Nabnitu: History and Key Facts

Nabnitu ("Creation") is an ancient encyclopedic work of the Old Babylonian period (c. 1800 BCE) that consists of multiple tablets. The name Nabnitu is taken from the first line of the first tablet in the series. Some of the tablets provide "scientific" names for "parts" of objects and the human body. Tablet VII lists the parts of the human hand.

Tablet XXXI seems to refer to domesticated animals. The readable part of this tablet mentions the pig and bull. Other tablets provide information concerning human actions/activities. Tablet IX is concerned with the activity of singing.

Tablet XXXII is the 32nd tablet in the series in the collections of the British Museum. It is also cited as UET VII 126 (with the excavation number U.3011). It is a lexical tablet written in Sumerian-Akkadian text from Ur.

This tablet lists the names and order of the nine strings of an unidentified musical instrument (presumed to be a horizontal harp). It, therefore, refers to the parts of a musical instrument and its construction.

Source and attribution

Text excerpted from Nabnitu by Wikipedia contributors, available under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0. The extract is abridged and formatting has been adjusted; the adapted text on this page is shared under the same licence. Revision history.