At the Dawn of History: Ancient Near Eastern Studies in Honour of J. N. Postgate 9781575064741

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At the Dawn of History

Photo: Tina Breckwoldt

At the Dawn of History Ancient Near Eastern Studies in Honour of

J. N. Postgate Volume 1

edited by

Yağmur Heffron, Adam Stone, and Martin Worthington

Winona Lake, Indiana Eisenbrauns 2017

Copyright © 2017 Eisenbrauns Inc. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. www.eisenbrauns.com

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Heffron, Yağmur, editor. | Stone, Adam, 1981– editor. | Worthington, Martin, editor. | Postgate, J. N., honoree. Title: At the Dawn of History : Ancient Near Eastern Studies in Honour of J.N. Postgate / edited by Yağmur Heffron, Adam Stone, and Martin Worthington. Description: Winona Lake, Indiana : Eisenbrauns, 2017. | Includes bibliographical references. | Description based on print version record and CIP data provided by publisher; resource not viewed. Identifiers: LCCN 2016049835 (print) | LCCN 2016049136 (ebook) | ISBN 9781575064741 (ePDF 2-volume set) | ISBN 9781575064710 (cloth, set 2 volumes : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781575064727 (volume 1 : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781575064734 (volume 2 : alk. paper)

Subjects: LCSH: Iraq—Civilization—To 634. | Iraq—History—To 634. | Iraq— Antiquities. | Civilization, Assyro-Babylonian. | Akkadian language—Texts. Classification: LCC DS69.5 (print) | LCC DS69.5 .A86 2017 (ebook) | DDC 935—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016049835

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984.♾™

Contents Volume 1 Editors’ Preface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   ix Nicholas Postgate’s Publications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiii A Fragment of a Stele from Umma . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   1 Lamia Al-Gailani Werr In the Shade of the Assyrian Orchards . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   7 Marie-Françoise Besnier The Šu-Suen Year 9 sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 Flour Dossier from Puzriš-Dagan . . . . . . .   25 Robert Biggs To Eat Like a God: Religion and Economy in Old Babylonian Nippur . . . . . .   43 Nicole Brisch Remarks on the Earliest History of Horoscopy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   55 David Brown A Ceramic Assemblage of the Early Literate Periods from Sumer . . . . . . . . .   73 Daniel Calderbank and Jane Moon Stolen, Not Given? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   85 María Dolores Casero Chamorro Are We Any Closer to Establishing How Many Sumerians per Hectare? Recent Approaches to Understanding the Spatial Dynamics of Populations in Ancient Mesopotamian Cities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .   95 Carlo Colantoni New Perspectives on ‘Early Mesopotamia’ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 119 Harriet Crawford Of Arches, Vaults and Domes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127 Stephanie Dalley Ethnicity in the Assyrian Empire: A View from the Nisbe, (III) “Arameans” and Related Tribalists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133 Frederick Mario Fales

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Instruktionen Tukultī-Ninurtas I. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 179 Helmut Freydank Gods, Temples, and Cult at the Service of the Early Hittite State . . . . . . . . . 189 Marie-Henriette Gates The Ending of the Çineköy Inscription . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 211 David Hawkins A New Palatial Ware or a Case of Imitation of Egyptian Pottery? The Brownish Red Slip (BRS) from Qatna and Its Significance within the Northern Levantine Ceramic Tradition of the Mid-Second Millennium BC . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 217 Marco Iamoni Building on the Past: Gertrude Bell and the Transformation of Space in the Karadağ . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239 Mark Jackson Studies in the Lexicon of Neo-Aramaic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 255 Geoffrey Khan The Temple of Salmānu at Dūr-Katlimmu, Nergal of Hubšalum, and Nergal-ereš . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 271 Hartmut Kühne Between Slavery and Freedom . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 289 Mogens Trolle Larsen The King and His Army . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 301 Mario Liverani Two Middle Assyrian Delivery Notes from the British Museum’s Tablet Collection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 313 Jeanette C. Fincke and Jaume Llop-Raduà The Governors of Halzi-atbari in the Neo-Assyrian Period . . . . . . . . . . . . . 321 Mikko Luukko Never The Same River Twice: The Göksu Valley Through the Ages . . . . . . . . 335 Naoíse Mac Sweeney and Tevfik Emre Şerifoğlu Piecing the Jigsaw . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 355 Harriet Martin A Palace for the King of Ereš? Evidence from the Early Dynastic City of Abu Salabikh, South Iraq . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 363 Roger Matthews and Wendy Matthews

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How Many Sumerians Does It Take to Put Out the Rubbish? . . . . . . . . . . . 373 Augusta McMahon

Volume 2 The Location of Raṣappa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 393 Simo Parpola Making Fire in Uruk-Period Abu Salabikh . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 413 Susan Pollock A Neo-Assyrian Legal Document from Tell Sitak . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 423 Karen Radner The Assyrian Palace at Nabi Yunus, Nineveh . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 431 Julian Reade The Socio-Economics of Cuneiform Scholarship after the ‘End of Archives’: Views from Borsippa and Uruk . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 459 Eleanor Robson Eine Königskette im Heiligtum der Ištar von Assur . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 475 Ursula Seidl On the Tablet Trail: Herdsmen’s Employment for Royal Wives in the Ur III Period . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 481 T. M. Sharlach An Expedition of King Shalmaneser I and Prince Tukultī-Ninurta to Carchemish . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 491 Daisuke Shibata The Role of Stimulants in Early Near Eastern Society: Insights through Artifacts and Texts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 507 Diana Stein An Estimate of the Population of the City of Umma in Ur III Times . . . . . . . 535 Piotr Steinkeller How Many Mesopotamians per Hectare? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 567 Elizabeth C. Stone The Terminology for Times of the Day in Akkadian . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 583 Michael P. Streck ‘Counter-Archaeology’: Putting the Ur III Drehem Archives Back in the Ground . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 611 Christina Tsouparopoulou

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Meaning in Perspective: Some Akkadian Terms for ‘Foundation’— -uššu, temennu, išdu, duruššu- . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 631 Johanna Tudeau Nergal-eṭir’s Correspondence in the Light of BM 30205, and a Preliminary Edition of BM 36543, another Fragmentary Neo-Assyrian Letter in the Babylon Collection of the British Museum . . . 651 Greta Van Buylaere Seven Debt-Notes of Anatolians from Ancient Kanesh . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 665 Klaas R. Veenhof Oracle Bones at the Sichuan University Museum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 685 Xianhua Wang and Changhong Chen Association of the Dog with Healing Power in Mesopotamia . . . . . . . . . . . 689 Chikako E. Watanabe Ugaritic Military Terms in the Light of Comparative Linguistics . . . . . . . . . . 699 Wilfred G. E. Watson Tabal and the Limits of Assyrian Imperialism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 721 Mark Weeden Ein dritter Backstein mit der großen Inschrift des Königs Takil-ilissu von Malgûm und der Tonnagel des Ipiq-Ištar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 737 Claus Wilcke Assur among the Gods of Urartu . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 753 Paul Zimansky Some Bronze Stamp Seals of Achaemenid Date . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 765 Dominique Collon and John Curtis Assyrians after the Fall: Evidence from the Ebabbar of Sippar . . . . . . . . . . . 781 John MacGinnis Prayer and Praise in the City of Assur . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 797 Frances Reynolds

Owing to circumstances for which the editors assume full responsibility, and for which neither authors nor publisher are to blame, the contributions by Dominique Collon and John Curtis, John MacGinnis, and Frances Reynolds were not included in the materials originally submitted to the publisher. As a result, they appear at the end of volume 2 instead of at the appropriate alphabetical location in the publication.

Editors’ Preface When the three of us first approached colleagues with view to convening a Festschrift for Nicholas Postgate, the response was overwhelming. Messages poured in enthusing over Nicholas’ intellectual and human qualities in the warmest terms, and it is no surprise that the final product has needed two volumes to fit everybody in (and that’s after we limited the project to contributors who had worked directly with the jubilar!). It has always been a feature of Nicholas’ scholarship and teaching that, unlike most Mesopotamianists, he is equally comfortable with Archaeology and Philology, and indeed sees the two as indissoluble parts of the same intellectual enterprise. We have therefore arranged the contributions alphabetically, to allow the most unexpected combinations of topics to appear side by side, as is characteristic of Nicholas’ own publication list (see pp. xiiiff.). Nicholas is the most modest and unassuming of scholars, and he probably shudders at the idea of both a Festschrift, and, even more, a preface to it. Yet, not least owing to our indebtedness to him as Doktorkinder, we cannot resist the urge to pen a few words on him and his career. It is a story with many exciting moments, and we hope Nicholas will indulge us in presenting it before readers to whom it is new. Nicholas first arrived in Cambridge in 1963, to read Classics, having previously attended his father’s preparatory school and Winchester College. In truth, harbingers of his future interests were not entirely absent: as a member of the Winchester Archaeological Society, he had invited Oliver Gurney to address the school on The Hittites (disappointingly receiving instead a lecture on the decipherment of cuneiform). But the real impetus towards Mesopotamia came from David Oates, Nicholas’ mentor at Trinity College, who, with the famous words It’s never too late to give up Classics, kick-started a meteoric career that would run for the next half-century and on, changing the fields of both Near Eastern Archaeology and Assyriology. Another dictum from David Oates, indeed an altogether surprising one, was that during one’s Undergraduate studies one should concentrate on languages, since one could always “gen up on different sword types” in the Long Vacation. And so Nicholas rapidly switched from Classics to Oriental Studies, reading for a degree in Akkadian and Hebrew. His contemporaries in the Faculty of Oriental Studies included Stephanie Dalley (née Page) and Julian Reade. Akkadian was taught by James Kinnier Wilson, and the History and Archaeology of the Ancient Near East by Margaret Munn-Rankin. Nicholas spent part of his third Undergraduate year in Münster at the feet of Wolfram von Soden, studying Akkadian and working on the Akkadisches Handwörterbuch, but also attending Sumerian classes with Joachim Krecher. Nicholas the Undergraduate also excavated at Mycenae with Lord William Taylour, and in Turkey: KültepeKaneš with Tahsin Özgüç, and Can Hasan with David French. Graduating with a starred 1st in 1967, Nicholas took up a position as Assistant Lecturer in Akkadian at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London, where alongside Donald Wiseman and David Hawkins he taught Akkadian and Sumerian to classes which included Barbara Parker, Michael Roaf, and John Curtis. Feeling that their staff should have experience of the modern regions of the world that they studied, in Autumn 1968 SOAS provided Nicholas with a VW beetle and said that they ix

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would see him twelve months hence. In an unusual form of honeymoon, Nicholas and Carolyn drove out overland across Europe and Turkey into Iran, from where they entered Mesopotamia from the east. With a base at the British School at 90/1 Karradet Mariam, overlooking the Tigris in Baghdad, Nicholas worked in the Iraq Museum on the tablets from Nimrud, but also visited much of the country, including working with David and Joan Oates at Tell al-Rimah in the north. In 1970, Trinity College elected Nicholas as Fellow for Research in Assyriology, on the strength of a work which was later to be published as Taxation and Conscription in the Assyrian Empire. The Fellowship continued until 1974, but in 1972 Nicholas was appointed as Assistant Director of the British School of Archaeology in Iraq. The post required a move to Baghdad, and so from 1972 to 1980 Nicholas and family lived in Iraq, acquiring the fluent Arabic that would later be matched by fluent Turkish. While conducting routine duties such as overseeing the School’s hostel, guests, and library, Nicholas decided that he wanted to excavate a Sumerian city. An ideal candidate was the 50-hectare site of Abu Ṣalabikh (16 km northwest of Nippur), first investigated in 1963–65 by Vaughn Crawford and Donald P. Hansen of the Chicago Oriental Institute. From a sounding in the Early Dynastic mound, Crawford and Hansen had recovered around 500 Old Sumerian inscriptions rich in lexical and literary material. Nicholas was attracted by the idea of using written documentation to elucidate the all-too-sketchy picture of Early Dynastic Sumerian archaeology: excavation at Abu Ṣalabikh would make it possible “to describe life in a small Sumerian city-state through the eyes of a visiting social anthropologist” (Postgate 1992–93: 410), and to match “the record in the ground and the record on the cuneiform tablet” (W. Matthews and Postgate 1994: 171). Meanwhile, diplomatic entanglements of pantomimical proportions between the Iraqi government and various foreign institutions led to the closure of the British School and to its re-opening under the different name of British Archaeological Expedition to Iraq, with Nicholas as Director. It was under the banner of this new institution that excavations at Abu Ṣalabikh began in 1975, a survey having been conducted in 1973. The team was led by Nicholas, assisted by Jane Moon and Roger Matthews as field director in different years. Excavations lasted until Saddam Hussein’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990.  A wide variety of interdisciplinary techniques — zoo-archaeological, botanical, micromorphological and micro-stratigraphic — were successfully employed at the site, many of them for the first time in southern Iraq. A particularly noteworthy “first” was the technique of surface scraping. The Abu Ṣalabikh team quickly realized that even a decade of full excavation would uncover less than 2% of the site, so another approach was needed to provide a wider scale of understanding. As the remains of the 3rd-millennium city were very close to the surface, to expose clearly visible layers and wall lines it sufficed to scrape away a shallow layer of loose soil. By this method, one could quickly generate a site plan of the Early Dynastic city. The technique was applied to wide areas of the West, South, and the Main mounds, giving a broad view of the internal layout of the city, the lattice of streets, and blocks of urban housing. Abu Ṣalabikh is far from being Nicholas’ only excavation during his Baghdad years. At this time, the Iraqi authorities were starting a long series of rescue projects in advance of dam constructions. The BAEI’s first site was the Ubaid mound of Tell Madhhur in the Hamrin region,

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and Nicholas began the work there before handing over to Michael Roaf, who had become Assistant Director of the BAEI in 1979. In 1981, on the retirement of his old teacher, Margaret Munn-Rankin, Nicholas returned to Cambridge, initially as University Lecturer in the History and Archaeology of the Ancient Near East, and Fellow of Trinity College. On the retirement of James Kinnier Wilson in 1989 he moved sideways into the language post, while the History and Archaeology were taken on by Joan Oates. With the introduction of an MPhil in addition to the four year Undergraduate course in Assyriology, they had a busy teaching schedule. There was an ‘open door’ policy of extending Mesopotamian teaching to interested sittersin, many of whom went on to secure academic positions in which they consolidated their Mesopotamian interests. Such “visitors” included Peter Williams, Guy Deutscher, Naoíse Mac Sweeney, Johannes Haubold, Cyprian Broodbank, and Kate Spence. At the same time, Nicholas was of course supervising a considerable number of his own PhD students, here listed in chronological order to the present day: Donald M. Matthews, Roger Matthews, Wendy Matthews (née Knight), John MacGinnis, Tina Breckwoldt, Chikako Watanabe, Graham Cunningham, David Brown, Simon Sherwin, Leyla Umur, Lauren Ristvet, Martin Worthington, Xianhua Wang, T. Emre Şerifoğlu, Rachel Fenton, Yaǧmur Heffron (née Sarıoǧlu), Adam Stone, Johanna Tudeau, and Olga Vinnichenko. He also served twice as Faculty Chairman, and was instrumental in establishing the Cambridge Central Asia Forum. All the while, archaeological excavation continued. Though fieldwork in Iraq had become impossible, in 1993 David French urged the British Institute at Ankara to undertake rescue excavations at Kilise Tepe (Göksu Valley, southern Turkey), which found itself within the proposed flood zone of the Kayraktepe Dam, and had once been within the boundaries of the Assyrian empire. In partnership with the Silifke Museum — represented first by Şinasi Başal, and then by İlhame Öztürk, one of the project’s most valuable allies — Nicholas undertook rescue excavations there in 1994–1998, leading the team together with field director Caroline Steele. Situated at a crucial nodal point between Cilicia and the Konya plain, Kilise Tepe turned out to be an especially rewarding site, opening a window onto the pre-Classical history of a region poor in archaeological documentation for the Late Bronze Age. Accordingly, even after it had become clear that the site would not be submerged after all, Nicholas returned for a renewed phase of excavations in 2007–2012, this time jointly with the University of Newcastle, Mark Jackson acting as co-director for the Byzantine levels. A good number of Cambridge Mesopotamianists excavated at Kilise Tepe, including T.  Emre Şerifoǧlu (assistant director in the second phase), and two of this volume’s editors. Indeed, with excavation out of the question in Iraq for much of the period 1994–2012, Kilise Tepe provided many Cambridge students — from Undergraduate to PhD — with their first experience of Near Eastern Archaeology. Against the backdrop of all his activities in teaching, administration, and excavation, it is remarkable that Nicholas was able to maintain an outstandingly active and diverse research profile of single-author publications across all aspects Mesopotamian studies, many of which have become established classics. As well as editing numerous texts (particularly Middle and Neo-Assyrian, but also Sumerian) and writing a long series of articles, in 1992 he became a household name among students of the Ancient Near East with his Early Mesopotamia: Society

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and Economy at the Dawn of History (Routledge), a research-led and innovative textbook of Mesopotamian civilisations up to the mid-second millennium BC, dedicated “to the people of Iraq”. More recently, his expertise in social and economic history culminated in the magnum opus written during a three-year grant from the Leverhulme Trust: Bronze Age Bureaucracy: Writing and the Practice of Government in Assyria (Cambridge University Press, 2014), winner of the 2014 Frank Cross Moore Award from the American Schools of Oriental Research. Nicholas’ publications made him Reader in 1986, Fellow of the British Academy in 1993, and Professor in 1994. Small wonder that, when invited to contribute to the present volume, one of our authors replied: “Since Nicholas is one of the best scholars in our field, I feel much honored! Although I have started to refuse writing for Festschriften, I have to make an exception in this case.” As witnessed by his many co-authored publications, and his membership of the editorial boards of the Reallexikon der Assyriologie and State Archives of Assyria, Nicholas has a distinct openness to team-work. Coupled with entrepreneurial flair, this repeatedly led him into largescale scholarly collaborations. In 1984 he and Marvin Powell founded the Sumerian Agriculture Group, with its own journal, Bulletin of Sumerian Agriculture, which ran until 1995. In 1999 he brought to fruition a plan conceived a decade earlier, namely the Concise Dictionary of Akkadian (Harrassowitz): a compressed and updated translation of von Soden’s Akkadisches Handwörterbuch produced in collaboration with Jeremy Black, Andrew George, and a team of postdoctoral scholars. The Concise Dictionary has established itself as one of the most important tools for Akkadian teaching (and indeed research) worldwide. On a personal note, all three of us have been privileged to experience Nicholas as both MPhil teacher and PhD supervisor. In the former role, he has a wonderful classroom presence, which combines deep knowledge with dry humour and an instinctive feel for students’ needs. In the latter role he leaves students free to develop their interests, which is one reason why the range of topics and approaches he has supervised is so wide. But he also knows exactly when to step in, with unerring clarity of thought, to straighten the flow of work when whirlpools start to form. By dispelling administrative duties, retirement (in 2013) has given Nicholas more opportunities to pursue his interests and projects — which include more text editions, and the final publication of the Kilise Tepe excavations (covering the seasons 2007–2012). A life Fellow of Trinity College, he continues to be a key member of the Cambridge Assyriological community, a much valued teacher of Graduate and Undergraduate Akkadian, and a leading international researcher. The present Festschrift is a token of our esteem and affection. It remains to voice our thanks to several parties: first of all to Nicholas himself, for everything he has done and is doing for Ancient Near Eastern studies; to the authors, for their contributions and for their patience with the volume’s slow gestation; to the publisher, for his efficiency; and to The Master and Fellows of Trinity College, Cambridge, the Thriplow Trust, and the C. H. W. Johns Fund in the University of Cambridge, for subventions towards the costs of publication. Yaǧmur Heffron Adam Stone Martin Worthington

Nicholas Postgate’s Publications (up to 2016)

A. Books (authored and co-authored)  1. Neo-Assyrian Royal Grants and Decrees (Studia Pohl, Series Maior 1; Rome, Pontifical Biblical Institute, 1969) pp. 1–138, Plates I–XXVIII.  2. The Governor’s Palace Archive (Cuneiform Texts from Nimrud, II; London, British School of Archaeology in Iraq, 1973) pp. i-xvii, 1–283, Plates 1–98.  3. Taxation and Conscription in the Assyrian Empire (Studia Pohl, Series Maior 3; Rome, Pontifical Biblical Institute, 1974) pp. i-xx, 1–441.  4.  Fifty Neo-Assyrian Legal Documents (Warminster, Aris & Phillips, 1976) pp. i-x, 1–221.  5. The First Empires (Oxford, Elsevier-Phaidon, 1977) pp. 1–152. (Hungarian translation: Budapest 1977; Arabic translation: Baghdad 1991).   6.  (with Dr. B.K. Ismail) Texts from Niniveh [edition & commentary; MS completed 1979, published Baghdad 1993].   7.  (Editor and principal author) The West Mound Surface Clearance (Abu Salabikh Excavations, 1; London, British School of Archaeology in Iraq, 1983) pp. i-vii, 1–111, Pl. I-XII.   8.  (with S.M. Dalley) Tablets from Fort Shalmaneser (Cuneiform Texts from Nimrud, III; London, British School of Archaeology in Iraq, 1984) pp. xii+289, Plates 1–50.   9.  (Editor and principal author) Graves 1 to 99 (Abu Salabikh Excavations, 2; London, British School of Archaeology in Iraq, 1985) pp. i-vi, 1–224, Plates I–XXXII. 10.  The Archive of Urad-Šerua and His Family: A Middle Assyrian Household in Government Service (Rome, Herder, 1988) pp. xxxiii, 230. 11.  Early Mesopotamia. Society and Economy at the Dawn of History (London/New York, Routledge, 1992; reprint 1994) pp. xxiii, 367.  (Also translated into Spanish). 12.  (with F. M. Fales) Imperial Administrative Records, Part I: Palace Administration (State Archives of Assyria, Vol. 7; Helsinki, 1992) pp. xliii, 260, Pl. XI. 13. (with P. Steinkeller), Third Millennium Legal and Administrative Texts in the Iraq Museum, Baghdad (Winona Lake, Eisenbrauns, 1992) pp. xv, 123, Pl. XXXII. 14.  (Co-editor, with H.D . Baker and R. J. Matthews), Lost Heritage (Fasc. 2) (British School of Archaeology in Iraq, 1993) [Illustrated list of stolen antiquities]. 15.  (with F.M. Fales) Imperial Administrative Records, Part II: Provincial and Military Administration (State Archives of Assyria, Vol. 11; Helsinki 1995) pp. xlii, 211. 16.  (Lead editor with J.A. Black and A.R. George) A Concise Dictionary of Akkadian (Wiesbaden, 1999; reprinted 2000 and 2004) pp. xxiv, 450. xiii

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17.  (Co-editor with D.C. Thomas, and contributor) Excavations at Kilise Tepe, 1994–1998: From Bronze Age to Byzantine in Western Cilicia, 2 vols. (McDonald Institute/ British Institute at Ankara, 2007) pp. 620 + 244, 527 b/w illus., 58 col. illus., 43 tables. 18.  (with A.Y. Ahmad), Archives from the Domestic Wing of the North-West Palace at Kalhu/Nimrud (Edubba 10; Nabu Publications, 2007) pp. xxi, 83, Pl 35. 19.  The Land of Assur and the Yoke of Assur: Studies on Assyria: 1971–2005 (Oxbow Books, 2007) pp. viii, 376. 20.  Bronze Age Bureaucracy: Writing and the Practice of Government in Assyria (CUP, 2013) pp. xi, 484.

B. Books (Edited) 1.  (with M.A. Dandamayev et al.), Societies and Languages of the Ancient Near East: Studies in Honour of I.M. Diakonoff (Warminster, 1982) pp. 356 2.  Artefacts of complexity: Tracking the Uruk in the Near East (Iraq Archaeological Reports 5: London, British School of Archaeology in Iraq, 2002). 3.  Languages of Iraq, ancient and modern (London 2007) pp. 187.

C.  Journal Articles and Contributions to Books, Encyclopaedias, Conferences, etc. a. Articles in the Reallexikon der Assyriologie: 1972: 1973: 1975: 1976: 1977: 1980: 1983: 1989: 2004:

Habur, Middle Assyrian Period Band IV Halzu Harran Hindanu Husur Huzirina Idu Band V Imgur-Enlil Itu’ Izalla Kalhu [with J.E. Reade] Kilizu Kurba’il Band VI Mannäer Band VII Palast, Einleitung Band X Palast A.V Mittel- und Neuassyrisch

28a–29a 64a–b 122b–125a 415b–416a 524a–b 535b–536a 33a–b 66b–67b 221b–222a 225b–226b 303a–323b 591–593 367b–368a 340–342 195–200 212–226

And smaller articles including: Halahhu, Halziadbar, Hadattu, Harihumba, Harmis, Hasamu, Hamedi, Ilu-milki, Isana, Išpalluri, Kašiari, Katmuhu, Laqe, Mahmur-Gebiet, Obst, Pfeil, Pinie, Schaf, Schmuck, Sahrizor, Steuer, Surmarrate, Tarsus, Terebinth, Weide

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C.  Papers in Journals and Edited Volumes  1. (with J.D. Hawkins), “Notes on the Rimah Texts, 1964”, Iraq 30 (1968) 186–7, Plates LXVII–LXXII.   2.  “Two Marduk Ordeal Fragments”, Zeitschrift für Assyriologie 60 (1969) 124–27.   3.  two contributions to: J.M. Coles (ed.), The Awakening of Man (Hamlyn, 1969) 14–25 and 37–64.   4.  “A Neo-Assyrian Tablet from Tell Al Rimah”, Iraq 32 (1970) 31–5.   5.  “More ‘Assyrian Deeds and Documents’ ”, Iraq 32 (1970) 129–64, Pls. 18–31.   6.  “An Assyrian Altar from Nineveh”, Sumer 26 (1970) 133–6.   7.  “Land Tenure in the Middle Assyrian Period: A Reconstruction”, Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies 34 (1971) 496–520.   8.  “Texts and Fragments”, Journal of Cuneiform Studies 24 (1972) 175–76.   9.  “The Role of the Temple in the Mesopotamian Secular Community”, in P.J. Ucko, R. Tringham and G.W. Dimbleby (eds.), Man, Settlement and Urbanism (London, G. Duckworth & Co., 1972) 811–25. 10.  “URU.ŠE=kapru” and “Old Sumerian GE =aš?”, Archiv für Orientforschung 24 (1973) 99. 23 11.  “Appendix 1: Tell Taya Tablets, 1972–73”, Iraq 35 (1973) 173–75. 12. “Neo-Assyrian Royal Grants and Decrees: Addenda and Corrigenda”, Orientalia NS 42 (1973) 441–4. 13.  “The Inscription of Tiglath-Pileser III at Mila Mergi”, Sumer 29 (1973) 47–59. 14.  “Royal Exercise of Justice under the Assyrian Empire”, in P. Garelli (ed.), Le palais et la royauté (Compte Rendu de la XIXe Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, Paris 1971 [1974]) 417–426. 15.  “Two Points of Grammar in Gudea”, Journal of Cuneiform Studies 26 (1974) 16–54. 16. “The bit akiti in Neo-Assyrian Nabu Temples”, Sumer 30 (1974) 51–74. 17.  “Some Remarks on Conditions in the Assyrian Countryside”, Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 17 (1974) 225–43 [review article of: F.M. Fales, Censimenti e catasti di epoca neo-assira]. 18.  Notes brèves, 6, Revue d’assyriologie 68 (1974) 93. 19. “Isin=INki?”, Sumer 30 (1974) 207–9. 20.  “Assyrian Texts and Fragments”, Iraq 35 (1975) 13–36. 21. “Some Old Babylonian Shepherds and their Flocks”, Journal of Semitic Studies 20 (1975) 1–21 (with a contribution by S. Payne) [review article of: J.J. Finkelstein, Yale Oriental Series, Babylonian Texts, Vol. XIII]. 22.  “Inscriptions from Tell al-Wilayah”, Sumer 32 (1976) 77–100. 23.  (with P.R.S. Moorey) “Excavations at Abu Salabikh, 1975”, Iraq 38 (1976) 133–69. 24.  “Excavations at Abu Salabikh, 1976”, Iraq 39 (1977) 269–99. 25.  “Excavations at Abu Salabikh, 1977”, Iraq 40 (1978) 77–88.

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26.  (with R.D. Biggs) “Inscriptions from Abu Salabikh, 1975”, Iraq 40 (1978) 101–118. 27.  “An Inscribed Jar from Tell Al-Rimah”, Iraq 40 (1978) 71–5. 28a. “The Organization of Labour in Assyria”, Xth Congress of Economic Historians, Edinburgh 1978, pp. 199–208 [not separately published; see 28b]. 28b. “Employer, Employee and Employment in the Neo-Assyrian Empire”, in M.A. Powell (ed.), Labor in the Ancient Near East (American Oriental Series 68; New Haven, 1987) 257– 270.  [Revised version of 28a]. 29.  “The Economic Structure of the Assyrian Empire”, in M.T. Larsen (ed.), Power and Propaganda: A Symposium on Ancient Empires (Mesopotamia 7, Copenhagen 1979) 193–221. 30a. “The Historical Geography of the Hamrin Basin”, 1st International Conference on Babylon, Assur and the Hamrin, Sumer 35 (1979) 594–91 (sic!). 30b. (same title; revised version with sources) Sumer 40 (1984) 149–59. 31.  “Assyrian Documents in the Musée d’Art et d’Histoire, Geneva”, Assur 2/4 (1979) 1–15. 32.  “On Some Assyrian Ladies”, Iraq 41 (1979) 89–103. 33.  “Excavations at Abu Salabikh, 1978–79”, Iraq 42 (1980) 87–105. 34.  “Early Dynastic Burial Customs at Abu Salabikh”, Sumer 36 (1980) 65–82. 35.  “The Place of the šaknu in Assyrian Government”, Anatolian Studies 30 (1980) 67–76. 36. “The Assyrian Empire”, in A. Sherratt (ed.), The Cambridge Encyclopaedia of Archaeology (Cambridge, 1980) 186–192. 37. “Palm-trees, Reeds and Rushes in Iraq Ancient and Modern”, in M.-Th. Barrelet (ed.), L’archéologie de l’Iraq (Colloques du C.N.R.S., No. 580; Paris, 1980) 99–110. 38.  “Princeps Iudex” in Assyria”, Revue d’Assyriologie 74 (1980) 180–2. 39.  “Administrative Archives from the City of Assur in the Middle Assyrian Period” (2nd International Conference on Babylon, Assur and the Hamrin, Baghdad 1979), Sumer 42 (1986) 100–105 (Arabic translation: 36–40). 40.  “Nomads and Sedentaries in the Middle Assyrian Sources”, in J.S. Castillo (ed.), Nomads and Sedentary Peoples (XXX International Congress of Human Sciences in Asia and North Africa, Mexico 1976; Mexico, n.d.) 47–56 41. “Ilku and Land Tenure in the Middle Assyrian Kingdom: A Second Attempt”, in J.N. Postgate et al. (eds.), Societies and Languages of the Ancient Near East: Studies in Honour of I.M. Diakonoff (Warminster, Aris & Phillips 1982) 304–13. 42. “Abu Salabikh”, in J. Curtis (ed.), Fifty Years of Mesopotamian Discovery (London, British School of Archaeology in Iraq, 1982) 48–61. 43.  (with J.A. Moon) “Excavations at Abu Salabikh, 1981”, Iraq 44 (1982) 103–136. 44.  (with J.A. Moon) “Excavations at Abu Salabikh, A Sumerian City”, National Geographic Research Reports: 1976 projects, 721–743. 45.  “A Plea for the Abolition of šeššimur!”, Revue d’Assyriologie 76 (1982) 188. 46.  “Abu Salabikh, 1981”, Archiv für Orientforschung 28 (1981–82) 255–257.

