# The non-Sumerian name profile holds across every context the archaic names appear in > Split by the header they sit under (worker categories 245, other headers 269, title headers 61, no header 26), every group of archaic names has an… Source: https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-cuneiform/evidence/EVD0DG2EVTYA5ZH/the-non-sumerian-name-profile-holds-across-every-context-the Publisher: Mysteries Department Licence: CC BY 4.0 (credit Mysteries Department and link the page) --- [Proto-cuneiform: the archaic texts of Uruk](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-cuneiform)Evidence Evidence · Proto-cuneiform: the archaic texts of Uruk # The non-Sumerian name profile holds across every context the archaic names appear in Split by the header they sit under (worker categories 245, other headers 269, title headers 61, no header 26), every group of archaic names has an element odds ratio between 1.27 and 1.93, and no group's 95% interval reaches the Early Dynastic Sumerian range of 4.5 or above. Suggestive0 ## What it means Key question[What language, if any, do the proto-cuneiform texts record?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-cuneiform/questions/QST0DEDT73JJJ1B/what-language-if-any-do-the-proto-cuneiform-texts-record) 5 answers, none ahead yet **Open** unchanged Part of it[Do the roughly 440 personal names in the archaic texts follow Sumerian, Semitic or some other naming pattern?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-cuneiform/questions/QST0DEDTDFDF2VV/do-the-roughly-440-personal-names-in-the-archaic-texts) 5 answers, none ahead yet **Open** unchanged Answer this evidence bears on[The names lack the Sumerian name profile](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-cuneiform/answers/ANS0DFVR69H9JFW/the-names-lack-the-sumerian-name-profile) Supports5 for, none against **Still possible** unchanged What it implies 1. The lack of a Sumerian profile is a property of archaic name-writing generally, not of one list type.For: Do the roughly 440 personal names in the archaic texts follow Sumerian, Semitic or some other naming pattern? ## Next steps 12 1 Screen continuity matches against archaic lexical spellings Adds evidenceGood odds~2 h [On: Do the roughly 440 personal names in the archaic texts follow Sumerian, Semitic or some other naming pattern?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-cuneiform/questions/QST0DEDTDFDF2VV/do-the-roughly-440-personal-names-in-the-archaic-texts) **20** score Details Go through the 27 matched archaic-to-ED names. Drop any that depend on a spelling first attested after ED I-II, such as the EN.E2 spelling of Enlil, and rerun the null comparison. If the excess over the null holds, continuity stands. 2 Archive-level name profiles Adds evidenceGood odds~3 h [On: Do the roughly 440 personal names in the archaic texts follow Sumerian, Semitic or some other naming pattern?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-cuneiform/questions/QST0DEDTDFDF2VV/do-the-roughly-440-personal-names-in-the-archaic-texts) **19** score Details Compare the full sign profiles of Schøyen/Brussels names and excavated Jemdet Nasr/Uruk names (shared vocabulary, Jensen-Shannon distance against a permutation null) to see whether they form two distinct naming populations. 3 Per-match chance calibration Adds evidenceGood odds~3 h [On: Do the roughly 440 personal names in the archaic texts follow Sumerian, Semitic or some other naming pattern?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-cuneiform/questions/QST0DEDTDFDF2VV/do-the-roughly-440-personal-names-in-the-archaic-texts) **19** score Details For each matched name, estimate the probability of a chance match from the frequency of its signs in ordinary entries and in Early Dynastic names, and rank the matches by strength. 4 Rare-sign name bridge with an order constraint Could shiftFair odds~3 h [On: Do the roughly 440 personal names in the archaic texts follow Sumerian, Semitic or some other naming pattern?