Sumerian King List

The following extant ancient sources contain the Sumerian King List or portions of it:

The Weld-Blundell Prism, inscribed with the Sumerian King List

• Apkullu-list (W.20030,7)
• Babyloniaca of Berossus
• Dynastic Chronicle (ABC 18)[4] including copies, K 11261+ and K 12054
• Kish Tablet
• UCBC 9-1819 ("California Tablet")
• WB 62
• WB 444 (Weld-Blundell Prism)[5][6]
• Nippur fragment (Ni. 3195)

The two sources marked WB are a part of the "Weld-Blundell collection", donated by Herbert Weld Blundell to the Ashmolean Museum. WB 62 is a small clay tablet, inscribed only on one side, unearthed from Larsa. It is the oldest dated source, at c. 2000 BC, that contains the list.[7] WB 444, in contrast, is a unique inscribed vertical prism,[1][8][9][10] dated c. 1817 BC, although some scholars prefer c. 1827 BC.[11] The Kish Tablet or Scheil dynastic tablet is an early 2nd millennium BC tablet which came into possession of Jean-Vincent Scheil, but only contains list entries for four Sumerian cities.[12] UCBC 9-1819 is a clay tablet housed in the collection of the Museum of Anthropology at the University of California.[13] The tablet was inscribed during the reign of the Babylonian King Samsu-iluna, or slightly earlier, with the earliest date of 1712 BC.[14] The Dynastic Chronicle (ABC 18) is a Babylonian king list written on six columns, beginning with entries for the antediluvian (prior to the flood) Sumerian rulers. K 11261+[15] is one of the copies of this chronicle, consisting of three joined Neo-Assyrian fragments discovered at the Library of Ashurbanipal.[16] K 12054 is another of the Neo-Assyrian fragments from Uruk (c. 640 BC) but contains a variant form of the antediluvians on the list. The later Babylonian king lists and Assyrian king lists repeated the earliest portions of the list, thus preserving them well into the 3rd century BC. At this time, Berossus wrote Babyloniaca, which popularized fragments of the list in the Hellenic world. In 1960, the Apkullu-list (Tablet No. W.20030, 7) or "Uruk List of Kings and Sages" (ULKS) was discovered by German archaeologists at an ancient temple at Uruk. The list, dating to c. 165 BC, contains a series of kings, equivalent to the Sumerian antediluvians, called "Apkullu".[17]

None of the following predynastic antediluvian rulers have been verified as historical by archaeological excavations, epigraphical inscriptions or otherwise. While there is no evidence they ever reigned as such, the Sumerians purported them to have lived in the mythical era before the great deluge. Some modern scholars believe the Sumerian deluge story corresponds to localized river flooding at Shuruppak (modern Tell Fara, Iraq) and various other cities as far north as Kish, as revealed by a layer of riverine sediments, radiocarbon dated to c. 2900 BC, which interrupt the continuity of settlement. Polychrome pottery from the Jemdet Nasr period (c. 3000–2900 BC) was discovered immediately below this Shuruppak flood stratum.[18] Alan Dickin has criticized this theory in favor of a larger riverine flood c. 5700 BC. He believes this time frame to be much more consistent with the cataclysmic descriptions of the ANE flood myths:

It is concluded that the Flood most likely occurred around 5700 BC, before the settlement of Oueili, corresponding to the radiocarbon age of the upper part of the sapropel layer dated by Aqwari. This early date makes the extreme effects described in the Flood narratives much more credible. At this time, lower Mesopotamia had only recently been colonized by people migrating southward from the villages of northern Mesopotamia where the agricultural revolution began. These people would have been living in small settlements on the immediate banks of the Euphrates, and their nascent civilization would have been completely overwhelmed by the greatest flooding event that Mesopotamia has ever seen.[19]

The antediluvian reigns were measured in Sumerian numerical units known as sars (units of 3,600), ners (units of 600), and sosses (units of 60).[20] Attempts have been made to map these numbers into more reasonable regnal lengths.[21]

This was a dynasty from Elam.

The First dynasty of Lagash (c. 2500 – c. 2271 BC) is not mentioned in the King List, though it is well known from inscriptions

(Possibly rulers of lower Mesopotamia contemporary with the Dynasty of Akkad)

The Second dynasty of Lagash (before c. 2093–2046 BC (short)) is not mentioned in the King List, though it is well known from inscriptions.

Independent Amorite states in lower Mesopotamia. The Dynasty of Larsa (c. 1961–1674 BC (short)) from this period is not mentioned in the King List.

* These epithets or names are not included in all versions of the king list.