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47.  (with A.K. Grayson) “Two British Museum Fragments, Possibly of a Royal Decree”, Annual Report of the Royal Inscriptions of Mesopotamia Project 1 (1983) 11–14. 48.  “The Columns of Kapara”, Archiv für Orientforschung 29–30 (1983/4) 55. 49.  “Introduction” and “The Problem of Yields in Cuneiform Texts” and “Processing of Cereals in the Cuneiform Record”, in Bulletin on Sumerian Agriculture 1 (1984), 1–7, 97–102, 103–113. 50.  “Cuneiform Catalysis: The First Information Revolution”, Archaeological Review from Cambridge 3/ii (1984) 4–18. 51.  “The Haditha Archaeological Project”, Ur: The International Magazine of Arab Culture 1984/ iii, 30–35. 52.  (review article of K. Nashef, Die Orts- und Gewassernamen der mittelbabylonischen und mittelassyrischen Zeit), Archiv für Orientforschung 32 (1985) 95–101. 53.  “Excavations at Abu Salabikh, 1983”, Iraq 47 (1985) 95–113. 54.  “The ‘oil-plant’ in Assyria”, Bulletin on Sumerian Agriculture 2 (1985) 145–151. 55.  (with J.A. Moon) “Late Third Millennium Pottery from Abu es Salabikh”, Sumer 43 (1985– 6), 69–79. 56.  “Middle Assyrian Tablets: The Instruments of Bureaucracy”, Altorientalische Forschungen 13 (1986) 10–39. 57.  “The Equids of Sumer, Again”, in H.-P. Uerpmann & R.H. Meadow (eds.), Equids in the Ancient World (Tübinger Atlas des Vorderen Orients, Reihe A, Beiheft 19/1; Wiesbaden, 1986), 194–206. 58.  “Administrative Archives from Assur in the Middle Assyrian Period”, (contribution to the Proceedings of the XXXe Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, Leiden, 1983; revised & expanded version of 39 above), in K.R. Veenhof (ed.), Cuneiform Archives and Libraries (Leiden 1986) 168–83. 59.  “The Transition from Uruk to Early Dynastic: Continuities and Discontinuities in the Record of Settlement”, in U. Finkbeiner & W. Röllig (eds.), Ğamdat Naṣr: Period or Regional Style? (Wiesbaden, 1986) 90–106. 60.  “Abu esSalabikh and Tell Mardikh: Sumer and Ebla”, Sumer 42 (1986) 68–70. 61.  “Some Vegetables in the Assyrian Sources”, Bulletin on Sumerian Agriculture 3 (1987) 93–100. 62. “Notes on Fruit in the Cuneiform Sources”, Bulletin on Sumerian Agriculture 3 (1987) 115–144. 63.  (with R.J. Matthews) “Excavations at Abu Salabikh, 1985–86”, Iraq 49 (1987) 91–119. 64a.  “Grundeigentum und Nutzung von Land in Assyrien im 1.  Jt. v.u.Z.”, in B. Brentjes (ed.) Das Grundeigentum in Mesopotamien ( Jahrbuch für Wirtschaftsgeschichte, Sonderband 1987) 89–110. 64b. “The Ownership and Exploitation of Land in Assyria in the 1st Millennium B.C.”, in M. Lebeau & Ph. Talon (eds.), Reflets des deux fleuves: Volume de mélanges offerts à André Finet (Leuven 1989), 141–152.  [English version of 64a].

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65.  “Scratching the Surface at Abu Salabikh: Urban Archaeology Sumerian Style”, The Society for Mesopotamian Studies Bulletin 14 (1987) 21–29. 66.  “BM 118796: A Dedication Text on an ‘Amulet’ ”, State Archives of Assyria Bulletin 1/ii (1987) 57–63. 67.  (with J.D. Hawkins) “Tribute from Tabal”, State Archives of Assyria Bulletin 2/i (1988) 31–40. 68.  “Middle Assyrian texts (Nos. 99–101)”, in I. Spar (ed.), Cuneiform Texts in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, I (New York, 1988) 144–148. 69.  “A View from Down the Euphrates”, in H. Hauptmann and H. Waetzoldt (eds.), Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft von Ebla (Heidelberger Studien zum Alten Orient, Band 2; 1988) 111–117. 70.  (with W. Pemberton and R.F. Smyth) “Canals and Bunds, Ancient and Modern”, Bulletin on Sumerian Agriculture 4 (1988) 209–221. 71.  “Ancient Assyria: A Multi-Racial State”, in ARAM 1/i (1989) 1–10. 72.  “Territorial Control in Mesopotamia: Theory and Practice” (Invited paper read to the Archaeological Institute of America, Baltimore, Jan. 1989). 73.  “Unwritten Law and the Code of Hammurapi”, paper read to international conference, Baghdad October 1989 (said to have been published in 1992). 74.  “The Assyrian Porsche?”, State Archives of Assyria Bulletin 4/i (1990) 35–38. 75.  “New Joins in the ADD II Material”, State Archives of Assyria Bulletin 4/i (1990) 77–78 76.  “A Middle Tigris Village”, Bulletin on Sumerian Agriculture 5 (1990) 65–74. 77.  “A Further Note on šallurum and ḫallurum”, Bulletin on Sumerian Agriculture 5 (1990) 146. 78.  “Excavations at Abu Salabikh, 1988–89”, Iraq 52 (1990) 95–106. 79.  “Archaeology and Texts–Bridging the Gap”, in Zeitschrift für Assyriologie 80 (1990) 228–240 [review article of E. Stone, Nippur Neighborhoods (Chicago 1987)]. 80.  “The Land of Assur and the Yoke of Assur”, World Archaeology 23/iii (1992) 247–263 [revision of part of Baltimore paper (no. 72)]. 81. “Trees and Timber in the Assyrian Sources”, Bulletin on Sumerian Agriculture 6 (1992) 177–192. 82.  (with P.R.S. Moorey) “Some Wood Identifications from Mesopotamian Sites”, Bulletin on Sumerian Agriculture 6 (1992) 197–199. 83.  “Text and Figure in Ancient Mesopotamia: Match and Mismatch”, in A.C. Renfrew and E.  Zubrow (eds.), The Ancient Mind: Elements of Cognitive Archaeology (C.U.P. 1994) 176–184. 84. (with W. Matthews and others) “The Imprint of Living in an Early Mesopotamian City: Questions and Answers”, in R. Luff and P. Rowley-Conwy (eds.), Whither Environmental Archaeology (Proceedings of the Association of Environmental Archaeologists, Cambridge 1990; Oxbow Monograph 38, 1994) 171–212. 85.  “In Search of the First Empires”, in Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 293 (1994) 1–13 [complete rewrite of part of no. 72]

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86.  “How Many Sumerians per Hectare? Probing the Anatomy of an Early City”, Cambridge Archaeological Journal 4/i (1994) 47–65. 87.  “Rings, Torcs and Bracelets”, in P. Calmeyer et al. (eds.), Beiträge zur Altorientalischen Archä­ olo­gie und Altertumskunde: Festschrift für Barthel Hrouda zum 65.  Geburtstag (Wiesbaden 1994) 235–245. 88.  “Gleanings from ADD: 1.  One of the First Middle Assyrian Texts Found at Assur”, State Archives of Assyria Bulletin 7/i (“1993”) 5–7. 89.  “The Four “Neo-Assyrian” Tablets from Šeḫ Ḥamad”, State Archives of Assyria Bulletin 7/ii (“1993”) 109–124 [copies by W. Röllig]. 90.  “A Middle Assyrian Bakery Memorandum”, SAAB 8/i, 13–15. 91.  “Middle Assyrian to Neo-Assyrian: The Nature of the Shift”, in H. Waetzoldt and H. Hauptmann (eds.), Assyrien im Wandel der Zeiten (Heidelberger Studien zum Alten Orient, Band 6; 1997) 159–68. 92.  “Abu Salabikh” in E.M. Meyers (ed.), The Oxford Encyclopaedia of Archaeology in the Near East, Vol. 1 (1997) 9–10. 93.  “Royal Ideology and State Administration in Sumer and Akkad”, in J.M. Sasson (ed.) Civilizations of the Ancient Near East, Vol. I (Scribner’s, 1995) 395–411. 94.  “Assyria: The Home Provinces”, in M. Liverani, Neo-Assyrian Geography (Quaderni di Geografia Storica 5; Rome 1995) 1–17. 95.  “Some Latter-Day Merchants of Aššur”, in M. Dietrich and O. Loretz (eds.), Vom Alten Orient zum Alten Testament: Festschrift für Wolfram Freiherrn von Soden (Neukirchen-Vluyn 1995) 403–406. 96. (with T. Wilkinson & T. Wang) “The Evidence for Early Writing: Utilitarian or Ceremonial?”, Antiquity 69 no. 264 (1995) 459–480. 97.  (with H.D. Baker et al.) “Kilise Tepe 1994”, Anatolian Studies 45 (1995) 139–191 (Director of excavation and co-ordinator of report) 98.  (with M.S. Tite and A.P. Middleton) “Scientific Investigation of Fire Installations at Abu Salabikh”, Sumer 47 (1995) 46–51. 99.  “A Sumerian City: Town and Country in the 3rd Millennium B.C.”, Scienze dell’Antichità: Storia Archeologia Antropologia 6–7 (1992–1993) [published 1996] 409–435. 100.  “Kilise Tepe 1994: A Summary of the Principal Results”, XVII. Kazı Sonuçları Toplantısı–I (Ankara 1996) 419–431. 101.  “Kilise Tepe 1995: A Summary of the Principal Results”, XVIII. Kazı Sonuçları Toplantısı–I (Ankara 1997) 441–456. 102.  “Kilise Tepe 1996: A summary of the principal results”, XIX. Kazı Sonuçları Toplantısı–I (Ankara 1998) 209–226. 103.  “Mesopotamian Petrology: Stages in the Classification of the Material World”, Cambridge Archaeological Journal 7 (1997) 205–224. 104.  (with M.D. Roaf) “The Shaikhan Relief”, Al-Rafidan 18 (1997) 143–156.

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105.  “Between the Plateau and the Sea: Kilise Tepe 1994–97”, in R.J. Matthews (ed.), Ancient Anatolia (London, 1998) 127–141. 106.  “Two Lines in Gilgamesh”, NABU 1998 no. 1 note 30, pp. 34–35. 107.  (with C.K. Hansen) “The Bronze to Iron Age Transition at Kilise Tepe”, Anatolian Studies 49 (1999) 111–121. 108.  “Assyrian Felt”, in P. Negri Scafa and P. Gentili (eds.), Donum Natalicium: Studi in onore di Claudio Saporetti in occasione del suo 60º compleanno (Borgia Editore, Rome 2000) 213–217. 109.  “The Assyrian Army in Zamua”, Iraq 62 (2000) 89–108. 110.  “Assyrian Uniforms”, in W.H. van Soldt (ed.), Veenhof Anniversary Volume (Leiden 2001) 373–388. 111. “System and Style in Three Near Eastern Bureaucracies”, in Economy and politics in the Mycenaean Palace States (Cambridge Philological Society. Supplementary Volume 27; 2001) 181–194. 112.  “ ‘Queen’ in Middle Assyrian”, NABU 2001 no. 2 note 40, pp. 44–5. 113.  “Business and Government at Middle Assyrian Rimah”, in L. Al-Gailani Werr et al. (eds.), Of Pots and Plans: Papers on the Archaeology and History of Mesopotamia and Syria Presented to David Oates in Honour of his 75th Birthday (NABU Publications. London, 2002) 297–308. 114.  “The First Civilizations in the Middle East”, in B. Cunliffe, W. Davies, C. Renfrew (eds.), Archaeology: The Widening Debate (London 2002) 385–410. 115.  “Learning the Lessons of the Future: Trade in Prehistory through a Historian’s Lens”, Bibliotheca Orientalis 60 (2003) 5–25. 116.  “Documents in Government under the Middle Assyrian Kingdom”, in M. Brosius (ed.), Ancient Archives and Archival Traditions: Concepts of Record-Keeping in the Ancient World (O.U.P., 2003) 124–138. 117.  (with R.A. Mattila) “Il-yada’ and Sargon’s South-East frontier”, in G. Frame (ed.) From the Upper Sea to the Lower Sea: Studies on the History of Assyria and Babylonia in Honour of A.K. Grayson (Leiden, 2004) 235–54. 118.  “The Invisible Hierarchy: Assyrian Military and Civilian Administration in the 8th and 7th Centuries B.C.”, in J.N. Postgate, The Land of Assur and the Yoke of Assur: Studies on Assyria 1971–2005 (Oxbow Books, 2007) 331–60. 119.  “Identifying the End of the Hittite Empire: Problems of Reuniting History and Archaeology at Kilise Tepe”, Newsletter of the Department of Archaeology and History of Art, Bilkent University 4 (2005) 26–30. 120.  “New Angles on Early Writing” (review article), Cambridge Archaeological Journal 15 (2005) 275–80. 121.  “The Ceramics of Centralization and Dissolution: A Case Study from Rough Cilicia”, Anatolian Studies 57 (2007) 141–150. 122.  (with Mark Jackson) “Kilise Tepe 2007”, Anatolian Archaeology 13 (2007) 28–30.

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123.  “The Organization of the Middle Assyrian Army: Some Fresh Evidence”, in P. Abrahami and L. Battini (eds.), Les Armées du Proche-Orient Ancien: IIe-Ier Mill. av.J.-C. (BAR Int. Series 1855; Oxford 2008) 83–92. 124.  “The Chronology of the Iron Age Seen from Kilise Tepe”, Ancient Near Eastern Studies 45 (2008) 166–87. 125.  (with B.K. Ismail) “A Middle Assyrian Flock-Master’s Archive from Tell Ali”, Iraq 70 (2008) 147–78. 126.  (with Mark Jackson) “Kilise Tepe 2008”, Anatolian Archaeology 14 (2008) 23–4. 127.  “The Tombs in the Light of Mesopotamian Funerary Traditions”, in J.E. Curtis, H. McCall, D. Collon and L. al-Gailani-Werr (eds.), New Light on Nimrud: Proceedings of the Nimrud Conference 11th–13th March 2002 (London 2008 [2009]) 177–80. 128.  (with M.P.C. Jackson) “Excavations at Kilise Tepe 2007”, XXX. Kazı Sonuçları Toplantısı, 3.  Cilt (Ankara: 2009) 207–232. 129.  (with Mark Jackson) “Kilise Tepe 2009”, Anatolian Archaeology 15 (2009) 21–23. 130. (with M. Krebernik) “The Tablets from Abu Salabikh and Their Provenance”, Iraq 71 (2009) 1–32. 131.  “Dismembering Enki and Ninhursaga”, in H.D. Baker, E. Robson and G. Zólyomi (eds.), Your Praise Is Sweet: A Memorial Volume for Jeremy Black from Students, Colleagues and Friends (London: British Institute for the Study of Iraq, 2010) 237–243. 132.  (with D. Collon & M.P.C. Jackson, “Excavations at Kilise Tepe 2008”, XXXI. Kazı Sonuçları Toplantısı, 1.  Cilt (Ankara: 2010) 159–84. 133.  “The Debris of Government: Reconstructing the Middle Assyrian State Apparatus from Tablets and Potsherds”, Iraq 72 (2010) 19–37. 134. (with M.P.C. Jackson) “Excavations at Kilise Tepe 2009”, 32. Kazı Sonuçları Toplantısı, 3. Cilt (Ankara: 2011) 424–446. 135.  (with Mark Jackson) “Kilise Tepe 2010”, Anatolian Archaeology 16 (2010) 22–23. 136.  “Making Tablets or Taking Tablets? Ṭuppa/u ṣabātu in Assyria”, in Iraq 73 (2011) 149–160. 137.  “Assyrian Percentages? Calculating the Birth-Rate at Dur-katlimmu”, in G.B. Lanfranchi, D. Morandi Bonacossi, C. Pappi, S. Ponchia (eds.), Leggo! Studies presented to Prof. Frederick Mario Fales on the Occasion of his 65th Birthday (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 2011) 677–685. 138.  (with Mark Jackson and T. Emre Şerifoğlu) “Kilise Tepe 2011”, Heritage Turkey 1 (2011) 23–4. 139.  (with Adam Stone) “A Luwian Shrine? The Stele Building at Kilise Tepe” in A. Mouton, I. Rutherford, I. Yakubovich (eds.), Luwian Identities: Culture, Language and Religion between Anatolia and the Aegean (Leiden: Brill 2013) 193–213. 140.  (with M.P.C. Jackson and T.E. Şerifoğlu), “Kilise Tepe 2011 Yılı Kazıları / Excavations at Kilise Tepe 2011”, 34.  Kazı Sonuçları Toplantısı, 2.  Cilt (Ankara, 2013) 1–24. 141.  (with C. Bouthillier et al. ), “Further Work at Kilise Tepe, 2007–2011: Refining the Bronze to Iron Age Transition”, Anatolian Studies 64 (2014) 95–161.

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142.  “Wool, Hair and Textiles in Assyria”, in Breniquet, C., Michel, C. (eds.), Wool Economy in the Ancient Near East and the Aegean (Oxford, 2014) 401–27. 143.  “The Bread of Aššur”, Iraq 77 (2015) 159–72. 144.  “Government Recording Practices in Assyria and Her Neighbours and Contemporaries”, in B.S. During (ed.), Understanding Hegemonic Practices of the Early Assyrian Empire: Essays Dedicated to Frans Wiggermann (Leiden, 2015) 275–85. 145.  “Measuring Middle Assyrian Grain (and Sesame)”, in G. Bartoloni and M.G. Biga (eds.), Not Only History: Proceedings of the Conference in Honor of Mario Liverani Held in Sapienza-Università di Roma, Dipartimento di Scienze dell’Antichità, 20–21 April 2009 (Eisenbrauns, Winona Lake, 2016) 219–241. 146.  “Assyria: Provincial Exploitation, First Time Round”, in J. MacGinnis, D. Wicke and T. Greenfield (eds.), The Provincial Archaeology of the Assyrian Empire (Cambridge, McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, 2016) 35–39.

D.  Reviews and Excavation Surveys   1.  (ed.) “Excavations in Iraq, 1971–72”, Iraq 34 (1972) 138–50.   2.  (ed.) “Excavations in Iraq, 1972–73”, Iraq 35 (1973) 189–204.   3.  (ed.) “Excavations in Iraq, 1973–74”, Iraq 37 (1975) 57–68.   4.  (ed.) “Excavations in Iraq, 1975”, Iraq 38 (1976) 65–79.   5.  (ed.) “Excavations in Iraq, 1976”, Iraq 39 (1977) 300–320.   6.  (ed. with P.J. Watson) “Excavations in Iraq, 1977–78”, Iraq 41 (1979) 141–181.   7.  (ed. with M.D. Roaf) “Excavations in Iraq, 1979–80”, Iraq 43 (1981) 167–198.   8.  review of: A. Salonen, Die Fussbekleidung der alten Mesopotamier, in Bulletin of the School of Oriental Studies 33 (1970) 444–45.   9.  review of: G. Cardascia, Les lois assyriennes, in BSOAS 34 (1971) 387–9. 10.  review of: S. Parpola, Neo-Assyrian Toponyms, in BSOAS 34 (1971) 389–90. 11.  review of: I.J. Gelb, Sequential Reconstruction of Proto-Akkadian, in BSOAS 34 (1971) 140. 12.  review of: A. Salonen, Die Fischerei im alten Mesopotamien, in BSOAS 35 (1972) 196. 13.  review of M. Civil (ed.), Materials for the Sumerian Lexikon XIII, in Bibliotheca Orientalis 30 (1973) 56–7. 14.  review of A. Salonen, Die Ziegeleien im alten Mesopotamien, in Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 1974, 52–3. 15.  review of W. Mayer, Untersuchungen zur Grammatik des Mittelassyrischen, in Bibliotheca Orientalis 31 (1974) 273–4. 16.  review of: C. Saporetti, Onomastica medio-assira, in Oriens Antiquus 13 (1974) 65–72. 17.  review of: H. Freydank, Mittelassyrische Rechts- und Verwaltungsurkunden (=Vorderasiatische Schriftdenkmäler 19), in Bibliotheca Orientalis 37 (1980) 67–70. 18.  review of: S. Parpola, Cuneiform Texts from Babylonian Tablets in the British Museum, Vol. 53, in Journal of Semitic Studies 25 (1980) 240–244.

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19.  review of: B. Oded, Mass Deportations and Deportees in the Neo-Assyrian Empire, in Bibliotheca Orientalis 38 (1981) 634–8. 20.  review of M. Dietrich, CT 54, in Oriens Antiquus 21 (1982) 259–260. 21.  review of: B. Menzel, Assyrische Tempel, in Journal of Semitic Studies 28 (1983) 155–159. 22.  review of: H. Freydank, Mittelassyrische Rechts- und Verwaltungsurkunden II (=Vorderasiatische Schriftdenkmaler 21), in Orientalia NS 59 (1990) 83–85 [submitted 1983]. 23.  review of: P. Machinist, Assur 3/ii, in Mesopotamia (Torino) 18–19 (1983–84) 229–234. 24.  review of: F. Malbran-Labat, L’armée et l’organisation militaire de l’Assyrie, in Bibliotheca Orientalis 41/3–4 (1984) 420–426. 25.  (with K. Deller) “Nachträge und Verbesserungen zu RGTC 5–Mittelassyrischer Teil”, Archiv fur Orientforschung 32 (1985) 68–76. 26.  review of: S. Lackenbacher, Le roi bâtisseur, in Zeitschrift für Assyriologie 74 (1984) 297–8. 27.  review of: M. Sigrist, Les sattukku dans l’Ešumeša. . . , in Journal of Semitic Studies 31 (1986) 237–38. 28.  review of: O. Pedersén, Archives and Libraries in the City of Assur, in Bibliotheca Orientalis 45 (1988) 355–57. 29.  review of: A. Harrak, Assyria and Hanigalbat, in Zeitschrift für Assyriologie 80 (1990) 139–40. 30.  review of: G. Selz, Altsumerische Verwaltungstexte aus Lagaš, Teil I (Freiburger Altorientalische Studien 15/i), in Journal of the American Oriental Society 111 (1991) 147–148 31.  review of: K. v.d. Toorn, Sin and Sanction in Vetus Testamentum 37/4 (1987) 510. 32.  notice of: T. Kwasman, Neo-Assyrian legal documents in the Kouyunjik Collection of the British Museum, in Orientalia 60 (1991) 123–4. 33.  review of A. Malamat, Mari and Israel, in Vetus Testamentum 41 (1991) 495–6. 34.  notice of: W.Ph. Romer et al., Texte aus der Umwelt des Alten Testaments: Lieder und gebete I, in Vetus Testamentum 42 (1992) 139. 35.  notice of: W. von Soden, Aus Sprache und Kultur. . . , in Vetus Testamentum 42 (1992) 280. 36. review of: R. Westbrook, Studies in Biblical and Cuneiform Law, in Vetus Testamentum 42 (1992) 431–2. 37.  review of: P. James et al., Centuries of Darkness, in Cambridge Archaeological Journal 1/ii (1991) 244–6. 38.  review of U. Finkbeiner (ed.), Ausgrabungen in Uruk-Warka Endberichte, in Zeitschrift für Assyriologie 84 (1994) 291–294 39.  notice of: P. Michalowski, Letters from Early Mesopotamia, in Vetus Testamentum 44/4 (1994) 575. 40.  review of: R. Zettler, The Ur III Temple of Inanna at Nippur, in Journal of the American Oriental Society 114/3 (1994) 494–5. 41.  review of: B.N. Porter, Images, Power and Politics: Figurative aspects of Esarhaddon’s Babylonian Policy, in Bibliotheca Orientalis 53 (1996) 200–202.

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42.  review of: G. Algaze, The Uruk World System: The Dynamics of Expansion of Early Mesopotamian Civilization, in Journal of the American Oriental Society 116 (1996) 147–8. 43.  notice of F. Pomponio, Formule di maledizione della Mesopotamia preclassica, in Vetus Testamentum 46 (1996) 139–40. 44.  review of D.R. Frayne, The Early Dynastic List of Geographical Names, in Archiv für Orientforschung XLI/XLII (1995/6) 222. 45.  notice of R.J. Tournay and A. Shaffer, L’épopée de Gilgamesh, in Vetus Testamentum 46 (1996) 575–6. 46. review of S. Tyson Smith, Askut in Nubia, in Cambridge Archaeological Journal 7/i (1997) 133–5. 47.  notice of: D. Fleming, The Installation of Baal’s High Priestess at Emar, in Vetus Testamentum 43/2 (1993) 285. 48.  review of M. Anbar, Les Tribus amurrites de Mari, Vetus Testamentum 43 (1993) 127–9. 49.  Review of S. Parpola, Assyrian Prophecies, Journal of Semitic Studies 47/2 (2002) 312–3. 50.  Review of M. Hudson and B.A. Levine (eds.), Urbanization and Land Ownership in the Ancient Near East, in Antiquity 74 (March 2000) 240–2. 51.  “New Angles on Early Writing”, review of J.J. Glassner, The Invention of Cuneiform: Writing in Sumer, and S.D. Houston (ed.), The First Writing: Script Invention as History and Process, in Cambridge Archaeological Journal 15/2 (2005) 275–80. 52.  review of C. Saporetti, Prestiti privati dei mezzi ufficiali di scambio nel periodo medio-assiro, in JNES 73 (2014) 354–356. 53.  review of D. Prechel and H. Freydank, Mittelassyrische Rechtsurkunden und Verwaltungstexte X (Keilschrifttexte aus mittelassyrischer Zeit 9; WVDOG 134, in ZAR 18 (2012) 379–82. 54.  review of Ö. Harmanşah, Cities and the Shaping of Memory in the Ancient Near East, in Landscape History (2014) 82–3. 55.  review of J. Englehardt, Agency in Ancient Writing, in Cambridge Archaeological Journal 25 (2015) 531–533. 56.  review of S. Paulus, Die babylonischen Kudurru-Inschriften (AOAT 51), in OLZ (2016).

A Fragment of a Stele from Umma Lamia Al-Gailani Werr In 2004 Abdulamir al-Hamdani was the Inspector of Antiquities for al-Muthna Governate in Iraq, when he confiscated a fragment of a limestone stele said to come from Umma. The stele fragment measures 70cm in height, 38cm in width and 26cm in thickness. It is part of one half of a stele depicting in relief festivities, possibly for a special occasion. The relief must have covered the whole surface, front, back and the sides.

Front (Figs. 1–2) The scene on the front side is divided into registers. The lower four registers show rows of four vessels; only parts of two vessels remain from the lowest register, but these must have been similar in shape to the pots in the above two registers, with what appear to be flat bases, slightly waisted above the base and with flaring mouths. The vessels of the fourth register are similar in shape except they have narrow necks and mouths. Above the vessels is a row of four crouching figures; each has one leg bent under the body, the second leg also bent at the knee but resting on the ground. The first figure from the left has his hand raised upward nearly touching his chin; the second figure has one hand extended forward, the other extending upward. The third figure is holding or working on an object on the ground and the fourth figure has both extended hands placed on a vessel similar in shape to the rows of vessels below. The register above has three figures. Two are crouching in a similar fashion to the figures in the register below; the first figure on the left with hands raised above his head holds two sticklike objects; the second figure has his hands raised upward. In front of them is a large round object with two handles, above it is a small round pot placed upside down, and a standing nude figure places both hands on the round object. Above this register are three striding figures, slightly worn. The first figure has his hands folded at his chest; the second figure places one hand by his waist while extending the other forward; and the third is in the same posture of having one hand by his waist and the other raised upward. The upper part of the stele is damaged. The scene along the broken right edge is of a meandering river full of various animals. At the bottom is a duck, then fish, a tortoise, what looks like a frog, a plant, a round object, a large fish, possibly an eel, another large fish and above it more fish. Author’s Note:  Nicholas excavated in Sumer and wrote his remarkable book, Early Mesopotamia. This frag-

ment of a stele is further contribution to his work. I am grateful to the Iraq State Board of Antiquities and Heritage for permitting to publish the fragment, and the staff of the Iraq Museum for the help while photographing in the storerooms. Photgraphs by Samir Abbas; drawings by Tessa Rickard.

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Fig. 1.  Drawing of Umma stele, front.

Fig. 1.  Photo of Umma stele, front.

Very little has survived from the right side of the river, but it seems the scene on its left was repeated, as part of the figure with the round object is visible, and so are the feet of a striding figure above.

Left Side (Figs. 3–4) The relief on the left side consists of five registers, each with two figures. Only the upper parts of the figures in the bottom register are visible. One figure is holding a pole-like object, while the second figure has one hand raised in front of his face. In the register above is a nude figure reaching forward to place both hands on the waist of the kilted figure in front. The latter

A Fragment of a Stele from Umma

Fig. 3.  Drawing of Umma stele, left side.

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Fig. 4.  Photo of Umma stele, left side.

has both hands clenched together and raised in front of his face. The third register has a similar scene. However, while the head and legs of the kilted figure are shown in profile like all the other figures, his chest and kilt are depicted frontally, as are the upraised arms with open hands. The fourth register is slightly worn. Of the two nude figures in this register, one is holding up a round object and stretching his second hand towards the waist of the figure in front of him. The latter holds a long object towards his mouth. Only the legs of two figures on the uppermost register are visible. On the left side of the relief are two slightly meandering lines similar to the river lines in the centre on the front side. No animal is visible here, and the surface is worn. The meandering lines separate the scenes on the side from the back of the stele.

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Back (Figs. 5–6) Unfortunately most of the relief has been eroded on the back. The surface is divided into at least three registers by dividing lines. Very little can be seen from the lowest register apart from a number of round carved circles and on the upper right corner are possibly the horns of an animal. Above the dividing line in the second register is a goat, behind which the legs of a second goat are visible. In the field are circles, semicircles, and a vertical stack of short horizontal grooves resembling numerical notations. In the upper right corner are two large unidentifiable objects, one oblong the other L-shaped. Just below the dividing line separating this register from the one above is a crescent-shaped object with a knob in the centre. Above the dividing line, on the third register, is a goat with five hollow circles above it. On the left side of the scene is a semi-circular object with a knob on top.

The Date The fragmentary condition of this stele with much of its surface missing rendered it difficult to understand its function, unlike the Warka Vase, for example, which clearly shows a ritual ceremony for the goddess Inana. This fragment lacks any religious symbolism, such as divine emblems or the figure of a deity or king, though these may have been depicted on the upper part, which is missing. However, it is clear that the surviving scenes are that of a festival. On the front, the three lower registers are taken up by vessels that must have contained food, similar in type to the vessels carried by the nude attendants and those piled with food on the Warka Vase. Although the four vessels on the fourth register are similar in shape to those below, they additionally have narrow necks indicating they may be containers for liquids, most probably beer. Above is a domestic scene of food preparation, apparent from the standing figure who is dipping into what seems to be a cooking pot. The posture of the three seated figures with one leg bent under the body can be seen on a number of Uruk period objects, notably the Blau Monument. 1 As the figures are depicted in profile, it may have been the stonecutter’s attempt at indicating the posture of a cross-legged crouching, still a common posture of rural people in Iraq. The fifth register tells us the festivity has started. A band of performing musicians, the first beating clappers above his head for rhythm setting, 2 the second is probably the singer who is at the same time also clapping, 3 and the third is beating a drum. 4 The performers and dancers are on the top registers and on the left side panel. Noticeable is how one dancer holds the second dancer

1.  Amiet 1980 pl. 48.679. 2.  Possibly made of copper; Rashid 1984: 8–49, Nos. 15–16. My gratitude to Dominique Collon who reminded me of this reference, and for her many comments on identifying the musical instruments. 3.  Rashid 1984: no. 18. 4.  For a drum with two knobs from Choga Mish, see Collon 1987: no. 660. My interpretation of the musicians and dancers are based on my childhood recollection in our farm by the Tigris north of Baghdad, watching the festivities of the people who lived in the farmstead nearby.

