# UD.GAL.NUN is a recoverable orthography

> Still possible: UD.GAL.NUN is a learned orthography, a regular table of sign substitutions that can in principle be fully recovered, after which the…

Source: https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/unread-cuneiform/answers/ANS0DEDWTEHR4KW/ud-gal-nun-is-a-recoverable-orthography  
Publisher: Mysteries Department  
Licence: CC BY 4.0 (credit Mysteries Department and link the page)  

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[Questions](https://mysteriesdept.com/questions)[Unread cuneiform: half a million tablets and the limits of Sumerian](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/unread-cuneiform)[Why do the Early Dynastic literary texts from Fara and Abu Salabikh resist reading, and can they be read without later duplicates?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/unread-cuneiform/questions/QST0DEDT3AM4NHK/why-do-the-early-dynastic-literary-texts-from-fara-and-abu)Answer

Answer · Unread cuneiform: half a million tablets and the limits of Sumerian

# UD.GAL.NUN is a recoverable orthography

UD.GAL.NUN is a learned orthography, a regular table of sign substitutions that can in principle be fully recovered, after which the texts read as ordinary Sumerian.

**Still possible** Answers **1** question0

## Where it stands

**Still possible** One piece of evidence for, one against. It needs two reviews to be accepted.

## What it predicts

- Every UD.GAL.NUN sign has a fixed standard equivalent across tablets, with few or no context-dependent exceptions.
- Applying the table to an unread UD.GAL.NUN myth yields Sumerian vocabulary at a rate close to that of standard-orthography texts of the same period.

## What would rule it out

- The substitutions prove inconsistent between tablets or scribes to a degree that no single table can capture.

## Evidence 1 for · 1 against

[Krecher identified regular sign substitutions (UD for AN, GAL for EN, NUN for LIL) across the Fara and Abu Salabikh…](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/unread-cuneiform/evidence/EVD0DEDYQRHMP6Q/krecher-identified-regular-sign-substitutions-ud-for-an-gal)

Supported

FOR

[Even where the substitutions are undone, the Early Dynastic spelling omits suffixes, postpositions and verbal…](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/unread-cuneiform/evidence/EVD0DEDYR66DXTW/even-where-the-substitutions-are-undone-the-early-dynastic)

Supported

AGAINST

## The questions it answers

[Why do the Early Dynastic literary texts from Fara and Abu Salabikh resist reading, and can they be read without later duplicates?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/unread-cuneiform/questions/QST0DEDT3AM4NHK/why-do-the-early-dynastic-literary-texts-from-fara-and-abu)

Open3 answers, none ahead

## Cite it

```
Mysteries Department. (2026). UD.GAL.NUN is a recoverable orthography [Answer ANS0DEDWTEHR4KW]. https://mysteriesdept.com/r/ANS0DEDWTEHR4KW
```

Key

**ANS** 0DEDWTEHR4KW

Kind

Answer · hypothesis

Proposed

[Session 1](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/unread-cuneiform/sessions/SES0DEE9K0P47XS/session-1-the-unread-cuneiform-seeded-corpus-readings-and) · 31 Oct 2026

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