Wheat and barley in Mesopotamia: Terminology, cultivation, and use according to cuneiform sources and against the background of paleobotanical and ethnographical evidence

谷物的种植构成了古代美索不达米亚文明生活的经济基础。然而，尽管有大量的相关数据，但目前还没有对这种谷物物种的最新处理方法。在一种跨学科的方法中，该项目侧重于美索不达米亚青铜时代大麦、颖壳小麦和裸麦物种的楔形和古植物学证据。根据古植物学和人种学调查的结果，特定的粮食作物的特性影响着种植和加工。因此，关于种植和加工的证据选自苏美尔语和阿卡迪亚语的楔形来源，从而可以得出关于特定谷类物种的结论。项目的主要目标是收集特定谷类作物的具体植物学、农业学和加工学特征，尽可能准确地识别代表谷类作物的阿卡迪亚语和苏美尔语词汇，并在其生态、农学和生态营养环境中对这些词汇进行分析。“特定的植物学特征”是指颜色、大小、味道、生境、地理分布、抗逆性和生长季节长度。“特定的农业特征”是指播种、收获和脱粒的日期以及播种速度、产量、种子/产量比、灌溉的规模和方式，以及轮作制度。“特定加工特性”指的是特定的谷物品种是被加工成动物还是人类食用的，这些谷物被加工成哪种食物，以及它们是如何加工的。该项目的目标是：1.收集来自青铜时代美索不达米亚和叙利亚的苏美尔人和阿卡德人关于大麦和小麦物种特定的植物学、农业和加工特征的文字证据，并在古植物学和人种学研究的背景下进行分类。因此，科学界根据古植物学、人种学和楔形文字的证据，提供了谷物的综合特性表。2.应尽可能准确地识别大麦(SHE及其化合物)、颖片小麦(ZINZ及其化合物以及SIG15)和裸小麦种(KMUB及其化合物以及Burrum)的阿卡德和苏美尔语术语。因此，我们将文字证据与古植物学和人种学数据进行了比较，这些数据涉及特定的植物学、农业和加工特征。3.收集到的关于特定特征的信息可以得出关于古代美索不达米亚农业社会的生态、农学、经济和生态营养环境的结论。在这方面，必须首先对数据进行分析，然后与目前关于传统田间种植和收获后活动的工作流程的人种学模型进行批判性比较，以阐明自然和历时的不同和相似之处。

The cultivation of grains forms the economic basis for life in the civilizations of ancient Mesopotamia. However, despite abundant relevant data, no up-to-date treatment of the grain species exists today. In an interdisciplinary approach, the project focuses on the cuneiform and paleobotanical evidence of the barley, glume wheat and naked wheat species in Mesopotamian Bronze Age. According to the results of paleobotanical and ethnographical investigations, the characteristics of specific cereal crops affect cultivation and processing. Thus the evidence regarding cultivation and processing selected from cuneiform sources in Sumerian and Akkadian, allows conclusions about the particular cereal species. The key project objectives are to collect the specific botanical, agricultural and processing characteristics of the particular cereal crops, to identify Akkadian and Sumerian words for cereal crops as precisely as possible, and to analyse them in their ecological, agronomical and ecotrophological environment. "Specific botanical characteristics" are colour, size, taste, habitat, geographical distribution, stress tolerances, and growing season length."Specific agricultural characteristics" are the dates of sowing, harvesting, and threshing as well as the rate of sowing, the yield, and the seed/yield rate, the scale and mode of irrigation, as well as the system of crop rotation. "Specific processing characteristics" mean whether the specific cereal species were processed for animal or human consumption, to which kind of food the cereals were processed, and how they were processed. The project's goals are: 1. The Sumerian and Akkadian textual evidence from Bronze Age Mesopotamia and Syria concerning the specific botanical, agricultural and processing characteristics of barley and wheat species is collected and classified against the background of paleobotanical and ethnographical research. Thus, the scientific community is supplied with comprehensive tables of characteristics of cereals according to the paleobotanical, ethnographical, and cuneiform evidence. 2. The Akkadian and Sumerian terms for barley (SHE and its compounds), glume wheat (ZÍZ and its compounds, as well as SIG15), and naked wheat species (KÌB and its compounds, as well as burrum) should be identified as precisely as possible. Therefore, we compare the textual evidence with the paleobotanical and ethnographical data concerning the specific botanical, agricultural and processing characteristics. 3. The collected information concerning specific characteristics allows conclusions about the ecological, agronomical, economic, and ecotrophological environment of ancient Mesopotamian agrarian societies. In this context, the data first has to be analysed and then critically compared with the current ethnographical models regarding the workflow in traditional field cropping and post-harvest activities, in order to elaborate the diatopic and diachronic differences and similarities.