Lugal

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Lugal

Lugal , Sumerian

Sumerian language

Sumerian was the language of ancient Sumer, spoken in Southern Mesopotamia since at least the 4th millennium BC. It was gradually replaced by Akkadian language as a spoken language somewhere around the turn of the 3rd and the 2nd millennium BC , but continued to be used as a sacred, ceremonial, literary and scientific language in Mesopotamia...
for leader from LÚ.GAL "man, big" was one of several Sumer

Sumer

Sumer was a civilization and a historical region located in Southern Iraq , known as the Cradle of civilization. It lasted from the first settlement of Eridu in the Ubaid period through the Uruk period and the Dynastic periods until the rise of Babylon in the early 2nd millennium BC....
ian titles that a ruler of a city-state could bear (alongside en
EN (cuneiform)

EN is the Sumerian cuneiform for "lord" or "priest". Originally, it seems to have been used to designate a high priest or priestess of a Sumerian city-state's patron-deity - a position that entailed political power as well....
and ensi
Ensi

Ensi can refer to:*a Mesopotamian royal title in various Babylonian city states, see ENSI.*an abbreviation of Ensign*ens?, the Old High German for a pagan deity, see ?ss...
, the exact difference being a subject of debate), and eventually became the predominant Sumerian term for a king in general. In the Sumerian language

Sumerian language

Sumerian was the language of ancient Sumer, spoken in Southern Mesopotamia since at least the 4th millennium BC. It was gradually replaced by Akkadian language as a spoken language somewhere around the turn of the 3rd and the 2nd millennium BC , but continued to be used as a sacred, ceremonial, literary and scientific language in Mesopotamia...
, lugal is used to mean an owner (e.g. of a boat or a field) or a head (of a unit such as a family).

Cuneiform
The cuneiform

Cuneiform

Cuneiform can refer to:*Cuneiform script, an ancient writing system originating in Mesopotamia in the 4th millennium BC*Cuneiform , three bones in the human foot...
sign LUGAL (Borger nr.

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Lugal , Sumerian

Sumerian language

Sumer

Sumerian language

Sumerian was the language of ancient Sumer, spoken in Southern Mesopotamia since at least the 4th millennium BC. It was gradually replaced by Akkadian language as a spoken language somewhere around the turn of the 3rd and the 2nd millennium BC , but continued to be used as a sacred, ceremonial, literary and scientific language in Mesopotamia...
, lugal is used to mean an owner (e.g. of a boat or a field) or a head (of a unit such as a family).

Cuneiform

The cuneiform

Cuneiform

Cuneiform can refer to:*Cuneiform script, an ancient writing system originating in Mesopotamia in the 4th millennium BC*Cuneiform , three bones in the human foot...
sign LUGAL (Borger nr. 151, Unicode U+12217) serves as a determinative

Determinative

A determinative, also known as a taxogram or semagram, is an ideogram used to mark semantics categories of words in logographic scripts....
in cuneiform texts (Sumerian

Sumerian language

Akkadian language

Akkadian or Assyrian-Babylonian is a Semitic language that was spoken in ancient Mesopotamia. The earliest attested Semitic language, it used the cuneiform writing system derived ultimately from ancient Sumerian language, an unrelated language isolate....
and Hittite

Hittite language

Hittite or Nesili is the extinct language once spoken by the Hittites, a people who created an empire centered on ancient Hattusas in north-central Anatolia ....
), indicating that the following word is the name of a king. In Akkadian orthography, it may also be a syllabogram šàr, acrophonically based on the Akkadian for "king", šarrum.

Lugal, ensi and en

There are different theories regarding the meaning of the title lugal in 3rd millenium Sumer. Some scholars believe that a ruler of an individual city-state was usually called ensi, and a ruler that headed a confederacy or larger dominion composed of several cities, perhaps even the whole of Sumer, was a lugal. The functions of such a lugal would include certain ceremonial and cultic activities, arbitration in border disputes, military defence against external enemies, and once the lugal has past away, the eldest son must take over. Interestingly, the ensis of Lagash would sometimes refer to the city's patron deity, Ningirsu, as their lugal ("master"). All of the above is connected to the possibly priestly or sacral character of the titles ensi and especially en (the latter term continuing to designate priests in subsequent times). Other scholars consider ensi, en and lugal to have been merely three local designations for the sovereign, accepted respectively in the city-states of Lagash

