Umman Manda (

Akkadian language Akkadian (, Akkadian: )John Huehnergard & Christopher Woods, "Akkadian and Eblaite", ''The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the World's Ancient Languages''. Ed. Roger D. Woodard (2004, Cambridge) Pages 218-280 is an extinct East Semitic language th ...

: ) is a term used in the early second and first millennia BC for a poorly known people in the

Ancient Near East The ancient Near East was the home of early civilizations within a region roughly corresponding to the modern Middle East: Mesopotamia (modern Iraq, southeast Turkey, southwest Iran and northeastern Syria), ancient Egypt, ancient Iran ( Elam, ...

. They have been identified in different contexts as

Hurrians The Hurrians (; cuneiform: ; transliteration: ''Ḫu-ur-ri''; also called Hari, Khurrites, Hourri, Churri, Hurri or Hurriter) were a people of the Bronze Age Near East. They spoke a Hurrian language and lived in Anatolia, Syria and Northern Mes ...

, Elamites,

Medes The Medes (Old Persian: ; Akkadian: , ; Ancient Greek: ; Latin: ) were an ancient Iranian people who spoke the Median language and who inhabited an area known as Media between western and northern Iran. Around the 11th century BC, the ...

Cimmerians The Cimmerians (Akkadian: , romanized: ; Hebrew: , romanized: ; Ancient Greek: , romanized: ; Latin: ) were an ancient Eastern Iranian equestrian nomadic people originating in the Caspian steppe, part of whom subsequently migrated into West A ...

, and

Scythians The Scythians or Scyths, and sometimes also referred to as the Classical Scythians and the Pontic Scythians, were an Ancient Iranian peoples, ancient Eastern Iranian languages, Eastern * : "In modern scholarship the name 'Sakas' is reserved f ...

. The homeland of Umman Manda seems to be somewhere from Central Anatolia to north or northeastern

Babylonia Babylonia (; Akkadian: , ''māt Akkadī'') was an ancient Akkadian-speaking state and cultural area based in the city of Babylon in central-southern Mesopotamia (present-day Iraq and parts of Syria). It emerged as an Amorite-ruled state c. ...

, possibly in what later came to be known as

Mitanni Mitanni (; Hittite cuneiform ; ''Mittani'' '), c. 1550–1260 BC, earlier called Ḫabigalbat in old Babylonian texts, c. 1600 BC; Hanigalbat or Hani-Rabbat (''Hanikalbat'', ''Khanigalbat'', cuneiform ') in Assyrian records, or ''Naharin'' in ...

Mannae Mannaea (, sometimes written as Mannea; Akkadian: ''Mannai'', Biblical Hebrew: ''Minni'', (מנּי)) was an ancient kingdom located in northwestern Iran, south of Lake Urmia, around the 10th to 7th centuries BC. It neighbored Assyria and Urartu, ...

, or

Media Media may refer to: Communication * Media (communication), tools used to deliver information or data ** Advertising media, various media, content, buying and placement for advertising ** Broadcast media, communications delivered over mass el ...

. Zaluti, whose name seems to have an Indo-Iranian etymology, is mentioned as a leader of Ummanda Manda. He is even suggested to be identified with

Salitis In the Manethonian tradition, Salitis (Greek ''Σάλιτις'', also Salatis or Saites) was the first Hyksos king, the one who subdued and ruled Lower Egypt and founded the 15th Dynasty. Biography Salitis is mainly known from a few passages of F ...

the founder of the

Hyksos Hyksos (; Egyptian '' ḥqꜣ(w)- ḫꜣswt'', Egyptological pronunciation: ''hekau khasut'', "ruler(s) of foreign lands") is a term which, in modern Egyptology, designates the kings of the Fifteenth Dynasty of Egypt (fl. c. 1650–1550 BC). T ...

, the

Fifteenth dynasty of Egypt The Fifteenth Dynasty was a foreign dynasty of ancient Egypt. It was founded by Salitis, a Hyksos from West Asia whose people had invaded the country and conquered Lower Egypt. The 15th, 16th, and 17th Dynasties of ancient Egypt are often combin ...

