Woman or Donkey?

Soundwise, it’s a close call in Sumerian—Ama vs. Eme

by Jennifer Ball © May 14, 2011

Ama is “mother” in Sumerian 863 times; eme is “donkey” 354 times and “tongue” 178 times.
What is the association? Eme also means “wet nurse”; imma is “vulva”; ummu is “mother” in
Akkadian. No surprise that ama is at the root of “to look at” in Akkadian. Men look at the large
breasts of woman, the bottoms of women, and it would seem, the bottoms of donkeys as well.
There is a reason that these words are close because in the early days, species was less important
that the experience. In Chinese “ma” is “mother” or “horse,” depending upon the tone: both are
beasts of burden. When early civilizations over-generalized, they used similar terms for related
concepts. All of these “eme” words share the concept of “mouth” (yes, even “vulva”). Emengir
was the sound pattern that signified for the “Sumerian language” 32 times (relevant definitions
clipped from the Pennsylvania Sumerian Dictionary are below). Eme is all about mouths, don-

Woman or Donkey? Close Call in Sumerian - Jennifer Ball © May 14, 2011 29 May 2011 11:07 AM - Page 1
 keys, and wet nurses. Ama is about mothers. But they’re very close.

AMA
Who would have thought that in 2011 we would have Obama vs. Osama? At the root of both
names is “ama”: female. We have many women’s names with this sound: Emma, Ima, Uma (re-
member Letterman’s “Uma Oprah, Oprah Uma”?). Women and animals were synonymous in the
eyes and ears of early speakers.

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 EME
Whereas ama is all about mothers, eme is all about wet nurses: adoptive mothers, be it animal
mothers or slave mothers caring for unrelated charges. Eme has to with the tongue, or anything
tongue-like, including a plow. Eme is also in the word for the Sumerian language, for translating,
speaking falsely, and “driveling.”

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 Cuneiform and definitions are from http://psd.museum.upenn.edu/epsd/index.html : “The Penn-
sylvania Sumerian Dictionary Project is carried out in the Babylonian Section of the University
of Pennsylvania Museum of Anthropology and Archaeology. It is funded by the National Endow-
ment for the Humanities and private contributions.”

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 Lady Gaga vs. Emegagu
Emegagu is the Sumerian word for “wet nurse.” It translates as
“female with milk,” but it sounds like the name of a clever per-
former who figured out that “gaga” is a very old word meaning
“agog.” “Gaga” is the infantile state that people get into when
they are starving and see large breasts. These days one doesn’t
need to be starving. That’s evolution for you. We like big breasts
because they suggested capacity at a time when humans were
hungry.

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