Before the Library of Babel: On Some Very Early Philologers

Writing began in ancient Mesopotamia more than five and a half thousand years ago. From the beginning, scribes, and teachers, alone and in groups, orally, and in writing, reflected on the texts they copied, composed, memorized, edited, and redacted. These anonymous people should be recognized as the first philologists known to us today. Cuneiform texts from the first millennium BCE preserve the works and names of those who composed, transmitted, reworked, and re-edited a rich textual tradition in at least two languages, Akkadian, and Sumerian, and much of this late Mesopotamian scholarly work has been well studied by modern academics. This paper addresses aspects of less well-known philological endeavours from early third millennium BCE Mesopotamia.