. The principal literary source is the so-called ''Cuthaean Legend'' of Naram-Sin, a composition that deals with the third-millennium BC king of

Agade Akkad (; or Agade, Akkadian: , also URI KI in Sumerian during the Ur III period) was the name of a Mesopotamian city. Akkad was the capital of the Akkadian Empire, which was the dominant political force in Mesopotamia during a period of about ...

(Akkad) Naram-Sin and his struggles against the Umman-manda. As a

literary topos In classical Greek rhetoric, topos, ''pl.'' topoi, (from grc, τόπος "place", elliptical for grc, τόπος κοινός ''tópos koinós'', 'common place'), in Latin ''locus'' (from ''locus communis''), refers to a method for developing ar ...

, the Umman-manda represent a socio-cultural phenomenon with a strong theological basis: The Umman-manda are created by the gods and called forth from their homeland on the northeastern frontier of Mesopotamia by the chief god, be it

Enlil Enlil, , "Lord f theWind" later known as Elil, is an ancient Mesopotamian god associated with wind, air, earth, and storms. He is first attested as the chief deity of the Sumerian pantheon, but he was later worshipped by the Akkadians, Bab ...

Marduk Marduk (Cuneiform: dAMAR.UTU; Sumerian: ''amar utu.k'' "calf of the sun; solar calf"; ) was a god from ancient Mesopotamia and patron deity of the city of Babylon. When Babylon became the political center of the Euphrates valley in the time of ...

, or

Aššur Aššur (; Sumerian: AN.ŠAR2KI, Assyrian cuneiform: ''Aš-šurKI'', "City of God Aššur"; syr, ܐܫܘܪ ''Āšūr''; Old Persian ''Aθur'', fa, آشور: ''Āšūr''; he, אַשּׁוּר, ', ar, اشور), also known as Ashur and Qal ...

, for some particular work of destruction; since this destruction is divinely ordained, human beings are powerless to stop it, and in fact are enjoined against interfering; when the destruction is completed, the gods themselves will destroy the Umman-manda. In the literary topos, the Umman-manda is the enemy of civilization. The question of who the original Umman-manda were remains a mystery. The

Cyrus Cylinder The Cyrus Cylinder is an ancient clay cylinder, now broken into several pieces, on which is written a declaration in Akkadian cuneiform script in the name of Persia's Achaemenid king Cyrus the Great. Kuhrt (2007), p. 70, 72 It dates from the 6th c ...

however, states that the Umman-manda were subdued by

Cyrus the Great Cyrus II of Persia (; peo, 𐎤𐎢𐎽𐎢𐏁 ), commonly known as Cyrus the Great, was the founder of the Achaemenid Empire, the first Persian empire. Schmitt Achaemenid dynasty (i. The clan and dynasty) Under his rule, the empire embraced ...

, and therefore made part of the

Achaemenid Empire The Achaemenid Empire or Achaemenian Empire (; peo, 𐎧𐏁𐏂, , ), also called the First Persian Empire, was an ancient Iranian empire founded by Cyrus the Great in 550 BC. Based in Western Asia, it was contemporarily the largest em ...

just before he captured Babylon in 539 BC. According to the Cyrus Cylinder: "Cyrus, king of Anšan ..made the land of Gutium and all the Umman-manda bow in submission at his feet." In the first millennium BC, the term denoted

and/or

References

Bibliography

*The Coming of the Greeks: Indo-European Conquests in the Aegean and the Near East,

Robert Drews Robert Drews (born March 26, 1936) is an American historian who is Professor of Classical Studies Emeritus at Vanderbilt University. He received his B. A. from Northwestern College, his M. A. from University of Missouri and his Ph.D. from Johns Ho ...

, Princeton University Press, 1989, , , 276 pages, see pages 226-230. Ancient Near East Ancient peoples {{AncientNearEast-stub