feminine

! rowspan="3" | Singular

! Nom.

|ullûm||ullītum

! Acc.

|ulliam||ullītam

! Gen.

|ullîm||ullītim

! rowspan="2" | Plural

! Nom.

|ullûtum||ulliātum

! Acc./Gen.

|ullûtim||ulliātim

Relative pronouns

Relative pronouns in Akkadian are shown in the following table:

{| class="wikitable"

! colspan="2" |

! Nominative

! Accusative

! Genitive

! rowspan="2" | Singular

! masc.

| šu

| ša

| ši

! fem.

| šāt

| colspan="2" | šāti

! colspan="2" | Dual

| colspan="3" | šā

! rowspan="2" | Plural

! masc.

| colspan="3" | šūt

! fem.

| colspan="3" | šāt

Unlike plural relative pronouns, singular relative pronouns in Akkadian exhibit full declension for case. Only the form ša (originally accusative masculine singular) survived, while the other forms disappeared in time.

Interrogative pronouns

The following table shows the interrogative pronouns used in Akkadian:

{| class="wikitable"

! Akkadian

! English

| mannum||who?

| mīnum, minûm||what?

| ayyum||which?

Prepositions

Akkadian has prepositions which consist mainly of only one word. For example: ina (in, on, out, through, under), ana (to, for, after, approximately), adi (to), aššum (because of), eli (up, over), ištu/ultu (of, since), mala (in accordance with), itti (also, with). There are some compound prepositions which are combined with ina and ana (e.g. ina maḫar (forwards), ina balu (without), ana ṣēr (up to), ana maḫar (forwards). Regardless of the complexity of the preposition, the following noun is always in the genitive case.

Examples: ina bītim (in the house, from the house), ana dummuqim (to do good), itti šarrim (with the king), ana ṣēr mārīšu (up to his son).

Numerals

Since numerals are written mostly as a number sign in the cuneiform script, the transliteration of many numerals is not well ascertained yet. Along with the counted noun, the cardinal numerals are in the status absolutus. Because other cases are very rare, the forms of the status rectus are known only by isolated numerals. The numerals 1 and 2 as well as 21–29, 31–39, 41–49 correspond with the counted in the grammatical gender. The numerals 3–20, 30, 40 and 50 are characterized by polarity of gender, i.e. if the counted noun is masculine, the numeral would be feminine and vice versa.

This polarity is typical of the Semitic languages and appears, for example, in classical Arabic. The numerals 60, 100, and 1,000 do not change according to the gender of the counted noun. Counted nouns more than two appear in the plural form. Body parts that occur in pairs appear in the dual form in Akkadian; e.g., šēpum (foot) becomes šēpān (two feet).

The ordinals are formed (with few exceptions) by adding a case ending to the nominal form PaRuS. The P, R and S must be substituted with the suitable consonants of the numeral. It is noted, that in the case of the numeral "one", the ordinal (masculine) and the cardinal number are the same. A metathesis occurs in the numeral "four".

{| class="wikitable" align="center"

|+Akkadian numbers

!rowspan=3|#

!colspan=4|Cardinal

!Congruence

!colspan=2|Ordinal

!colspan=2|(masculine)

!colspan=2|(feminine)

!rowspan=2|(Gender agreement of the cardinal numeral)

!rowspan=2|(masculine)

!rowspan=2|(feminine)

!(absolute)

!(free)

!(absolute)

!(free)

| align='left' | 1 || ištēn || (ištēnum) || išteat, ištēt || (ištētum) || Congruent (no gender polarity) || pānûm maḫrûm (ištīʾum) ištēn || pānītum maḫrītum (ištītum) išteat

| align='left' | 2 || šinā || — || šittā || — || Congruent || šanûm || šanītum

| align='left' | 3 || šalāšat || šalāštum || šalāš || šalāšum || Gender polarity || šalšum || šaluštum

| align='left' | 4 || erbet(ti) || erbettum || erbe, erba || erbûm || Gender polarity || rebûm || rebūtum

| align='left' | 5 || ḫamšat || ḫamištum || ḫamiš || ḫamšum || Gender polarity || ḫamšum || ḫamuštum

| align='left' | 6 || šeššet || šedištum || šediš? || šeššum || Gender polarity || šeššum || šeduštum

| align='left' | 7 || sebet(ti) || sebettum || sebe || sebûm || Gender polarity || sebûm || sebūtum

| align='left' | 8 || samānat || samāntum || samāne || samānûm || Gender polarity || samnum || samuntum

| align='left' | 9 || tišīt || tišītum || tiše || tišûm || Gender polarity || tešûm || tešūtum

| align='left' | 10 || eš(e)ret || ešertum || ešer || eš(e)rum || Gender polarity || ešrum || ešurtum

| align='left' | 11 || colspan=2| ištēššeret || colspan=2| ištēššer || Gender polarity || ištēššerûm || ištēššerītum

| align='left' | 12 || colspan=2| šinšeret || colspan=2| šinšer || Gender polarity || šinšerûm || šinšerītum

| align='left' | 13 || colspan=2| šalāššeret || colspan=2| šalāššer || Gender polarity || šalāššerûm || šalāššerītum

| align='left' | 14 || colspan=2| erbēšeret || colspan=2| erbēšer || Gender polarity || erbēšerûm || erbēšerītum

| align='left' | 15 || colspan=2| ḫamiššeret || colspan=2| ḫamiššer || Gender polarity || ḫamiššerûm || ḫamiššerītum

| align='left' | 16 || colspan=2| šeššeret? || colspan=2| šeššer? || Gender polarity || šeššerûm? || šeššerītum?

