Langdon Stephen. The Weld-Blundell Collection: Volume 1: Sumerian and Semitic religious and historical texts

Oxford University Press, 1923. — 108 p. — (Oxford editions of cuneiform texts 1).The Series of Oxford Editions of Cuneiform Inscriptions which begins with
this volume has been planned primarily for the purpose of publishing the tablets
and inscribed monuments presented to the University of Oxford bv Mr. H. Weld-Blundell
of Queen,s College. The material contained in the earlier volumes
has been obtained by Mr. Weld-Blundell by purchase during his first visit to
Mesopotamia in the spring to 1921 and later through the valuable assistance of
Captain Cook of the Ministry of Awkaf in Bagdad. The munificent patron of the
university then decided to send out an expedition to excavate in Mesopotamia
and after a prolonged conference with the writer he decided to excavate Kish,
the ancient capital of Babylonia, for the University of Oxford. In view of the
heavy expense involved in such a project; for the ruins of Kish consist in two
great mounds, Tel-el-Ahaimer and Umm Gharra, which revert to the oldest period
of human history, we gladly accepted the generous offer of the Director of the
Field Museum of Natural History (Chicago), under sanction of his Board of
Trustees, to form a joint expedition. The philological material which shall accrue
to Oxford and the Field Museum will be published in this Series. The Field
Museum has undertaken to publish all the archaeological results. We are
under no misapprehension concerning the difficult task of excavating one of
the largest mounds or double mounds in Mesopotamia. It is already obvious
from the experience obtained in the first year's work that the buried remains of
these vast ruins cannot be obtained without long and patient exploration.