The Poor Man of Nippur - World's first film in Babylonian

[@crestfalen88]

This is one of the nerdiest things I've ever seen and I absolutely love it - never wanted to be an Assyriologist more. More historical language films please!

[@Artexerxes101]

I agree! More films in old languages! There are so many great works of literature from thousands of years of writing. It'd be great to see more and more of them adapted into movies where the actual languages are used, instead of a modern one.

[@hebrewgreek7420]

Artexerxes101, absolutely!!!

[@verywrecked_mind]

Iraqi here, you guys did a great job, I could recognize many of the words. The sentence “ala bab khazzanu tarrak” word by word means “on door of storer he knocked”. For those who are interested, in all semitic languages(Arabic, Hebrew, Syriac etc) the root KH-Z-N is used for anything that has to do with storing or keeping. Even in old Arabic a male mayor is called “Khazzan” because the taxes that were taken from people were stored and kept by the mayor. I wish there was a way to teach this language at our schools in Iraq... You should have hired Arabic speaking actors, cuz these actors don’t have that semitic accent and pronunciation lol but anyways making a movie in a dead language isn’t easy whether it be short or long, so your work is to be admired!

[@rflora25]

Akkadian was never pronounced the arab way. They speak with less throat sounds. BUt as we never have the chance to talk to a living akkadian speaking person the correct pronounciation is lost and every Assyriologist as a little bit different pronounciation.

[@ashur3504]

That's not your hsitroy son why you making it yours you already know that you killed Assyrians and trying to kill Thier language in Iraq Syria etc and making it yours i mean obv your Muslim that's what your God tells you to do 🤷🏻‍♂️ lmfao sucha twat

[@alphazar]

ashur the ancient Assyrians were ruthless people. It wasn't the Arabs who killed Assyrians it was Timur the Turco-Mongol. How ironic, if the Arabs were stronger they would have been able to defend Iraq and Timur wouldn't be able to kill a lot of Assyrians. Also, Arabic is the Semitic language with the largest and vibrant body of literature and long continuous history, in addition it is the best preserved Semitic language still in use. Any student serious in learning any Semitic language would find Arabic to be very helpful. Even the Jews learned and borrowed a lot from Arabic to revive Hebrew.

[@ashur3504]

@@alphazar hahaha 1915 Turks and Kurds killed us in southern turkey 1933 in Iraq Iraqi government killed us til now they are Killing us Arabic is a Semitic language yeah but where did it come from 75% from Arabic is Assyrian aka aramaic the Hebrew you hear from Jewish is actually a dialect from aramaic plus mate I'm assyrian from Iraq i can speak my lang also Arabic Kurdish even Persian and I can understand Turkish I can understand Hebrew too and really man 😂 they learn Arabic bcuz it's the key for middle East why am I speaking English why do I know this language? Bcuz where ever you go you can speak English with other people it's open language English Spanish Arabic my language was open language at that time too soooooo and I'm not talking about ancient time I'm talking about 15s 20s etc still in use looool what you thought Assyrian is not a spoken language or Hebrew 😂 we still speak our languages in daily life not just that we even have 100+ accent's revive Hebrew dude who's older ? Assyrian and Hebrews of Arabs ? Obv our languages can't be fully at that time we didn't have stuff that you speaking now days ofc we will use English or Arabic world's anyways your and can tell it all you are not English or a native English speaker in fact your name is actually assyrian long story son I can't write it down for you but I disagree with you sorry but you are wrong

[@Hussein_Al_Enezi-w4p]

@@ashur3504 isn’t the language you speak different than ancient Assyrian if remember correctly they spoke a dialect of Akkadian while you speak Aramaic.

[@gilgaflesh6978]

Finally! A movie I don't have to use subtitles for.

[@fuads.ramadan4930]

I am very happy to see that people from far away are interested in Mesopotamia civilization... and in the same time I feel sad because the majority of Iraqi people don't know any thing about our history.... special thanks and respect from Iraq.

[@mohammedsalman3397]

@Dinah Shaheen true and that's not gonna change any time soon.

[@aidenbayati2182]

You're wrong to a degree. Compared to other countries, iraqis are one of the .ost informed people about their ancient history. The epic of gilgamesh is still past down in the country sidenin the south and many tales and stories are still talked about. In addition to this, many modern art work, poetry , books, architecture, businesses etc use many aspects of mespotamian history. Our schools in Iraq teach a lot of our ancient history too from primary school. The only downfall in the upkeep of historical sites from the government.

[@dickon728]

@@mohammedsalman3397 Sadly.