A Fragment of a Stele from Umma

Fig. 5.  Drawing of Umma stele, back.

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Fig. 6.  Photo of Umma stele, back.

on both the second and third side registers. 5 Musicians are seen on the fourth register of the left side, one playing a tambourine the second blowing a trumpet. 6 It is more puzzling to interpret the back side. Very few motifs have survived here, and with the exception of the goats on the second and third registers, the remainder of motifs are difficult to identify. The carved number like circles and half circles, seem to be meaningless. 7 5.  Would this be similar to the traditional Arab dance performed today where male dancers form half a circle by holding on to each other? 6.  Rashid 1984: 77, figs. 59; 97. 7.  Roger Matthews, personal communication.

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A number of the motifs find parallels among the antiquities of the Uruk/Jamdet Nasr periods. The Warka Vase shares with the stele the flaring vases and the nude figures. Similar vessels can be seen on Uruk cylinder seals. One seal shows the main figure offering a goat, followed by an attendant holding a spouted vase, and pots laden with food in the field; two pots are similar in shape to the Warka Vase, and a second goat in the field has curved horns like the horns on the Umma Stele. 8 Nude figures are not confined to the Warka Vase but are depicted on cylinder seals as performing various activities. 9 What distinguishes this stele is the location of the activities or festival. On the Warka Vase, if indeed the ritual is taking place by the river, wavy lines are placed at the bottom of the vase. On one seal the hunting scene is placed over a rocky area, possibly mountainous region. 10 There is an attempt at setting the landscape on the Umma Stele where the river is in the center and the whole festival is taking place by its bank. Another distinctive feature of the stele is what is probably a mirror image of the whole scene repeated on the right side of the river, as seen from the tiny preserved section with the musician with the drum and above it the foot of nude figure. The emphasis that the episode has taken place by the river is seen by a second set of wavy lines that separate the left side from the back. I hastily dated the stele to the Early Dynastic period when it was published, but after careful examination I have come to the conclusion Uruk/Jamdat Nasr would be a better date. 11

Conclusion The Warka Vase is considered one of the earliest examples of narrative relief sculpture. It tells the story of the ritual ceremony of offerings to the goddess, showing a procession of animals and above it a register of food bearers culminating in the goddess receiving goods from a dignitary. The Umma Stele, while it shares in principles similar motifs such as the rows of pots containing food and drink, the presence of animals on the eroded back side must have also been part of the ceremony. However, the subject matter differs from the Warka Vase which shows a ritual and offering scene, while the Umma Sele depicts a festival occasion. 8.  Amiet 1980: pl. 44.643. 9.  Amiet 1980: pls. 11, 203B; 39; figs. 603, 48, fig. 680. For various domestic activities similar to the fifth register see Amiet 1980: pl.16. 10.  Amiet 1980: no. 603. 11.  Crawford 2013: 393, fig. 19–11.

References Amiet, P. 1980 La glyptique mésopotamienne archaïque. Paris: CNRS. Collon, D. 1987 First Impressions: Cylinder Seals in the Ancient Near East. London: The British Museum. Crawford, H. 2013 The Sumerian World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Rashid, S. A. 1984 Musikgeschichte in Bildern, Band II: Musik des Altertums/Lieferung 2: Mesopotamien. Leipzig: Deutscher Verlag für Musik.

In the Shade of the Assyrian Orchards . . . Marie-Françoise Besnier Sargon designing a park similar to Mount Amanus, Aššurbanipal celebrating with his spouse his victory over Elam in the coolness of a garden, Sennacherib undertaking the Herculean task of surrounding Nineveh with flourishing gardens. . . The wonderful gardens of the gardener- kings were meant to impress. Yet they remain unappreciated, receiving attention only in a few articles. 1 Recently, the research of S. Dalley has contributed to shedding light on them: the famous “hanging gardens of Babylon” became the “hanging gardens of Nineveh”. 2 But is such an excuse needed to recall the fabulous Assyrian gardens, or to point out the influence of Sennacherib in the long history of gardens? As early as 1965, A. L. Oppenheim underlined the innovations of the Assyrian kings in garden art: “. . . with the Sargonids, the royal interest in gardens definitely shifts from utilitarian to display purposes, from an interest in assembling the largest possible variety of specimens to incorporating a garden into the palace precinct for the personal pleasure of the king. This change is expressed in the replacement of the ancient term for garden, kirû, by kirimāḫu”. 3 According to him, the Assyrian kings, specifically Sargon, “invented” the royal pleasure garden. There is no doubt the Assyrian kings broke new ground in garden art. So why do they remain unknown in the wider history of gardens? In part, the sources are to blame. For instance, the description of the kirimaḫḫu 4 is succinct, as are most descriptions of gardens. In the same way, reliefs with gardens are scarce, and some pose problems of interpretation (see below). Finally, we need to admit that our sources are too laconic to enable a precise description of an Assyrian garden (which species was it planted with? how were the beds drawn and organised? were there canals or fountains? etc.). Thus, if we confine the study of Assyrian gardens to simple gardening practices, there is not much to say. But a garden is a lot more than trees, flowers and fountains: intrinsically more complex than it seems, it is full of contradictions, and reveals a lot about the ways in which human beAuthor’s note:  Gardens were the topic of my PhD dissertation, defended in 2003 under the direction of O. Rouault: “Les jardins du Proche-Orient ancien. Mésopotamie, fin IIIe-milieu Ier millénaire” (EHESS). While writing it, I became a regular reader of the BSA in the library of the Collège de France, and often found the name “Postgate” who himself wrote about Assyrian gardens, royal or not. I was not in touch with him at the time, but was delighted to meet when I arrived in Cambridge. I thank the volume editors for giving me the opportunity to “offer” Nicholas Postgate some conclusions from my PhD dissertation. 1.  Mentions of and more or less detailed reports on Assyrian gardens are numerous in books about Neo-Assyrian kings or in articles dealing with Mesopotamian gardens, and it is not possible to quote them all here. Yet, to my knowledge, there are only three articles devoted to the Assyrian royal gardens: Oppenheim 1965, Lion 1992 and Amrhein 2015. 2.  Dalley 2013. We do not wish here to debate the location of the famous hanging gardens. 3.  Oppenheim 1965: 331. 4.  We accept here the spelling of the CDA for the word kirimaḫḫu.

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ings interact with the natural world. It is a fragile place, ephemeral, yet a place where human beings show their ability to master the wild world. In between nature and culture, it is located in the outside world but also clearly differentiates itself from the wild surrounding it, because it is the place where human beings shape nature according to their own wishes. 5 The garden is the “third nature”, 6 where “first” and “second” nature, the wild and the cultivated, are merged. The garden thus embodies the vision of men about nature, even if it is sometimes unconsciously expressed. As J. D. Hunt put it: “garden becomes a conceptual metaphor rather than, if at all, a formal design model”. 7 The Assyrian sources are enough to understand the idea of garden according to the Assyrian kings, and this is essential in garden history. So, what did the gardens mean for the Assyrian kings? Why are they assigned so much importance in some of their inscriptions? What do gardens reveal of their relationship with the wild world? How does this relationship change from reign to reign? To answer those questions, I choose to focus here on the inscriptions of the main gardener-kings: Tiglath–pileser I, Aššur-naṣir-pal II, Sargon II, Sennacherib and Aššurbanipal. Each of them, in his own way, adds something new to the garden, so that the idea of garden keeps changing over the years, together with the way it is used in their narratives.

(1) ina qereb kirî šuātu ēkalla [. . .] ēpuš — “within this garden, I built a palace [. . .]”     (Tiglath–pileser I 10: 75) 8 Tiglath–pileser I is the first gardener-king and the inventor of the royal garden in Assyria: 9 the first to mention the plantation of gardens in his inscriptions, 10 the first to distinguish the royal garden from the Assyrian orchards. They are not planted for the same reasons: the first is a pleasure garden, while the second could almost be assimilated to our botanical gardens as it is planted with foreign and exotic species: Cedar, boxwood, Kaniš oak, from the countries over which I had gained dominion, those trees which none of the previous kings, my fathers, had ever planted, I took (them) and in the gardens of my land I planted and the rare fruits of the gardens 5.  Definition according to J. D. Hunt’s suggestions (Hunt 2000: 14–15). 6.  The concept was stated during the Renaissance by Bartolomeo Taegio and Jacopo Bonfadio (see infra). 7.  Hunt 1999: 90. 8.  To quote the Assyrian royal inscriptions, we will use here the numbering of the “Royal Inscriptions of Babylonia and Assyria” collection: RIMA 2/1 for Tiglath-pileser I and Aššur-naṣir-pal II, RINAP 3/1 and 3/2 for Sennacherib and RINAP 4 for Esarhaddon. I will use the numbering of Fuchs 1994 for Sargon and Borger 1996 for Aššurbanipal. 9.  Few royal gardens are mentioned in the texts before the Assyrian kings. For instance, there is a “palace garden” in Mari (quoted in ARM 9, 38; ARM12, 267–268–270–271; ARM 19,  208; ARM 21, 15, 18, 83) and a “palace garden” is the setting of the first part of Adad-šuma-uṣur epic (Grayson 1975). Finally, a garden was excavated in the palace at Ugarit (see Schaeffer 1962). 10.  Gardens are also mentioned in the inscriptions of Aššur-uballiṭ I and Adad-Nirāri I. They are neither royal gardens nor an achievement of the king, but only landmarks in the city (Aššur-uballiṭ I 3: 21; Adad-Nirāri I 11: 5′, 19: 7′ and 42: 4. See Grayson 1987).

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that are absent from my land I took (them); I indeed filled the gardens of the land of Aššur (with them). (Tiglath–pileser I 1 vii: 17–27) Next to this terrace, a [gard]en for my lordly pleasure, I planted; I dug a ca[nal f ]rom the river Khosr; I [directed it] into this garden; I brought up the surplus of this water to the city meadows for irrigation; within this garden, I built a palace [. . .] . . . (Tiglath–pileser I 10: 71–75) According to the king himself, the garden of the palace is before all a pleasure garden, created “for (his) lordly pleasure”. The word translated here by “pleasure” (multaʾītu) is rare according to the CAD, and this would be the oldest known occurrence. It derives from the verb šutaʾû “to trifle, to treat lightly” and appears only in royal inscriptions, always connected with the pleasure of the king or his leisure, e.g., the bīt ḫilāni or the royal hunt. 11 The garden then acquires a new dimension: during Tiglath–pileser’s reign, not during Sargon’s, some gardens shift from utilitarian purposes to leisure displays. Even if the king stresses this new feature of the garden, the most important fact lies in the way he is using the idea of garden for ideological purposes. He thus insists on the fact that the new Assyrian gardens (and the palace’s) are full of foreign species, trees that have never been seen in Assyria before his time. But it is not just about novelty value: the trees come from the countries newly conquered, they are “deported”, in a way, towards Assyria. The scribe here uses the verb leqû, also used in the same inscription to describe the deportation towards Assyria of the people the king vanquished (1, i: 87 and iii: 5). This verb is indeed commonly employed in many different contexts, but what looks here like a coincidence might also be a purposeful effect: the king “takes” back to Assyria human beings as well as trees, thus showing his own strength and the power of Assyria, over both human beings and plants. 12 Furthermore, Tiglath– pileser’s palace is built into (ina qereb) the garden. This way, the conquests are laid out in the heart of Assyria, dominated by the palace and the king. The garden is a miniaturized Assyrian empire, enclosing all its diversity and wealth, for the admiration of all. We find in Tiglath–pileser’s inscriptions some of the main features of the royal Assyrian garden: not only has he suggested a new model of garden, closely linked to the palace and planted for his lordly pleasure, but he has also proposed a new use of the idea of the garden in his inscriptions to exalt his strength and the dominion of Assyria over the known world. The reign of Tiglath-pileser marks a significant development in the phraseology of the royal inscriptions. 13 He introduced new similes and comparisons, amongst them the images related to the garden. Many of the literary patterns that appear in his inscriptions were adopted by 11.  See CAD M/2 sub multaʾītu et multaʾûtu, p. 192. 12.  The analogy between the trees and human beings is otherwise expressed in the royal inscriptions by the plundering of the enemy orchards. The image is employed only in some circumstances, to hide a defeat, and not each time a city is attacked. The felling of the trees allows the scribes to employ a military vocabulary, that shows the strength of the Assyrian army despite the factual lack of action. Thus, when a city is besieged, the trees are “attacked”, e.g., felled. By contrast, when the city is assaulted and surrenders immediately, the orchards — and their trees — are safe (for some examples, see Fales 1991: 145). 13.  For a study on Tiglath-pileser’s innovations, see Grayson 1991: 6 or Tadmor 1997: 327–328.

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his successors. 14 The gardens, however, did not encounter an immediate success. Surely, the building plans of his immediate successor, Aššur–bēl–kala, included the plantation of gardens in the city of Aššur, 15 yet after him the gardens reappear in the royal inscriptions only after two centuries, and the reigns of twelve kings. 16

(2) kir ṣīḫâte kir rīšāte — “garden of delights . . . garden of happiness”     (Aššur-naṣir-pal II 30: 50 and 52) The return of the gardens in the royal inscriptions is nonetheless remarkable. The famous “Banquet Stele” of king Aššur-naṣir-pal II not only offers the longest list of trees in cuneiform literature — forty-one species are named — but also includes one of the most picturesque description of gardens that has came down to us. The canal comes rushing? from above to the orchards; the paths [are full?] of scent; the channels of water flow like the stars of heaven in the garden of pleasure; the pomegranate-tree(s), which are clothed with clusters? like vines, make the wind rich in the garden of . . . [I], Aššur–nāṣir–apli, gather fruit in the garden of delights like a mouse [. . .] (Aššur-naṣir-pal II 30: 48–52) Despite a few gaps, this passage is clearly distinct from the other royal Assyrian inscriptions. The style, vocabulary and images rather belong to the language of love poetry, as showed by expressions such as “garden of delights”, “garden of happiness”, both common in the love literature. 17 J. V. Kinnier Wilson has suggested that the passage could be an insert from another text. 18 The garden of Aššur-naṣir-pal II is exceptional in that it appeals to the five senses. During our “walk” in Aššur-naṣir-pal’s garden, we are first charmed by the murmur of the water, softly stroked by a light wind, then enchanted by the bright colours of the fruits grapes and the sweet fragrances wafting over the pathways, before getting lost amongst the trees and the running rivulets in games of shadows and lights. The garden of Aššur-naṣir-pal II is indeed a locus amoenus, as later defined in classical and medieval literatures. The expression is not as anachronistic as it may first seem. I. Trivisani–Moraneau has showed that the concept could apply to places

14.  See  Grayson 1991:  7–8 for a presentation of the way Tiglath-pileser’s successors re-used the literary patterns he introduced. 15.  Aššur-bēl-kala 7: v: 23 (RIMA 2/1: 105). 16.  The omission of the gardens is not surprising: after the reign of Aššur-bēl-kala, Assyria enters a period of political decline, so that planting gardens was not a priority for the kings. Moreover, by reason of this decline, sources are much fewer. 17. The garden is a common place of love poetry, and both words used in Aššur-naṣir-pal II’s inscription to qualify the garden often appear in this corpus, to qualify a garden or other places. For instance in “Ludingira’s message to his mother”, they appear in the “third sign” to describe the “mother” (see Civil 1964). The expression also appears in the incipit of a Middle-Assyrian poem, according to the catalogue of incipits KAR 158 (see Limet 1996). 18.  Kinnier Wilson 1988: 81. However, I do not subscribe to his whole interpretation or his suggestion for the reconstitution of the last line.

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described by Homer, even to the Garden of Eden. 19 The garden of Aššur-naṣir-pal II could well be one of their ancestors. According to E. R. Curtius who studied this literary motif, the locus amoenus is characterised by a stereotyped list of components, seven usually, 20 selected from characteristics or symbols of the five senses and the four elements. 21 There are usually seven of them in Medieval or Renaissance works, but the list falls down to three or four components in Homer’s writing to describe the gardens of Alcinoüs, for instance: the garden itself, the fruits, the sources and the trees. 22 This simply corresponds to the main features of Aššur-naṣir-pal II’s garden. But as I. Trivisani–Moraneau has pointed out, qualities rather than the single components are meaningful in a locus amoenus: they stand for fertility and pleasure 23 that are also the main features of Aššur-naṣir-pal’s garden. Still, this passage is part of a royal inscription, and as such, is needed for some reasons in the royal phraseology. First, the garden is simply perfect, so that it better expresses the legitimacy of Assyrian rule. In this fabulous place, a locus amoenus, not only is the natural world totally controlled to please the senses, it also flourishes under the benevolent yoke of the powerful Assyrian king. 24 The aim of the scribe thus remains the same, exalting the power of Assyria and its king, but he borrows a different literary lexicon to reach his aim. Second, the long list of trees which precedes the description is also characteristic of Assyrian inscriptions, even if, here again, its form — an exhaustive list — differs from the notable conciseness of other royal inscriptions, especially, as we will see, those of his successors. But the meaning of this long list is substantially the same as the short list of Tiglath–pileser I: the trees all come from the lands the king conquered or travelled up and down, so that the garden is nothing other than the representation of the new empire in the heartland of Assyria. Yet the exhaustiveness of the list also provides the garden with universal qualities which will become one of the main characteristics of the gardens of his successors. Consequently, Aššur-naṣir-pal II has taken up the idea of planting a royal garden that would represent all his conquests in the very heart of Assyria, and would thus exalt his dominance. But he also provided his garden with two more features: universality on the one hand and, on the other, legitimacy of Assyrian rule over the newly conquered lands. Those two features will characterize the gardens of Sargon and his successors, 25 but will be expressed more in accordance with the stylistic characteristics of the Assyrian royal inscriptions.

19.  Trivisani-Moraneau 2001: 129. 20.  Curtius 1986: 301–326. 21.  Curtius 1986: 319 22.  Curtius 1986: 305. 23.  Trivisani-Moraneau 2001: 133–134. 24.  Descriptions of loci amoeni are also frequently used in later literary works to praise individuals or legitimate the rules of a society (see Trivisani-Moreau 2001: 130–31). 25.  It has to be noted that, after Aššur-naṣir-pal II’s reign, gardens again disappear from the Assyrian royal inscriptions. It is then difficult to explain this omission as some of the greatest Assyrian kings succeed to Aššur-naṣir-pal, who are also great conquerors such as Shalmaneser III or Tiglath-pileser III. This clearly indicates that gardens still not are a favourite image of the royal inscriptions for expressing the king’s power.

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(3) tamšīl KURḫamâni — “the replica of Mount Amanus”    (Sargon IL 1: 41) 26 Sargon introduces the kirimaḫḫu, the royal garden which is “a replica of Mount Amanus” into the Assyrian royal inscriptions. The garden planted in Khorsabad then serves as a model for both Sennacherib’s and Esarhaddon’s gardens : Sargon: 27 I created a park alongside it (the palace), a replica of Mount Amanus, within which all the aromatic trees from Ḫatti and all the fruit trees of the mountains are collected. Sennacherib: 28 I planted a park alongside it (the palace), a replica of Mount Amanus, within which all the aromatic plants, the fruit trees, trees that are the mainstay of the mountains and Chaldea are collected. Esarhaddon: 29 I planted a park alongside it (the palace), a replica of Mount Amanus, where all the aromatic trees and the fruit trees are collected. According to these short descriptions, sketching the Assyrian royal garden is straightforward. Indeed, the description is so terse that it may explain the frustration of Assyriologists interested in the royal garden. Yet the repetitions from one description to another and the seeming lack of originality are all hints that the idea of the Assyrian royal garden has become archetypal. Thus the kirimaḫḫu is a designed landscape (similar to a mountain), a universal botanical garden (composed of all the vegetal species, collected from all known countries, distant or not, conquered or not), closely linked to the king (located next to the palace, planted or created by the king himself, as is the norm in the phraseology of Assyrian royal inscriptions). Despite appearances, the Assyrian kirimaḫḫu(s) are not all the same. In the passage quoted above, for instance, Sennacherib replaces the trees from Ḫatti by trees from Chaldea. But this change is a detail in the sense that the choice springs from the same idea of the garden, which needs to be planted with species from newly conquered provinces. It is thus not surprising to find Babylonian species in the garden of the king for whom the conquest of Babylonia was so essential. Of course, Sennacherib also adds the “wool-bearing tree” 30 in the royal garden. Here again, though, this addition obviously proceeds from the universal value of the royal garden, and this seems more meaningful than simply mentioning the fact that the cotton plant was cultivated in Assyrian gardens. Contrary to the suggestion of A. L. Oppenheim, Sargon invented neither the royal garden nor the pleasure garden. Both were invented by Tiglath–pileser I. In fact, none of the three Assyrian kings who mention the kirimaḫḫu associate it with pleasure or leisure in their inscriptions. Still, the kirimaḫḫu is a new kind of garden: a landscaped one. Here lies Sargon’s real 26.  Fuchs 1994: 66. 27.  Sargon IL 1: 41–42 (Fuchs 1994: 66–67). 28.  Sennacherib 3: 57–60. 29.  Esarhaddon 1 vi: 30–31. 30.  iṣṣu nāš šīpāti (Sennacherib 16: vii 20). The adjunct appears only once in Sennacherib’s inscription.

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innovation: he not only plants trees coming from all over the known world in the Assyrian gardens, but also transforms the landscape of Assyria to make it look like distant, exotic countries. This specificity may explain why Sargon is the only king to describe his action concerning the kirimaḫḫu as banû “to create”. The other kings prefer zaqāpu “to erect, to plant”, more expected when mentioning activities related to gardens. It is just as if Sargon wants to insist on the shape of the garden rather than the trees that compose it, unlike the other Assyrian kings who hence attach more significance to the garden’s content. 31 Re-creating a distant landscape in the heart of Assyria, in the center of the capital, close to the royal palace: 32 what better image to point out the supreme power of the Assyrian monarch over the known world? The “Mount Amanus garden” also appears on the walls of Sargon’s palace. One of the reliefs in room 7 33 shows a hill, planted with conifers and topped with a stela (?). The hill is located on the banks of a pond (or river), where fish and two boats are pictured. Next to the pond is a portico building on stilts (it is also possible that it was built on an island). Fruit trees are depicted in the background, though they are rare on Sargon’s other reliefs. 34 The relief does not provide much more information about the royal garden, especially as many details remain difficult to interpret due to the lack of similar sources. Supposing the royal garden is showed here, this representation is especially interesting for its association with the other reliefs in room 7. There we see a hunt: riders and foot soldiers shoot arrows at birds and hares, with conifers in the background, while others are practising archery. Standing on his chariot, led by four galloping horses, the king is himself taking part in the hunt. In front of the royal chariot, four foot soldiers are heading to the royal garden, according to a clockwise reading of the reliefs around the room. 35 It is well known that hunting is one of the favourite prestige activities of Assyrian kings. Hunting allows the king to exalt his merits as a warrior, strength and courage. The connection between hunting and gardening is obvious: the monarch triumphs over the animals the same way he subdues trees and plants. He then appears as the master of the wild as a whole. On the walls of Dūr–Šarrukin, the hunting scenes end with a parade of selected troops leading the king’s chariot into the royal garden. The hunt thus becomes a glory-march for Sargon, and the

31.  Sennacherib also insists on the creation of his “marshes” (see below) by using the Š-stem of bašû. The scribes may choose those verbs to better describe the making of new landscapes, maybe by comparison with the gods’ creation. We finally notice that, in the duplicates of the passage quoted above, Esarhaddon uses emēdu “to lean on, to install” (Esarhaddon 2 v: 54–56 and 3 v: 37′–38′), unexpected in relation to gardens, as it is more often used of architectural components. The verb also means “to flank”: Esarhaddon might have wished to stress the proximity between the garden and the palace with a nearly redundant expression (itâša ēmid — see CAD E, p. 140). 32.  M. Novak has studied the spatial link between the royal garden and the palace in the various Assyrian capitals. He has also insisted on the symbolic value of such a scheme (Novak 2002: 446–452, with further bibliography). 33.  The reliefs in this room were first described by Guralnick 1976, then studied by Albenda 1986. 34.  For a study concerning the plants depicted in reliefs from Sargon’s reign, see Bleibtreu 1980: 97–125. The fruit trees suggest that this relief shows an artificial landscape, a garden, rather than a wild one. 35.  For this interpretation, see Albenda 1986: 77–79.

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garden a stage for such a demonstration — if not for real, at least for the persons admitted to the room. 36 Yet the most essential feature of the kirimaḫḫu is surely its likeness to Mount Amanus, probably the most famous mountain of the cuneiform literary tradition, the setting for the deeds of Sargon the first, the glorious founder of the Akkad dynasty, and of Gilgameš, the great Mesopotamian king. But the behaviour of the king towards Mount Amanus radically shifts in the Assyrian royal inscriptions. In order to mark their supremacy over it, Mesopotamians routinely attack and seek to destroy Mount Amanus. On the one hand, they plunder the forest that covers it to fell the famous cedar, precious for building palaces and temples; on the other hand, they slaughter the monstrous guardian of the forest. But this baneful rage does not count any more for the Assyrian king (at least in this specific context): he needs here to stress his role as a builder and pacifier. The relationship to a wild landscape is thus differently told: the Assyrian king is still seeking to subdue nature, but not by destroying it, rather by shaping it according to the wishes of the new gardener-king. With this aim, Mount Amanus is well chosen, because the famous mountain is indeed the locus terribilis — the wildest landscape — of Mesopotamian literary tradition. Here are the main features of the locus terribilis according to Roman literature: “Rochers menaçants, chemins tortueux et escarpés, forêts obscures même en plein jour, vallées inaccessibles, montagnes surplombantes, fleuves en crue et marais fangeux, repaires de bêtes féroces ou de monstres mythologiques, forment la base d’un tableau paysager grandiose et effrayant”. 37 Hence, Mount Amanus best illustrates the “first nature”, the wild one, in Mesopotamian tradition. As such, it is also one of the sites where man comes in contact with the mysterious, somehow terrifying, world of the gods, as is the case for “first nature” landscapes in Classical literature according to Cicero. 38 Thanks to the will and the accomplishment of the Assyrian king, this locus terribilis is metamorphosed and sublimated. Finally, it is striking that the “Mount Amanus” of Khorsabad has only its name in common with the famous mountain. Though brief, the descriptions of the kirimaḫḫu quoted above are enough to show that the copy lies far from its original. The Mount Amanus in Assyria is partly composed of fruit trees, while the “real” one is essentially, if not only, planted with conifers. In Assyria, some species from Ḫatti or Babylonia grow on the flanks on Mount Amanus, together with the “wool-bearing tree” — they were, of course, missing on the original mountain. Consequently, one of the most symbolic places in Mesopotamian literary tradition is covered with all the diversity of the Assyrian empire, which is thereby simultaenously miniaturized and magnified. The Assyrian king manages to bring together the conquered lands and to merge them so that they become one, despite their diversity, in the very heart of the empire. The image aggrandises and exalts the supremacy of the Assyrian monarch.

36.  We do not know for sure the purpose of room 7. It is a rather small room that only opens onto courtyard IV. 37.  Morzadec 2009: 226. It is noteworthy that some of these characteristics could well apply to the cedar forest as depicted in the Epic of Gilgameš. 38.  Mentioned by Hunt 2000: 53.

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The royal garden thus proceeds from the “third nature” and becomes a garden in its idea: a place where “first” and “second” natures, the wild and the domesticated, 39 are mixed up to compose the “third nature”. The garden represents within itself the first two natures: “For in the gardens. . . the industry of the local people has been such that nature incorporated with art is made an artificer and naturally equal with art, and from them both together is made a third nature [terza natura], which I would not know how to name”. 40 In Assyrian inscriptions, the description of the royal garden, the kirimaḫḫu, appears repetitive because it is archetypal. But for this very reason, it gives us several pieces of information about how the Assyrian king approaches the natural world. He needs to show how superbly he dominates it, but the ways of mastering nature have changed: he does not destroy it like kings and heroes of old, but models it according to his wishes. Sargon thus changes the palace grounds into a garden according to the idea of the place: it then becomes a “third nature”. Sennacherib does like.

(4) agammu ušabši — “I created a marsh”    (Sennacherib 16: viii: 30) Plantation of gardens and orchards in and around the Assyrian capital reaches its peak under Sennacherib. According to his inscriptions, he transforms his capital, Nineveh, into a “green city”. To achieve this aim, he undertakes gigantic works to construct an elaborate canal network around Nineveh which makes it possible to cultivate fields and plant new orchards – all this to improve, as the king says, the everyday life of the capital’s inhabitants. Excavations around Nineveh showed that Sennacherib indeed undertook impressive works there. 41 It is, indeed, possible to suggest more or less accurate locations for the various gardens and orchards mentioned in Sennacherib’s inscriptions, and the names of some of the city gates indicate it was surrounded with gardens. 42 Such deeds well correspond to the image, already constructed by his predecessors, of the Assyrian king as a builder, pacifier, benevolent and concerned about the well-being of his subjects. 43 Amid this “horticultural agenda”, the royal garden (kirimaḫḫu) almost seems secondary, 39.  Cicero defined the concept of “second nature”: “We sow cereals and plant trees; we irrigate our lands to fertilize them. We fortify river-banks, and straighten or divert the courses of rivers. In short, by the work of our hands we strive to create a sort of second nature — alteram naturam — within the world of nature” De natura deorum II 152 (translation by P. G. Walsh 1997). By contrast, the “first nature” is the wild nature. Yet different cultures will identify the “first nature” differently, so that there are many kinds of wild landscapes. For a detailed study of “first nature”, see Oelschlaeger 1991. 40.  Jacopo Bonfadio, epistle to a fellow humanist, August 1541; translation by Hunt 2000: 33. 41.  Reade 1978 and Bagg 2000 have suggested reconstructions of the canal network Sennacherib built around Nineveh. The aqueduct of Jerwan testifies to the scale of the works he undertook ( Jacobsen and Lloyd 1935). 42. Grayson and Novotny 2014, vol.  1: 19 offers a plan of Nineveh with the locations and the names of the city gates. The “Gate of the Garden” is mentioned in the inscriptions 15 (vii: 15–16′) and 16 (vii: 59–60) and the “Step Gate of the Gardens” in the inscription 18 (vii: 31–32). Both bear the name “The God Igisigsig Is the One Who Makes Orchards Flourish”. 43.  See Russel 1991: 260.

