Component Position Fluctuation in Signs Retaining Same Components

This page tabulates examples of Cuneiform signs which have alternate forms, one with infixation, one with the same components arranged differently, yet the two forms retain the same meaning and function. This reinforces the approach that it is signs, rather than sequences of components, which are the persisting unities of the Cuneiform script. Included are also some similar instances showing variation between forms, one ligatured and one not. Examples in which the "extrusion" of infixed material is observable as a historical change across time are on a separate page. Please click here for that one.

Friedrich Ellermeier and Margret Studt's compendium of the standard catalog tradition (which accompanies the Neoassyrian "ASSUR" fonts) is helpful on this sort of material, since it includes sequences of signs which carry the same function as infixed or ligatured signs, information usually missing from other catalogs. It also has a separate list of ligatures only some of which are listed below. Others are ASH+SHUR, AN+AG, AN+EN, ENME (EN+ME), AN+MUSH2, AN+MUSH3 (and variant), I+NA (with variant), NI+GISH, SHESH+KI, METE (TE+ME), EN+DISH, A2+DISH, AN+DISH, NENNI (BUL+BUL), NIGIN (LAGAB+LAGAB), MUNUS+MA, and "KU" (lookalike) = DISH+SHU. The last is another example where a ligature can have the same form as the rendering of a distinct character or character sequence.

Fluctuation of form with constant meaning is rather the norm. Contrast is the exception. Three examples of contrast are given first. The one with LAGAB + AN may be interesting for another reason. If the Ellermeier catalog is correct here, it involves an example of a single ligature shape which can represent two different sequences of signs. The one with "HI x ASH" includes probably unrelated signs, the sign name misleading if one of them had originally no separable components. The supposed "SU x A" is a name that works only for its late form after some components of distinct signs come to have the same shape.

For Han characters, there are cases of fluctuation of components, not merely their arrangements, while the character itself retains its identity through its lineal historical descent. For an interesting discussion of examples, please click here.

Steinkeller (RA 69 no.2 pp.176-187 -- pp.181-2) discusses the possibility that a unique "playful" writing URU x PA is to be identified with the title "PA.URU" 'foreman / forewoman'.

Rosengarten comments in her 1967 Répertoire de Commenté des Signes Présargoniques Sumériens de Laga$

J'entends par <<composé>> un ensemble des signes dont la leture diffère de celle des composants. Par example, les signes e11(d) (DUL.DU) ou síb(ad) (PA.UDU). On voit immédiatement que ces deux <<composés>> n'ont pas la même origine, le second ayant une <<étymologie>>, le premier, non, du moins en l'état actuel de nos connaissances. Rien n'empêche, d'autre part, de traiter comme des <<composés>> des signes tels que lugal, buzur4, zabar (cf. RSP 130, 202, 208 et les notes correspondantes), car les dispositions variables de leurs éléments montrent que les Sumériens ne distinguaient pas fondamentalement les associations produites par des signes juxtaposés, ou formés de caractères dont l'un est inscrit à l'intérieur de l'autre.

Il est moins satisfaisant pour l'esprit de traiter comme un <<composé>> le signe UMBIN, en lequel le signe GAD n'a d'autre rôle que de représenter la pointe d'un sabot d'animal.

ENGUR = LAGAB + HAL (B756)