Following the decline ofAkkadian supremacy after Shar-kali-sharri and throughout the Gutian period, the cities of the Sumerian south, from Ur to Uruk, Umma and Lagash, managed to maintain a considerable degree of independence. The disappearance of a central power must have brought considerable economic advantages. It is true that, due to a general sense of uncertainty, the Gutian period would be remembered as a negative time for trade (‘on the highways of the land, the grass grew high’). However, it was also a period of limited tributes levied by kings whose role was more symbolic than anything else, at least in the south. In fact, Gutian rule must have been more solid in the north, where they were a substitute for the Akkadian dynasty, possibly implementing its administrative structure.
Therefore, the south had its own dynasties of ensi, who continued the tradition of the Sumerian city-states. The Sumerian King List only attests the ‘Fourth Dynasty of Uruk’. The best attested dynasty in the surviving evidence is the one of Lagash, especially for the reigns of Ur-Baba, Gudea and Ur-Ningirsu. We possess a large number of inscriptions and votive statues of Gudea, making him one of the best-attested rulers of this time. Admittedly, if we had a similar amount of evidence from Uruk or Ur, it would have been of a better quality. However, the marginal role of Lagash compared to other more prestigious cities in Sumer makes its documentation more typical of the period, and more useful when trying to reconstruct an overall picture of this period.
Gudea’s activities were predominantly local. There is only one conflict attested during his reign, against Anshan and Elam. This was probably due to the proximity of Lagash to Iran, making it an easy target for Elamite incursions. Gudea mainly pursued building and administrative activities, such as the construction of the E-ninnu, the temple of Lagash’s city-god Ningirsu. The king described this achievement as a global endeavour. Every land contributed to the temple’s construction, and each provided its local materials, from timber to bitumen, metals and semiprecious stones (Text 9.1). to the prestige of Ningirsu and the ability of Gudea, all these materials managed to travel from the edge of the land to the centre of the world, where the temple was constructed. Naturally, this is a ‘world’ imagined precisely for the temple’s construction, with rivers flowing from north to south to facilitate the arrival of materials at Lagash. This was the point of view of an ensi who was neither the most powerful, nor entirely independent in the political situation of the time.
The relative freedom of the city-states explains why the Gutians, considered unbearable by the Sumerians, stayed in power for about a century. Their collapse was caused by a single war and was not particularly difficult. A king of Uruk, Utu-hegal, the only ruler of the ‘Fifth Dynasty of Uruk’, managed to form an army able to face the one sent by the Gutian king Tirigan, and defeated it.
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