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as Sennacherib insists much more on his great innovation: the creation of magnificent and fruitful marshes, that truly are a wonderful metamorphosis of the landscape around Nineveh: I created a marsh to moderate the flow of those waters and planted a canebrake in it. I let loose in it herons, wild boars, roe deer?. By divine will, within (those) gardens, newly tilled soil, vines, all kinds of fruit trees, olive trees, aromatic trees flourished greatly. Cypress trees, musukkannu-trees, all kind of trees grew tall and sent out shoots. The marshes thrived greatly. Birds of the heavens, heron(s) whose home(s) are far away, made nest(s) and wild boars (and) roe deer? gave birth in abundance. I cut down musukkannu-trees (and) cypress trees grown in the orchards (and) reeds from the marsh and I used (them) in the work required (to build) my lordly palatial halls. They picked (from) the “wool-bearing trees” and wove (the wool) into clothing. (Sennacherib 17: viii: 46–64)  44 The “marshes” probably bordered Nineveh on its eastern side. 45 They were created thanks to the surplus of water from the irrigation network. Both the animals and plants mentioned in this passage testify to the marsh-like nature of this garden, which is also visible on some of the reliefs of the “Palace without rival”, where wild boars and antilopes graze peacefully in a canebrake together with their siblings. Adjacent to this marshy area, the landscape abruptly shifts into a hilly one planted with fruit trees and vines. The inscription quoted above enlarges in the same way the landscape of the marshes: first the beasts of the forest, then the vine, the olive trees and the fruit trees, finally the cypress and the trees from the land of Magan. As with the kirimaḫḫu, Sennacherib does not want his landscaped marshes to be identical to natural ones: they are naturalistic enough to allow people to recognize them, but some details change. Here again, his aim is not to merely imitate a landscape, rather to improve it: to magnify an exotic landscape with new species that prove to be extraordinarily fertile in the heart of Assyria. The plants and trees are growing extraordinary fast, animals and birds have numerous offspring. The “marshes” of Sennacherib are thus an archetypal garden, with the main features of the category all represented: a preserved and selected place, clearly distinguished from the landscape surrounding it, a miniaturised and sublime imitation of a wild scene. Above all, Sennacherib’s marshes belong to the “third nature”, according to both Bonfadio’s definition quoted above and to all that is implied by this definition: a place where human interventions go beyond what is required by the necessities or practice of agriculture or urban settlement. Several elements would be involved here: the specific intention (of the creator, but sometimes of the perceiver, visitor or consumer. . .); some relative elaboration of formal ingredients above functional needs; some cunjunction of metaphysical experience with physical forms, specifically some aesthetic endeavour — the wish or need to make a site beautiful. 46

The description of Sennacherib’s “Babylonian marshes” tallies in almost all respects with the features of the “third nature”. Sennacherib’s creative intention is beyond doubt; the garden 44.  The same passage regularly appears in Sennacherib’s inscriptions (see Grayson and Novotny 2014: 20). 45.  The location of the marshes was suggested by Reade 2000: 406. 46.  Hunt 2000: 62. Stresses have been added by the author.

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was created thanks to an excess of water, and is thus “above functional needs”; the whole description and especially the luxuriance of the site testify to the quest for beauty. J. D. Hunt also points out that gardens are often no more than an elaborate form of the “second nature”, which explains why they often are located inside it. It is also the case for Sennacherib’s marshes which, from a topographic point of view, are in the midst of the cultivated land of Nineveh. Sennacherib’s preference for imitating Babylonian marshes rather than the landscape of another country is also highly significant. Both Sargon and Sennacherib had to face fierce resistance from Marduk–apla–iddina II, and encountered many difficulties in conquering Babylonia. By creating a marsh in the surroundings of Nineveh, Sennacherib shows his ability to transform Babylonia into an Assyrian garden. What better way for Sennacherib to display his permanent and definite victory over the Babylonian king? It is underscored by the fact that, according to his own words, Sennacherib is destroying Babylon the same way he is building Nineveh: I dug canals into the centre of that city (Babylon) and (thus) levelled its site with water; I destroyed the outline of its foundations (. . .). So that, in the future, the site of that city and (its) temples will be unrecognizable, I dissolved it in water and annihilated (it) (by making it) like a swamp. (Sennacherib 223: 52–53). With iron picks I cut a canal straight through the mountain (. . .); I caused an inexhaustible supply of water to flow there (. . .) and made it gush through feeder canals into those planted areas. To moderate the flow of water for (those) gardens, I created a marsh and planted a canebrake within it. (Sennacherib 43: 94–97) Put side by side, these passages show the ability of the king to create landscapes and destroy them, to do and to undo. This is an essential motif in Sennacherib’s inscriptions, and the garden is one of the key sites for expressing this idea. It is striking how Sennacherib undertakes the same deeds — digging to divert canals towards a city, laying out of a swamp – for two fundamentally opposite aims. On the one hand, a provoked, artificial flood leads to the complete destruction of Babylon, which is turned into a devastated swamp; on the other hand, a provoked flood of abundance helps to irrigate the fields of Nineveh and allows the creation of a flourishing marsh. The members of the court could hardly miss such a parallel between the two deeds. In the same way, they could admire the reliefs with the marshes among other reliefs depicting the building of the “Palace without rival” and the works undertaken to establish the irrigation network. All of them are located on the walls of the “throne-room suite”, comprising four rooms and two courtyards. 47 The whole is of course essential in the staging of the king to remind viewers of the image of the monarch as a builder and pacifier, in order to legitimise the Assyrian domination over the whole known world. The gardens are at the heart of this ideological scheme. Consequently, the king shows the Assyria’s ability to assimilate conquered lands by inscribing them in the very heart of the empire. The provinces become gardens, where Assyrian supremacy is unquestionable. Animals and plants adapt so well to their new environment that 47.  Russel 1991: 257–260.

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they are more fertile and fruitful than in their original habitat. The assimilation of the conquered lands by Assyria is thus perfect. It even becomes a safe haven for the migratory birds. The marshes are thus one of the places where the king best shows his two faces, conqueror and builder. Using products from both the gardens of the capital and the provinces achieves the analogy between them. The tributes come from the four edges of the empire to help in the building of the capital. In the same way, the trees of Magan and the cypress, together with the reed from the “Babylonian marshes”, are felled and cut down to build the “Palace without rival”. Neither the orchards of Nineveh, nor the royal garden, are vain or pointless. Indeed, Assyrian gardens are not pleasure gardens 48 — not even the proper royal one, the kirimaḫḫu, if we believe the inscriptions of Sargon, Sennacherib or Esarhaddon. This notion will be put forward only during the reign of Aššurbanipal.

(5) ana multaʾʾûti bēlūtiya — “for my lordly pleasure”    (Aššurbanipal A2: 104–105) 49 Unlike Sennacherib, Aššurbanipal does not present himself as a major gardener-king: gardens and orchards are scarcely mentioned in his inscriptions. 50 But the striking feature of his reign lies in the creation of the pleasure garden. This meaningful difference with Sargon or Sennacherib’s gardens is especially remarkable in the way Aššurbanipal introduces the royal garden: 51 The bīt ridûti, a dwelling to protect my kingship, in its (the bīt ḫilāni’s) surroundings, I completed perfectly, I filled (it) luxuriously; a park, where (were planted) the totality of the trees, the fruit-(trees), all the products of a garden, I planted on its side. (Aššurbanipal A2: 103–105) The kirimaḫḫu is no longer compared to Mount Amanus. The garden is thus losing its landscape appearance in this king’s phraseology, while it was as an essential point in the inscriptions of his predecessors. Besides, a “different” garden is mentioned in two duplicate manuscripts of this inscription. The passage quoted above is then as follows: “. . . a garden (giš.kiri6–kirû) (full) of fruits and products of the garden, for my lordly pleasure [. . .]”. 52 In this duplicate, not only is the garden no longer like Mount Amanus, it also loses its “name”, kirimaḫḫu. Furthermore, it is no longer universal, as it is no longer composed of all 48.  It is important to stress here that the notion of pleasure is far from essential to the definition of garden or the concept of the “third nature” according to Bonfadio or Taegio. J. D. Hunt specifies: “distinctions between beauty and utility, or between pleasure and profit, are largely of recent origin and did not impede earlier discussions of place-making where the terms may have overlapped or coincided” (Hunt 2000: 65). 49.  Borger 1996: 74. 50.  It has been suggested that he does not mention planting gardens in his inscriptions because he would have enjoyed Sennacherib’s gardens that would have come to maturity by the time of his reign. 51.  See Borger 1996: 74 (transliteration) and 256 (translation): F VI 57–59. 52.  We mean here the manuscripts A2 (“Rassam Prism”) and A3 of the same inscription, which differ significantly from the other manuscripts only in these two lines (see Borger 1996: 74).

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known species of trees and plants. Finally, in some inscriptions of Aššurbanipal, the royal garden is reduced to a mere pleasure garden for the king, as stressed by the expression ana multa’’ûti bēlūtiya. We saw above that the expression was introduced some centuries earlier by Tiglath–pileser I, whereas it was omitted in the inscriptions of Sargon and his first two successors. The new significance given to the king’s pleasure and leisure time in the discourse of Aššurbanipal is reflected on the reliefs of his palace in Nineveh. First, the appearance of flowers in the landscape is a noteworthy innovation 53 that considerably changes the image of the garden, as it softens and embellishes it. This new image of the garden is well illustrated by the slabs in Room E of Aššurbanipal’s palace. 54 The most famous relief from this room depicts a couple of lions resting under the shadow of trees and flowers. The others show musicians and tame lions or attendants keeping dogs on a leash, all against the background of trees covered with vines and grapes. They seem perfectly to reflect the description from the inscriptions. The peace and quietness of these scenes offer a strong contrast with the violent and bloody hunting scenes which are so numerous on the walls of Aššurbanipal’s palace. Hunting is surely the king’s most prized prestige activity. On Sargon’s palace walls a hunting expedition was held in the garden, as seen above. By contrast, the hunting expeditions of Aššurbanipal take place in bare arenas without a single plant or tree. Yet one of the reliefs clearly shows that hunting expeditions took place in spaces close to the royal garden, which is separated from the hunting arena by a high wooden barrier people can climb to watch the hunt. 55 This relief depicts a hill — quite possibly “Mount Amanus” — on top of which is a stele with a figure of the king on his chariot during the hunt. Conifers are planted all over the hill together with some few leafy deciduous trees. Several male figures are reprensented amongst the trees, all walking in the same direction, left to right. They most probably just attended a hunt that is illustrated on the reliefs on the left, and are now heading for the place where the king is getting ready for the hunt. 56 Lines of standing soldiers reinforce the solemnity of the moment, that almost looks like a parade in honour of the king. Everything here is obviously made up to give prominence to the Assyrian king, and the garden is one of the settings for this. Yet, unlike the situation depicted on the reliefs in Khorsabad, the association between the hunt and the garden is more thematic than spatial, as the garden is only juxtaposed to the hunt. We observe the thematic association again on one of Aššurbanipal’s most famous reliefs, where the king and his wife are pictured feasting in a garden under a climbing vine. 57 There were probably hunting scenes in a lower register. 58 The charming scene appears as the best illustration of the Assyrian royal pleasure garden, but we can spot the head of the Elamite king hanging on a branch. Aššurbanipal here celebrates his victory over his enemy: here again the garden is used as a setting to feature the triumph of the king, to emphasize his power and supremacy over the plants and . . . human beings.

53.  See Bleibtreu 1980: 191. 54.  See Barnett 1976, plate XV (BM 118914, 118915 and 118916). 55.  See Barnett 1976, plates V–VI (BM 120861-2). 56.  For a reproduction of the whole scene, see Barnett 1976, plate A. 57.  See Barnett 1976, plates LXIII, LXIV, and LXV. 58.  Reade 1983: 65–66.

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Thus, the idea of garden slightly changes with the reign of Aššurbanipal and takes another turn in the discourse of the royal inscriptions. The king insists less on the garden as evidence of his ability to shape nature according to his wishes — a topos dear to his predecessors — and more on the idea of the pleasure garden, obviously related to leisure. Yet courtly activities, such as hunting and feasting, are as significant as war and conquests during his reign to emphasize the supremacy of the Assyrian monarch, 59 and the garden becomes an essential setting for the king’s leisure. The feast held in a garden with the queen is the climax of the king’s victory on both his fierce enemy and the wild lions, represented on the adjacent slabs. But this relief also reveals another feature of the garden. It now belongs to the king’s private realm: he is pictured drinking together with his wife, and the slab was probably located in Aššurbanipal’s private apartments. 60 The access to both the garden and the representation of the garden is now restricted, most probably to the highest nobility of the court. The garden as a restricted place, in between the private and the public spheres is another essential feature of the idea of garden. 61

Conclusion Assyrian royal gardens and orchards are more changeable than they seem to be at first sight. Most probably, the too famous image of the Mount Amanus has partly hidden the diversity of the royal garden. Yet, such a diversity is not much surprising given the variety of the royal inscriptions themselves that keep changing from reign to reign according to both the deeds and personality of the kings. 62 Planting orchards in Assyria and the royal garden are standard literary motifs of the royal discourse, but each scribe gives them a personal touch, varying with the reigns and the kings. Consequently, the garden evolves together with the idea of garden and the way it is used in the royal phraseology. The Assyrian kings invented a new concept of garden, and especially a new idea of garden which reflects their relationship with the natural world. They understood that the garden is a miniaturized word, on a human scale, which allows human beings to reveal their ascendancy over nature. The garden then becomes an ideal place, most valuable for the royal narrative, where the king may recall the extent of his conquests while legitimising the Assyrian rule. The garden is also the ideal setting to give prominence to the king. Because they use the garden as a metaphor, they change the idea of the garden, which is then assimilated to the “third nature” as it was defined much later on. For this very reason, the Assyrian garden has a crucial place in the long history of gardens, where they yet remain unrecognized, if not completely unknown. 63 59. The close connection between the two is clear in the reliefs from Aššurbanipal’s palace (see Russel 1999: 154–156). 60.  Reade 1983: 66. All those slabs were located in the first floor apartments (Russel 1999: 156). 61.  See Hunt 2000: 29. 62.  Concerning this subject, see Tadmor 1981, among others. 63.  Among many examples, we may mention here the book of M. Baridon (1998). In the chapter devoted to ancient gardens, he almost confines the Mesopotamian ones to the hanging gardens of Babylon. There are but only three lines for the Assyrian gardens (p. 111). In the same way, J. D. Hunt in a history of gardens dating from 2012 mentions the Assyrian gardens but does not seem to reckon the meaning of the Assyrian royal garden (Hunt 2012: 26). In the same book, there is no word about Mesopo-

In the Shade of the Assyrian Orchards . . .

21

Yet, the memory of Assyrian gardens has survived in garden history, though inderectly, through the seventh world wonder, the hanging gardens of Babylon. But the Greek and Roman descriptions of the hanging gardens are far from the Assyrian gardens, 64 even though three notable features are preserved: they are landscaped, they are royal, and they are pleasure gardens. But the idea of the royal Assyrian garden, its inherent significance in the royal discourse, has disappeared from the Graeco-Latin narratives which describe the hanging gardens. By contrast, this significance appears in Xenophon’s Oeconomicus when he tells us about the paradise of Cyrus: Socrates: And furthermore in whichever of his territories he lives and whichever he visits, he is concerned that there should be gardens — the paradeisoi, as they are called — full of the fine and beautiful plants that the earth naturally produces. And he spends most of his time in these, except when the time of year prevents him. Critobulus: By Zeus, then Socrates, the king must be concerned that the paradeisoi in which he himself spends time should be furnished in the finest manner possible with trees and all the other fine things that the earth produces. 65 Xenophon stresses in the same book the gifts of the Great King as a gardener, who himself draw the plans of the garden and planted some of the trees. 66 Here stands the distant successor of Sennacherib who was already creating artificial marshes, and Socrates stresses that Cyrus attached the same importance to cultivating lands and conquering new lands, just as was said in the Assyrian royal inscriptions. 67 Power and gardens remain closely linked till the Roman times, when gigantic gardens are said to be “oriental” ones. 68 Many Classical authors, both Greek and Roman, relate the paradises — landscaped gardens similar to the Persian paradise and its ancestor the kirimahhu — with the tyrants because of the specific view of the world expressed in those gardens: 69 an ideal miniaturized world where human beings in general, the king more specifically, show their undeniable power by mastering and transforming the wild world. tamian gardens in the chapter concerning the “sacred gardens” (pp. 9–21), although this kind of garden is fundamental in the ancient Near East (see Besnier 2004). Even the book edited by M. Conan about a history of gardens of the Middle East mentions the Assyrian gardens in less than ten lines (Hirschfeld 2007: 21–22). Finally, in a book dedicated to Persian gardens, the origins or eventual Mesopotamian influences are mentioned without a word about Assyrian gardens (Gharipour 201: 12–16). 64.  I disagree, for this reason, with S. Dalley’s recent thesis (2013) and do not believe the Classical texts accurately describe Nineveh gardens. I already wrote an article about the question of the hanging gardens of Babylon (cf. Besnier 2001). 65.  Oeconomicus, IV: 13–14 (edited and translated by S. B. Pomeroy 1994). 66.  Oeconomicus IV: 22–23. 67.  Oeconomicus IV: 16–17. 68.  See Grimal 1984: 82–83. 69.  As examples, we may mention Polycrates of Samos or Kotys of Thrace (Athénée XII: 531 e–f).

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References Albenda, P. 1986 The palace of Sargon, King of Assyria: monumental wall reliefs at Dur-Sharrukin, from original drawings made at the time of their discovery in 1843–1844 by Botta and Flandin. Paris: Editions Recherche sur les civilisations. Amrhein, A. 2015 Neo-Assyrian gardens: a spectrum of artificiality, sacrality and accessibility. Studies in the History of Gardens & Designed Landscapes 35/2: 91–114. Bagg, A.M. 2000 Assyrische Wasserbauten: landwirtschaftliche Wasserbauten im Kernland Assyriens zwischen der 2. Hälfte des 2. und der 1. Hälfte des 1. Jahrtausends v. Chr. Mainz am Rhein: P. von Zabern. Baridon, M. 1998 Les jardins — paysagistes, jardiniers, poètes. Paris: Robert Laffont. Barnett, R. D. 1976 Sculptures from the north palace of Aššurbanipal at Nineveh (668–627 B.  C.). Londres: British Museum Publications Ltd. Besnier, M.-F. 2001 Les archéologues à la recherche d’un mythe  : les découvertes des jardins suspendus de Babylone. Pp. 297–323 in Actes de la Table Ronde : Rêver l’archéologie au XIXe siècle : de la science à l’imaginaire. Saint-Etienne: Mémoires du Centre Jean-Palerne XXIII. 2004 Vegetation in Mesopotamian Temple Precincts: Gardens, “Sacred Groves” or Potted Trees?  JAC 19: 59–88. Bleibtreu, E. 1980 Die Flora der neuassyrischen Reliefs. Wien: Institut für Orientalistik der Universität. Borger, R. 1996 Beiträge zum Inschriftenwerk Assurbanipals: die Prismenklassen A, B, C = K, D, E, F, G, H, J und T sowie andere Inschriften. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Civil, M. 1964 The ‘Message of lú-dingir-ra to his Mother’ and a Group of Akkado-Hittite ‘Proverbs’. JNES 23: 1–10. Curtius, E. R. 1986 La littérature européenne et le Moyen-Âge latin. Paris: PUF. Dalley, S. 2013 The mystery of the Hanging Garden of Babylon: an elusive world wonder traced. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Fales, F. M. 1991 Narrative and Ideological Variations in the Account of Sargon’s Eighth Campaign. Pp. 129–147 in Ah, Assyria — Studies in Assyrian history and ancient Near Eastern historiography presented to Hayim Tadmor, ed. H. Tadmor et al. Jerusalem: Magnes Press, Hebrew University. Fuchs, A. 1994 Die Inschriften Sargons II. aus Khorsabad. Göttingen: Cuvillier. Gharipour, M. 2013 Persian Gardens and Pavilions: Reflections in History, Poetry and the Arts. London: I.B. Tauris. Grayson, A. K. 1975 Adad-šuma-uṣur Epic. Pp.  56–67 in Babylonian historical literary texts. Toronto and Buffalo: University of Toronto Press. 1987 Assyrian Rulers of the Third and Second Millennia BC (to 1115 BC). RIMA 1. Toronto-BuffaloLondon: University of Toronto Press.

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Assyrian rulers of the early first millennium BC. RIMA 2/1 and 2/3. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Grayson, A. K. and Novotny, J. 2014 The Royal Inscriptions of Sennacherib, King of Assyria (704–681 BC). RINAP 3/1 et 3/2. Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns. Grimal, P. 1984 Les jardins romains. Paris: Fayard. Guralnick, E. 1976 Composition of some narrative reliefs from Khorsabad. Assur 1/5. Malibu: Undena. Hirschfeld, Y. 2007 The Rose and the Balsam: the Garden as a Source of Perfume and Medicine. Pp.  21–39 in Middle East garden traditions: unity and diversity questions, methods, and resources in a multicultural perspective, ed. M. Conan. Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection. Hunt, J. D. 1999 Approaches (New and Old) to Garden History. Pp.  77–90 in Perspectives on garden histories, ed. M. Conan. Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks Research Library and Collection. 2000 Greater perfections: the practice of garden theory. London: Thames & Hudson. 2012 A world of gardens. London: Reaktion. Jacobsen T., and Lloyd S. 1935 Sennacherib’s aqueduct at Jerwan. OIP 24. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Kinnier Wilson, J. V. 1988 Lines 40–52 of the Banquet Stele of Assurnasirpal II. Iraq 50: 79–82. Leichty, E. 2011 The royal inscriptions of Esarhaddon, king of Assyria (680–669 BC). RINAP 4. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns. Limet, H. 1996 Le texte KAR 158. Pp. 151–158 in Collectanea Orientalia. Histoire, arts de l’espace et industrie de la terre. Etudes offertes en hommage à A. Spycket, ed. H. Gasche et B. Hrouda. Neufchatel-Paris: Recherches et publications. Lion, B. 1992 Jardins et zoos royaux. Dossier Archéologie 82: 72–79. Morzadec, F. 2009 Les images du monde: structure, écriture et esthétique du paysage dans les oeuvres de Stace et Silius Italicus. Bruxelles: Latomus. Novak, M. 2002 The Artificial Paradise: Programme and Ideology of Royal Gardens. Pp. 443–460 in Sex and gender in the ancient Near East: proceedings of the 47th Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, Helsinki, July 2–6, 2001, ed. S.  Parpola and R.  M.  Whiting. Helsinki: The Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project. Oelschlaeger, M. 1991 The idea of wilderness: from prehistory to the age of ecology. New Haven, Conn.-London: Yale University Press. Oppenheim, A. L. 1965 On Royal Gardens in Mesopotamia. JNES 24: 328–333. Postgate, J. N. 1973 The Governor’s Palace archive. CTN II. London: British School of Archaeology in Iraq. Reade, J. 1978 Studies in Assyrian Geography. Part I: Sennacherib and the Waters of Nineveh. Studies in Assyrian Geography (suite). RA 72: 47–72 and 157–180. 1983 Assyrian sculpture. Londres: British Museum Publications Ltd. 1991

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2000 Ninive. Pp. 388–433 in RlA 9. Berlin. Russell, J. M. 1991 Sennacherib’s palace without rival at Nineveh. Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press. 1999 The writing on the wall: studies in the architectural context of late Assyrian palace inscriptions. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns. Schaeffer, C. 1962 Bemerkungen zur Palastgarten Sondage. Pp. 301–327 in Ugaritica IV. Paris. Tadmor, H. 1981 History and Ideology in the Assyrian Royal Inscriptions. Pp. 13–33 in Assyrian royal inscriptions: new horizons in literary, ideological and historical analysis: papers of a symposium held in Cetona (Siena) June 26–28, 1980, ed. F. M. Fales. Roma: Ist. per l’Oriente. 1997 Propaganda, Literature, Historiography: Cracking the Code of the Assyrian Royal Inscriptions. Pp. 325–338 in Assyria 1995: Proceedings of the 10th anniversary symposium of the Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project, Helsinki, September 7–11, 1995, ed. S. Parpola and R. M. Whiting. Helsinki: The Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project. Trivisani-Moreau, I. 2001 Dans l’empire de Flore: la représentation romanesque de la nature de 1660 à 1680. Tübingen: Narr.

The Šu-Suen Year 9 sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 Flour Dossier from Puzriš-Dagan Robert Biggs When on a family visit in Spokane, Washington, in 1982, I asked permission to study the small collection of cuneiform tablets owned by the Spokane Public Library, some of which I recalled seeing on display in the library in the late 1940s and 1950s. They were purchased by the library in 1916 from Edgar J. Banks. Among the texts I copied in 1982 is an Ur III bulla, dated to Šu-Suen year 9. Subsequently, in following up on questions raised by that text, I have found that there is a unique situation in that year of flour deliveries designated sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 without parallel in any other year in the Ur III period, as far as I can determine. I believe that all the twenty-four texts cited here are bullae, though several were published in transliteration without being identified as bullae. I believe it likely that all of the bullae were sealed, though in two cases no mention of a seal impression is included in the publication. None are sealed with an arad2-zu seal, thus not sealed by high officials in the Puzriš-Dagan administration, but use of the Reichskalender implies that these transactions were part of the administrative activities of the central government. The bulla in the Spokane Public Library is published with the kind permission of Mrs. Betty W. Bender, former Director of the Spokane Public Library (letter May 21, 1982). The three examples in the collections of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago are published with the kind permission of Professor Walter Farber, Curator of the Tablet Collections. I thank Professor Markus Hilgert for generously ceding to me the rights to publish these pieces, which were to be included in a future volume devoted to texts from the reigns of Šu-Suen and Ibbi-Suen in the Oriental Institute collections. I wish also to express thanks to Manuel Molina and BDTNS (Base de Datos de Textos Neo-Suméricos) for making so many Ur III texts easily accessible. The sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 deliveries of several kinds of flour are documented in a number of months in Šu-Suen year 9. In some cases several such texts dealing with a specific type of flour survive from a given month. A number of the documents record precisely the same relatively small amount of flour, 5 ban and 8 sila3. Only one text (BIN 3 574, Month X) lists a quantity measured in gur. See below for the types of flour attested in these texts. These bullae were obviously excavated at Drehem and probably reached the antiquities market in the years 1911–1930. The bulla in the Spokane Public Library was acquired in 1916. Thanks to the information given in Hilgert 1998, p. 2, I can provide acquisition information for the examples in the Oriental Institute. A 3085 was purchased from Georges Khayat in Baghdad in the winter of 1919–1920; A 4183 and A 4387 were part of the Chaldean Rescue purchase in 1924. 25

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No texts have been identified datable to Month I, II, VI, or later than X, though such texts may well exist in the usually small collections of tablets sold to institutions and individuals by Edgar Banks or in other institutional collections purchased on the antiquities market. Two of our texts (one in Spokane and one in Salt Lake City) were in fact sold by Banks. All of these bullae were part of the Puzriš-Dagan recordkeeping. Of course, we do not know that the bureaucratic recordkeeping represented by these bullae began in month I of year 9. The latest attested come from Month X. It will be recalled that Šu-Suen died early in Month X. No such texts from other years have been identified, and it thus appears that they reflect a bureaucratic practice that was instituted and abandoned, all in Šu-Suen’s ninth and final year. These bullae do not indicate where the flour shipments originated or what their purpose or destination was. I have not been able to identify any other records involving these transactions in Šu-Suen year 9. It appears that the containers for the flour were closed by cords that passed through the bullae to assure the integrity of the shipments of the quantity and type of flour specified on the bullae. The bullae I have seen personally or have seen photos of are all more or less triangular in shape or somewhat rounded on the right, but I do not have this information for those published only in transliteration. Because the bullae are narrower on the right side, the signs are often scrunched and overlapping near the right edge. Keiser 1914, p. 10, states that the most common forms of bullae were three-sided, conical, elliptical or olive-shaped, though he was describing Ur III bullae in general and not those from Drehem specifically. There is an excellent recent study on sa2-du11 labels from Ur III Umma (Laurito, Mezzasalma, and Verderame 2008). 1 I am not aware of a comparable study dealing with labels or bullae from Puzriš-Dagan, so I do not know to what extent their findings and interpretations are valid for Puzriš-Dagan. They suggest (2008, p. 101) that such labels probably hung from a container, and that because of an administrative need for them to be archived, they were fired after having served their original purpose. The authors also state that the seals were rolled on the labels or bullae before they were inscribed. Whether these conclusions also apply to the sa2-du11 bullae from Puzriš-Dagan remains uncertain, though the questions may be answered by the forthcoming publication of The Ur III Seals Impressed on Cuneiform Documents from Drehem announced by Christina Tsouparopoulou (see Tsouparopoulou 2013, p. 15). I list here the examples I have been able to identify. Because of space considerations, published texts are cited by the abbreviations used in BDTNS. The sequence of months is that in use at Puzriš-Dagan in year Šu-Suen 4 and later, i.e., the so-called Reichskalender. 2 Month I none identified Month II none identified Month III MVN 9 174 CST 452 BIN 3 343 Month IV Spokane Public Library text (unpub.)

zi3-sig15 ša3-DU zi3-ba-ba-sig5 zi3-ba-ba-sig5 zi3-GUM ša3-DU

1. See also Laurito, Mezzasalma, and Verderame 2006, though the latter deals in generalities about bullae and more specifically with Messenger Texts from Umma. 2.  See Sallaberger 1999, pp. 235–237 and 2006, p. 125.

The Šu-Suen Year 9 sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 Flour Dossier from Puzriš-Dagan BIN 3 393 Month V BIN 3 392 BRM 3 150 SET 129 Oriental Institute A 4287 (unpub.) Month VI none identified Month VII BIN 3 394 SAT 3 1885 TLB 3 149 DoCu Strasbourg, Sch. 27 Month VIII Oriental Institute A 4183 (unpub.) Month IX ASJ 19 211 31 MVN 13 30 PDT 1 174 CST 454 Ontario 1 173 SAT 3 1883 TLB 3 58 Oriental Institute A 3085 (unpub.) Month X BIN 3 574 SET 183

27

zi3-GUM ša3-DU zi3-sig15 ša3-DU zi3-ba-ba-sig5 zi3-gu-⸢sig5⸣ zi3-gu-us2 zi3-GUM ša3-DU zi3-GUM-sig5 zi3-sig15 ša3-DU zi3-GUM zi3-ba-ba- / ⸢sig5⸣ zi3-ba-ba-sig5 zi3-ba-ba-sig5 zi3-ba-[ba-sig5] zi3-sig15 ša3-DU zi3-sig15 ša3-DU zi3-sig15 ša3-DU zi3-sig15 ša3-DU zi3-sig15 ša3-DU zi3-sig15 ša3-DU ⟨zi3⟩-sig15 ša3-DU

No later texts identified. Because five of the bullae, CST 454, Ontario 1 173, SAT 3 1883, TLB 3 58, and Oriental Institute A 3085 all have exactly the same text, I first thought that perhaps only one of them is original, and the rest are casts. That appears not to be the case, and it looks as though all are original. Sigrist 1992, p. 123, in a section called “Doubles de tablettes,” remarks, “Des doubles de tablettes sont nécessaires, en raison du nombre de vérifications qui s’imposent. Mais il est normal de ne pas trouver de corbeille à tablettes de ces doubles (pisan dub-ba gaba-ri), étant donné que les doubles étaient archivés et utilisés dans d’autres bureaux.” I do not know whether this explanation would account for our multiple copies or not. 3 On the other hand, the explanation may be simply that in Month IX there were multiple deliveries all involving precisely the same quantities of flour and involving the same individuals. Sallaberger 1993, pp.  12–13, understands the term sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 as the unused portion of a regular delivery, adding, “Bei Durchsicht der . . . Belege für sá dug4 ku5-rá, ‘nicht verbrauchte(r Teil einer regelmässigen) Lieferung’, womit diejenigen Restbestände bezeichnet werden, . . . die innerhalb der Organisation von Drehem verbleiben, fiel auf, dass diese immer auf den 29. oder 30., also — naheliegenderweise — den letzen Tag eines Monats datieren.” 4 Our texts are dated by year and month only. Because of our multiple copies from the same month and often for the same quantity of the same kind of flour, it is not clear to me that this defini3.  See also Hilgert 2003a, pp. 31–42, but applying mainly to i3-dab5 texts from the reign of AmarSuen, and apparently not applicable to our small corpus. 4.  See also Maeda 1989, pp. 105–107, but dealing specifically with food for livestock.