Lagash

Lagash is located northwest of the junction of the Euphrates and Tigris rivers and east of Uruk, Lagash was one of the oldest cities of Sumer and later Babylonia....
, Uruk

Uruk

Uruk , from the Akkadian rendering of the Sumerian toponym 'unug', is modern Warka , Iraq. Uruk was an ancient city of Sumer and later Babylonia, situated east of the present bed of the Euphrates river, on the ancient Nil canal, some 30 km east of As-Samawah, Al Muthanna Governorate, Iraq....
and Ur

Ur is modern Tell el-Mukayyar, Iraq, and was a city in ancient Sumer. Once a coastal city near the mouth of the then Euphrates river on the Persian Gulf, Ur is now well inland....
(as well as most of the rest of Sumer), although the various terms may have expressed different aspects of the Mesopotamian concept of kingship. A lugal at that time is assumed to have been "normally a young man of outstanding qualities from a rich landowning family." Thorkild Jacobsen

Thorkild Jacobsen

Thorkild Jacobsen was a renowned historian specializing in Assyriology and Sumerian literature.Jacobsen received an M.A. from the University of Copenhagen and then came to the United States to study at the Oriental Institute of Chicago of the University of Chicago, where he received his PhD....
theorized that he was originally an (elected) war leader, as opposed to the (likewise elected) en, who dealt with internal issues. Among the earliest rulers whose inscriptions describe them as lugals are Enmebaragesi

Enmebaragesi

Enmebaragesi was a king of Kish , according to the Sumerian king list. The list states that he subdued Elam, reigned 900 years, and was captured single-handedly by Dumuzid, the Fisherman of Kuara , predecessor of Gilgamesh....
and Mesilim

Mesilim

Mesilim was LUGAL of the Sumerian city-state Kish .He is one of the first persons in history whose name is recorded in archaeological documents....
at Kish

Kish

Kish may refer to:...
, and Meskalamdug

Meskalamdug

Meskalamdug was an early ruler of Ur who does not appear in the Sumerian king list.His tomb, discovered by English archaeologist Sir Leonard Wooley in the Royal Cemetery of Ur in 1924, contained numerous gold artifacts including a golden helmet with an inscription of the king's name....
, Mesannepada

Mesannepada

Mesannepada was the first monarch listed for the first dynasty of Ur on the Sumerian king list. He is listed to have ruled for 80 years. Mesannepada overthrew Mesilim of Kish and Lugal-kitun of Uruk....
and several of their successors at Ur

Third Dynasty of Ur

The Third Dynasty of Ur refers simultaneously to a 21st century BC to 20th century BC century BC Sumerian ruling dynasty based in the city of Ur and a short-lived territorial-political state that some historians regard as a nascent empire....
onwards, only lugal was used to designate a contemporary sovereign in Sumerian.

Amarna letters Lugal

Lugal is used extensively in the Amarna letters

Amarna letters

The Amarna letters are an archive of correspondence on clay tablets, mostly diplomatic, between the Ancient Egypt administration and its representatives in Canaan and Amurru during the New Kingdom....
, for addressing the kings or pharaohs, and elsewhere in speaking about the various kings. One common address, in the introduction

Salutation (greeting)

A salutation is a greeting, in particular a formal greeting used in a Letter . Salutations usually take the form "wikt:dear X", or sometimes simply "X", usually followed by a comma or a colon ....
of many letters, from the vassal

Vassal

A vassal in the terminology that both preceded and accompanied the feudal of medieval Europe, is one who enters into mutual obligations with a monarch, usually of military support and mutual protection, in exchange for certain guarantees, which came to include the terrain held as a fiefdom....
s writing to the pharaoh

Pharaoh

Pharaoh is a title used in many modern discussions of the ancient Egyptian rulers of all periods. In antiquity this title began to be used for the ruler who was the religious and political leader of united ancient Egypt, only during the New Kingdom, specifically, during the middle of the Eighteenth dynasty of Egypt....
was to use: Šàr-ri, (for šarrum); they used Lugal + ri = Šàr-ri, (i.e. Pharaoh, or King of, Ancient Egypt). (Ri (cuneiform) is one of the more commonly used hieroglyphs, in many cases for the use of the "r" ).