L1.7: The Locative-Adverbiative#

The adverbial -um as the adverbial -iš represents an old case form, which in Old Akkadian or Old Assyrian was still in use but in the Old Babylonian it is not productive anymore.

  • The ending -um has a locative function, thus it corresponds to the genitive preceded by the preposition ana or ina.

  • It can be used independently without a preposition:

    Example

    ištēn manaʾum “in/for one mina”.

  • Or with the preposition ina or ana

    Example

    ina bītum “In the house”.

  • When it is used with another noun, the second is in genitive:

    Example

    • qerbum Babili “In the middle of Babylon”.

    • ina libbu mātim “inside the land”. In this case libbu without the final -m.

  • It can also be used with suffixes. In this case the -m assimilates before the suffix.

  • When it is used with another noun the second is in genitive:

    Example

    • šaptukki “on your lip” (= ina šaptīki).

    • qerbuššu “in its midst” (= ina qerbīšu).

    • *šepūʾa “at my foot”.

  • Sometimes it is preceded by the morpheme -ān:

    Example

    • šaplānum “underneath” (from šaplum “underside”).

    • elēnum “above, beyond” (from ēlûm “uper”).

  • The use of the locative-adverbial ending is restricted to a few frozen adverbial forms, such as libbum.