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tion fits our examples, and we may need to seek another explanation. Sigrist 1992, pp. 199–200, in writing about the sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 deliveries refers to them as “transferts internes de Drehem, c’est-à-dire du bureau des enregistrements aux bureaux de redistribution” and adds, “cette expression précise que toute la quantité convenue est transmise. sá-du11 ku5-rá n’est donc qu’une expression comptable qui ne dit rien sur l’emploi des livraisons régulières.” Miguel Civil points out to me occurrences of kinsigu parsu, “distributed meal” (see CAD s.v. kinsigu) as well as a broken passage in SBH 92a No. 50a:16f. with kisallu parsu (see CAD parsu lexical section). It thus appears that ku5-ra2 has a wider application than that intended to describe balances remaining on the records at the end of a month or year. It would appear that the meaning in our texts concerned with deliveries of flour may mean something like “partial” or “separate.” A rare variant of this term seems to be sa2-du11 ku5-a, attested only a few times in Umma and Nippur documents. BDTNS lists the following: NATN 369 (Umma, Šulgi 31) NATN 486 (Nippur, Amar-Suen 8) MVN 4 162 (Umma, undated) UTI 3 2113 (Umma, Šu-Suen 3)

In view of these occurrences, it seems unnecessary to emend še sa2-du11 ku5-a in Stillman 1998, p. 16, a letter order of uncertain provenance and date, since the a in the published photo is unambiguous. The flour deliveries in these texts consist of five different categories, some of which were surely used in making bread (inda3-še3 in Brunke’s terminology). 5 The type most frequently occurring in this small corpus is zi3-sig15 ša3-DU. The flour designated as zi3-sig15(KAL), whose definition is not more precisely known than “a type of flour,” 6 when qualified as ša3-DU apparently occurs only in our texts. Brunke 2011, p. 119, cites no passages that I was not aware of. He understands ša3-DU as a quality designation (p. 120), and points out that it does not occur with any food commodity other than flour. See below for further comment on this term. In the case of another type of flour occurring in our texts, zi3-GUM, it is specified either as sig5, “excellent,” or ša3-DU, which suggests that ša3-DU is a quality inferior to that designated as “excellent.” The zi3-GUM flour is attested frequently in addition to the occurrences in our texts, but is rarely designated as ša3-DU. 7 The zi3-gu-sig5 flour occurs in our corpus in only one text, SET 129, though it is a very common type of flour in Ur III texts in general, as is also the case of zi3-gu-us2 (Oriental Institute A 4287). 8 The other type of flour attested in these texts is zi3-ba-ba-sig5. It is defined by the Pennsylvania Sumerian Dictionary, vol. 2, p. 17, as “excellent porridge flour.” 9 However, Brunke 2011, p. 159, insists that ba-ba is not porridge (German Brei), and that it is not to be confused with ba-ba-za, which corresponds to Akkadian pappasu, “porridge.” 5.  See Brunke 2010, p. 393. 6.  See Milano 1993, pp. 26–27. 7.  See Brunke 2011, p. 119. See also Milano 1993, p. 26. 8.  See Milano 1993, p. 26. 9.  See Milano 1993, pp. 25–26.

The Šu-Suen Year 9 sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 Flour Dossier from Puzriš-Dagan

29

Twelve different individuals occur in our texts, four of whom occur only once in a single document. Roman numerals are used here for the months: Ba-za-za, kišib, Month III; Šu-zu(?)-e, kišib, Month V; Šu-dIŠKUR, kišib, Month X; Šeš-kal-la, mu . . . še3, Month V. Except for these four individuals, it seems that a small coterie of men dealt with these flour deliveries, the men’s functions sometimes varying from month to month, and at times serving more than one function within a single document. The maximum information on the personnel involved in these transactions is bala PN, mu PN-še3, and kišib PN. All examples include kišib PN. Note that in the numerous examples from month IX no one is designated as recipient (mu PN-še3), for which there is no obvious explanation. It is striking that until year 10, all these bullae list bala PN in first place. In fact, there seems to be a pattern of alternation in serving as bala. Thus Erra-qurād (see discussion of this name below) served in months III and VII; Lugal-ezem served in months IV and VIII, and Ur-tur in months V and IX, interrupted only by Er3-re-eb also listed in month III and Ku3-dNingal in month V. If this pattern were to be followed we might expect to see Erra-qurād listed in month X, but the two texts from month X list no bala. I suspect that this may have a political or bureaucratic significance. Because Šu-Suen died early in month X, was no one assigned to be responsible for the bala? I do not have an answer, so I simply raise the question. There appears to be no similar pattern regarding the names listed as kišib or recipient (mu . . . še3). Name Er3-ra-GAR3 Er3-ra-qu2-ra-ad Ir3/11-re-eb

Ha-la-la

Designation bala bala bala kišib

kišib mu . . . še3

Ba-za-za Lugal-ezem

kišib bala

Šu- Šu-mu-dar

kišib kišib

(d)

mu . . . še3

Month III VII VII III III IX X V III VIII X III IV VIII VIII V IX IV V VII

Number of Texts 2 2 2 1 1 7 1 1 1 1 1 1 2 1 1 1 1 2 2 4

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Name Tu-ra-am-i3-li2

Designation kišib

Ur-tur

bala mu . . . še3 mu . . . še3 kišib bala kišib

Šeš-kal-la Šu-zu(?)-e Ku3-dNin-gal Šu-dIŠKUR

Month IV V VII V IX X V V V X

Number of Texts 2 1 4 2 7 1 1 1 2 1

The bala officials in our texts: Month III Month IV Month V Month VII Month VIII Month IX Month X

Er3-ra-GAR3 / Er3-ra-qu2-ra-ad Ir3-re-eb Lugal-ezem Ur-tur Ku3-dNin-gal Er3-ra-GAR3 / Er3-ra-qu2-ra-ad Lugal-ezem Ur-tur none

Several names in these texts deserve brief comments. Semitic names containing the element GAR3 have long been a puzzle. In my publication of the mid-third millennium Abu Ṣalabikh tablets I did not suggest any interpretation (Biggs 1974, p. 35). A number of scholars over the years have suggested various interpretations which are detailed in Hilgert 2002, p. 332, n. 62 and Di Vito 1993, p. 309, n. 12. Illingworth 1988, p. 95, suggests, for an Akkadian period name written Ir3-ra-GAR3, a reading Ir3-ra-qarrād. Similarly, Krebernik 1998, p. 261, n. 213, suggests that GAR3 may be a graphic shortening for qarrād. I have found only two possible examples of qarrād in Ur III texts, both from Girsu: E-la-qa2-ra-ad Berens 80 and DINGIR-qa2-ra-ad TCTI 2 3783, so syllabic writings are rather rare. I do not address the occurrences in Pre-Sargonic texts here, although I believe GAR3 in Semitic names is probably to be interpreted as qurād, as I propose here for specific name types in Ur III texts. The occurrences of both Er3-ra-GAR3 and Er3-ra-qu2-ra-ad in our texts, where, I believe, they appear undeniably to refer to the same man, clinch the case for GAR3 to be interpreted as qurādum, “hero,” in these names. BDTNS lists only our three occurrences of Er3-ra-GAR3 (to which I propose adding another — DoCu Strasbourg, Sch. 27) in Puzriš-Dagan texts, and Er3ra-qu2-ra-ad in only two texts besides the two occurrences in our corpus.

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I suspect that the older third-millennium writing with GAR3 for qurād may have been largely replaced in Ur III writing with UR.SAG in the name Er3-ra-UR.SAG, and that it is also to be interpreted as qurādum. I am not suggesting this for names with any deity other than Erra. I cannot offer any proof, so I raise it merely as a suggestion. I believe another such pair involving GAR3 and its suggested Akkadian equivalent, is GAR3-i3-li2 and Qu2-ra-ad-i3-li2. Another may be DINGIR-qu2-ra-ad in MVN 13 411 and DINGIR-UR.SAG in MVN 2 283 (both are unique occurrences, however). I present here in tabular form the occurrences I have been able to identify that I believe are relevant in this discussion (I thank BDTNS for a number of examples I had not previously located). It is likely that this list is incomplete. I believe that it is probable that all names Qurād-ilī, “Hero-among-the-gods,” are to be understood as meaning the god Erra. Note that qurādu is a frequent Akkadian epithet of Erra (CAD s.v.) Hilgert 2002, pp.  328–334, discusses names with the element gar3 in his discussion of the Semitic root WQR. I am proposing that in specifically structured Ur III names (DN-GAR3, GAR3-DN and variants), GAR3 is to be interpreted as a logogram for Akkadian qurādum (written qu2-ra-ad, qur-ra-ad, etc.), and thus not relevant for discussions of writings such as wa-qar3, ba-qar3, etc. All our examples of qurādum in these names lack mimation. Hilgert 2003b, p. 10, notes, “. . . the graphic representation of the mimation may be lacking with Akkadian proper nouns — i.e., personal, divine, geographical and month names. . . .” Ways of writing DN-qurād, qurād-DN, and DN-šu-qurād in Ur Ill texts Syllabic Er3-ra-qu2-ra-ad TLB 3 149 (Puzriš-Dagan; our text) SAT 3 1885 (Puzriš-Dagan; our text) MVN 13 512 (Puzriš-Dagan) Ontario 1 69 (Puzriš-Dagan) BE 3–1 116(Nippur) NATN 268 (Nippur) TMH NF 1–2 102 (Nippur) Nisaba 22 77 (Girsu, partly restored) TCTI 1 809 (Girsu) SAT 3 2199 (Umma) OrSP 47–49 145 (Umma(?))

Logographic Er3-ra-GAR3 MVN 9 174 (P-D; our text) BIN 3 343 (P-D; our text) BIN 3 394 (P-D; our text) NATN 336 (Nippur) DoCu Strasbourg, Sch. 27 (P-D;   our text)

Er3-ra-UR.SAG TCL 2 5531 (P-D) CST 127 (P-D) CST 507 (P-D) PDT 1 168 (P-D) PDT 1 499 (P-D) SET 114 (P-D) MVN 4 94 (P-D) and 13 others in P-D

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Ways of writing DN-qurād, qurād-DN, and DN-šu-qurād in Ur Ill texts Syllabic

Er3-ra-qu6(GU2)-ra-ad YOS 4 31 (Umma) Er3-ra-qu6-⟨ra>-ad NRVN 1 149 Qu2-ra-ad-i3-li2 BIN 3 217 Puzriš-Dagan) BIN 3 558 (Puzriš-Dagan) MVN 1 144 (Puzriš-Dagan) MVN 3 285 (Puzriš-Dagan) MVN 8 138 (Puzriš-Dagan) SAT 3 1219 (Puzriš-Dagan) CST 263 (Girsu) TUT 209 (Girsu) AnOr 7 295 (Umma) Ladders to Heaven No. 52 (Umma) MVN 21 376 (Umma) NATN 308 (Nippur, i3-li2 partly restored) JCS 38 56 22 (Turam-ili Arch.) JCS 54 63 2 (SI.A-a Arch.) Qu3-ra-ad-i3-li2 Nisaba 3–1 157 (Umma) Qur3-ra-di3(TI)-li2 Grégoire AAS 175 Coll. De Clercq 1 105, cited MAD 3 227 (seal) Nisaba 22 77 (Girsu) Qu2(!)-ra-ad-i3-li2-šu NATN 311 and 269 (Nippur) DINGIR-qu2-ra-ad MVN 13 411 (Puzriš-Dagan) DINGIR-qu6(! )-ra-ad FS Owen 174 L 5441 (Girsu)

Logographic Er3-ra-UR.SAG (cont.) MDP 28 57 410 (Susa) ABTR 13 (Girsu) TUT 212 (Girsu) Amherst 98 (Girsu) Orient 16 99 150 (Girsu) CST 263 (Girsu) TCL 5 6041 (Umma) NATN 367 (Nippur; seal)

d

GAR3-i3-li2 MVN 3 380 (Puzriš-Dagan) JAOS 52 113 (Šuruppak) MVN 8 165 (SI.A-a Archive) JANES 9 24 11 (unknown)

not attested not attested

not attested DINGIR-UR.SAG MVN 2 283 (Girsu)

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Ways of writing DN-qurād, qurād-DN, and DN-šu-qurād in Ur Ill texts Syllabic

Be-li2-qu2-ra-ad YOS 4 239:5 and seal (Umma) Il-šu-qu2-ra-ad (Girsu only) MCS 4 108 163 Nisaba 22 55 MVN 2 203 Nisaba 17 15 (see correction in BDTNS) RA 10 66 99 HLC 2 71 (4 occurrences ) DAS 163 Il-šu-qur-ad (Girsu only) MVN 2 69 and envelope DAS 361 Nisaba 17 27 and seal TCTI 2 2696 TCTI 2 4039 TUT 106 ASJ 9 117 47 E-šu-qur-ad (Girsu only) Nisaba 22 2 E-šu4-qu2-ra-ad (Girsu only) Mess. Diss. No. 537; see Notizia, NABU 2011/50 (Girsu only)

Logographic DINGIR-GAR3-ad YOS 4 156 (Umma) not attested not attested

not attested

not attested not attested

When I first encountered the name Šu-Šu-mu-dar, I was struck by the resemblance of Šumu-dar to a plant name common in first-millennium Babylonian and Assyrian medical texts that is normally written logographically as SUMUN(BE).DAR, to be read in Akkadian as šumuttu, “beet” (in American English), “beetroot” (in British English). 10 Because the divine name Šu-mudar did not initially seem to me to be either Sumerian or Akkadian, I asked colleagues whether it might be Elamite. Wouter Henkelman suggested that it is probably the dŠu-mu-du in Assurbanipal’s account of the sack of Susa (Borger 1996, 53 A vi 33), which has invariably been considered the name of an Elamite deity (see, for example, Deimel 1914, p. 257). 11 Whether the deity attested in Elam and in our name from Puzriš-Dagan is truly of Elamite origin or whether the name is derived from earlier Mesopotamian sources is an open question, though I am inclined to believe that it is ultimately of Mesopotamian origin. 10.  See discussion in Civil 2013, pp. 46–47, for the complex third millennium background of the plant name, listed in mid-third millennium lexical sources among root vegetables. 11.  See also Henkelman 2011, pp. 511f. s.v. Šimut.

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It is striking that Ur III names with the element Šu-mu-dar are so rare. I can propose only one additional occurrence in a personal name beyond the occurrences in our texts. I propose reading the name in another Puzriš-Dagan document dated one year earlier than our texts. In Alster 1989, p. 326, No. 17, in lines 3–4 I suggest reading: 3. ki Er3-ra-⸢GAR3⸣(!)-ta 4. kišib Šu-Šu-mu-dar Note that the two men, assuming my suggestions are valid, occur together in one of our texts a few months later (Šu-Šuen 9, Month VII). Šumudar occurs only in BIN 3 393 and ASJ 19 (in the text and on the seal) with the divine determinative. The name Šu-mu-dar also occurs in the name of a watercourse, I7-Šu-mu-dar in Nisaba 15, No. 831, a text from Irisagrig. 12

Transliterations In the case of unpublished examples, I include transliterations of the month and year names. MVN 9 174 (Month III ŠEŠ-da-gu7) 1. 0.0.5 8 sila3 zi3-sig15 ša3-⸢DU⸣ 2. sa2-du11 ku5-[ra2] 3. bala Er3-ra-GAR3 4. kišib Ir3-re-⸢eb⸣ seal illegible BIN 3 343 (Month III ŠEŠ-da-gu7) 1. 0.0.1 5 sila3 zi3-ba-ba-⸢sig5⸣ 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Er3-ra-GAR3 4. kišib Ir3-re-eb seal illegible CST 452 (collation MVN 12, p. 114) (Month III ŠEŠ-da-gu7) 1. 0.0.1 5 sila3 zi3-ba-ba-sig5 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Ir3-re-eb 4. mu Ha-la-la-še3 5. kišib Ba-za-za Seal 1. Ba-za-za 2. dumu-munus SAG(?)-la-x

12.  See now Abraham and Gabbay 2013, especially p. 186 for writings of the canal name in various periods.

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I retain the tentative reading of line 2 of the seal as given in BDTNS, though it does not yield a plausible Sumerian name. Spokane Public Library (unpublished) (Month IV u5-bi2mušen-gu7) 1. 0.0.5 8 sila3 zi3-GUM / ⸢ša3⸣-DU 2. ⸢sa2-du11 ku5⸣-ra2 3. bala ⸢Lugal-ezem⸣ 4. mu Šu-Šu-[m]u-dar-še3 5. kišib Tu-ra-am- / i3-li2 6. iti u5-bi2mušen-gu7 7. mu dŠu-dSuen / lugal-Uri5ki-ma-ke4 / ⸢e2⸣-dŠara2-Ummaki-ka / mu-du3 seal illegible This bulla is very heavily encrusted with salt, especially in lines 3 and 4. At the time I copied it in 1982, I had no knowledge of related texts or access to any research materials, but I believe the readings proposed here are correct. BIN 3 393 (Month IV u5-bi2-gu7) 1. 0.0.5 8 sila3 zi3-GUM ša3-DU 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Lugal-ezem 4. mu Šu-dŠu-mu-dar-še3 5. kišib Tu-ra-am-i3- / li2 seal 1. Tu-ra-am-i3-li2 2. arad2 d[Nu-muš-da] BRM 3 150 (Month V ki-siki-dNin-a-zu) 1. [x]+1 sila3 zi3-ba-ba-sig5 2. ⸢sa2⸣-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Ur-tur 4. mu Šeš-kal-la-še3 5. kišib(!) Šu-zu(?)-e seal illegible I am unable to propose a plausible interpretation of the name copied as Šu-zu-e. The other texts in this small corpus make it abundantly clear that the supposed urudu preceding it must be read kišib(!). I thank Professor Benjamin Foster, Curator of the Yale Babylonian Collection and Elizabeth Payne, Conservator of the Yale Babylonian Collection, for sending me a digital photo of this bulla. The Šu is unambiguous; the zu is probable. The e sign is clear but is separated from the zu(?) by some distance and is written at a lower level, but I cannot see that it can belong to any other line. The name Šu-zu is well attested, but no other example adds e. BIN 3 392 (Month V ki-siki-dNin-a-zu) 1. 0.0.5 8 sila3 zi3-sig15 ša3-⸢DU⸣ 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Ur-tur

36

Robert Biggs 4. kišib Ha-la-la seal 1. Ha-la-la 2. dub-sar 3. dumu Puzur4-lugal 4. arad2 dNu-[muš-da] SET 129, copy JAC 23 68 (Month V ki-siki-dNin-a-zu) 1. 0.0.4 5 sila3 zi3-gu-⸢sig5⸣ 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Ku3-dNin-gal 4. mu Šu-Šu-mu-dar-še3 5. kišib Tu-ra-am-i3-li2 seal illegible Oriental Institute A 4287 (Month V ki-siki-dNin-a-zu) 1. 0.0.1 5 sila3 zi3-gu-us2 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Ku3-dNin-gal 4. mu Šu-Šu-mu-dar-še3 5. kišib Šu-Šu-mu-dar 6 iti ki-siki-dNin-a-zu 7. mu dŠu-dSuen / lugal-Uri5ki-ma-ke4 / ⸢e2⸣-dŠara2-Ummaki-ka / mu-du3 seal illegible BIN 3 394 (Month VII a2-ki-ti) 1. 0.0.5 8 sila3 zi3-GUM ša3-DU 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Er3-ra-GAR3 4. mu Šu-Šu-mu-dar-še3 5. kišib Tu-ra-am-i3-li2 seal 1. Tu-ra-am-[i3-li2] 2. arad2 d[Nu-muš-da] SAT 3 1885 (Month VII a2-ki-ti) 1. 0.0.5 8 sila3 zi3-GUM-sig5 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Er3-ra-qu2-ra-ad 4. mu Šu-Šu(!)-mu-dar-še3 5. kišib Tu-ra-am-i3-li2 seal 1. Tu-ra-am-i3-li2 2. arad2 dNu-muš-da

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According to the publication, the divine name in line 2 of the seal inscription is preserved intact, and is thus the basis for the restorations in the other seal inscriptions of Turam-ili. TLB 3 149 (Month VII a2-ki-ti) 1. 0.0.5 8 sila3 zi3-sig15 ša3-DU 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Er3-ra-qu2-ra-ad 4. mu Šu-Šu-mu-dar-⸢še3⸣ 5. kišib Tu-ra-am-i3-li2 seal 1. Tu-ra-am-i3-li2 2. arad2 dNu(!)-[muš-da] DoCu Strasbourg, Sch. 27 (Month VII a2-ki-ti) 1. 0.0.5 8 sila3 zi3 GUM 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2(!) 3. bala Er3-ra-G[AR3] 4. mu Šu-Šu-mu-d[ar-še3] 5. kišib Tu-ra-am(!)- / [i3-li2] No seal is mentioned in the publication. Oriental Institute A 4183 Month VIII ezem-dŠul-gi) 1. [ x ] + 5 sila3 zi3-ba-ba- / ⸢sig5⸣ 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Lugal-ezem 4. mu Ha-la-la-⸢še3⸣ 5. kišib Lugal-ezem 6. iti ezem-dŠul-gi 7. mu e2-dŠara2 mu-du3 seal illegible CST 454, collation MVN 12, p. 114 (Month IX ezem-dŠu-dSuen) 1. 0.0.5 8 sila3 zi3-sig15 ša3-DU 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Ur-tur 4. kišib Ir3-re-eb seal illegible TLB 3 58 (Month IX ezem-dŠu-dSuen) 1. 0.0.5 8 sila3 zi3-sig15 ša3-DU 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Ur-tur 4. kišib Ir3-re-eb seal 1. Ir3-re-eb 2. dub-sar 3. [dum]u I3-li2-[x x]

38

Robert Biggs SAT 3 1883 (Month IX ezem-dŠu-dSuen) 1. 0.0.5 8 sila3 zi3-sig15 ša3-DU 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Ur-tur 4. kišib Ir3-re-eb seal 1. Ir3-re-eb 2. dub-sar 3. dumu I3-li2-[x x] Ontario 1 173 (Month IX ezem-dŠu-dSuen) 1. 0.0.5 8 sila3 zi3-sig15 ša3-DU 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Ur-tur 4. kišib Ir3-re-eb seal 1. Ir3-re-eb 2. dub-sar 3. dumu I3-li2-[x x]

This example is not identified in the publication as being a bulla, but Clemens Reichel of the Royal Ontario Museum confirms that is a bulla and kindly sent me a photo of it. PDT 1 174 (Month IX ezem-dŠu-dSuen) 1. [x] +2 sila3 zi3-ba-[ba-sig5] 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Ur-tur 4. kišib Ir3-re-eb seal illegible This example is not identified in the publication as being a bulla, but I assume it is. MVN 13 30 (Month IX ezem-dŠu-dSuen) 1. 0.0.1 5 sila3 zi3-ba-ba-sig5 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Ur-tur 4. kišib Ir11-re-eb No seal is mentioned in the publication. ASJ 19 211 31 (Month IX ezem-dŠu-dSuen) 1. 0.3.2 zi3-ba-ba-sig5 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Ur-tur 4. kišib Šu-dŠu-mu-⸢dar⸣(!) seal 1. [Šu]-dŠu-mu-[dar] 2. dub-[sar]

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3. dumu I3-li2-[x x] 4. arad2 An-nu-[ni-tum] The restoration in the last line of the seal inscription is conjectural, and could equally well be d Nu-[muš-da]. Oriental Institute A 3085 (Month IX ezem-dŠu-dSuen) 1. 0.0.5 8 sila3 zi3-sig15 ša3-DU 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. bala Ur-tur 4. kišib Ir3-re-eb 5. iti ezem-dŠu-dSuen 6. mu dŠu-dSuen lugal- / Uri5ki-ma-ke4 / e2-dŠara2-Ummaki-ka / mu-du3 seal Ir3-re-[eb] rest of seal illegible BIN 3 574 (Month X ezem-mah) 1. 10.0.0 zi3-sig15 ša3-DU gur 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. mu Ha-la-la-še3 4. kišib Šu-dIŠKUR seal 1. Šu-dIŠKUR 2. arad2 dNu-muš-[da] This example is not identified as being a bulla. SET 183 (Month X ezem-mah) 1. 0.0.5 8 sila3 ⟨zi3⟩-sig15 ša3-DU 2. sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 3. mu Ur-tur-še3 4. kišib Ir3-re-eb seal illegible The year and the month are given, as well as information on the seal, in SET, but not transliterated. These bullae from Šu-Suen’s final year, unparalleled in any other years, pose several questions to which I have not found satisfactory answers in the published documentation. The current understanding of sa2-du11 ku5-ra2 does not seem to fit the situation in our bullae with sometimes multiple bullae with precisely the same quantities of flour with the same personnel in a given month. Perhaps Marcel Sigrist’s more literal understanding of the terminology in one of our texts, Ontario 1 173 (see Sigrist 1995, p. 109), where his understanding of sa2-du11 ku5ra2 / bala PN / kišib PN2 as “regular deliveries, complete assigned contribution of PN, tablet of PN2” may be applicable. None of the texts indicate the destination of the flour (beyond saying, in most months, mu PN-še3, “for PN”). In spite of the uncertainty surrounding these flour deliveries and their purpose, the fact that it is a very strictly limited corpus (it is likely that there are additional examples unknown

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to me) covering a few months in a single year involving a very limited number of participants, led me, on the basis of this documentation, to propose that DN-GAR3 and similarly structured Akkadian names in the Ur III period are to be interpreted as DN-qurād.

References Abraham, Kathleen and Gabbay, Uri 2013 “Kaštiliašu and the Sumundar Canal: A New Middle Babylonian Royal Inscription, Zeitschrift für Assyriologie 103, 83–195. Alster, Bendt 1989 “Ur III Texts Belonging to the University of Oslo,” Acta Sumerologica 11, 315–328. Biggs, Robert D. 1974 Inscriptions from Tell Abū Ṣalābīkh. Oriental Institute Publications, vol. 99. Chicago, University of Chicago Press. Borger, Rykle 1996 Beiträge zum Inschriftwerk Assurbanipals: Die Prismenklassen A, B, C = K, D, E, F, G, H, J und T sowie andere Inschriften. Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz. Brunke, Hagen 2010 “Zur Rekonstruktion von Speisen in Sumer anhand administrativer Urkunden,” pp. 375–399 in Selz, Gebhard J., ed., The Empirical Dimension of Ancient Near Eastern Studies. Wiener Offene Orientalistik, vol. 6. Vienna, Lit Verlag. 2011 Essen in Sumer: Metrologie, Herstellung und Terminologie nach Zeugnis der Ur III-zeitlichen Wirtschaftsurkunden. Munich, Herbert Utz Verlag. Civil, Miguel 2013 “Remarks on AD-GI4 (A.K.A.) ‘Archaic Word List C’ or ‘Tribute’,” Journal of Cuneiform Studies 65, 13–67. Deimel, A. 1914 Pantheon Babylonicum: Nomina Deorum e textibus cuneiformibus excerpta et ordine alphabetico distri­ buta. Rome, Pontifical Biblical Institute. Di Vito, Robert A. 1993 Studies in Third Millennium Sumerian and Akkadian Personal Names: The Designation and Conception of the Personal God. Studia Pohl: Series Maior, vol. 16. Rome, Editrice Pontificio Istituto Biblico. Henkelman, W. F. M. 2011 “Šimut,” Reallexikon der Assyriologie und vorderasiatischen Archäologie, vol. 12, 511–512. Berlin, Walter de Gruyter. Hilgert, Markus 1998 Drehem Administrative Documents from the Reign of Šulgi. Oriental Institute Publications, vol. 115. Chicago, Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago. 2002 Akkadisch in der Ur III-Zeit. Imgula, vol. 5. Münster, Rhema. 2003a Drehem Administrative Documents from the Reign of Amar-Suena. Oriental Institute Publications, vol. 121. Chicago, Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago. 2003b “New Perspectives in the Study of Third Millennium Akkadian,” Cuneiform Digital Library Journal 2003:4. Illingworth, N. J. J. 1988 “Inscriptions from Tell Brak 1986,” Iraq 50, 87–108. Keiser, Clarence E. 1914 Cuneiform Bullae of the Third Millennium B.C. Babylonian Records in the Library of J. Pierpont Morgan, vol. 3. New Haven, Yale University Press.

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Krebernik, Manfred 1998 “Die Texte aus Fāra und Tell Abū Ṣalābīh,” Pp. 235–427 in Bauer, Josef; Englund, Robert K.; and Krebernik, Manfred, Mesopotamien: Späturuk-Zeit und Frühdynastische Zeit. Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis 160/1. Freiburg, Switzerland, Universitätsverlag and Göttingen, Vanderhoeck & Ruprecht. Laurito, Romina; Mezzasalma, Alessandra; and Verderame, Lorenzo 2006 “Oltre la tavoletta: documenti archivistici dall’amministrazione mesopotamica del III millennio, pp. 191–208 in Mora, Clelia and Piacentini, Patrizia, eds., L’Ufficio e il documento: I luoghi, i modi, gli strumenti dell’amministrazione in Egitto e nel Vicino Oriente antico. Università degli Studi di Milano Facoltà di Lettere e Filosofia, Quaderni di Acme, vol. 83. Milan, Cisalpino. 2008 “Texts and Labels: A Case Study from Neo-Sumerian Umma,” pp. 99–110 in Biggs, Robert D; Myers, Jennie; and Roth, Martha T. eds., Proceedings of the 51st Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale held at the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago July 18–22, 2005. Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilization, No. 62. Chicago, The Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago. Maeda, Tohru 1989 “Bringing (mu-túm) Livestock and the Puzuriš-Dagan Organization in the Ur III Dynasty,” Acta Sumerologica 11, 69–111. Milano, L. 1993 “Mehl,” pp. 22–31 in Reallexikon der Assyriologie und vorderasiatischen Archäologie, vol. 8. Berlin and New York, Walter de Gruyter. Sallaberger, Walther 1993 Der kultische Kalender der Ur III-Zeit. Untersuchungen zur Assyriologie und vorderasiatischen Archäologie 7. Berlin and New York, Walter de Gruyter. 1999 “Ur III-Zeit,” pp. 119–390, in Sallaberger, Walther and Westenholz, Aage, Mesopotamien: Akkade-Zeit und Ur III-Zeit. Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis 160/3. Freiburg, Switzerland: Universitätsverlag and Göttingen, Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. 2006 “Puzriš-Dagān,” Reallexikon der Assyriologie und vorderasiatischen Archäologie, vol. 11, 125–128. Berlin and New York, Walter de Gruyter. Sigrist, Marcel 1992 Drehem. Bethesda, CDL Press. 1995 Neo-Sumerian Texts from the Royal Ontario Museum, vol. 1, The Administration at Drehem. Bethesda, CDL Press. Stillman, Larry 1998 “Grain and Luxury Shoes: Sumerian Temple Records at the Australian Institute of Archaeology,” Buried History 34, 16–20. Tsouparopoulou, Christina 2013 “A Reconstruction of the Puzriš-Dagan Central Livestock Agency,” Cuneiform Digital Library Journal 2013:2.

