The

cuneiform Cuneiform is a Logogram, logo-Syllabary, syllabic writing system that was used to write several languages of the Ancient Near East. The script was in active use from the early Bronze Age until the beginning of the Common Era. Cuneiform script ...

šu sign is a common, multi-use syllabic and alphabetic sign for ''šu'', ''š'', and ''u''; it has a subsidiary usage for syllabic ''qat''; it also has a

majuscule Letter case is the distinction between the letters that are in larger uppercase or capitals (more formally '' majuscule'') and smaller lowercase (more formally '' minuscule'') in the written representation of certain languages. The writing syste ...

-(capital letter) Sumerogram usage for ŠU, for

Akkadian language 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 was an East Semitic language that is attested ...

"qātu", the word for "

hand A hand is a prehensile, multi-fingered appendage located at the end of the forearm or forelimb of primates such as humans, chimpanzees, monkeys, and lemurs. A few other vertebrates such as the Koala#Characteristics, koala (which has two thumb#O ...

". The cuneiform character ''šu'' is shaped like a human hand and was created late 4th millennium BC or early 3rd millennium BC. The scribal usage of a sign allows for any of the 4 vowels (there is no vowel 'o' in Akkadian), ''a, e, i, u'' to be interchangeable; thus a usage for syllabic ''qat'' could conceivably be used for the following (k can replace 'q', and d can replace 't'): ''q, a,'' or ''t''; also ''ka, qa, ad, at''. (The "š" (shibilant s) is also interchangeable with the other two esses, "s", and "ṣ", for "''šu''"!) The ''šu'' sign is quite common in the Amarna letters and the ''

Epic of Gilgamesh The ''Epic of Gilgamesh'' () is an epic poetry, epic from ancient Mesopotamia. The literary history of Gilgamesh begins with five Sumerian language, Sumerian poems about Gilgamesh (formerly read as Sumerian "Bilgames"), king of Uruk, some of ...

'' as follows:Parpola, 1971. ''The Standard Babylonian

'', Sign List, pp. 155-165, no. 354, p. 161. ''qat''-(16), ''šu''-(420), ''ŠU''-(13).

References

* Moran, William L. 1987, 1992. ''The Amarna Letters.'' Johns Hopkins University Press, 1987, 1992. 393 pages.(softcover, ) * Parpola, 1971. ''The Standard Babylonian

'', Parpola, Simo, Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project, c 1997, Tablet I thru Tablet XII, Index of Names, Sign List, and Glossary-(pp. 119–145), 165 pages. Cuneiform signs {{Semitic-lang-stub