[@aaroncarson1770]

I had heard about some Iraqi film students that were working on a film about Gilgamesh, but I don't know what happened with that.

[@fuads.ramadan4930]

@@aaroncarson1770 Iraqi movies industry is very very weak.. so even if they made it, it will never be something worth to watch.

[@stefangeorg9048]

I studied Akkadian decades ago as a minor subject. Of course I cannot follow the narrative, but with the subtitles I can identify some words, sometimes even longer fragments. Time to go back the my old notes and the books and to brush up my Akkadian. Thanks *lots* for this beatuful labour of love.

[@stephenwilliams3388]

This was incredibly entertaining! I loved every minute of it. The actor playing Gimil-Ninurta should get an Oscar or BAFTA for his wink alone! The person playing the Mayor also had laughing, especially his drunken staggering in the field. It wish there were more modern works of creativity like this that connect us to the ancient world. Great job.

[@randhamed9511]

As an Iraqi we can't do films rn, so big thanks to u it was like a dream to me watching a movie with our old languages, thanks a lot. Btw we still use a lot of these words)

[@alshukurh.a.m9794]

As a Mesopotamian from Iraq, I am telling you , THANK YOU !!

[@bassilsaid634]

Impressive work! I am from Iraq and I feel grateful for Cambridge Assyriology for reviving our civilization.

[@Ult._]

I love the effect of broken tablet being shown by a glitch and then a cut.

[@taleenbright563]

Im iraqi and I understand many words here .. omg !

What a surprise!!! It's interesting... Any Words you like to share it?

[@taleenbright563]

@ I still feel strange actually hehe Worse like .. enza =goat Shalash = three but we say thalath Bab = door .. babil means the door of god btw

[@alphazar]

Malku = king

[@البريقاللامع-ج8خ]

Pablo Carrión ARG many! Anza= goat man anta= who are you? Elbab= the door / gate. Kalb= dog Ana= I

[@yaqo6577]

@@البريقاللامع-ج8خ akkadian is part of the Semitic language family, like Arabic, Hebrew and Aramaic spoken today by Assyrians and Aramaeans

[@srodomeniko]

Greetings from Brazil. Thank you very much Cambridge Archaeology. Because of the decision to add subtitles in Brazilian Portuguese, we can now both use or point to this amazing short film in our classes on Ancient History and Archaeology.

[@tabithablandford986]

Hurrah! Language is not dead! Tremendous thanks to everyone involved in the making of this remarkable video. I am so fascinated by the histories and languages of ancient civilizations and after watching this short film, I am reminded why words captivate my soul. Thank you for exploring another perspective of what it means to have meaning as we look to the past to uncover our future. With love, T

[@karamp242]

We are still around we still speak it... but modern one

[@longcastle4863]

I was curious, but had no idea it would be this good. Kudos.

[@strawandherb2452]

I'm an Hebrew speaker and less than 2 minutes in I got quite a lot of words I recognized !!! It is a bit funny and weird to listen to something in another language with Hebrew subtitles and suddenly actually hear same word as written in the subtitles !

[@lowqualityshitposts8860]

how similar is it?

[@ahmedjasim7920]

In arabic and understand few words like me Ana , Anza Ghot, bab Door , shu what , khzano keeper or guard, and i didt listen to all of it

[@zeroakk4339]

@@ahmedjasim7920 لانو العبريه والعربيه هم للهجات تابعه اللغه الاراميه والارامية تخالطتت مع للغات بلاد الرافدين من البابليه والاشوريه😂

[@RamomarNY]

This was a breath of fresh air thank you for sharing.

[@aqeel8484]

Greetings of love, appreciation, honor and gratitude from Mesopotamia to all who participated and contributed to this beautiful work

[@oliviaschmalfuss1282]

[tablet broken. The goat is butchered] lol! My favorite part. Great Job!

[@Tarih_Obası]

Greetings from Turkey. It's a great work :)

[@roycenord9659]

Urfa'da yanı basimizda bulunan bir bir tabletten ama yabancilar bunu yapıyor. Üzüldüm mü? Eskiden olsa evet ama şimdi sadece sanatın kendisine odaklaniyorum.

[@ofyanapcaz]

@@roycenord9659 niye üzülüyosun :D adamlar çalıyor ama çalışıyor :D

[@somebody1241]

@@roycenord9659 aslında bende bu dillerden bir tanesini öğrenmek istiyorum(antik ölü diller)

[@babylonkid]

So this is Akkadian? I understood very few words, then again I speak Aramaic. Anyway, I really enjoyed the film. Everyone did so well. Especially the actor playing Gimil-Ninurta. He was great. A lot of emotion. All the costumes were great too.