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To Eat Like a God: Religion and Economy in Old Babylonian Nippur Nicole Brisch It is a great pleasure and a privilege to contribute to this Festschrift for Nicholas Postgate. I hope that he will accept this article as a small token of my gratitude for all his support during my time in Cambridge. Although this contribution will only include a minor discussion of archaeological evidence, this nevertheless is offered in the spirit of Nicholas’s scholarship and the Cambridge tradition, which always sought to combine archaeological and textual evidence. 1 More than any other ritual, the daily ritual of ‘feeding the gods’ is one that many Assyriologists, especially in the past, have found difficult to understand. The reasons for this are not entirely clear but perhaps may be found in the close association of Assyriology with Old Testament studies. Though Old Testament polemics against idol worship focused mainly on the production process of divine statues as a proof that they were idols rather than actual gods (see Berlejung 1998, especially 315–413), the feeding of such statues also caused some bewilderment among ancients and moderns alike. 2 In modern scholarship such attitudes can be identified as inherently Orientalist, since they betray a deficient appreciation of the nature of divine statues and the Mesopotamian notion of the divine. Selz (1997; 2008) has done much to help us gain a deeper understanding of divinity and the nature of Mesopotamian statues. It is proposed here that the daily ritual of ‘feeding the gods,’ through which a connection between religion and economy can be explored, can add a new facet to our perception of Mesopotamian religion. Oppenheim’s call 3 for systematic studies of the divine image and the caring for it in the form of food offerings is being heeded half a century after it was first published: a number of studies are now either exclusively or partly dedicated at least to the daily ritual of feeding the gods, 4 yet there is much that is still poorly understood, in particular regarding food offerings in the third and early second millennium BCE. The Mesopotamian ritual can be connected with several mythological tales. One of these tales, the Flood Story, has recently received an increased attention with the publication of a previously unknown manuscript that details the 1.  I would like to thank J. A. Brinkman and N. Yoffee as well as the anonymous peer-reviewers for the comments. 2.  For ancient bewilderment at this rite see Lambert 1993: 200 and Postgate 1994: 124–125, for testimonies of modern bewilderment see Römer 1969: 149 and Wiggerman 1995: 1862. 3.  Oppenheim 1977[1964]: 183. 4.  See, for example, Sigrist 1984; Lambert 1993; Bottéro 2001: 125–133; Maul 2008; 2013; Gaspa 2010; 2011a; 2011b; Waerzeggers 2010: 113–18; Sallaberger 2012.

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building of the ‘ark’ (Finkel 2014). Two other mythological tales that connect the purpose of humanity’s existence with service to the gods are the tale of Enki and Ninmah and Enūma Eliš. The importance of these tales for our understanding of the Mesopotamian religious ritual of ‘Feeding the gods’ has been pointed out several times (Lambert 1993; Maul 2008; 2013) and need not be repeated here. Suffice it to say that these myths explain that humanity was created by the gods to serve them and to provide them with offerings so that the gods would not have to ‘do the work’ by themselves. In return, the gods promised to not destroy humanity (again). Yet there are other dimensions of this important ritual. Maul has focused on social and political aspects of this rite, in addition to its religious dimension (Maul 2008; 2013), and coined the term “Gottes-Ernährungsgemeinschaft” to describe this (Maul 2008: 81). In the Middle and Neo-Assyrian periods, food offerings were an integral part of creating and maintaining a community to demarcate and stabilize the Assyrian state (Postgate 1992; Maul 2013). In Maul’s words: “Der mit einer solchen Götterspeisung verbundene Gedanke einer Gemeinschaft, die die Menschen untereinander ebenso verbindet wie das Gottesvolk mit seinem göttlichen Herrn, wird zumindest der Gemeinschaft der Willigen Identität und Festigkeit verliehen und so schon in mittelassyrischer Zeit dem assyrischen Reich in nicht unerheblichem Maße zu innerer Stabilität verholfen haben” (Maul 2013: 574). Such an interpretation of this rite as one that creates community is in line with recent interpretations in the field of religious studies. Bell (2009: 108–114), for example, classifies such daily offerings as ‘rites of exchange and communion’ and suggested that these rites “appear to invoke very complex relations between the human and the divine” (Bell 2009: 109). The complexity of human-divine relations is borne out by the Mesopotamian evidence: in particular the Babylonian Flood story shows that the relationship was one of mutual interdependence. Humans were indeed created to work for the gods and to provide them with all the goods they needed to be comfortable, but this also made the gods depend on humans: without humanity they had to work on their own, and, as the time before the Flood shows, this was not a successful enterprise. The economic dimension of food offerings to the gods has not been adequately addressed to date. It is proposed here that gaining a deeper understanding of the economic aspects of religion could open up new perspectives on our understanding of Mesopotamian religion. The ‘Sattukku’ archive from Nippur, which records food offerings to gods and their redistribution, presents a unique opportunity to explore this connection between economy and religion further. On the one hand, there is the question of how food offerings contributed to the overall economy of a city-state, on the other hand it could help pursue the question of how the temple economy interacted with the community within which it was embedded. The following represents an exploration of this topic, which is likely to raise more questions than it answers.

The ‘Sattukku’ Archive In 1984 Sigrist published a study of an archive from Nippur that recorded food offerings for deities and their redistribution to officials of temples and the palace. Though the term sattukku is not mentioned in every text, it does occur in many of them, and where it does not occur the similarities to those texts where it does occur are strong enough to indicate the cohesion of

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this archive. 5 Though only 17 out of 428 tablets and fragments were published in the form of line drawings, Sigrist’s study contained numerous tables, which summarized the contents. Kraus (1985: 526) already pointed out that it was probably the poor state of preservation that was one of the reasons for the lack of adequate publication (in addition to the repetitive character of the tablets). However, the importance of this archive, together with technological advances, especially in digital photography, makes the full publication of this archive a useful endeavour. 6 The archive was excavated during the fourth and fifth postwar campaigns to Nippur and was discovered between the years 1954–56 (Sigrist 1984: 3; Kraus 1985: 526). It is well known that the archive was found as fill in a platform dating to the Parthian era and was found close to (but on top of) where the Ur III remains of the Inanna temple at Nippur were, thus the archaeological context offers little information on the precise institutional affiliation of this archive. 7 According to Sigrist (1984: 3–6) and others (for example, Postgate 1986: 238), the archive was originally part of the Ninurta temple administration, though Kraus (1985: 533) and Zettler (2003: 11–13) have raised doubts about this identification. Kraus observed that Ninurta’s temple, the Ešumeša (translation unclear), is never mentioned in these texts, and Zettler pointed out additional difficulties based on the archive’s archaeological context. Zettler (2003: 12–13) suggested instead that the archive may have been part of the Inanna temple and should be seen an example of cross-institutional temple administration. A third possibility, already briefly mentioned by Sigrist (1984: 192), is that the administration of temples was centralized throughout Nippur and that the archive therefore was not part of any particular temple administration but of some unnamed central authority that accounted for food offerings and their redistribution. A similar suggestion had been made by Robertson with regard to the administration of livestock at Nippur (Robertson 1981: 206). The archive itself offers little information to solve this question: Ninurta is frequently mentioned in prominent position amongst the divine recipients of food offerings; his throne is also mentioned as receiving offerings, usually in prominent position as well, as is the E’igišugalamma “House in front of Šu-galam”, 8 probably part of Ninurta’s Nippur temple, the Ešumeša. For the time being the question of institutional affiliation of the archive has to remain open and should be reconsidered in light of other administrative records from Nippur, in particular those from the late 19th century excavations, if and when they will become available. 9 The term sattukku, loaned from the Sumerian compound verb sá — dug4 “to deliver” (kašādum or šukšudum in Akkadian) is slightly complicated. Lambert (1993: 196) understood it to be a term referring to foods being handed out either to gods or to people on a regular basis, whereas Mayer and Sallaberger (2003–2005: 100) translate the term as regular “Lieferung,” not 5.  It is to be hoped that issues such as this will become clearer when the archive is published in full. 6.  I am planning on making available all the tablets and fragments belonging to the archive that was analyzed and studied by Sigrist (1984). The complete archive will be published as a monograph, yet the continued archival work is subject to obtaining further funding. 7.  For a discussion surrounding the location of the Ninurta temple at Nippur see Zettler 2003: 11–13. 8.  George 1993: 105. 9.  Anne Goddeeris (personal communication) will soon publish the Old Babylonian administrative texts from Nippur that are kept at the Hilprecht Sammlung in Jena.

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only of materials for offerings, but also for other occasions. 10 Sigrist (1984: 183–189) gave an overview of the different uses of the term from the Early Dynastic IIIb until the Old Babylonian period and concluded that the term designates regular deliveries that are not necessarily of a religious nature. Kraus (1985: 528) suggested as a basic meaning “das, was man erhalten hat” and interpreted the accounts in this archive as ‘balanced accounts,’ in which the obverse designates the deliveries and the reverse the expenditures. However, whether this interpretation is correct remains subject to further research. In addition to the poor state of preservation, the tablets are also hard to read, because they were written in a small and somewhat cursive script, which makes their decipherment extremely difficult. The entire archive is attested over a time-span of almost 80 years (Sigrist 1984: 197–201, also see Charpin 2010: 102 and n. 45). It is unusual for several reasons: one is that some of the tablets, a group that Sigrist called the ‘5-column tablets’ (“tablettes à 5 colonnes” Sigrist 1984: 19), use tabular formatting for the first time in a more extensive manner (Robson 2004: 119). The significance of the invention and use of tabular formatting for the purpose of accounting and its advantages over the less efficient list-format have already been pointed out several times (Robson 2004; 2008: 163–4). In Robson’s (2004: 116) terminology, the tables that appear in the Nippur archive should be classified as headed, formal tables with colophons, i.e. tables with vertical and horizontal rulings, headers, and colophons at the end. 11 The tabular formatting is only found on the obverse of these 5-column tablets, on the reverse the information is written in list form. The obverse consists of two columns, both of which have tabular formatting, but only the left column has proper headers (the right column, at least where preserved, shows no headers). The left column is sub-divided into 6 sub-columns, five of which describe quantities of foods (ninda “bread”; ninda-ì “short-bread”; eša “flour”; útu “a cereal”; kaš “beer”) in their headers and the sixth contains the names or description of the recipients of these foods, in most cases a deity, sometimes a throne, a temple, or other objects (Sigrist 1984: 139–153). The second column consists of only three sub-columns, two of which may also describe quantities of foods (though it is unclear which foods) and the third contains additional divine names. The second column on the obverse usually ends in the entry sá-dug4, which is written across the three sub-columns, though this entry is sometimes followed by additional quantities for deities. The reverse of these 5-column tablets, though divided into three tablet columns, does not employ the tabular formatting. The first column always begins with the entry šà-bi-ta “from this” and then lists the human recipients of the foods, both temple and palace officials as well as other persons only identified by their name (Sigrist 1984: 155–173). Though the quantities of foods that were redistributed here are given in litres (sìla), the foods are not specified. In some cases the redistributed quantities are summarized in larger script in the upper left corner of the reverse, but this is not always the case. Usually, this part ends with the entry še-ba-àm, literally “it is rations,” showing a clear designation for these redistributed food rations. 12 10.  CAD S, s.v.  sattukku translates this term as: “food allowance, regular offering.” AHw III, s.v. šattukku(m) translates “regelmässige Lieferung, r.s Opfer.” 11.  The other types of tablets, especially the 2- and 6-column tablets do not contain tabular formatting but the more traditional, list-form. 12.  It is not yet possible to establish how often this phrase occurs on the tablets of this archive.

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There is little information on the redistribution of food offerings in general (Mayer and Sallaberger 2003–2005: 98) and the ‘Sattukku’ archive represents an important source of information on this. It is interesting to observe that the recipients of the redistributed foods include both temple and palace officials, and thus the archive could represent an example of crossinstitutional redistribution. However, as long as it is unclear where the foods that were used for the offerings came from, it is difficult to answer this question. The texts themselves offer no information about the provenience of the foods. Among the religious personnel who received these rations are some priests and priestesses of high standing, for example, en, gala, NIN-dingir, lukur, and others (see Sigrist 1984: 160), though not all of the priests and priestesses occur together on each tablet. However, it seems by far the largest quantity of redistributed foods often goes to a unit named é-gal-tuš “palaceresidents,” though this is also subject to further research.

Religion and Economy In spite of the gaps in our knowledge on some of the administrative procedures that lay behind the processes recorded in the Nippur archive, it may nevertheless offer an opportunity to closely study the relationship between religion and economy in the Old Babylonian period. 13 The emerging field of Economics of Religion may offer an opportunity to revisit some of the most contested questions pertaining to Mesopotamian economy in general and Old Babylonian economy in particular. What is meant here is not the study of temple economies, but rather the actual merging of religious and economic studies to arrive at a more refined picture of ancient Mesopotamian religion. 14 A particular focus here should lie on the study of human agents within these temple economies and how they interacted with their community. Though the theoretical framework of the Economics of Religion may not necessarily be applicable to ancient Mesopotamia, 15 it may nevertheless offer an opportunity to rethink our approaches to ancient religiosity and economy. For example, scholars working in the Economics of Religion have suggested that “humans seek to gain the most reward at the least cost” (Iannoccone and Bainbridge 2010: 462). A particularly controversial claim within this emerging field is that “producers of religion,” e.g., clergy, like consumers of religion, tend to maximize their profits (ibid. 464). However, profit, as understood there, refers to both economic and social rewards. The phenomenon of Old Babylonian ‘temple loans,’ a type of loan in which a god, in most cases the god Šamaš, appears as the overt creditor, could serve as a testing ground for this hypothesis. 16 There are all in all more than two hundred of such temple loan contracts attested 13.  I hope to explore these and other questions within the framework of a larger project on religion and economy in Nippur. 14.  Older, simplistic ideas on the ‘Sumerian temple economy’ have to be considered obsolete now (Beld 2002; Schrakamp 2013). 15.  Discussing the question of the nature of ancient economies and whether they were fundamentally different from modern economic systems would go far beyond the framework of this contribution. I refer to Van De Mieroop 1999: 105–22, Stol 2004: 904–908; Garfinkle 2012: 5–17, who have explained these debates much more eloquently than I could. 16.  On temple loans see Harris 1960 and Charpin 2005 with further references.

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thus far (Charpin 2005: 16), not all of which are considered here. To my knowledge, there are ten such temple loans known from Nippur. 17 Thus far, the only deities that appear in the temple loans from Nippur are Utu and Sîn, though there may be an additional instance of a temple loan from the “Gate of Ninurta” (see below). 18 Although it is not always clear whether the human agents that were behind these temple loans were members of the clergy (Charpin 2005: 22–24), such loans nevertheless offer valuable evidence pertaining to how religious sentiments might have influenced economic behaviour, and thus such questions are indirectly relevant to gaining a better understanding of the beliefs that lie behind the ritual of feeding the gods. Harris already pointed out that some of these loan documents stipulate that the interest of the loan can be repaid in the form of food (offerings) to a god (Harris 1960: 132; see also Skaist 1994: 127–29). An example from Nippur for such a stipulation is the text BE 6/1 no. 20, unfortunately a badly broken tablet (obv. 2′ reads: máš-bi ì-gu7-e “its interest he [sc. the god] will eat.”). Another interesting text from Nippur is PBS 8/2 no. 127, in which a loan of grain is identified as “grain, the food of Šamaš” (obv. 2: še níg-gu7 dutu), though it is not clear to me whether this describes that the purpose of the loan or a pledge for its repayment. Further down the text reads: “In the month of Šabāṭu he will repay Šamaš with food (offerings).” (obv. 5–7: iti zíz-a-ka níg-gu7 šà dutu bí-ib-du10-ga). 19 Both texts date to the reign of Samsuiluna, BE 6/1 no. 20 probably dates to the year Samsuiluna 1, and PBS 8/2 no. 127 dates to the year Samsuiluna 27, so they are both later than the ‘Sattukku’ archive. Only three of the Nippur temple loans date to the time period of the ‘Sattukku’ archive and will therefore be considered here: they are SAOC 44, nos. 2, 3, 67. Two of these were found in the TA area of Nippur, one in the TB area. SAOC 44, no. 2 is a loan of seven shekels of silver from the god Sîn to a person named Šeškalla, son of Enlil-amah and stipulates an interest rate of 20%. The text is dated to the year Enlil-bāni Q. 20 According to Sigrist (1984: 195) there is a Šeškalla attested in the ‘Sattukku’ archive, though without patronymic, thus it is impossible to know whether the two are the same. The temple loan was found in the TA area, locus 230, of level XIIB in fill of House M (Stone 1987: 39–40 and 178). 17.  In addition to those temple loans from Nippur mentioned in Harris 1960: 127 and 134, there are two, possibly three additional loans published by Stone (1987), bringing the total of such temple loans known from Nippur up to ten (to my knowledge). Two of the temple loans published by Stone were already mentioned by Harris (2N-T 130 and 3N-T 222). The temple loans published by Stone are: SAOC 44, no. 2 (3N-T 855 = IM 58765): silver loan of Sîn; date: Enlil-bani Q, see Sallaberger 1996: 191, interest rate = 20% (obv. 2–3: máš 10 gín 2 gín kù-babbar dah-he-dam); SAOC 44, no. 3 (3N-T 842 = IM 58753): silver loan of the gate of Ninurta [obv. 3: kù ká dnin-urta]; date: Sin-iddinam 7; no interest; a woman named Gud-ku, daughter of Nanna-manšum, appears as the creditor; SAOC 44, no. 28 (3N-T 222 = IM 58385): silver loan of Šamaš to Mar-erṣetim; Samsuiluna 1; no interest, to be repaid at harvest; SAOC 44, no. 39 (3N-T 868 = IM 58778): silver loan from the storeroom [obv. 2: kù-bi é-kišib-ta] from the god Šamaš to Eatayyar; no date; no interest; one of the witnesses is the god Sîn; SAOC 44, no. 67 (2N-T 130 = IM 57849): silver loan from the god Sîn to Anni-babdu; date: Rim-Sin 8; interest rate 20%, to be repaid at harvest. 18.  The existence of a temple of Utu at Nippur has been debated (see most recently Richter 2004: 154–55). However, Utu regularly appears in the ‘Sattukku’ lists and the existence of prebends also indicate that he must have had a temple there. Richter’s arguments indicate that even if Utu did not have a proper temple at Nippur he may have had a chapel that was part of the Ninurta temple. 19.  For the use of the phrase šà DN –dug10 in the sense of “to pay” see already Harris 1960: 130. 20.  For a discussion of Enlil-bāni year names see Sallaberger 1996.

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Whether text SAOC 44, no. 3 also is a temple loan is not entirely clear. The text was found in the TA area as well and is a loan of 1 shekel of silver with no interest (máš nu-ub-tuku). I have classified it as a temple loan, because it states that the silver belongs to an entity called ká d nin-urta “gate of Ninurta.” To my knowledge, this particular gate is only attested in one other text, 21 but in analogy to similar gates that were part of temples at Nippur, 22 one could interpret this as a part of Ninurta’s temple. As the creditor appears a woman named Gudku, daughter of Nannamanšum, the debtor is a man named Šešaldu, son of Ibiya. Whether Gudku was a priestess at or an agent for the Ninurta temple cannot be established at this point. The text is dated to the year Sîn-iddinam 7 and was found in TA 205 level XIIB, also in fill (Stone 1987: 40 n. 25). Stone (1987: 71–74) suggested that TA was an area in which mainly small property owners lived, who–though not directly affiliated with the temples–were involved in temple business. This is in contrast to the TB area, in which residents who were most likely administrators for the temples but not property owners lived (Stone 1987: 101). Whether this suggestion will turn out to be correct, is also subject to further research. The third temple loan that falls within the timespan of the ‘Sattukku’ archive is SAOC 44, no. 67, which dates to the year Rīm-Sîn 8. It is also a temple loan by Sîn, 23 the amount borrowed is 1 shekel of silver, and the debtor’s name is Anne-babdu (no patronym). The interest rate here is again 20%. The text was found in the TB area (locus 30, level I-3, Stone 1987: 185), though the context seems to have been disturbed. Though none of the persons mentioned in the temple loans discussed above are mentioned in the ‘Sattukku’ archive, other connections exist. Two of the temple loans were made by the god Sîn, who, though not amongst the most important deities worshipped at Nippur, was nevertheless of some importance (Richter 2004: 148–151). That Sîn had a temple at Nippur is fairly certain (see Richter 2004: 148 and n. 659), and there are also indications that there was an en-priestess for his worship at Nippur (Richter 2004: 150). Whether the en-priestess was involved in giving out temple loans is unclear. Sîn is also regularly mentioned in the ‘Sattukku’ archive as a recipient of food offerings, often in a fairly prominent position, usually in fourth place, after Nuska but before Enki and Inanna.

Charitable Loans? Is it possible to interpret such temple loans as charitable acts by temples and their human agents to help people in times of need? If so, could they be interpreted as acts in which religious motivations influence economic behaviours? 21.  UM 29–15–946 obv. 3, transliterated by Robertson 1981: 338. The text is dated to Rīm-Sîn 31, thus a couple of years after the last text from the ‘Sattukku’ archive. The context is somewhat obscure, but the reverse mentions fodder for donkeys of Enlil and Ninurta, see Robertson 338f. I owe this reference to Thomas Richter. 22.  See, for example, ká dnin-líl (Richter 2004: 55) and ká den-líl (Richter 2004: 47–8). 23.  Contra Stone (1987: 219) one can clearly see from the very good copy provided by Stone (plate 73) that the name of the deity providing the loan is Sîn (d+EN.ZU) and not Enlil, though the signs /zu/ and /líl/ are sometimes difficult to distinguish. This would also be in line with other temple loans, in which the divine creditors are usually Utu or Sîn.

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The two temple loans by Sîn both show an interest rate of 20%. 24 However, the loan of the “Gate of Ninurta,” if it was a temple loan indeed, was interest-free. Though it cannot be proven at this point, the likelihood that the human agents of these temple loans were priests or priestesses is quite strong. That Šamaš often appears as a creditor has been explained with his role as the god of justice and the presumably charitable aspects of such temple loans. The moon god’s appearance in these temple loans, though less frequent, could be explained with similar reasons. The exclamations i-dutu and i-dnanna, both interpreted as “cries for justice” or “cries of distress,” show that the sun and the moon god were appealed to for justice or when in need (Charpin 2005: 20). 25 Though Ninurta normally does not appear in these loans, at least to my knowledge, the mention of a part of his temple here could be explained as a local Nippur phenomenon, since in some cases patron deities of cities were also known to have given such loans (Charpin 2005: 20). The small sum that often appears in these temple loans combined with the lack of interest that appears in at least some of them has led many to conclude that such temple loans were of a charitable nature. However, more recently it has been argued that only some of the temple loans were charitable, while others had a commercial purpose (Veenhof 2004: 554–5; Charpin 2005: 32–33). A sub-type of temple loan shows a particular clause, which has been frequently discussed, the ‘šalmu-balṭu’ loans (Harris 1960: 133–37; Skaist 1994: 172–80; Veenhof 1987: 58–62; Charpin 2005: 26–7). Only one such loan document from Nippur has this particular clause albeit in Sumerian (PBS 8/2, no. 150). While the loan documents do not always tell us whether a loan may have been charitable or commercial, it is clear that temples also engaged in commercial activities (Veenhof 2004), which perhaps should not come as a surprise. Is it possible to interpret such loans as attempts by the clergy to “maximize profits,” either economically or socially? This is a difficult question to answer. If an interest rate is stipulated, as it was in two of the three temple loans discussed above, the loan may still have had a charitable purpose of lending someone silver who may not have had other means to secure a loan. If a loan was given without interest, the charitable aspect appears more clearly. And if the interest could be repaid in the form of food offerings, the temple (and the larger) community could benefit from this as well. If Stone’s interpretation of the two different Nippur neighbourhoods is correct, the find spots of the three temple loans discussed above would indicate that the recipients of temples loans at Nippur were both people involved in temple business as well as temple administrators. Rather than interpret such temple loans as attempts at profit-maximization on the part of the clergy, either to increase the temple’s revenue or to increase religiosity amongst the population, they could be interpreted as attempts by the temple to keep a community in balance. The new economic realities of the Old Babylonian period, in which economies were much less controlled than in the preceding Ur III state (Yoffee 1995: 297–98), must have changed the social realities considerably. An example may be the growing problem of debts and associated 24.  SAOC 44, no. 2: máš 10 gín 2 gín kù-babbar; SAOC 44, no. 67: máš 1 gín igi-6-gál 6 še. Both interest rates indicate 20%. For the first expression, which is also known from other Nippur texts, see Skaist 1994: 108. For the second expression see Skaist 1994: 106–7. 25. See CAD I: 144, s.v. inannû, and 317, s.v. iutû.

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debt-slavery, which forced kings to periodically issue annulments of debts (see, e.g., Van De Mieroop 2002: 168). According to Charpin (2005: 28–9) the royal edicts that annulled debts also affected temple loans, possibly also an indication that they were not entirely charitable. Though loans in the Old Babylonian period are complex and also served to facilitate the circulation of goods, it is clear that some loans were made to relieve economic distress. Temples were responsible for feeding the gods, but also for sustaining a substantial part of the city community, be it through employing parts of the population as craftsmen or agricultural workers, for example, or through priestly offices. On a religious level, feeding the gods kept them content and kept the cosmological balance, as the Flood Story and other mythological tales show. In ancient Mesopotamia this was also important, because an angry god could be the cause of multiple problems, such as disease, poverty, destruction, defeat, etc. On an economic level, feeding the gods contributed to feeding parts of the population, at least those who were employed by the temples and by the palace, but, as the temple loans show, it also enabled temples to accumulate capital that allowed them in some cases to help people in need, though it is uncertain to what extent this happened. Though this contribution ends with more questions than answers, it is to be hoped that these questions and more can be studied further in the future.

References Bell, C. 2009 Ritual. Perspectives and Dimensions. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Beld, S.G. 2002 The Queen of Lagash. Ritual Economy in a Sumerian State. PhD dissertation, University of Michigan. Berlejung, A. 1998 Die Theologie der Bilder. Herstellung und Einweihung von Kultbildern in Mesopotamien und die altestamentliche Bilderpolemik. Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis, 162. Freiburg, Schweiz: Universitätsverlag. Bottéro, J. 2001 Religion in Ancient Mesopotamia. Translated by Teresa Lavender Fagan. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Charpin, D. 2005 Les dieux prêteurs dans le Proche-Orient amorrite (c. 2000–1600 av. J.-C.). Topoi Orient-Occident 12–13: 13–34. 2010 Reading and Writing in Babylon. Transl. by Jane Marie Todd. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Finkel, I. 2014 The Ark Before Noah. Decoding the Story of the Flood. London: Hodder & Stoughton. Garfinkle, S. 2012 Entrepreneurs and Enterprise in Early Mesopotamia. A Study of Three Archives from the Third Dynasty of Ur. Cornell University Studies in Assyriology and Sumerology, 22. Bethesda, Maryland: CDL. Gaspa, S. 2010 Alimenti e Pratiche Alimentari in Assiria: Le Materie Alimentari nel Culto Ufficiale dell’Assiria del Primo Millennio A.C. Padova: S.A.R.G.O.N. 2011a Bread for Gods and Kings. On Baked Products in Profane and Cultic Consumption of Ancient Assyria. Food & History 9: 3–22.

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2011b The rāb gināʾe’s Administrative Unit at Work. A Quantitative Study on the Provision of Foodstuffs in the Middle Assyrian Period in the Evidence of the Tabular Lists. Ugarit-Forschungen 43: 161–222. George, A.R. 1993 House Most High. The Temples of Ancient Mesopotamia. Mesopotamian Civilizations, 5. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns. Harris, R. 1960 Old Babylonian Temple Loans. Journal of Cuneiform Studies 14: 126–137. Iannoccone, L.R. and W.S. Bainbridge 2010 Economics of Religion. Pp.  461–75 in The Routledge Companion to the Study of Religion, ed. J. Hinnels. Second Edition. London: Routledge. Kraus, F.R. 1985 Eine altbabylonische Buchhaltung aus einem Amtsarchiv in Nippur. Bibliotheca Orientalis 42: 522–41. Lambert, W.G. 1993 Donations of Food and Drink to the Gods in Ancient Mesopotamia. Pp. 191–201 in Ritual and Sacrifice in the Ancient Near East, ed. J. Quaegebeur. Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta, 55. Leuven: Peeters. Maul, S.M. 2008 Den Gott Ernähren. Überlegungen zum regelmäßigen Opfer in altorientalischen Tempeln. Pp. 75–86 in Transformations in Sacrificial Practices. From Antiquity to Modern Times, ed. E. Stavrianopoulou, A. Michaels, and C. Ambos. Berlin: LIT. 2013 Die tägliche Speisung des Assur (ginā’u) und deren politische Bedeutung. Pp. 561–74 in Time and History in the Ancient Near East. Proceedings of the 56th Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, Barcelona, July 26–30, 2010, ed. Ll. Feliu. Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns. Mayer, W. and Sallaberger, W. 2003–2005 Opfer. A. I. Nach schriftlichen Quellen. Pp. 93–102 in Reallexikon der Assyriologie und Vorderasiatischen Archäologie, vol. 10, Berlin: DeGruyter. Oppenheim, A.L. 1977[1964] Ancient Mesopotamia. Portrait of a Dead Civilization. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Postgate, J.N. 1986 Review of Sigrist (1984). Journal of Semitic Studies 31: 237–38. 1992 The Land of Assur and the Yoke of Assur. World Archaeology 23: 247–63. 1994 Early Mesopotamia. Society and Economy at the Dawn of History. London: Routledge. Richter, T. 2004 Untersuchungen zu den lokalen Panthea Süd- und Mittelbabyloniens in altbabylonischer Zeit. 2., verbesserte und erweiterte Auflage. Alter Orient und Altes Testament, 257. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. Robertson, J. 1981 Redistributive Economies in Ancient Mesopotamian Society: A Case Study from Isin-Larsa Period Nippur. PhD Dissertation, University of Pennsylvania. Robson, E. 2004 Accounting for Change: The Development of Tabular Book-keeping in Early Mesopotamia. Pp 107–144 in Creating Economic Order. Record-Keeping, Standardization, and the Development of Accounting in the Ancient Near East, ed. M. Hudson and C. Wunsch. Bethesda, MD: CDL Press. 2008 Mathematics in Ancient Iraq. A Social History. Princeton: Princeton University Press. Römer, W.H.Ph. 1969 Religion of Ancient Mesopotamia. Pp. 115–94 in Historia Religionum. Handbook for the History of Religions, ed. C.J. Beeker and G. Widengren. Volume 1, Religions of the Past. Leiden: Brill.

