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[German version] I. General ‘Multilingualism’ refers to two different things: on the one hand the ability of an individual to use several languages, on the other hand a situation where, within a social group, several languages are used (linguistic contact). As a result, research into multilingualism can look at multilingual individuals or a multilingual society; accordingly, points of contact arise to psycho- and neurolinguistics on the one hand or to sociolinguistics and historical linguistics (des…

[German version] The cult of the Sumerian god Iškur can be documented for Babylonia from the early 3rd. millennium BC. He was the head of the pantheon of the Middle Babylonian city of Karkar, but remained less significant beyond this area. Iškur was attributed with the threatening power of storms, but also with the rains beneficial for vegetation. Just as Ninurta, he was regarded as a fighter against the power of chaos, and vice versa, Ninurta displayed traits of a storm god in this context. As early as in the 3rd millennium, Iškur was identified with the Semitic weather god, who was one of the most prominent gods in Syria and Upper Mesopotamia from earliest times (the oldest form of the name in Syria: Hadda, later Haddu/Hadad, in Babylonia/Assyria Adda, Addu, then usually Adad; different variants existed in all epochs). Beginning in the Old-Babylonian Period (early 2nd millennium BC) - supported by the establishment of Amurritic dynasties in Babylonia (Amurru [1]) - Adad was one of the great gods of the Babylonian-Assyrian pantheon (wi…

[English version] I. Begriff “M.” bezeichnet zwei verschiedene Dinge: zum einen die Fähigkeit des Individuums, sich mehrerer Sprachen zu bedienen, zum anderen eine Situation, in der innerhalb einer gesellschaftl. Gruppe mehrere Sprachen verwendet werden (Sprachkontakt). Dementsprechend kann sich M.-Forsch. mit dem mehrsprachigen Individuum oder der mehrsprachigen Ges. befassen; je nach Sichtweise ergeben sich Berührungspunkte zur Psycho- und Neurolinguistik einerseits oder zur Soziolinguistik und histor. Linguistik (deskrip…