A Discussion of the Use of im-babbar2 by the Craft Workers of Ancient Mesopotamia1

§1.1. im-babbar2 is often listed amongst the materials supplied to craft workers in the Ur III and Isin periods.2 The term literally means “white clay,” but it is more frequently translated, with its Akkadian correspondence ga‡‡u, as “gypsum, whitewash” (CAD G s.v.). This already introduces a problem, since gypsum and whitewash are not clay. However, this can readily be removed if we relax the meaning of ‘im’ in this context and permit im-babbar2 to be interpreted as ‘white earth.’3 Further, the references provided by the Old Babylonian Nippur lexical list of stones ÎAR-ra = Ìubullu 4, Seg. 1, ll. 122124 (following the diffi cult score rendering of this list found in the web pages of the Oracc project ): 4im-babbar2 / na4kišib im-babbar2 / na4lagab im-babbar2, we may imagine that at least by this time (ca. 1800 BC), Babylonians considered im-babbar2 to derive from a stone-like material (semantic determinative na4) and could be found in the form of “blocks” (Sumerian lagab; see below, §5).