Debate Between Sheep and Grain

by Unknown

The "Debate between sheep and grain" or "Myth of cattle and grain" is a Sumerian creation myth, written on clay tablets in the mid to late 3rd millennium BCE.

It is one of the seven "debate" topics known from the Sumerian literature, falling in the category of 'disputations'.

Unknown Binding

First published January 1, 2601

About the author

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Reviews

[Genesis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This ancient debate is a testament to the superiority of Veganism.

[Ethan Hulbert · Rating 5 out of 5]

A wonderful piece in the genre of Sumerian disputation literature. A proto-play - probably not staged and acted out like a modern play (and by modern I mean like, 400s BCE), but likely read aloud and back and forth between two people, or perhaps three people if there was someone reading the narration (or more if people play Enki and Enlil for the very end bit). There were so many copies of this found, it was likely very popular!

And I can see why, it's short and fun and a little dramatic and has a clear resolution. Starts off with the gods creating grain and sheep to eat themselves, but they didn't like it so much, so they gave it to mortals instead; and boy oh boy did mortal humans love it!

Then the grain goddess and the sheep goddess are sitting in a tavern hall, drinking beer, drinking wine, and then one of them stands up and says "listen girl I'm better than you" and the other one says "nuh-uh, here's why I'm better than YOU" and they go back and forth on their merits, getting more and more dramatic.

As fun as it is, it also mirrors the real-world discussions of whether domesticated crops or animal husbandry was more important for the development of ancient civilizations, and it shows that they themselves were aware of this back and forth debate, especially because it would concern the use of land (which, by this time - the Third Dynasty of Ur period - would be of grave importance after reclaiming their territories from the Gutians and others) and how much space they allot for crops vs. shepherding.

In the end, the god of wisdom, Enki, declares Grain the winner (since sheep need grain to live, but grain doesn't need sheep to live), and then Enlil, the top god, decrees it so. "But of the two, Grain shall be the greater. Let Sheep fall on her knees before Grain!" says Enki.

Something I found interesting about this is how later plays and literature take this format and expand on it. I'm so glad I paused my reading of Aristophanes to go back to earlier lit first, because I can so clearly see the influence of this type of literature on how he wrote, say, his debate between Right Logic and Wrong Logic in The Clouds - and that was nearly 2000 years later!

In theory you could also argue that these are the earliest forms of Socratic dialogues and Hegelian dialectics. Structured thought about opposing ideas.

So, all in all, a great read!

[Adrián P. C. · Rating 3 out of 5]

⭐⭐⭐ OK/Good.