06-19-2006, 08:30 PM
For those who are interested, here's a minor error I spotted in Lionel Casson, Ships and Seamanship on the Ancient World.
On page 163, he says that kerkouros (the name of a Greek merchant galley) is derived from "the Assyrian word qurqurru, a Mesopotamian riverboat". He refers to a Finnish book from 1938.
However, Assyriologists now know better. The word is derived from from Sumerian magurgurru, MA2.GUR4.GUR4, which means "large boat" and happens to be word in the Sumerian and Babylonian Epic of the Flood, so it means "Ark".
It remains to be seen if there is a connection with Greek kerkouros, because magurgurru appears to have been a rare, high-brow word, not a word used by common sailors.
The misunderstanding appears to have been created when someone read the MA2-sign as determinative, and took gurgurru for the main word.
The error can also be found in The Mariner's Museum, A Dictionary of the World’s Watercraft: From Aak to Zumbra (2002).
On page 163, he says that kerkouros (the name of a Greek merchant galley) is derived from "the Assyrian word qurqurru, a Mesopotamian riverboat". He refers to a Finnish book from 1938.
However, Assyriologists now know better. The word is derived from from Sumerian magurgurru, MA2.GUR4.GUR4, which means "large boat" and happens to be word in the Sumerian and Babylonian Epic of the Flood, so it means "Ark".
It remains to be seen if there is a connection with Greek kerkouros, because magurgurru appears to have been a rare, high-brow word, not a word used by common sailors.
The misunderstanding appears to have been created when someone read the MA2-sign as determinative, and took gurgurru for the main word.
The error can also be found in The Mariner's Museum, A Dictionary of the World’s Watercraft: From Aak to Zumbra (2002).
