Song of the hoe

The Song of the hoe is one of several known Sumerian disputations. Other examples from this genre include: The Debate between sheep and grain; The Debate between bird and fish; the Debate between Winter and Summer; and The Debate between silver and copper, etc. The debates, stretching back to the late 3rd millennium BC, are philosophical and address humanity's place in the world. The Song of the hoe stands alone in its own sub-category as a one-sided debate poem. ==Inscriptions and translations==

Three tablets of the myth are held by the British Museum, numbers 80170, 132243 (unpublished) and 139993. Two tablets of the myth are held by the Louvre in Paris, number AO 7087 & AO 8898. One is held in the Vorderasiatisches Museum Berlin, number 17378 and three at the Yale Babylonian collection, numbers 5487, 7070 and 11941. Lines of the myth were discovered on the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, catalogue of the Babylonian section (CBS), from their excavations at the temple library at Nippur. Tablets from this collection, numbers 8111, 13122, 13382 and 13864 were documented by Edward Chiera in "Sumerian Epics and Myths". Samuel Noah Kramer included CBS tablets 8531, 10310, 10335, 29.16.23, 29.16.436. He also included translations from tablets in the Nippur collection of the Museum of the Ancient Orient in Istanbul, catalogue numbers 1117, 2337, 2473, 2742. Other tablets were added from the "Ur excavations texts" in 1928 along with several others to bring it to its present form, which is virtually complete. The latest composite text and translation was produced in 1996 by H. Behrens, B. Jagersma and Joachim Krecher. ==Story==

The poem is composed of the frequent use of the word "al", which means hoe. The verb-forms and nouns also frequently start with, or contain the syllable "al" (or "ar"), suggesting the writer intended it for humour as a satirical school text or as a tongue-twister. The song starts with a creation myth where Enlil, god of the earth, separates heaven and earth from the point of the world-axis, Duranki: The myth continues with a description of Enlil creating daylight with his hoe; he goes on to praise its construction and creation. Enlil's mighty hoe is said to be made of gold, with the blade made of lapis lazuli and fastened by cord. It is inlaid with lapis lazuli and adorned with silver and gold. Enlil makes civilized man, from a brick mould with his hoe – and the Annunaki start to praise him. Nisaba, Ninmena, and Nunamnir start organizing things. Enki praises the hoe; they start reproducing and Enlil makes numerous shining hoes, for everyone to begin work. Enlil then founds the Ekur with his hoe whilst a "god-man" called Lord Nudimmud builds the Abzu in Eridug. Various gods are then described establishing construction projects in other cities, such as Ninhursag in Kesh, and Inanna and Utu in Zabalam; Nisaba and E-ana also set about building. The hymn ends with extensive praisings of the hoe, Enlil, and Nisaba: ==Discussion==

Modern society may have trouble comprehending the virtue of extolling a tool such as the lowly hoe, for the Sumerians the implement had brought agriculture, irrigation, drainage and the ability to build roads, canals and eventually the first proto-cities. The second Sumerian tradition which compares men to plants, made to "break through the ground", an allusion to imagery of the fertility or mother goddess and giving an image of man being "planted" in the ground. The myth was called the "Creation of the Pickax" by Samuel Noah Kramer, a name by which it is referred in older sources. In Sumerian literature, the hoe or pickaxe is used not only in creation of the Ekur but also described as the tool of its destruction in city-lament hymns such as the Lament for Ur, where it is torn apart with a storm and then pickaxes. The cosmological position of the hoe does not fit into Charles Long's categorization of cosmogenic myths. Creation has been suggested to have been the responsibility of different gods via different processes. Creation via a cosmological agricultural implement seems to occupy a unique place in the creation myth genre. The song was meant to be sung aloud with the repetition of the word hoe or "al" a total of forty five times in the text with common use of the two syllables together "al"/"ar". A cosmological link is suggested between the hoe's being and its doing; making everything prosper and flourish within a community. Gary Martin discusses the sociological benefits of singing songs to a hoe, to remind people that they wield the implement of Enlil and of creation. That they can participate in creativity and work well to preserve and improve society. He suggests that "perhaps by praising the simple tool of an extremely important group of laborers, and imbuing it with cosmological significance, those wielders of the hoe are themselves brought into a grand cosmological drama." ==See also==