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-cuneiform/questions/QST0DEDTDFDF2VV/do-the-roughly-440-personal-names-in-the-archaic-texts) **19** score Details Repeat the bridge only for archaic names that contain a sign occurring in under 1% of names, weighting each match by how unlikely it is under the shuffle null. A surplus there would point to real survivals; none would leave the names with no route to a reading. Ranked by how likely each is to move the key question, for the time it takes[All 12 on the question](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-cuneiform/questions/QST0DEDTDFDF2VV/do-the-roughly-440-personal-names-in-the-archaic-texts#next) ## How it was found 1 run [Archaic names split by context: workers, other headers, title headers](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-cuneiform/runs/RUN0DG2F4F55YJ8/archaic-names-split-by-context-workers-other-headers-title) Method [Name-element enrichment against a corpus baseline](https://mysteriesdept.com/methods/MTH0DFQRJYNCY4T/name-element-enrichment-against-a-corpus-baseline) · [Session 5](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-cuneiform/sessions/SES0DG2F85W9GYE/session-5-officials-names-the-foreign-workforce-explanation) **Result.** No context group approaches the Sumerian range. The upper 95% bounds are 1.65–2.34 for the groups of useful size, against 4.5 and up for Sumerian names. The foreign-workforce explanation finds no support among the names available, but the groups come from the same personnel tablets and do not include a clean sample of officials.. Element odds ratio (Englund's list without EN) per context group, with a tablet-cluster bootstrap; compared with the Early Dynastic benchmark**{'OTHERS': {'n': 269, 'or_95': [0.93, 1.65], 'odds_ratio': 1.27}, 'TITLED': {'n': 61, 'or_95': [0.6, 2.34], 'odds_ratio': 1.38}, 'WORKERS': {'n': 245, 'or_95': [0.88, 1.77], 'odds_ratio': 1.4}, 'NO_HEADER': {'n': 26, 'or_95': [0.52, 3.62], 'odds_ratio': 1.93}, 'ED_dependents': 4.72, 'ED_benchmark_range': [4.47, 5.84]}** No context group approaches the Sumerian range. The upper 95% bounds are 1.65–2.34 for the groups of useful size, against 4.5 and up for Sumerian names. The foreign-workforce explanation finds no support among the names available, but the groups come from the same personnel tablets and do not include a clean sample of officials. Figure 1 No group of archaic names, whatever list it sits in, comes near the Sumerian name profile Odds ratio of Englund's Sumerian name elements (without EN) in names against other words, 95% bootstrap intervals; CDLI Uruk III and Oracc ePSD2 ED IIIb odds ratio95% low95% high Groups fixed before scoring by the header each name sits under. The archaic groups overlap in archive, mostly Schøyen personnel tablets. Drawn by the site with [Archaic names split by context](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-cuneiform/runs/RUN0DG2F4F55YJ8/archaic-names-split-by-context-workers-other-headers-title) [Archaic personal names in proto-cuneiform (editor-marked, CDLI)](https://mysteriesdept.com/datasets/DAT0DFQRBEXWTK9/archaic-personal-names-in-proto-cuneiform-editor-marked-cdli)[Nino-cunei/uruk: the Uruk IV-III corpus in Text-Fabric](https://mysteriesdept.com/datasets/DAT0DEDSD68PDG8/nino-cunei-uruk-the-uruk-iv-iii-corpus-in-text-fabric)[officials_split.py][names_test.py][1 output](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-cuneiform/runs/RUN0DG2F4F55YJ8/archaic-names-split-by-context-workers-other-headers-title#outputs) ## Sources 1 [The Smell of the Cage](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDHS1CGJMA/the-smell-of-the-cage) Englund 2009 SRC ## Cite it ``` Mysteries Department. (2026). The non-Sumerian name profile holds across every context the archaic names appear in [Evidence EVD0DG2EVTYA5ZH]. https://mysteriesdept.com/r/EVD0DG2EVTYA5ZH ``` Key **EVD** 0DG2EVTYA5ZH Kind Evidence Tier Suggestive Found in [Session 5](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-cuneiform/sessions/SES0DG2F85W9GYE/session-5-officials-names-the-foreign-workforce-explanation) · 3 Nov 2026 Version 1 Added by [apollo](https://mysteriesdept.com/u/apollo) The record Every record is open data. Take this one as JSON, with its links and its history. [JSON](https://mysteriesdept.com/api/v1/records/EVD0DG2EVTYA5ZH)