| align='left' | 17 || colspan=2| sebēšeret || colspan=2| sebēšer || Gender polarity || sebēšerûm || sebēšerītum

| align='left' | 18 || colspan=2| samāššeret || colspan=2| samāššer || Gender polarity || samāššerûm || samāššerītum

| align='left' | 19 || colspan=2| tišēšeret || colspan=2| tišēšer || Gender polarity || tišēšerûm || tišēšerītum

| align='left' | 20 || colspan='4' align='center' | ešrā || No gender distinction || ešrûm || ešrītum?

| align='left' | 30 || colspan='4' align='center' | šalāšā || No gender distinction || colspan=2| (as with 20?)

| align='left' | 40 || colspan='4' align='center' | erbeā, erbâ || No gender distinction || colspan=2| (as with 20?)

| align='left' | 50 || colspan='4' align='center' | ḫamšā || No gender distinction || colspan=2| (as with 20?)

| align='left' | 60 || colspan='4' align='center' | absolute šūš(i), free šūšum || No gender distinction || colspan=2| (as with 20?)

| align='left' | 100 || colspan='4' align='center' | absolute sg. meat, pl. meât (free meatum) || No gender distinction || colspan=2| (as with 20?)

| align='left' | 600 || colspan='4' align='center' | absolute nēr, free nērum || No gender distinction || colspan=2| (as with 20?)

| align='left' | 1000 || colspan='4' align='center' | absolute līm(i), free līmum || No gender distinction || colspan=2| (as with 20?)

| align='left' | 3600 || colspan='4' align='center' | absolute šār, free šārum || No gender distinction || colspan=2| (as with 20?)

Examples: erbē aššātum (four wives) (masculine numeral), meat ālānū (100 towns).

Syntax

Nominal phrases

Adjectives, relative clauses and appositions follow the noun.

Numerals precede the counted noun.

In the following table the nominal phrase erbēt šarrū dannūtum ša ālam īpušū abūya 'the four strong kings who built the city are my fathers' is analyzed:

{| class="wikitable"

!Word

!Meaning

!Analysis

!Part of the nominal phrase

| erbēt || four || masculine (gender polarity) || Numeral

| šarr-ū || king || nominative plural || Noun (Subject)

| dann-ūtum || strong || nominative masculine plural || Adjective

| ša || which || relative pronoun || rowspan='3' valign='middle' | Relative clause

| āl-am || city || accusative singular

| īpuš-ū || built|| 3rd person masculine plural

| ab-ū-ya || my fathers || masculine plural + possessive pronoun || Apposition

Sentence syntax

Akkadian sentence order was Subject+Object+Verb (SOV), which sets it apart from most other ancient Semitic languages such as Arabic and Biblical Hebrew, which typically have a verb–subject–object (VSO) word order. Modern South Semitic languages in Ethiopia also have SOV order, but these developed within historical times from the classical verb–subject–object (VSO) language Ge'ez. It has been hypothesized that this word order was a result of influence from the Sumerian language, which was also SOV. There is evidence that native speakers of both languages were in intimate language contact, forming a single society for at least 500 years, so it is entirely likely that a sprachbund could have formed. Further evidence of an original VSO or SVO ordering can be found in the fact that direct and indirect object pronouns are suffixed to the verb. Word order seems to have shifted to SVO/VSO late in the 1st millennium BC to the 1st millennium AD, possibly under the influence of Aramaic.

Vocabulary

The Akkadian vocabulary is mostly of Semitic origin. Although classified as East Semitic, many elements of its basic vocabulary find no evident parallels in related Semitic languages: mārum 'son' (Semitic *bn), qātum 'hand' (Semitic *yd), šēpum 'foot' (Semitic *rgl), qabûm 'say' (Semitic *qwl), izuzzum 'stand' (Semitic *qwm), ana 'to, for' (Semitic *li).

Due to extensive contact with Sumerian and Aramaic, the Akkadian vocabulary contains many loan words from these languages. Aramaic loan words were limited to the 1st centuries of the 1st millennium BC and primarily in the north and middle parts of Mesopotamia. Sumerian loan words were spread in the whole linguistic area. Beside the previous languages, some nouns were borrowed from Hurrian, Kassite, Ugaritic and other ancient languages.

Since Sumerian and Hurrian, two non-Semitic languages, differ from Akkadian in word structure, only nouns and some adjectives (not many verbs) were borrowed from these languages. Some verbs were borrowed, along with many nouns, from Aramaic and Ugaritic, both of which are Semitic languages.

