The rulers of pre-Sargonic Lagash usually took the royal title ensi, except for Ur-Nanshe and UruKAgina whose royal title was lugal. However, there are records in the royal inscriptins that among them, Eannatum, Enannatum and Entemena, were given the kingship title (nam-lugal) by the gods, not the rulership title (nam-ensí). On the face of it this seems to reveal a discrepancy. But I will try to show it is reasonable to distinguish between the two titles by examining the phrases immediately following the phrases which granted them kingship in their royal inscriptions.
The lugalship given by gods in the period before UruKAgina designated the ruler's capability in military activities. This military capacity is one function among many belonging to the ensiship of Lagash. The lugalship in this period was regarded as a sub-function of the superior ensiship. It was never the reverse, although the lugalship in the advanced stage of UruKAgina's rule, a comtemporary of Lugalzagesi, the king of Sumer, was clearly superior to the ensiship.

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The UrIII dynasty can be characterized as a highly centralized bureaucratic state. A number of studies of trial documents (diti-la's) have focused on the reconstruction of the UrIII society, studying personal status, family, property, inheritance and so on. Yet surprisingly little has been written about the change of jurisdiction from the local power at Lagaš to the royal power of Ur.
 Through analyzing the prosopography of ‘judges’ (di-ku₅) mentioned in the UrIII ditilla's, this paper explains the process by which jurisdiction of courtcases in Lagaš was transferred from the local power to the royal power.
 The first appearance of the word di-ku₅ is in the year Amar-Suen 4. This is probably connected with the fact that the local administrative system of Lagaš had been radically changed in the year Amar-Suen 3 by royal intervention. In other words, the appearance of di-ku₅'s seems to be connected with royal power. However, upon investigating the prosopogtaphy of the di-ku₅'s, one finds that some di-ku₅'s belong to the royal power, and others belong to the local power. Therefore, in the year Amar-Suen 4 jurisdiction of Lagaš was not yet completely controlled by the UrIII court. The confrontation between the royal power and the local power was settled in the year Amar-Suen 7, when Ir-Nanna, who was chancellor of the UrIII state (sukkal-mah), was installed as governor (ensi₂) of Lagaš. After the year Amar-Suen 7, jurisdiction in Lagaš was systematically controlled by the UrIII dynasty.

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In the Ur III period, the neighboring cities Lagash and Umma had different organizations for public administration. Lagash reorganized the temples to fulfill the role as a secular administration. On the other hand, in Umma temples did not have any administrative role, and consequently this role was filled by the district.
The ensi₂ of Lagash gave his sons the position of chief administrators (sanga) of the temples. In contrast, the ensi of Umma gave members of his family important positions in the city-state organization, such as ka-gur₇, nu-banda₃ and chief administrator of the Apisal district.
Through the use of the administrative means described above, the ensis of Lagash and Umma as viceroys of the Ur III king were able to fulfill their obligation to the king and at the same time build up power of their own in their native cities.