[@street-zombie]

This is fantastic and I knew learning this language would come in handy! I've been desperately wanting to watch something in Akkadian to practice my skills in the language for such a long time now.

[@ashwinnmyburgh9364]

May I ask where and how one can learn this language? It is something I have been wanting to do for some time.

[@street-zombie]

@@ashwinnmyburgh9364 sure! I got started with Richard Caplice’s “Introduction to Akkadian” - it’s pretty cheap if you want to pick up a copy on Amazon and there might even be a pdf floating around. It’s a little dense and assumes some knowledge of linguistic terminology, but doing the exercises helped me. It helped that I was in college at the time and had a professor who could answer questions and give me more stuff to translate. I think I also have a “Manual of Akkadian” which has a couple longer texts I graduated to but I wouldn’t recommend to learn on.

[@ashwinnmyburgh9364]

@@street-zombie amazing! Thanks a bunch! I'll be looking into those books immediately.

[@tyborseptim]

What is pretty freaking awesome is that we have, 3500 years later, verbatim the same tale in Hungarian - Ludas Matyi: (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mattie_the_Goose-boy_(poem) - the poem was based on the popular narrative). The constancy and agelessness of fairy-tale archetypes and narratives is astounding.

[@wesakmal]

The first meeting of Prince Vijaya (from Bengal) with Queen Kuveni in Sri Lanka is said to resemble an event in a Greek (?) folk tale.

[@Uttrediay]

The similarity of the two stories is astonishing. It's been preserved in almost full detail for over 3000 years!

[@of_science_and_superstition]

This is fantastic, I am from Iraq and so proud to be from this culture, I noticed the pronunciations are similar to modern Hebrew, which is a European version of the real Hebrew, some letters are not spelled correctly, but still, this is AMAZING!

[@TunnelHack]

While everyone was awesome to watch, Alex Barker is the best Babylonia-speaking actor that I have ever seen. Keep doing this sort of work, your emoting gave your dialog parts a really understandable flow.

[@jacobpeters5458]

the guard's micro-reactions were the funniest thing in the whole movie. great film!

[@sabinecolbus8960]

Please more of this stuff. Absolutely loving this!

[@JeiFaeKlubs]

Love the effect you put in wherever the tablet was broken, fantastic idea!

[@ajrollo1437]

We get it, Gimil-Ninurta, you have a shed. We're all really impressed by your shed.

[@فاطمالنصرالله]

شكرا لاهتمامكم بتراثنا ❤

[@ashur3504]

خخهههه مو تاريخك تاريخ الشوريين

[@midsummernightswork]

Great short film.There are almost no movies about mesopotamian history, so this was a breath of fresh air. Thank you for creating it!

[@daviydviljoen9318]

Great work! Perhaps the epic of Gilgamesh next?

[@omidfarhadi5541]

Gilgamesh is meane Lake Buffalo Gili+gamesh this name of Kurdish village so nobady knows about 12 thousands years ago who belong to the history although nobady can't denies median empire

[@SuperTim23]

@@omidfarhadi5541 oh no no your translation is completely wrong. The original word is not Gilgamesh is "Bilga-mes" In Sumerian, Akkadian, Babylonien and old Aramaic and its two word "Bilga" its mean ancestor. and the word " mes" pronounced " mesh " because the "s" pronounced "sh" in the old Babylonien languages and its mean young strong man its mean also hero. So Gilgamesh "Bilga-mes" it is mean in Sumerian and old Babylonien "the ancestor is a hero". And do not forget the kurdish language is Iranian language belong to indo european languages and the language of ancient Sumer is a natural language so its completely different in the meanings of words.

[@223cw7]

Super 1970s maybe wrong but gamesh does mean buffalo

[@somebody1241]

@@yilmazbatu Ciddi misin?

[@crowsong8097]

This is wonderful! Very well produced and scripted! I watched all the way to the end. You've made quite a gift to the world. :)

[@adonaielzuucki3743]

The comments were almost more entertaining than the video. So much ego, such defensiveness. I shake my head. The video was very interesting and revealed more than the simple translations of the cuneform tablets. The clothing without change gives thought to awareness to things v time. I thoroughly enjoyed it and congratulate the folks at Cambridge Archaeologywho produced it. Thank you

[@allisonphillips1682]

That's how we roll 😜 Heck I don't know. China Korea this weird bloodletting thing in South America. One of the coolest places in the world. Funny movie about the Holocaust... Dude I'm just messing with ya but 👊

I love your work and production! Congrats! Greetings from Argentina!

