The next slide in your presentation (following the 1869 milestone) should build directly on Oppert's coinage of the term "Sumerian" by shifting to the decisive evidence that confirmed the language's existence and non-Semitic nature: the bilingual Sumerian-Akkadian lexical lists (essentially ancient dictionaries or vocabularies).

Suggested Slide Title:Confirmation: Bilingual Lexical Lists from Nineveh (Ashurbanipal's Library)Key Points to Include:

• Primary Evidence: These are structured word lists/glossaries where Sumerian terms appear alongside their Akkadian translations/equivalents. They function like bilingual dictionaries, often organized thematically (e.g., by categories like animals, professions, body parts, or legal terms).
• Discovery Context: Excavated primarily from the royal library of Ashurbanipal (r. ca. 668–627 BCE) at Nineveh (modern Kuyunjik, Iraq). This massive collection (over 30,000 tablets) was unearthed in the mid-19th century by Austen Henry Layard and Hormuzd Rassam, with major publications and analysis following in the 1860s–1880s.
• Why This Proves Key:
  • The lists treat Sumerian as a distinct language (not cryptography or artificial script), with explicit equivalences showing grammar, vocabulary, and phonetics.
  • They demonstrate Sumerian as the older, underlying language (Akkadian speakers learned it as a classical/literary tongue, much like Latin in medieval Europe).
  • Combined with royal titles like "King of Sumer and Akkad" (used by rulers from the Akkadian period onward to denote dominion over both non-Semitic southern/Sumerian and Semitic northern/Akkadian regions), this sealed the case for a separate Sumerian people and language.
• Impact: These texts were instrumental in the full decipherment of Sumerian grammar and vocabulary starting in the 1870s–1880s (e.g., by scholars like François Lenormant and others building on Oppert). Earlier debates (e.g., Joseph Halévy's claim that "Sumerian" was just a priestly code) were largely refuted by this bilingual evidence.
• Visual Suggestion: Include an image of a classic example, such as a tablet from the Urra=hubullu series (the most famous lexical encyclopedia, with 24 tablets in its canonical form) or a Sumerian-Akkadian synonym list from Nineveh.

This slide logically transitions from Oppert's 1869 naming (based on titles) to the concrete textual proof that turned hypothesis into accepted fact. It sets up later slides on full decipherment, major excavations (e.g., Nippur, Ur), or Sumerian culture/literature.If you'd like, I can suggest phrasing for bullet points, a timeline graphic, or the following slide (e.g., on Halévy controversy or early grammars).