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In this paper I shall discuss the ki-a-nag (the libation place for the dead) of the Pre-Sargonic Lagaš, especially the ki-a-nag of Enentarzi who was the first ruler of the new dynasty after that of Urnanše. We have many records about ki-a-nag in the administrative-economic archives of the é-mí (the house of the wife (of the ruler)). There are some kinds of ki-a-nag as follows: ki-a-nag, the ki-a-nag of Enentarzi, the ki-a-nag of lugal of Lagaš (district), the ki-a-nag of NINA (district) and the ki-a-nag of Urub (district). The most significants results of my investigation are the following:
1. We find the ki-a-nag of Lagaš and of NINA in níg-giš-tag-ga texts, detailed account books of offerings for deities and temples. It is the point at issue why these two places were involved in the records of offerings to deities, though ancestors were generally differenciated from deities.
2. The ki-a-nag of Urub in which maš-da-ri-a offerings were brought seems to be identical with that of Enentarzi, because he was the only one departed spirit who was given those in his ki-a-nag.
3. The ki-a-nag of ensi is identical with that of Enentarzi according to DP 56 and Nik. I, 161.
4. The ki-a-nag of Enentarzi was built in the first year of his reign according to RA 11, 61.
5. Lugalanda and Barnamtarra, his wife, gave many offerings to the ki-a-nag of Enentarzi, but they did not directly bring those to this place.
6. The ki-a-nag in gar lists, lists of monthly expenditure of barley and emmer, seems to be identical with that of Enentarzi, because Dudu, father of Enentarzi and sanga of Ningirsu, had been received and Lugalanda and his wife had individually given same quantity of emmer and barley to it every month until the first year of Uruinimgina, ensi.
7. Dudu was enshrined in the é-ki-šál-la, not his ki-a-nag.
8. I can find the ki-a-nag of Enentarzi but can not find that of Lugalanda, his son, in the records.
9. Uruinimgina suspended the giving of cereal to ki-a-nag of Enentarzi from the first year of lugal. Therefore he seemed to have had the obligation to worship his ki-a-nag. He, however, gave emmer to Enentarzi and Lugalanda in the fifth and sixth year of his reign according to DP 53, Fö 14 and Nik. I, 89.
10. The ki-a-nag in VAT 4875 and DP 57 might have been identical with that of Uruinimgina, because he as well as Enentarzi was the first ruler of the dynasty and also must have built his ki-a-nag.
The ki-a-nag was the sacred place that the first ruler of the dynasty must have built and the successors and their wives must have been enshrined together. Urnanše also may have built his ki-a-nag, because he was the first ruler of the dynasty. Some of the ancestors such as Gilgameš must have become a deity. When the ancestor who had been enshrined in a ki-a-nag was deified, his ki-a-nag became the holy place such as the temple of Ningirsu. The ki-a-nag of lugal of Lagaš must have been that of Urnanše, because he had assumed the title of lugal.
Enentarzi, the first ruler of the dynasty, built his ki-a-nag and Lugalanda, his successor, was enshrined together with him in the same ki-a-nag. It had been the private libation place in which the ruler's family worshipped. Under the reign of Uruinimgina, his ki-a-nag became the place that the ruler worshipped officially. He attemped to make his rulersnip stronger in relation to his reform policy.

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The documents referring to the operation of the land for barley crops which belonged to ‘dam-ensí’ or ^dBa-ba₆ were so much diversified than those of the barley-ration (še-ba) and barley-delivery (še-gar ziz-gar) that any comprehensive point of view regarding these sorts of dacuments has not been carried through up to now.
The present writes, then, in this paper, has tabulated 195 documents on which the name of field was mentioned with regard to some agricultural operation, and on which the historical date was fully recorded or of which we are somehow able to assess the date, in order to afford a foundation for finding out of a comprehensive point of view. Each of 195 documents makes one item of the table with the tablet-number (Ex. DP 601) in the first place, the key-word of the tablet at the right end, and other characteristic words below them. These 195 items are classified in four main groups, three of which are classified into Deimel's three categories (nig-en-na, Kur₆, and APIN·LAL), and they are arranged chronologically.
The accuracy of the chronological assessment of so many tablets (i. e. the items with *, **, *? at the right shoulder of the tablet-number on the table) would be the key to the success of this table and it would be secured by appearances of personal names, their combinations and the rhythm of the occurance of each field's name, especially at the first year of ensí and the first year of lugal under Urukagina.
The following three matters could be drawn as the direct results of this tabulation. (1) The inference that the cultivated land of ‘é-mí’ or ^dBa-ba₆ should be operated really by Deimel's three categories. (2) The facts that the documents relating to the operation of ‘níg-en-na’-land are overwhelmingly more numerous (134 among 195 tablets; that makes a little over two-thirds) and much more diversified in the sorts of documents than the other two. The operation of ‘níg-en-na’ land was one of the central problem of the land-system of ‘é-mí’. (3) The increase of reliability of the chronological supposition that the sixth year of Enentarzi should belong to the same calendar year as the first year of Lugalanda, and the seventh year of the latter same as the first ensí-year of Urukagina.
The successful framing of this sort of table would contribute to the application of the concept of ‘agricultural year’ or ‘agricultural cycle’ as a comprehensive point of view to these documents, together with more than forty lists of the chronologically arranged agricultural informations by field's name which the writer is preparing.