The following table contains examples of loan words in Akkadian:

{| class="wikitable"

!Akkadian

!Meaning

!Source

!Word in the language of origin

| dûm || hill || Sumerian || du

| erēqum || flee || Aramaic || ʿRQ (root)

| gadalûm || dressed in linen || Sumerian || gada lá

| isinnum || firmly || Sumerian || ezen

| kasulatḫum || a device of copper || Hurrian || kasulatḫ-

| kisallum || court || Sumerian || kisal

| laqāḫum || take || Ugaritic || LQḤ (root)

| paraššannum || part of horse riding gear || Hurrian || paraššann-

| purkullum || stone cutter || Sumerian || bur-gul

| qaṭālum || kill || Aramaic || QṬL (root)

| uriḫullum || conventional penalty || Hurrian || uriḫull-

Akkadian was also a source of borrowing to other Semitic languages such as biṣru "onion" (into and ), āsu "myrtle" ( ās) and so on, above all Sumerian with examples: Sumerian da-ri ('lastingly', from Akkadian dārum), Sumerian ra gaba ('riders, messenger', from Akkadian rākibum).

In 2011, the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago completed a 21-volume dictionary, the Chicago Assyrian Dictionary, of the Akkadian language. The dictionary took 90 years to develop, beginning in 1921, with the first volume published in 1956. The completion of this work was hailed as a significant milestone for the study of the language by prominent academic Irving Finkel of the British Museum.

Sample text

The following is the 7th section of the Hammurabi law code, written in the mid-18th century BC:

Akkadian literature

Atrahasis Epic (early 2nd millennium BC)
Enûma Elish ()
Amarna letters (14th century BC)
Epic of Gilgamesh (Sin-liqe-unninni', Standard Babylonian version, 13th to 11th century BC)
Ludlul Bel Nemeqi

References

Sources

Aro, Jussi (1957). Studien zur mittelbabylonischen Grammatik. Studia Orientalia 22. Helsinki: Societas Orientalis Fennica.
Buccellati, Giorgio (1996). A Structural Grammar of Babylonian. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.
Buccellati, Giorgio (1997). "Akkadian", The Semitic Languages. Ed. Robert Hetzron. New York: Routledge. Pages 69–99.
Bussmann, Hadumod (1996). Routledge Dictionary of Language and Linguistics. New York: Routledge.
Caplice, Richard (1980). Introduction to Akkadian. Rome: Biblical Institute Press. (1983: ; 1988, 2002: ) (The 1980 edition is partly available online .)
Gelb, I.J. (1961). Old Akkadian Writing and Grammar. Second edition. Materials for the Assyrian Dictionary 2. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
George, A. (2007). "Babylonian and Assyrian: A History of Akkadian". In: Postgate, J. N., (ed.), Languages of Iraq, Ancient and Modern. London: British School of Archaeology in Iraq, p. 37. Online
Huehnergard, John (2005). A Grammar of Akkadian (Second Edition). Eisenbrauns.
Marcus, David (1978). A Manual of Akkadian. University Press of America.
Mercer, Samuel A B (1961). Introductory Assyrian Grammar. New York: F Ungar.
Soden, Wolfram von (1952). Grundriss der akkadischen Grammatik. Analecta Orientalia 33. Roma: Pontificium Institutum Biblicum. (3rd ed., 1995: )
Woodard, Roger D. The Ancient Languages of Mesopotamia, Egypt and Aksum. Cambridge University Press 2008.

External links

Introduction to Cuneiform Script and the Akkadian language on The Open Richly Annotated Cuneiform Corpus (Oracc)
electronic Babylonian Library: includes a dictionary and a corpus of Akkadian texts with translations
Akkadian cuneiform on Omniglot (Writing Systems and Languages of the World)
Assyrian grammar with chrestomathy and glossary (1921) by Samuel A B Mercer
Akkadian-English-French Online Dictionary
Old Babylonian Text Corpus (includes dictionary)
The Assyrian Dictionary of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago (CAD)
Old Akkadian Writing and Grammar, by I. J. Gelb, 2nd Ed. (1961)
Glossary of Old Akkadian, by I. J. Gelb (1957)
List of 1280 Akkadian roots, with a representative verb form for each
Unicode Fonts for Ancient Scripts and Akkadian font for Ubuntu Linux-based operating system (ttf-ancient-fonts)
The Assyrian Dictionary of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago (CAD)
Akkadian in the wiki Glossing Ancient Languages (recommendations for the Interlinear Morphemic Glossing of Akkadian texts)

Akkadian language

Classification

Decipherment

Dialects

Phonology

Consonants

Reconstruction

Stress

Noun states and nominal sentences

Verbal morphology

Verb aspects

Verb moods

Demonstrative pronouns

Relative pronouns

Interrogative pronouns

Prepositions

Numerals

Syntax

Nominal phrases

Sentence syntax

Vocabulary

Sample text

Akkadian literature

References

Sources

Further reading

General description and grammar

Textbooks

Dictionaries

Akkadian cuneiform

Translations

Technical literature on specific subjects

External links