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Sallaberger, W. 1996 Zu einigen Jahresdaten Enlil-bānis von Isin. ZA 86: 177–91. 2012 Home-made Bread, Municipal Mutton, Royal Wine. Establishing Social Relations during the Preparation and Consumption of Food in Religious Festivals at Late Bronze Age Emar. eTopoi 2: 157–77. Schrakamp, I. 2013 Die “Sumerische Tempelstadt” heute: Die sozioökonomische Rolle eines Temples in frühdynastischer Zeit. Pp.  445–65 in Tempel im Alten Orient, ed. K. Kaniuth, et al. Colloquien der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft, 7. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Selz, G. 1997 ‘The Holy Drum, the Spear, and the Harp.’ Towards an Understanding of the Problems of Deification in Third Millennium Mesopotamia. Pp. 167–213 in Sumerian Gods and Their Representations, ed. I.L. Finkel and M.J. Geller. Cuneiform Monographs, 7, Groningen: Styx. 2008 The Divine Prototypes. Pp. 13–31 in Religion and Power: Divine Kingship in the Ancient World and Beyond, ed. N. Brisch. Oriental Institute Seminars, 4. Chicago: The Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago. Sigrist, M. 1984 Les satukku dans l’Ešumeša durant la periode d’Isin et Larsa. Bibliotheca Mesopotamica, 11. Malibu: Undena. Skaist, A. 1994 The Old Babylonian Loan Contract. Its History and Geography. Ramat-Gan: Bar Ilan University Press. Stol, M. 2004 Wirtschaft und Gesellschaft in altbabylonischer Zeit. Pp. 643–975 in D. Charpin, D.O. Edzard, M. Stol, Mesopotamien. Die altbabylonische Zeit. Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis, 160/4. Fribourg: Academic Press. Stone, E. 1987 Nippur Neighborhoods. Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilization, 44. Chicago: The Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago. Van De Mieroop, M. 1999 Cuneiform Texts and the Writing of History. London: Routledge. 2002 Credit as a Facilitator of Exchange in Old Babylonian Mesopotamia. Pp. 163–73 in: Debt and Economic Renewal in the Ancient Near East, ed. M. Hudson and M. Van De Mieroop. International Scholars Conference of Ancient Near Eastern Economies, vol. 3. Bethesda, Maryland: CDL. Veenhof, K. 1987 ‘Dying Tablets’ and ‘Hungry Silver.’ Elements of Figurative Language in Akkadian Commercial Terminology. Pp.  41–75 in Figurative Language in the Ancient Near East, ed. M. Mindlin, M. Geller, and J.E. Wansbrough. London: School of Oriental and African Studies. 2004 Trade with the Blessing of Šamaš in Old Babylonian Sippar. Pp. 551–82 in Assyria and Beyond. Studies Presented to Mogens Trolle Larsen, ed. J.-G. Dercksen. PIHANS 100. Leiden: NINO. Waerzeggers, C. 2010 The Ezida Temple of Borsippa. Priesthood, Cult, Archives. Achaemenid History, XV. Leiden: NINO. Wiggermann, F.A.M. 1995 Theologies, Priests, and Worship in Ancient Mesopotamia. Pp. 1857–70 in Civilizations of the Ancient Near East, ed. J. Sasson. Vol. III. New York: Scribner. Yoffee, N. 1995 Political Economy in Early Mesopotamian States. Annual Review of Anthropology 24: 281–311. Zettler, R. 2003 Reconstructing the World of Ancient Mesopotamia: Divided Beginnings and Holistic History. Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient 46: 3–45.

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Remarks on the Earliest History of Horoscopy David Brown The richness of cuneiform personal astrology has become ever more apparent in recent years and we are able to move on from Neugebauer’s minimalist interpretation 1 of 1975: 161 that astrology: with the exception of some typical Mesopotamian relics . . . was changed in Greek hands to a universal system in which form alone it could spread all over the world,

to a maximalist one, which suggests that Hellenistic personal astrology was essentially Mesopotamian, if embellished by notions from neighbouring lands. 2 The following discusses one of the most important types of those celestial configurations that were interpreted first by Babylonian scholars, namely the location of the planets in a zodiacal sign or ecliptic constellation at the moment of birth. This adds to the useful summary in Koch-Westenholz 1995: Ch. 8 and Rochberg’s fine discussion of the divinatory background to the so-called “Babylonian Horoscopes” in 2004: Chs. 3 and 5, and is based on a closer look at some already published texts dating predominantly to the late Achaemenid period.

BM 53282 Reconsidered In 1999, Hunger published and discussed BM 53282 = 82–3-23, 4316, a tablet which appears to have originated in Borsippa. The tablet is in a poor state of preservation, but enough of the 33 lines survive for Hunger to have determined that it contains data on the location of the planets at the times of birth of several children, two male and two female of whom are named, in the early years of the reign of Artaxerxes. A typical section (upper edge to obv. 3) reads thus: ina a-mat dPa liš[lim] At the word of Nabû, may (all) be well. i-na itu⸢du6⸣ ud-7-kam mu-[šu du-8-kam] In the month Tešrītu, the 7th day, ni[ght of the 8th] Year 8 of Artaxerxes, mu-8-kam IAr-ta-ri-t[a-as-su] I ⸢Ba⸣-šá-a-dAmar.ud šá Ix [. . .] Iqīša-Marduk, whose [(other) name is x was born. The Moon was in the “house” of month ma-al-⸢du⸣ dSin ina é itu⸢du6⸣ ⸢d⸣Utu Teš[rītu; the Sun . . . . .

Which Artaxerxes was meant was determined by Hunger firstly on the basis of the spelling of the name (op. cit. p. 234) and secondly on the basis of a reference to an intercalary Ulūlu in lines rev. 1 and 11. His conclusion, with which I agree, was that the text dates to the reign of Artaxerxes II (-403/2 to -358/7) and the birth-dates range from January -401 to October -394. However, an intercalary Ulūlu is otherwise attested only for the first year of Artaxerxes I, which, 1.  As to why he held this view is discussed now in Brown 2010. 2.  A view I develop in great detail in Brown, forthcoming.

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based on the contents of BM 53282, cannot have been the one referred to here. Intercalary Ulūlus are, according to Hunger, attested for years 16 and 35 of Artaxerxes II. As I will show, on the basis of the data preserved on this tablet there is good reason to suppose now that a further Ulūlu was intercalated in year 10 of that reign, a view with which John Britton concurred. 3 Most interestingly, from the perspective of the history of horoscopy, this text locates the planets according to which “house” of a given month they find themselves in — ina é ituX, a formulation otherwise found in BM 36609+ Section 8: Rev. IV, 1′–22′, a “Star Catalogue” published by Roughton et al. 2004, but the common association of month and zodiacal sign in astrological-astronomical texts of the late period make its existence unsurprising. 4 That is, it is not surprising to see here that month I is associated with Aries, month II with Taurus, and so forth. Nevertheless, when we note that the two oldest cuneiform proto-horoscopes (Rochberg 1998: Texts 1 and 2) do not definitively refer to zodiacal signs, but rather to constellations or individual stars, then BM 53282 contains the oldest attested use of abstract 30° segments of the ecliptic in a personal-astrological context. For example, Hunger notes that in rev. 8, in month VI2, the Sun is said to be located “in the house of month VII (Tešrītu)”, which would imply “daß das ‘Haus’ eines Monats jener Bereich (der Ekliptik) ist, in dem die Sonne während dieses Monats steht.” The Sun’s “house of a month” is clearly associated with its longitude, namely with a 30° region of the ecliptic. Hunger, however, was unable to reconcile all the surviving planetary data in BM 53282 with his retrocalculated data for the years of Artaxerxes II. Further comparison of the retrocalculated positions of the planets with their stated “houses of month so-and-so” forced him to the following conclusion (op. cit. p. 234): “Dabei zeigt sich leider, daß entweder das Datum nicht zutrifft, oder die oben angestellte Vermutung über die ‘Häuser’ der einzelnen Monate irrig ist.” A further look appears to have eliminated the difficulties, however. The first problem was with the location of Mars in the “house of month XII (Addaru)” as recorded in the fragmentary lines obv. 11–13. Hunger associates these lines with obv. 6–10, which record the locations of the planets at the time of birth of the second child mentioned, a certain Nidintu-Nanaya, on the “26th of month X, Year 2”. This is incorrect, I suggest, as the masculine form ma-al-du “was 3.  My notes on BM 53282 were made available to John Britton, and shortly before he died he wrote to me as follows: “Greetings, David, I’ve recently been trying to understand whether the E2 terminology for signs in BM 53282 assumes the same sidereal norm for the zodiac as BM 36609 (Roughton et al. 2004) where Hermann [Hunger, DB] tells me that what they transliterate as MUL4 is probably an NB form of E2. (See now Britton, 2010: 624.) In connection with this Hermann sent me a copy of your insightful letter to him pointing out that there were 5 not 4 horoscopes involved and that the author of BM 53282 appears to have assumed a VI2 intercalation in year 10 Artaxerxes II contra BM 36910 and the normal 19-yr scheme. Have you published this note, and if so where and could you send me a pdf of it? I need to clean up a few details and will send you the result when I do, but basically, using a slightly different approach than yours–namely computing sidereal longitudes as Lsid = Ltrop +(3.196–1.3828Y) degrees: (Y = Julian centuries from 0.0)–I confirm both your findings with only a few minor exceptions and also find that the zodiacal norm agrees with that for BM 36609 and BM 46083 (Sachs, JCS 1952; now Roughton et al. App A) which places α-Tau and α-Sco at the mid-points of their signs.” Attached were a brief text and five tables summarizing the results of his calculations, some of which were then published in his last article, Britton 2010. 4.  See, for example, Brack-Bernsen and Hunger 1999: 288.

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born” in obv. 14 shows. Nidintu-Nanaya is female, and her birth is recorded correctly with the feminine form ma-al-da-a-ta in obv. 8. The location of Mars in obv. 11–13 pertains to the birth of another male child. This implies, of course, that BM 53282 records the situation in the heavens at the time of birth of five and not four children. Hunger shows (op. cit. p. 235) that the surviving data pertaining to the Moon and Venus in obv. 6–10 fit with the retrocalculated data for year 2 of Artaxerxes II, and implies that the “house of month X” had a longitude c. 280°. 5 This longitude is calculated as the angular distance from the intersection of the ecliptic and equator, the Vernal Point, at that time. Assuming, for the time being, that month I began at the Vernal Point, 0°, then month X ought to cover the approximate longitude 270–300°. Clearly, the fit is excellent. Assume, then, that Mars is in the “house of month XII”, i.e., with longitude of c. 330–360°, sometime after month X of year 2 of Artaxerxes II, and we find that this occurred in years 3 and 5. We can specify this more precisely on the basis of the badly preserved date in line 11, where month XI (Šabāṭu) can be read. The zíz sign seems clear enough in Hunger’s copy, and it is followed by an ud “day”. In month XI of years 3 or 5 of Artaxerxes II, that is around February 401 or 399 BCE, Mars had a longitude of c. 345°. In obv. 15–17 it is stated that the next child, Amat-Nanaya, also female, was born in year 5, month X, which would imply that the earlier date, namely month XI of Artaxerxes II year 3, is the far likelier of the two choices, given that the latter date is a month later than Amat-Nanaya’s birthday. The unnamed child was born, then, in month XI of year 3 of Artaxerxes II. Finally, Hunger finds no correspondence between the data recorded for the planets in rev. 1–12, and their actual positions as calculated for the 8th of month VI2, assuming that the year in question was Artaxerxes II year 16, namely 25/9/-388. There is also no fit if we take the second year in which a second Ulūlu is “attested” during Artaxerexes II’s reign, that is year 35. Checking years after Artaxerxes II year 5, I discovered, however, that there is an excellent fit in year 10 (395 BCE): According to BM 53282, rev. 1–12, on the 8th of Ulūlu: Saturn was in the house of month X — i.e., c. 270–300° Jupiter was in the house of month V — i.e., c. 120–150° Venus was in the house of month VI — i.e., c. 150–180° The Sun was in the house of month VII — i.e., c. 180–210° Mars — broken Mercury does something at the end? of monthVI2.

It also states in rev. 4 that the Moon was in the house of a certain month, the sign for which is damaged. Hunger reads it as šu, for month IV (i.e., c. 90–120°), which is possible on the basis of the surviving traces, but with a query. Rev. 1, however, states that the child in question was born in an intercalary Ulūlu on the 8th day. The Ulūlu is broken, but can be reconstructed with some certainty given that it appears again in rev. 11. On the 8th day of the month, the Moon’s elongation from the Sun should be around 95°. Assuming that we are correct about the approximate 5.  Hunger’s retrocalculated longitude of the Moon was 254°, but two days later the Moon and Venus would have been virtually coincident around 280° and thus both firmly within the “house of month X”.

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longitudes of the “houses”, then with the Sun at c. 180–210°, the Moon should be at about 290° in the “house of month X”, assuming its location had been recorded immediately after the birth. Based on the copy, the surviving traces could just about permit a reading zíz, for month XI, or possibly an apin, for month VIII. If it truly is a šu, for month IV, then we have to assume that the heavens were interpreted some days after the birth, during which time the Moon had moved on. I suggest we read zíz. Based on Hunger 2001: Text 61, rev. II: 11–12, discussed below, it is possible to determine quite accurately that month VI, 395 BCE ended on the 23rd September, when the Moon was coincident with the Sun. Calculations according to SkyMap 3.2 show that 9 days later, on the child’s birthday on the 8th of month VI2, which was the 2nd of October 395 BCE, assuming one day of lunar invisibility: The Moon was at c. 300° Saturn was at c. 277° Jupiter was at c. 105° Venus was at c. 150° The Sun was at c. 185° Mars was at c. 172° Mercury was at c. 160°, and approaching the Sun. Indeed, it may already have been invisible. It reached the latter on the 12th of October, 395 BC, some 10 days later. By the 20th of October, Mercury’s elongation from the Sun was such that it could have become visible again, but this probably took a few more days, taking us to the end of month VI2, exactly as seems to be being described in rev. 10.

The fit is so good that it can hardly be doubted that this is the year and month in question. Indeed, each of the 12 “houses of month so-and-so” could be reduced in longitude by 15 or so degrees to ensure that the fit is perfect and that Jupiter, as described in rev. 6, is found within the longitude of the “house of month V”, which would thus lie between 105°–135°. The “house of month I” would lie then at 345–15°, wholly in line with the idea that the Vernal Point, with a longitude of 360° or 0°, should occur in the middle of month I. 6 As is well known, this is the assumption in many far older compositions of astral science, for example in MulApin. If this “house of month I” was designed to parallel or perhaps was the inspiration for the zodiac sign Aries, it is less surprising that the Vernal Points in Systems A and B of the later databaseindependent cuneiform astronomical texts (e.g., the ephemerides) were placed at 10° or 8° of Aries respectively, and not at Aries 0°. Perhaps, if these systems had placed the Vernal Point at 15° of Aries, modern scholars would argue that this choice was a direct parallel of the notion of the Vernal Point lying at the middle of month I, and leave it at that. As it is, we have to account for why other values within Aries were chosen. I do not believe that BM 53282 provides evidence that the Vernal Point was ever placed at 15° of Aries, despite what I noted at the start of this paragraph.

6.  Britton (2010) compared the ancient and retrocalculated data by assuming the correctness of Huber’s (1958) result as to the zodiacal longitude of the vernal equinox at this time, and he arrived at the same result.

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In 1958 Huber argued that the Babylonian zodiac was always fixed according to the background stars and that in -100 the Vernal Point was located at 4;28° ± 0;20° of Aries and that, if one were to calculate back, the Vernal Point would have been at (the System A norm of) 10° of Aries in -500. This is an attractive result, for it suggests a date when the Vernal Point was assigned a value in the zodiac, and would mean that only the System B norm of 8° of Aries need be seen as a later idiosyncrasy. Britton 2010, however, dislikes this idea and has addressed the issue in some detail on the basis of new publications of texts which permit the comparison of ancient and modern retrocalculated data. He concludes that the mean difference between Babylonian sidereal and modern tropical longitudes is best approximated by the formula: Δλ* = 3.20°–1.3828° Y ± 0.09°, where Y is the number of Julian centuries from 0.0. On the one hand, this confirms the supposition that the Babylonian zodiac was fixed against the stars and thus wandered via precession against the tropoi of the year at a rate of 1.3828° per century. This result also differs only very slightly from Huber’s. On the other hand, Britton further speculates on what the Babylonian scholars used to fix the zodiac. He notes op. cit. p. 631–32 that the stars α-Tauri and α-Sco were located precisely in the middle of their respective zodiacal signs and that this fact was known to Cleomedes, and he also finds some confirmation of this in the longitudes assigned to these and other stars by Ptolemy. He concludes: In summary, the placement of the zodiac appears to have been a consequence of keeping both the Pleiades and ζ-Tau within Taurus combined with the accurate estimates that α-Tau was separated from ζ-Tau by half a sign and in opposition to α-Sco. This made placing α-Tau and α-Sco at the mid-points of their signs a logical choice, which also put ζ-Tau, β-Gem, and δ-Cap at the ends of their respective signs thereby marking those sign boundaries directly.

In other words, the placement of the Vernal Point within Aries sufficed, even if other factors resulted in it not being placed precisely in the middle of that sign. Britton goes on to argue that this all took place between -408 and -397. The text BM 53282 is thus all the more important, for it describes the locations of the heavenly bodies in terms of zodiacal segments, albeit named as the “house of month so and so”, precisely at this time. Was this then the first zodiacal system and was it replaced by the one that assigned constellation names to the 30° stretches, as Britton 2010: n. 33 suggests? Certainly, BM 53282 strongly supports the idea that the 30° spans of the ecliptic were inspired by the ideal year of 12 30-day months. As soon as they were fixed in space by assigning degrees to specific fixed stars and/or to the vernal equinox, the 30° signs provided another way of giving meaning to the calculated longitudes of the seven wandering celestial bodies. It became possible to both calculate and observe in which signs the wandering heavenly bodies were located at any given moment, say at birth. Brack-Bernsen and Hunger 1999 speculated on the basis of some enigmatic lines in the unedited texts LBAT 1494 and 1495 (Pinches et al. 1955) and TU 11 (Brack-Bernsen and Hunger 2002) that this may have been done by observing the points on the eastern and western horizons where the bodies rose and set. If they are right, it would also help explain why in the cuneiform records of observations, as in this text, the observed locations of the planets are only given to the nearest zodiacal sign, whereas the calculated ones are given to the nearest degree or better. In the decades around -400 scholars writing in cuneiform further developed both lunar and planetary astronomical theory, and the zodiac was most likely a by-product of that

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endeavour. It came, of course, to be very useful to those undertaking personal astrology and I believe it helps us to understand why these otherwise hard to visualize abstract 30° arcs came to have such astrological significance, when we realise that they “belonged” not only to the ancient constellations, but first and perhaps foremost to months and thus indirectly to the Moon and Sun gods. The early years of Artaxerxes II are relatively poorly documented, falling as they do just after the Kasr archive in Babylon and Murašû archive in Nippur cease. The scant sources of the archives of the satrap Belšunu of Babylon, of the gallūbu in Ur, of Absummu of Ur, and of Nidintu-Ea of Nippur may in due course allow us to determine better when intercalations were made during this king’s reign. In the meantime, our evidence for intercalations from this period is limited to texts of an astral-scientific nature, and often this evidence is ambiguous. Walker (1997: 24) notes that in the 16th year of Artaxerxes II, two sources suggest that an Ulūlu and one that an Addaru was intercalated. In year 20 of Artaxerxes II, three astronomical texts, 7 to my knowledge, confirm that Addaru was intercalated, even though this does not cohere with the pattern of intercalations determined by the so-called “Metonic” or 19-year cycle, which was in use by this time (Britton 1993), for which an intercalation in year 21 would have been expected. An intercalary Addaru is confirmed for year 2 by Hunger 2001: Text 58, rev. 12′. An intercalation is also attested for year 5 in the same Text 58, left edge 9, though not necessarily an Addaru, and finally an intercalary Addaru is noted in op. cit. Text 3, rev. II′:2′ for Artaxerxes II, year 7. None of these texts, however, was necessarily written at the time the phenomena described occurred, nor do they necessarily record without emendation that which was recorded at that time. It is likely that some of the original dates were adapted to a regular 19-year luni-solar calendar in order to make research on the surviving data easier. No direct attestation of an intercalary month for year 10 of Artaxerxes II survives, to my knowledge. There is, however, indirect evidence in Hunger 2001: Text 61, rev. II: 11–12 that for the compiler of these data on Mars and Venus there should have been no intercalary Ulūlu in 395 BCE, Artaxerxes II, year 10. This particular text was compiled sometime after Philip year 7, in the Macedonian or subsequent Seleucid periods. In it, Venus is described as moving from 2 fingers below α-Leonis on the 10th of month VI to 2 fingers below β-Virginis on the 4th of month VII. 8 A study of the planet’s movement according to SkyMap 3.2 shows that Venus was coincident with α-Leonis on the 6th of September 395 BCE, and 22 days later with β-Virginis. This corresponds precisely with the description in our cuneiform source BM 53282, in which case it is not possible that observations for an intercalated month VI were simply left out. Month VII did follow month VI according to the compiler of Text 61 in Hunger 2001. We can only assume that the compiler, working at least some 80 years after these observations were first recorded, altered the original dates, turning month VI2 dates into month VII dates and presumably intercalating later. I feel such discoveries reflect importantly on how in the third century BCE older 7.  Hunger 2001: Texts 59 IV 23′; 60 I 26′; and 61 I 25′. In his notes to Text 59 V 1′ff. on p. 209 Hunger comments that the dates in that section of this text also imply an intercalary Addaru in the 23rd year of Artaxerxes II, which again is in contradiction to the 19-year intercalation cycle. 8.  (11) Kin 10 sig lugal 2 u dim4 du6 (12) 4 sig gìr ár 2 u “Ulūlu (month VI) the 10th, it was below the King (star) 2 fingers. It was close by. Tešrītu (month VII) the 4th, it was below the rear foot (of the Lion star) 2 fingers.” The identification of these stars is not in doubt. See Hunger and Pingree 1999: 272; Roughton et al. 2004: Appendix B.

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astral data was recast in a form more suitable for doing astronomy. It gives us a brief glimpse of the on-going endeavours of the astronomers and shows us again how dependent their achievements were on the existence of good records, often centuries old at the time. It was this fact above all others that permitted the development of sophisticated astronomical methods, with their accurate values for mean periods, and the modulations thereabout, cleverly modelled with piecewise linear techniques. To conclude, then, despite the counter-evidence of Hunger 2001: Text 61, I argue that BM 53282 describes observed planetary positions at the moment of five births during the first 10 years of Artaxerxes II’s reign, and implies that an extra Ulūlu was intercalated in year 10, although this fact was omitted by later astronomers. The planets are located in BM 53282 according to an ecliptic system analogous to the zodiac, in which “houses of the months” rather than signs are used, the first one apparently beginning some 10–15° before the Vernal Equinox. Whether this system was a Borsippan adaptation of the zodiac, whose existence pre-dates BM 53282, or whether it represents a pre-zodiacal means of dividing up the ecliptic, is impossible to judge. Either way it is the earliest composition known to use 30° stretches of the ecliptic to serve genethlialogical ends and reveals to us yet another aspect of the vibrant and complex world of late Babylonian astrology. It is noteworthy, for example, that there is no mention made of atmospheric phenomena in this composition. No eclipses are referred to, nor are the heliacal phases of the planets, except perhaps the indirect allusion to Mercury’s heliacal rising in rev. 11. One can only assume that by this time the locations of the seven planets alone were considered adequate to draw up what would in all probability have been horoscopes. BM 53282 is a compilation, I suggest, of the raw data upon which astrological predictions for five babies were made. Why a compilation was made can only be speculated at. One might imagine that the interpretations would have drawn on such schemes as those in the so-called Gestirn-Darstellung (GD) series of texts, edited by Weidner in 1967, in which each month is identified with a zodiacal sign (Aries with month I, and so forth) and then twelfths of each sign are each further associated with a zodiacal sign and associated with a temple or city, a tree, a plant, or a stone. Each of these twelfths is referred to as a ki, read by Weidner as qaqqaru “location” in text AO 6448 (= TU 12) of the Gestirn-Darstellung series and each is assigned a set of prognostications, including when the planets are to be found within them (Weidner op. cit. pp. 21f, his “Reihe A”). For example: Libra: “location” (ki) for a decision about the total purchase price. Speech will be untrue; the change will not be successful (if) Jupiter is faint, (or if) Mars is bright (or if) Saturn is bright (after Weidner op. cit. p. 23).

Another section (Weidner’s “Reihe B”) links these twelfths to temple rituals. E.g. Taurus: Day of the city god, the hero Ninurta: opening of the gates (after Weidner op. cit. p. 26)

and a final section (Weidner’s “Reihe C”) links them to day-to-day warnings, such as: Aries: not good for legal conflict. He should not look at a snake (after Weidner op. cit. p. 27).

However, are such “predictions” really relevant to an individual? Would a horoscope really have drawn on such material? We will return in particular to this technical term ki, below, but for

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now Weidner’s Reihe A leads me on to another text, whose contents, I believe, would also have suited the aims of the Achaemenid or Hellenistic cuneiform astrologer.

BM 47494 Reconsidered BM 47494 (= 81–11–3,199) was published with a photograph, but no hand copy, by Hunger in 2004. It is most likely from Babylon and is a copy of a compilation of older material made by a scribe known to have been active in the reign of one, at least, of the Artaxerxes. It is damaged and the date of composition has been lost, but it uses the zodiacal signs, and so dates, presumably, to the decades either side of -400. Hunger (op. cit. p. 30) considers it to be “another instance of an ad-hoc compilation of astral lore . . . of the Late period . . . a lowly text,” and in a brief discussion points to some parallel compositions in which constellations are also linked to cities and countries, and constellations are linked to particular areas about which future predictions could be made. He notes that in the lines rev. 1 to 16, the zodiacal signs are arranged in trine aspect, i.e., four signs apart, and how the presence of a celestial body in these signs, and whether it is bright or dim, is linked to the cost of goods. He made very little attempt to place it in the history of cuneiform astral science, and I will attempt to remedy that now. 9 BM 47494 is a manual apparently describing how to make prognostications for the land, based mainly on the location of the planets in the constellations or zodiacal signs. The ease with which the two ecliptic systems were used side by side is typical of texts of this period, as KochWestenholz (1995: 167) emphasises. It was presumably a matter of choice whether a diviner used the 12 signs or the more numerous constellations when locating the planets. The lines obv. 1–16 relate constellations to cities or countries, paralleling the older (NeoBabylonian) text, MNB 1849, published in part by Weidner (1963), for example. Some of the cities mentioned had long been abandoned by the Achaemenid period. Even if the original correlations preserved in BM 47494 long predate -400, it is still odd that a composition using the recently invented zodiacal signs would have envisaged scenarios predicting eventualities for non-existent peoples. One can only assume that such predictions were interpreted non-literally. My surmise is, this was generally the case in this text. Lines obv. 17–38 summarise the relevance of the constellations. E.g., in l. 23 Hunger reads: For business (ana ki.lam) : within (ina) the Crab, the Scales, the Goat-Fish, and the Field.

This implies that if a planet is located within one of those constellations, the interpretation can concern business. Other constellations are associated in this way with attacks of the enemy, famine, deaths, the harvest, women giving birth, cattle, barley, dates, sesame, wool, rain and flood, wind, storm, and other (broken) fundamentals of life in ancient Iraq. The reverse of the text builds on this idea. It perhaps derives from a different tradition, given that it locates the planets by means of the zodiacal signs and not the ecliptic constellations, but it makes perfect sense that it should appear on the reverse of this tablet. Firstly, a set of three signs, Aries (the Hired Man), Leo (the Lion) and Sagittarius (Pabilsag) are said to concern business in the land of Akkad. 10 In rev. 17–22, three zodiacal signs each for 9.  A few preliminary comments were made in my 2005 review. 10.  Ki.lam šá k[ur Uriki].

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Elam, Amurru and Subartu are given. The pattern matches precisely the one in the contemporary text BM 36746+ investigated by Rochberg in 1984. That text, when complete, presented 12 lunar eclipse omina, each said to occur in a given zodiacal sign at the end of the night watch, and each associated with the four cardinal winds. The presence or absence of the benefics — Jupiter or Venus — in the zodiacal sign where the Moon was eclipsing, and the location of the malefics — Mars or Saturn — in zodiacal signs 120° distant were noted, and predictions given pertaining to Akkad, Elam, Amurru and Subartu, based on the sign in which the Moon eclipses, according to this scheme: Akkad: Aries/Leo/Sagittarius Elam: Taurus/Virgo/Capricorn Amurru: Gemini/Libra/Aquarius Subartu: Cancer/Scorpius/Pisces The linking of each of the four lands or four winds to three particular equidistant signs meant, of course, that these signs themselves entered into trigonal relationships, ones that were used repeatedly by later astrologers writing in other languages. 11 BM 36747+ is itself very closely related to that section of the Gestirn-Darstellung series dealing with eclipses in each zodiacal sign. Following the assigning of the three zodiacal signs to the business of Akkad, BM 47494 continues by noting whether or not the benefics ( Jupiter or Venus) “stand therein”, 12 that is, in one of the signs mentioned. If the benefic is bright then business prospers, if it is faint business decreases. Next, the text states that if the Moon is eclipsed in one of the signs, business will diminish. Furthermore, if one of the malefics (Saturn or Mars) is in one the signs and is bright, business will also decrease. The next lines of the reverse (rev. 7–10) describe the fact that business will diminish if the Moon is eclipsed 13 or if it “stands with the Sun on the 13th day”, 14 but will prosper if it stands (in opposition) on the 14th. These codes of omen interpretation characterise the great omen series Enūma Anu Ellil (EAE), as outlined in detail in Brown 2000 §3.2.2. Finally, a solar eclipse also bodes ill. 15 According to these lines, however, the prognostications apply only to Akkad if the celestial configurations occur in months 1, 5 or 11. This is an ancient association, going back to EAE and the Great Star List (now Koch-Westenholz 1995: 274f). 16 However, as in the text BM 53282 11.  Hunger 2004: 30 notes the general similarity of BM 47494 to the text TU 11 (= TCL 6 11 = AO 6455). In fact it is in §8: 17 of TU 11 that we find the first use of the triplicities of the zodiacal signs explicitly, as noted by Ross 2008: 252. Ptolemy Tetrabiblos 1.21 assigns to the “Chaldaeans” a system which gives each group of three signs a planetary lord. Saturn and Mercury both share the trigon Gemini-LibraAquarius. In BM 36746+, while the sign in which an eclipse occurs is linked to the signs in which Saturn or Mars lie, if those signs form part of a trigon, this is not quite the same as a planet being the lord of a triplicity. 12.  ina šà gub-ma. 13.  This is Hunger’s reconstruction. The line itself is too damaged to be sure what is meant. 14.  This refers to the day of “Morning Setting”, for which see Brown 2000: n. 236 15.  This is how I interpret rev. 8 16.  The Great Star List is known from Neo-Assyrian sources and is a guide as to how to interpret celestial phenomena and use EAE by providing a list of associations, both asterism to asterism and asterism to mundane phenomenon.

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we considered above, the author here is clearly showing that month 1 is to be linked to Aries, month 5 to Leo, and so forth. In rev. 11, an omen is given which describes the consequences of the Arrow-Star being in one of these zodiacal signs and being bright. As a fixed star cannot move relative to the zodiac, Hunger is surely right to assume that Mercury is meant here. 17 As one might expect from Mercury’s ambivalent astrological nature, a bright Arrow-Star bodes well for business, but predicts the attack of an enemy. Interestingly, the ambiguous natures of Mercury and Saturn as found in the great omen series EAE (Brown 2000:143) appear to have been simplified here, with Saturn going malefic and only Mercury remaining ambiguous. These latter natures of the planets closely mirror those used by Ptolemy, for example. 18 The section ends with a set of omens that are more general, but still appropriate, but that seem to come from a different source, given that each predicts that “business will be rare” and not simply decrease. 19 Thus, a faint Jupiter or Venus warn that business will be rare, as do a bright (presumably — the line is broken at this point) Mars or Saturn. A faint Moon at (first) appearance bodes the same, and most interestingly: If the Moon’s na in front of the Sun is not visible, business will be rare. 20

That is, the ‘na’, or date of the first occasion in the month when the Moon sets after Sunrise (or indeed the time interval between those two occurrences — it is not clear which is meant here) was considered significant. If there was no such interval (or it could not be observed), that was deemed to be ill-boding. In 2000: 166, I argued that the date of ‘na’ (and its length) was observed for the sake of ominous interpretation. If Brack-Bernsen is right, it was the record of such ‘na’ values, and of other such values around mid-month and the month’s end that led to the discovery of periodicities in their sum, which helped in the discovery of those luni-solar relationships found in TU 11, and, as she argued in 1997, perhaps lie behind the enigmatic function F of the lunar ephemerides. In BM 47494, ‘na’ is an explicit object of divinatory interest, a further small piece of evidence that predictive astronomy emerged out of research conducted on the institutionally held records of astrologically significant phenomena. 21 Although the two sections, obv. 17–38 and the reverse, appear to derive from different traditions, enough information has been provided to interpret the consequences of any one planet being present in any of the given constellations or signs that span the ecliptic. Take, for example, a bright Mars, which according to rev. 6 will bode ill, lying in the constellation múlab.sín 17.  Note the associations between planets and Normal stars in the contemporary BM 36609+ Section 10 in Roughton et al. 2004. 18. Ptolemy Tetrabiblos 1–2. See further Rochberg, 1988. 19.  Ki.lam lal-al. 20. Be-ma dSîn ina igi dutu na-su nu igi [ki.lam] lal-al. 21.  CBS 11901 (= LBAT 1478, see now Hunger 2001: Text 57, p. 194) from Nippur is a planetary report with data from -424/3 including for each month the so-called “Lunar Three”: the length of the previous month, the date of the ‘na’, and the date of last lunar visibility, referred to here as ud.ná.a, but elsewhere described by the sumerogram kur. Given that it is precisely these three bits of data that are found in the Babylonian Horoscopes (see Rochberg 1998: 39–40), here is evidence that both na and kur had personal astrological significance back into the 5th century BCE. CBS 11901 otherwise provides data on the planets’ first and last appearances, Sirius’ first appearance, the dates of solstice and equinox, and of a lunar eclipse. It looks to all intents and purposes as if CBS 11901 was a collection of data for someone preparing an early form of horoscope.