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The object of this article is to point out, analyzing chiefly the administrative tablets from Lagash, some characteristics of agricultural production in ancient Sumer and to explain how closely these characteristics were related to the collective labor-system.
This paper consists of three parts. In the first chapter, I illustrated the productivity of the fields in Lagash. 6 gur-sag-gál 49 sìla per bùr (2179.1l per ha) and 76.1-fold of sowing amount, the figures which I gained from RTC71 and DP574 written in the same year, can be regarded as the average land and seed-productivity of barley in Lagash at the end of the Early Dynastic Period.
But fertility declined greatly by the time of the Third Dynasty of Ur. My estimate of 30 gur-lugal per bùr (1193.2l per ha) was obtained from RTC407 in which were written the total area of directly-controled fields of barley in Lagash at that time, the amount of barley expected to be yielded from this area and lastly the amount actually yielded. As 1.5 gur-lugal of barley was sowed per bùr, seed-productivity was 20-fold. Th. Jacobsen and R. M. Adams think salinization of soil to be the cause of decline in fertility. But what brought about salinization still remains unsolved.
At any rate, 20-fold at the period of the Third Dynasty of Ur is still higher than the figures reported about Italy in the Roman period. And 76.1-fold at the end of the Early Dynastic Period shows clearly the extraordinary fertility of Sumer. This was possible, of course, only by the elaborate irrigation-system.
In the second and third chapter, I discussed the character of irrigating-works in Sumer. To begin with, I dealed with the so-called ‘Farmers' Almanac’ in which were described various advices for a good harvest given by a farmer to his son. The farmer gives his son many, sometimes too trifle, advices about the agricultural activities at the time of preparing land, sowing and harvesting. To irrigate three or four times according to the growth of barley is, however, the only one instruction by him about the period between sowing and harvesting. That is to say, a good harvest could be expected in ordinary years only by doing such works during the interval period. Naturally it was chiefly between sowing and harvesting that people were engaged in the collective irrigating-labor. In fact, we know from CT III 18343, a large Lagash-tablet of the Third Dynasty of Ur, that erìn-people worked exclusively at the ditches of various fields and canals from the seventh month to the twelfth, roughly between sowing and harvesting.
A further study must be made about the interrelations between agricultural production and collective labor-organization, because ‘the pattern of despotism in Sumer’ will be defined by these two fundamental factors of sumerian society.

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P. A. Deimel's contributions relating to the land system of the Sumerian city-state of Lagash in “Orientalia” about half a century before are sometimes referred to and quoted from by Western scholars as the most fundamental on this subject to this day. But on the other hand, particularly as to his conclusive conception of the socio-economic structure of the Sumerian city-state, so called ‘Tempelwirtschaft’, he has been often criticiyed for the reason that he made mistakes in the interpretation of individual materials as well as in the process of building up the conception. In consideration of such state of diversified evaluations of his achievements, the present writer discusses in this paper the following items so as to discriminate the points in question from his acceptable results relating to the land system.
(1) Deimel's elucidation of ‘níg-en-na’; the propriety of the point of view that ‘gán-níg-en-na’ was cultivated and harvested by the labour organization of ‘gán-kur₆’-holders. (2) The interpretation of ‘kur₆’; the reason why ‘übernehmen’ than ‘festgesetzt’ should be adopted as the interpretation of ‘dab₅’ between Deimel's duplicate presentation. (3) Questions about Deimel's proposition that ‘gán-kur₆’-holders were as a whole 'militärkolonen or military husbandmen, and that all of them were under the obligation of corvée and military services. (4) The writer's points to demonstrate are as follows. Among the ‘gán-kur₆’-holders, there were, to a not inconsiderable extent, administrators, officials, and higher religious personalities who did not appeared in še-ba lú-kur₆-dab₅-ba' lists or the records concerning mass labour and appreciably more who did not appeared in the recruitment lists. The ‘šub-lugal’ people in the narrower sence, most of whom appeared in both of the še-ba lists and of recruitment lists, were only one specific sort of ‘gán-kur₆’-holders, Of course, the writer, too, does not deny the existence of the ‘gán-kur₆’-holders as a social order, considering them in view of the people of the other social orders who did not hold ‘gán-kur₆’. The writer's central aim in this paper is to make clear the complexity of this order.

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For a long time the date of the Šuruppak tablets has been the subject of controversy. However, since R. D. Biggs concluded that these tablets can be placed in the EDIIIa Period, his proposal seems to be widely accepted today.
This paper will reexamine this view and argue that the Šuruppak tablets actually belong to a different period. To substantiate this view, we will investigate the usage of ku₃-luh-ha in the Šuruppak sale documents and royal inscriptions and administrative documents of the other cities. The term ku₃-luh-ha is used in the time between Entemena and Uruinimgina, rulers of Lagaš in the EDIIIb Period. This fact leads to the conclusion that the date of the Šuruppak sale documents belong to the second half of the EDlllb Period.
This paper will also investigate the order of the person attesting in bal-PN, the date system of Šuruppak sale documents. The persons are classified into two groups according to the material for payment, urudu group and ku₃-luh-ha group. It is possible to assume that the one proceeds the other.

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