[@TomkeTijs]

This is fantastic! Great compliments to all your work here (from the Netherlands)

[@wedadschlotte2247]

I am from Iraq, Tikrit. I recognized several words. Thank you University of Trinity college, Cambridge, British museum and all the participants who produced this film about fulfilling Justice .

[@alphazar]

Words cannot express how much I love this work. Looking forward for what lies ahead in this field. Maybe the Epic of Gilgamesh in its original language, with soundtracks from the Hymn of Nikkal?

[@AH-rp9ov]

This is great! The narration is fantastic and I thought the guard and the chase were hilarious.

[@bilgemis8746]

Batılıların bilime verdikleri değere hayranım. Bilimi ilerlettiğiniz için teşekkürler. ( I admire the value Westerners place on science. Thanks for advancing science. )

[@billhassa]

Biz de batılıyız, durmak yok yola devam.

[@sarahali7991]

Great work.greetings from Iraq the land of babylon

[@jamesr.g.2320]

Land of Arabs* not ancient Babylon anymore

[@hassanbassim4007]

James R. G. I always find you in videos about ancient Mesopotamia just to comment these stuff , it seems you are just an idiot who dislikes Iraqis with no knowledge of history .

[@eliseten9573]

Great job Dr.Martin Worthington, Babylonian dialect similar to the tone of the people of Iraq today dominated by the sound "Sh" /ʃ/, and some words are still used so far.

[@JamesEis]

Great music Stef! Thoroughly appropriate and very enjoyable. Couldn’t activate the subtitles on my iPhone, so didn’t understand much first time around - but I’ll be listening and watching again 😊👍

[@rodrigorearte9337]

there is a song by the swedish band THERION, the siren of the woods from the year 1998 sung in the Akkadian language

[@argamdilanyan930]

Great work, Thank you very much from Armenia In armenian we have word like goat-əndza (babylonian) indz or əndz-ինձ-ընձ (armenian)-əndza, and 2 words like this əndzaryuts-ընձառյուծ- leopard and əndzught-ընձուղտ-giraffe if i listen it right

[@trishmurray6488]

This is the first time I’ve watched it. Very well done to everyone involved in this fantastic creation, both past and present.

[@artinarakelian660]

Great Acting & narrative, enjoyed very much. Thanks

[@Nyctophora]

Amazing, thank you! It takes me right back to my degree course at Liverpool a very long time ago.

[@mpristovsek]

Thank you for this very nice work, which bring the ancient tale to modern audiences. Despite some other commentors, I also really enjoyed the music, it contributes to well the narrative. Even though, it may be as much babylonian as the medivial Cambridge. Anyway, I could listen to it also without a film too ...

[@BubskaLeDeux]

This is absolutely amazing! Excellent work!

[@davidgreenway9872]

What a great piece of work - I really enjoyed the story telling in the first place, and it's amazing that the story is told in an ancient language. Well done to everyone who helped !!

[@madisonleeson4015]

This is fantastic! The guard is the best part

[@andrewwordsworth5088]

Thank you for bringing this to the modern world. I will never look at a goat the same way again!

[@CATinBOOTS81]

The palace guard is my favorite character 🤣

[@fionatinker23]

This is amazing! Thank you so much for sharing it.

[@deehrmz64]

I'm born raised in America, but my people come from ancient babylon... we are Chaldeans. Great work!!

[@wilpikle7754]

Actually you are more Assyrian, new Chaldeans don’t have any connection to old Chaldeans of Babylon except for the name.

[@10kkk_24]

Огромное уважение и восхищение из России! Потрясающий фильм и невероятно качественная работа!

[@MrHosbenz]

this is brilliant great work

[@atakanbalaban3543]

Great thanks for letting us hear an ancient language.

[@evaalex001]

Thank you all for this gem!

[@serhiipavlechko]

Чудова робота! Продовжуйте й надалі Вашу просвітницьку роботу.

[@Ali-aliraqi7000]

A beautiful film tells the story of Mesopotamia, our great ancestors.

[@cehaletkorkusu7398]

Great work ,Thanks all

[@claudioyandreaespinamonsal433]

thanks for this beautiful work!!!!!!! greetings from Chile!!!!!

[@eriathwen1303]

This is amazing! Congratulations! Please make more videos.

[@aaroncarson1770]

Okay I loved this. May many more films follow.

[@ابوذر-ج6ش]

Great work. Thanks for all contributors. I wish Gilgamesh story next. It’s true story not epic.

[@joebruno1130]

Great acting by the goat at about 4 mins in.

[@turksergio]

Excellent work... Keep going guys so interesting and adorable

[@claytonwalter8700]

I doubt Babylonians would regognize most of this; reading an unheard language from 3,000-year-old tablets leaves much room for error. Still, this is pretty cool.

[@pavelvaverka3972]

What an excellent storytelling!

[@Mohammed.kareem.official]

Greetings of love from Iraq to Great Britain

[@starlight2009xxx]

fantastic work well done from Wales

[@almishti]

Zach Long does an especially good job at portraying the vaguely amused boredom that must be the hallmark of the gatekeeper's profession. :)

[@notimportant2478]

Totally amazing, thanks for letting live through a such a fascinating prehistoric tell.

[@ccolca]

Muy interesante esfuerzo. Suena parecido al árabe, tanto el árabe como el arameo, proceden del acadio mesopotámico. Habría sido más fidedigno con arabo-parlantes. Saludo desde Arequipa, Perú.

[@JavierSalazarCalle_escritor]

Very nice initiative. Thanks.

[@epatodennakoisiaselityksia4901]

Amazing ! I am studying Bablylonian ( purely for amusement, although I live in hope that I might be able to converse with the checkout person at Aldi in Babylonian... ) from Martin Worthington's wildly entertaining * book. And this video is from his group ! * His book, "Complete Babylonian, A Teach Yourself Guide " is a treasure ! Buy it , borrow it from or local library or (ahem ) download a copy.

[@aniruddhramanujam5479]

a beautiful piece of work

[@mariuasobol4131]

Wonderful work. This story is intresting. Your video was shown on the Russian TV channel.👍

[@RabahQ]

21:05 I liked that at the end of the movie, they thanked the student who copied the tablet (701 BC): Nabu-rehtu-usur, and the owner of the school: Nabu-ahu-iddina, and the owner of the library: Qurdi-Nergal 🙂

[@ASHORSHEMAYA]

It would have been more interesting if the background music had been lower or completely non-existent. You say that it is the first film in the world in the Babylonian language... so it would have been better if the focus had been on speech instead of that accompanying auditory noise.

[@stanislawzasada1641]

Can you upload original subtitles (transcribed)?

[@oderalon]

Have a look here: cdli.ucla.edu/search/archival_view.php?ObjectID=P499186 (the lines starting with #tr.ts: )

[@renatateixeiradasilva3954]

Absolutely fantastic!! Love it!!

[@epatodennakoisiaselityksia4901]

Perfectly wonderful !

[@user-kl1on3nw7y]

Love the narration

[@elifkaba6519]

Greetings from Turkey.So perfect.

[@ashur3504]

The people who killed us 1915 hello there! i hope Turk are enjoying Thier problems with Kurds and PKK that's pay back for killing us in hakkari van marden etc 😊

[@linguadan]

Great film! Thanks for sharing!

[@timgoddard5259]

What an amazing accomplishment! Well done - and I love the idea that he was beaten to a squeak!

[@afrahuday7769]

فلم جميل أحسنتم الإخراج والتمثيل

[@wesakmal]

Bohoma lassannayi! Subha pathum! (Sinhala, Sri Lanka)

[@merdiperdi2120]

Wow, great story. How did you pull it off? Amber - 6½.

[@JohnNobody_]

Where can i access the music used for this ? At least what's the name of it ?

[@annachoutsisvili8805]

That's so beautiful! Great job :)

[@a.z.foreman74]

My first thought: oh awesome, a film in Babylonian! My second though: wait where are the ejectives and affricates and dorsal /r/!? In the name of John Huehnergard, I demand ejectives and affricates! My third thought: more of this plz. Comprehensible audio input for students of languages with no living speakers is a big help. My fourth thought: this really demands ejectives, affricates, aspirates and a dorsal rhotic! Lemme try w/ the narrator's opening lines: www.dropbox.com/s/trtgir13gou7new/e%E1%B9%ADlum%20m%C4%81r%20nippur.mp3?dl=0

[@katathoombs]

Well played, Dr. Whyte - quite literally.

[@cesardaniel5658]

Está bien genial. ya esperaba poder ver y oír algo así

[@gamiIato]

OMG! That is so precious! You did incredible work! Greetings from Ukraine!

[@goktugaydogdu60]

Çok güzel bir çalışma olmuş.

[@usedx115x]

As someone who studied this stuff for years it was cool to recognise a lot of the words.

[@dickon728]

Ain't it but.

[@allisonphillips8118]

Thank you Doctor Worthington! Looking forward to part 2! And perhaps that city there in Saudi will speak this language????