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“the Furrow”. According to lines obv.  18, 20, and 24, planets lying in “the Furrow” provide omens in respect of famine, harvest, and barley. A bright Mars in “the Furrow” should thus signal ill for these things. 22 Information as to whom the prognostications apply is provided, given that on the reverse the 12 zodiacal signs are linked with Elam, Amurru, Subartu and Akkad (i.e., home) and on the obverse fixed stars and constellations are linked to cities or areas. In obv. 8, the Furrow constellation is linked to the land of Elam and in rev. 17 the zodiacal sign also called “the Furrow”, and which was taken over in Greek as Virgo, is also associated with Elam. BM 47494, rev. 23–30 ends with omens pertaining to the effect on the rule of the king that the planets or eclipses have when in the ki “location” of a given zodion linked to the four geographical areas. Jupiter’s presence in the appropriate ki bodes well for the king of all four geographical designations, as explicitly stated in rev. 23–24. Mars’ and Saturn’s presences bode ill for the king according to rev. 25 and 28. Mercury’s presence leads to some revolt against the king, and Venus’s presence (rev. 27) will lead to the king’s son seizing the throne. It is not clear to me if this is meant to bode well or ill, given that Venus’s presence generally bodes well, especially when bright. Perhaps, I argue, since this text was unlikely to have been composed for a king, the Venus omen would have been interpreted by the non-royal audience for cuneiform divination of the last few centuries BC as propitious. Finally, a solar eclipse bodes ill for the king’s troops and a lunar eclipse foretells the downfall of the land. What was meant by the term ‘ki’ here? I suggest that it may well have meant a twelfth of a zodiacal sign, as in the GestirnDarstellung texts mentioned above. The reference to the brightness or faintness of the planets in each 2½° “location” in Reihe A of the GD texts attests to a very close parallel with the last few lines of BM 47494. BM 47494 does not include any of the interpretations typical of EAE derived from atmospheric phenomena (except for faintness and brightness), nor from the mutual interaction of the planets, or their heliacal phenomena, aside from the solar and lunar eclipse interpretations given at the very end, nor does it consider the importance of when things occurred. What, then, was the purpose of BM 47494? I suggest that BM 47494 was meant to be used to effect interpretations for private individuals in conjunction with the knowledge of the location of planets at the moment of birth. I suggest BM 47494 was a step on the way to horoscopes — the distillation of royal celestial divination to a limited number of phenomena, seemingly to provide prognostications for the land, but really for individuals. The text is concerned primarily with the presence of star-planets in constellations or zodiacal signs and their brightness. The only other phenomena considered are the locations of eclipses, the dates of lunar “opposition” and the faintness of the Moon at its appearance. In the Babylonian horoscope AO 17649 dating to -409 (Text 1 in Rochberg 1998), the date of the birth of the child is given, followed by the location of the planets in the zodiacal constellations or signs. While the locations given are not those of the planets at the moment of birth, but rather of the synodic phenomena which occurred closest to that date, it is noteworthy that 22.  A striking confirmation from EAE is quoted by an Babylonian scholar writing in -678 in Hunger (1992)’s No. 502: 15. “If Libra is dark: for three years locusts will attack and devour the harvest of the land, variant: locusts will devour the land: the land will have to eat a reduced harvest.” The scholar interprets “dark” as “Mars stands in it” in the previous line. We see here how a code implicit in EAE was later made explicit (and simplified) in texts designed to assist those performing personal, zodiacal astrology.

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in rev. 3 Saturn was said to be “high and faint”. The Babylonian horoscope AB 251 (Rochberg 1998: Text 2), also dating to -409, locates the planets at birth by zodiacal sign or constellation, the Moon by the zodiacal constellation si gír.tab “the Scorpion’s Pincer” and provides the times for the “Lunar Three” (see note 21) including the date and length of ‘na’. In BM 53282 discussed above, the five birth notes describe the locations of the planets in 30° ecliptic signs, and in line 13 we find the expression ina muḫḫi ša 2 rapaštu ša mulxx “under the 2 stars of the rump of [the Lion] star. . .”. Rapaštu is only otherwise attested as part of the name for two stars of The Lion constellation, θ- and δ-Leonis, and as Hunger (1999: 232) points out, is found in a list of culminating (or ziqpu) stars that are used to tell the time at night. However, I doubt that the reference here is to an exact time of night, but rather to a more precise location of the planet, namely a point on the ecliptic which is intersected by a line through θ- and δ-Leonis. BM 53282 also locates the planets by both zodiacal sign and by constellation or fixed star, I suggest. Thus, three contemporary texts employ astronomical data in order to draw up horoscopes that are more or less identical with those described in BM 47494. Might we also compare the prognostications provided by BM 47494 and those in the surviving horoscopes? The table on p.  67 summarizes the predictive scheme employed in BM 47494. It implies that if, say, Jupiter were bright and in the zodiacal constellation “The front of the Crab”, then good-boding prognostications in respect of the attack of the enemy, cattle, business and the rising of the wind could be drawn and said to concern Dilbat. Equally, Jupiter could be said to be within the zodiacal sign “The Crab”, and that the prognostications should then pertain to Subartu. Using Rochberg’s 1998 numbering, only horoscopes 2, 5, 9, 10, 11, and 27 have astrological predictions, and 10 and 11 are duplicates. Although we have little material, we can check to see if the prognostications are at least consistent with the BM 47494 scheme: Text 2 merely states that “things will be propitious”. Text 5 (MLC 1870) dates to -262, and locates the Sun at 13;30° of Aries and the Moon at 10° of Aquarius; Jupiter is at the beginning of Leo; Venus and Mercury are with the Sun (in Aries); Saturn is in Cancer, Mars at the end of Cancer. The entire reverse is devoted to detailed predictions and states that the child will be lacking property and have difficulties with regard to hunger and his wife, but live a long time. According to BM 47494, the Moon in Aquarius could concern famine, otherwise I see no correlations. Text 9 (NCBT 1231) dates to -248, locates the Sun in 9;30° of Capricorn and the Moon in 12° of Aquarius, and states that “his days will be long”. Jupiter is located at the beginning of Scorpius, so “someone will help the Prince.” Since the child (Anu-bēlšunu) was born in? Aquarius in the “location” (ki) of Venus, “he will have sons.” (I will refer again to this important line — line 6 — below.) Mercury and Saturn were in Capricorn, and Mars in Cancer. According to BM 47494, planets in Capricorn, Scorpius and Aquarius are configurations significant for giving birth. BM 47494 rev. 23 and 27 also relate that Jupiter in the appropriate ki bodes well for the King, and Venus in the appropriate ki bodes well for the King’s son. What is perhaps most noteworthy here is that an omen purportedly for a prince appears in a private horoscope, indicating how an astrology industry originally designed for royalty (and indeed thereby legitimized, I suggest) was adapted for personal use. Text 10/11 (MLC 2190 / W20030/143) dates to -243 and tells us that one Aristocrates was born when the Moon was in Leo, the Sun in 12;30° of Gemini, Jupiter in 18° of Sagittarius,

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Modern Zodiacal Signs Zodiacal Signs, names in the defined from reverse of BM Zodiacal Constellations named in BM 47494 the Vernal 47494 (defined by and the areas of life they pertain to according Point fixed stars) to obv. 17f. a dates; wool; rising wind; rising storm; sick people

Cities linked to the constellations according to obv. 1–15

Lands linked to the signs in the reverse

ARIES 0–30°

[The Hired Man]

The Hired Man

TAURUS 30°–60°

The Bull of Heaven

The Stars death; rain/flood; rising wind; rising storm The Bull of Heaven death; cattle [ Jaw of the] Bull . . ..

Keš (r.1) Elam Nippur, Ur, Der plus 3

GEMINI 60°–90°

The Great Twins

The True Shepherd of Anu (Orion) death; wool; . . . dates; . . . The Old Man The Great Twins The Twins rising wind

Sippar, Larsa Eridu plus 1 Kutha, Ur

Amurru

CANCER 90°–120°

The Crab

The Crab middle The Crab front The Crab end?

Sippar, Dilbat, Girsu

Subartu

LEO 120°–150°

The Lion

Uruk Babylon Nippur

Akkad

VIRGO 150°–180°

The Furrow

The Furrow

Elam

Elam

LIBRA 180°–210°

The Scales

The Scales

The land of Akkad

Amurru

SCORPIUS 210°–240°

The Scorpion

The Scorpion sesame

Dilmun, Borsippa

Subartu

attack of enemy; cattle; business; rising wind

The Head of the Lion The Breast of the Lion The Foot of the Lion The King (α-Leonis) . . .

attack of enemy; rising wind

famine; harvest; barley famine; business; dates, wool attack of enemy; giving birth; rising wind; . . . sesame

SAGITTARIUS Pabilsag 240°–270°

Pabilsag The Eagle?( Aquila)

CAPRICORN 270°–300°

[The Goat-Fish]

The Goat-Fish

giving birth; cattle; business; sick people; . . .

AQUARIUS 300°–330°

The Great One

The Great One

famine; harvest; barley; rain/flood

PISCES 330°–360°

The Field

The Tails harvest The Field famine; harvest; business; barley; . . . Anunītub giving birth; rising of wind; sick people The Fish (Piscis Austrinus) rain/flood The Swallowc rising of wind

. . ..

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Akkad

Babylon, Marad, Akkad Elam Subartu

Elam

. . .

Amurru

Babylon . . . of the land

Subartu

a.  Britton 2010: 636, Table 11 has attempted to determine the boundaries of the zodiacal constellations for around -400 and in his Table 12 he presents the data in terms of the extent to which the zodiacal constellations and the signs match up. In general the match is good, but most constellations begin and end a few degrees before or after the 30° signs, and there is even some overlap between constellations. b.  According to Hunger and Pingree 1999:271 to be identified with the Eastern fish and part of Pisces. c.  According to Hunger and Pingree 1999:276 to be identified with parts of Pegasus and the western fish of Pisces. See also Roughton et al. 2004: 566.

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Venus in 4° of Taurus, Mercury in Gemini with the Sun, Saturn in 6° of Cancer, and Mars in 24° of Cancer. The positive latitude of the Moon predicts “prosperity (and) greatness”. The “location” (ki) of Jupiter suggests that the native’s life will be “prosperous, at peace(?), his wealth will be long-lasting, long days”. The “location” (ki) of Venus means “he will find favour wherever he goes, he will have sons and daughters”. The “location” (ki) of Mercury implies “he will be first in rank, he will be more important than his brothers, he will take over his father’s house.” If these ki refer to 2½° stretches of the ecliptic, which in the GD-text, for example, are ordered in each zodiacal sign according to the zodiacal order beginning with the sign in question, then 18° of Sagittarius would be in the eighth twelfth from Sagittarius, namely Cancer. Thus, Jupiter was in the ki of Cancer, Venus in the ki of Gemini and Mercury in the ki of Libra or Scorpius. I see no correlations with the schemes of BM 47494 outlined in the table above, but this is because the predictions here are based on the presence of the planets in the ki of certain zodia and not on their mere presence in zodiacal signs. BM 47494 rev. 26–27 states that if Venus or Mercury (“the Arrow Star”) are in the ki of the land of Akkad then there will be a revolt against the king and “the son will seize the throne.” In rev. 23, Jupiter’s presence in the ki implies a long reign for the king. These prognostications correlate nicely with those in this particular horoscope. Finally, Text 27 (BM 38104) dates to -68 and again the Moon, Sun and planets are all located in terms of degrees of zodiacal signs, and the child is predicted a diminishing good fortune. Jupiter was in Sagittarius, Venus in Gemini, Saturn in Aquarius, Mars in Libra and Mercury was invisible. According to BM 47494, Mars in Libra would bode ill for business and famine, and Saturn in Aquarius should mean a bad harvest and famine, which are consistent with the predictions of this cuneiform horoscope. Although the evidence is slight, the above study of the astrological predictions of the surviving cuneiform horoscopes in the light of BM 47494 in no way contradicts the suggestion made above that the latter text represents a distillation of the code underlying the royal astral omens of Enūma Anu Ellil and that just such a distillation provided the code used by Babylonian scholars to draw up horoscopes for their clients. It has also pointed up the existence of two ways in which the locations of the planets in the ecliptic led to prognostications, firstly on the basis of their presence in constellations or signs, and secondly on the basis of their presence in the ki, the 2½° “locations”, or twelfths of the signs. BM 47494 shows us that both methods were in use by the end of the fifth century BCE, and we turn to the latter to conclude.

A note on ‘ki’ and the Ascendant Given that the twelfths of the zodiacal signs were each named after the zodiac, one might expect the significances of each ki to be similar to those of its 30° zodiac equivalent. This alone would lead to more interpretations for any given celestial configuration. Indeed, I believe it is a pre-requisite for any non-falsifiable industry of such longevity to be able to provide a multitude of (often contradictory) interpretations. However, so far as I am able to judge, the significances of the twelfths differ from the significances of the signs. AO 6483 (= TCL 4:14) was transliterated and translated by Sachs as Appendix II of his 1952 article publishing six Babylonian “horoscopes” because of its clear relationship to the horoscope genre. AO 6483, like BM 47494, apparently provides schemes for the interpretation

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of the configuration of the heavens at any given moment. It begins with some descriptions of the lunar phases, moves on to note the use of a stone-plant-tree scheme based on the twelfths of the zodiacal signs, each of which is named after a zodiacal sign. The twelve “portions” (ḫa. la) for Aries are enumerated and then for each “location” (ki) of these twelfths the themes to which interpretations could be given are indicated, thus: The ki “location”

The significance of ki, according to AO 6483: obv. 22–25

Aries

Death of his family

Taurus

Death in battle

Gemini

Death in prison

Cancer

Death in the ocean; longevity He will grow old; he will be wealthy The capture of his personal enemy He will be wealthy; anger

Leo

Virgo

Libra

Good days, he will die at 40? years? Scorpius Death by rage; his death by fate Sagittarius Death in the ocean

Capricorn

Aquarius

Pisces

He will be poor, he will be hysterical? He will grow sick and die At 40? years? he will have sons; death by water At 40? years? he will die; distant days

The significance of the ki, or of a planet lying in that particular ki, according to Reihe A of the Gestirn-Darstellung texts Faint Saturn/Jupiter: Onion and barley prices Bright Mars: Attack of the enemy Faint Mercury: Rain Against the dignitaries Mercury: Thunder Mars: Falling sickness/conflagration/earthquake Mercury/Bright Venus: Strong storm Onion and barley prices/earthquake/conflagration/rebellion/ severe shortage of all fruits Rain and flood/storm. Decision for Tigris and Euphrates, Sippar (and) Larsa, Idid, the hero Ningirsu and Ninlil. Power/conflagration/attack of an enemy/heat and glare of Mars Jupiter: Power of the king Mars: Attack of an enemy Flourishing of the harvest/abundance of agricultural produce/well-being of pregnant women/decision of onion and barley prices/decision for the Elamites. Venus/Mercury: . . ... Decision on purchase prices. Faint Jupiter or bright Mars/Saturn: untrue speech/unsuccessful change Earthquake and attack of the enemy/conflagration/mudslide Faint Jupiter or bright Mercury/Mars: Enmity Conflagration Bright Jupiter/Venus/Mercury: Death, thunder and storm Bright Mars: Attack of the enemy Rain and flood. Venus/Mercury/Saturn/Mars: Downpour and flood will be stemmed, the land will mourn, destruction of the land Ditches and canals will not be in good order. Bright Mars: loss of wheat and spelt. Saturn/Venus/Mercury/Jupiter: they will flourish Ki.a/flourishing harvest/ abundance of fruits Bright Venus/Mercury/Saturn/Mars or faint Jupiter: flourishing of sesame, dates, mustard.

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AO 6483 continues, providing prognostications for the child at the appearance and settings of the Moon, Sun, planets and some stars, sometimes according to various technical terms we only poorly understand. For our purposes, it is sufficient that the significances of the ki according to AO 6483 are different from those in both BM 47494 and Reihe A of the Gestirn-Darstellung texts (also seen from the table above), 23 and as noted, different to the BM 47494 scheme which assigns meaning to a planet being in a zodiacal sign or constellation. Section 4 of BM 36609+ (Roughton et al. 2004: 543–5), a text likely dating to the Achaemenid period, identifies rising twelfths of zodiacal signs in terms of certain fixed stars. E.g., obv. 15–16 reads: [ta . . .] x x a-na 4 šá múllu-lim [EN. . .]um-mu-lut ki šá alla

[From . . .] . . . the 4 Stars of the Stag [to . . . the Du]sky Stars: the “location” of Cancer

Again ki — “location” — is used to describe this twelfth of a sign. Roughton et al. op. cit. p. 547 suggest that ki here is short for ki.gub (manzāzu or mazzāzu) following the suggestion made by Reiner 1998: 18 that the latter refers to a planet’s or star’s location at the horizon. BM 36609+ shows that in the pre-Hellenistic period attempts were made to identify visually where the ki were located against the background stars at the moment of their rising or setting. What if this pointed to a central concern of the term ki? Have we not been overlooking the importance of those ki(.gub) being at the horizon and does this fact not account for why their astrological significances do not match the astrological significances of the full 30° signs whose names they share, so far as we can judge the latter from BM 47494 and the cuneiform horoscopes? Were these 2½° segments used in a way similar to the Ascendant or Descendant in later Greek and Latin astrology? Thus, I would point to line 6 of that Uruk horoscope, NCBT 1231 — Text 9 in Rochberg 1998 — mentioned above: [lú.tur]⸢x⸣ gu ki dele-bat a-lid

[The child] was born ⸢in⸣ Aquarius with the “location” of Venus.

Although the beginning of the line is fragmentary, it seems clear that what is meant here is that the child was born “in Aquarius”, the location of Venus. I suggest that, at the very least, this implies that this zodiacal sign was crossing the horizon at this moment and that this became associated with the child. I suggest, though, that it was the 2½° segment named Aquarius (gu) that was crossing the horizon at the precise moment of birth. Does not the idea of the 2½° ki rising or setting at the moment of birth and serving to identify each child with a particular zodiacal sign best account for the zodiacal signs found on the personal seals recovered from Hellenistic Uruk, published and discussed by Wallenfels 1993? In Ch. 6 of my forthcoming book, I treat this idea in some detail, and believe the evidence there assembled makes the case reasonably convincing. Since it is taking forever to get that book published, it seems most appropriate to make the suggestion here for the first time in print in a volume dedicated to my former supervisor and friend, and the man to whom I give thanks for giving me the chance to devote some wonderful years of my life to these esoteric matters. 23.  Koch-Westenholz 1995: 165 n. 1 notes that ki appears as a designation of twelfths of the zodiacal signs in similar context in SpTU 11 43: 20–28 and LBAT 1600: 3′–14′. I have not considered these here.

Remarks on the Earliest History of Horoscopy

71

Bibliography Brack-Bersen, L. 1997 Zur Entstehung der babylonischen Mondtheorie, Beobachtung und theoretische Berechnungen von Mondphasen. Boethius 40. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner. Brack-Bersen, L., and Hunger, H. 1999 The Babylonian Zodiac: Speculations on its invention and significance. Centaurus 41: 280–292. 2002 TU 11: A Collection of Rules for the Prediction of Lunar Phases and of Month Lengths. SCIAMVS 3: 3–90. Britton, J. P. 1993 Scientific Astronomy in Pre-Seleucid Babylon. Pp. 61–76 in Die Rolle der Astronomie in den Kulturen Mesopotamiens: Beiträge zum 3. Grazer Morgenländischen Symposion (23.-27. September 1991), ed. H. D. Galter. Grazer Morgenländische Studien 3. Graz: Rm-Druck and Verlagsgesellschaft. 2010 Studies in Babylonian lunar theory: part III. The introduction of the uniform zodiac. Archive for History of Exact Sciences 64: 617–663. Brown, D. R. 2000 Mesopotamian Planetary Astronomy-Astrology. Cuneiform Monographs 8. Groningen: Styx. 2005 Review Article of Charles Burnett, Jan P. Hogendijk, Kim Plofker, and Michio Yano eds., Studies in the History of the Exact Sciences in Honour of David Pingree, Leiden/Boston: Brill. Wiener Zeitschrift für die Kunde des Morgenlandes 95: 407–428. 2010 What Shaped Our Corpuses of Astral and Mathematical Cuneiform Texts? Pp.  277–304 in Looking at it from Asia: The Processes that Shaped the Sources of History and Science, Boston Studies in the History of Science 265, ed. F. Bretelle-Establet. Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science 265. Dordrecht/Heidelberg/London/New York: Springer. Forthcoming The Interactions of Ancient Astral Science. Vergleichende Studien zu Antike und Orient X. Bremen: Hempen. Hunger, H. 1992 Astrological Reports to Assyrian Kings. State Archives of Assyria 8. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. 1999 Planetenstellungen bei der Geburt. Pp.  229–239 in Munuscula Mesopotamica: Festschrift für Johannes Renger, ed. B. Böck, E. Cancik-Kirschbaum and T. Richter. AOAT 267. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. 2001 Astronomical Diaries and Related Texts from Babylonia V: Lunar and Planetary Texts. Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. 2004 Stars, Cities, and Predictions. Pp. 16–32 in Studies in the History of the Exact Sciences in Honour of David Pingree, ed. Ch. Burnett, J. P. Hogendijk, K. Plofker and M. Yano. Leiden/Boston: Brill. Hunger, H., and Pingree, D. 1989 Mul.Apin: An astronomical Compendium in Cuneiform. AfO Bh. 24. Horn, Austria: F. Berger. 1999 Astral Sciences in Mesopotamia. Handbuch der Orientalistik 44. Leiden: Brill. Huber, P. J. 1958 Ueber den Nullpunkt der babylonischen Ekliptik, Centaurus 5: 192–208. Koch-Westenholz, U. 1995 Mesopotamian Astrology, an introduction to Babylonian and Assyrian Celestial Divination. CNI Publications 19. Copenhagen: The Carsten Niebuhr Institute of Near Eastern Studies Museum Tusculanum Press. Neugebauer, O. 1975 A History of Ancient Mathematical Astronomy. Berlin/New York: Springer. Neugebauer, O., and van Hoesen, H. B. 1957 Greek Horoscopes. Memoirs of the American Philosophical Society 48. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society.

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Pinches, T. G., Strassmaier J. N., and Sachs A. J. 1955 Late Babylonian Astronomical and Related Texts. Providence R.I.: Brown University Press. Reiner, E. 1998 Babylonian Planetary Omens Part Three (in collaboration with D. Pingree). Cuneiform Monographs 11. Groningen: Styx. Rochberg-Halton, F. 1984 New Evidence for the History of Astrology. JNES 42: 115–140. 1988 Benefic and Malefic Planets in Babylonian Astrology, Sachs Mem. Vol.: 323–328. 1998 Babylonian Horoscopes, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society 88/1. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society. 2004 The Heavenly Writing — Divination, Horoscopy, and Astronomy in Mesopotamian Culture. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Ross, M. 2008 All’s DUR that ends Twr. Pp. 245–256 in From the Banks of the Euphrates: Studies in Honor of Alice Louise Slotsky, ed. M. Ross. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Roughton, N. A., Steele, J. M., and Walker, C. B. F. 2004 A Late Babylonian Normal and Ziqpu Star Text. Archive for History of Exact Sciences 58: 537–572. Sachs, A. J. 1952 Babylonian Horoscopes. JCS 6: 49–74. SpTU II = E. von Weiher, 1983, Spätbabylonische Texte aus Uruk II. ADFU 10: Berlin TU =   TCL6 = F. Thureau-Dangin, 1922, Tablettes d’Uruk = Tablettes Cunéiformes du Louvre Vol. 6.    Paris. Walker, C. B. F. 1997 Achaemenid Chronology and the Babylonian Sources. Pp. 17–25 in Mesopotamia and Iran in the Persian Period: Conquest and Imperialism 539–331 BC, ed., J. Curtis. London: British Museum Press. Wallenfels, R. 1993 Zodiacal Signs among the Seal Impressions from Hellenistic Uruk. Pp. 281–289 in The Tablet and the Scroll, ed. M. Cohen, D. Snell and D. Weisberg. Bethesda, MD: CDL Press. Weidner, E. 1963 Astrologische Geographie im Alten Orient, AfO 20: 117–21. 1967 Gestirn-Darstellungen auf babylonischen Tontafeln. Philos.-histor. Kl. S. B. 254,2. Vienna: Öster­ reichische Akademie der Wissenschaften.

A Ceramic Assemblage of the Early Literate Periods from Sumer Daniel Calderbank and Jane Moon JNP and JNP — Jane Moon J. Nicholas Postgate and I were both participants at the 1983 symposium ‘Ğamdat Nasr: Period or Regional Style?’ in Tübingen. 1 He was at the time Director of the British School of Archaeology in Iraq, where I was based too. Invitations to participate in conferences or Festschrifts have not been so frequent in my career as to become burdensome, and I was flattered to be asked, as well as intrigued to see if we could ‘crack’ the contentious Jemdet Nasr. Was it a facet of Early Dynastic (ED) I, or a variant of Late Uruk? Was it a painted style confined to the Diyala and nearby, or even a figment of earlier excavators’ imagination? We flew from Baghdad to Tübingen (a drop of 300 C, as I remember), and between us we showed and discussed results from current excavations we were both involved in. These were in the Hamrin region, and at Abu Salabikh, where we had recently dug a sounding from ED I levels through to Uruk ones, and so, in theory, had new material to present from the Jemdet Nasr, which should come inbetween. Of the symposium, generously funded and well-run, I have happy memories of excellent meals, heated discussions, and good times with my colleagues and Tübingen friends. I wish I could recall that we solved the ‘Jemdet Nasr problem’, but I fear we did not. In fact, the Abu Salabkih sounding subsequently proved to have an irritating break in occupation just where the Jemdet Nasr levels should have been, 2 rendering it just as hard to really pin down as at Uruk 3 and Nippur. 4 The debate as to how the Jemdet Nasr assemblage should be defined, whether it has true chronological significance, or whether the term is a useful one, remained open. Hopes for some clarification were raised again when Roger Matthews began new excavations at Jemdet Nasr itself, 5 but events and conditions in Iraq associated with war and invasion meant a premature conclusion, and we remained as baffled as ever. In 2012, in the shadow of the miserable circumstances that had overtaken Iraq, a new project was created, 6 to start up excavation work on the ground in southern Iraq. During the 1. Ğamdat Naṣr Period or Regional Style? Beihefter zum Tübinger Atlas des vorderen Orients Reihe B Nr. 62 Ed. Uwe Finkbeiner and Wolfgang Röllig (Wiesbaden, 1986). Hereafter TAVO B62. 2.  J. N. Postgate and J. A. Moon, ‘Excavations at Abu Salabih, 1981′, Iraq 44 (1982) 103–36. 3.  U. Finkbeiner ‘Uruk-Warka. Evidence of the Ğamdat Naṣr-Period’. In TAVO B62, 33–68. 4.  Karen L. Wilson, ‘Nippur: The Definition of a Mesopotamian Ğamdat Naṣr- Assemblage’ in TAVO B62, 37–89. 5.  R. Matthews, Secrets of the Dark Mound: Jemdet Nasr 1926–1928 (Warminster, 2002) 6.  The Ur Region Archaeology Project, under the auspices of the University of Manchester, the Iraq State Board for Antiquities and Heritage, and the British Institute for the Study of Iraq www.urarchaeology.org

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years when international archaeologists had only a fleeting presence there, much work was done from afar, using newly available aerial images. Many fresh and interesting questions are now being asked about the region that was Sumer and Akkad, later Babylonia, 7 and excavations conducted to contemporary standards will help to answer these. They will also inject some much-needed confidence into the beleaguered remnants of Iraqi scholarship, and, it is hoped, encourage other international archaeologists to venture outside Kurdistan and research other parts of Iraq again. Once the idea of returning to Babylonia had taken root and developed into a plan, it was time to take advice and muster support. After more than 10 years working outside archaeology, and twice as long since working directly on Mesopotamia, I found that the human landscape had altered quite a bit; several old friends were missing, and there were many unknowns. But I had no hesitation in contacting JNP straight away, knowing I could rely on him to be encouraging and optimistic, to write references and warn of pitfalls, and — crucially — not to opine that the venture was impractical, ill-advised and dangerous. 8 In 2012 only parts of Iraq were safe to work in, and Thi Qar was one of them. The Ur region had always intrigued me: the excavations at Eridu, 9 Al-Ubaid, 10 and Ur itself 11 had each in turn changed our understanding of how early Iraq worked, as indeed did those at Sakheri Saghir, 12 coupled with the ‘Southern Margins of Sumer’ survey. 13 That is not many excavations for a seminal region of Sumer and Babylonia, their gateway to the Gulf and beyond. The Stony Brook team, 14 already setting up close to Ur, pointed us towards ‘EPS 60’ of the Southern Margins survey, Tell Khaiber, 20 km northwest of Ur, for which satellite images showed a massive single building, and where Henry Wright had found pottery of the second millennium, the odd ‘Ubaid sherd, and vestiges of the early third millennium too, including some ‘JNP’: Jemdet Nasr Painted. The plan of the building visible from space bore a credible resemblance to the ‘palace’ at Jemdet Nasr itself. 15

7.  E.g., J. R. Pournelle, KLM to CORONA: A Bird’s-Eye View of Cultural Ecology and Early Mesopotamian Civilization, in Settlement and Society: Essays dedicated to Robert McCormick Adams, ed. E. C. Stone (Chicago, 2007) 29–62. 8.  I am grateful to several others who similarly offered help and encouragement, including Roger Matthews, the late Tony Wilkinson, and Henry Wright. 9.  F. Safar, M. A. Mustafa and S. Lloyd, Eridu (Baghdad 1981). 10.  H. R. Hall and C. L. Woolley, Ur Excavations Vol. 1, Al-‘Ubaid (London, 1927) 11.  L. Woolley and M. Mallowan, Ur Excavations Vol. 7, The Old Babylonian Period Ed. T. C. Mitchell (London, 1976). 12.  H. T. Wright, The Administration of Rural Production in an Early Mesopotamian Town Anthropological Papers No. 38 (Michigan, 1969) 13.  H. T. Wright, ‘The Southern Margins of Sumer: Archaeological Survey of the Area of Ur and Eridu’ in R. McC. Adams, Heartland of Cities 295–351 (Chicago, 1981). 14.  We are greatly indebted to the Stony Brook team, especially to Dr Abdul Amir Hamdani, and to the Director, Professor Elizabeth Stone. 15.  Although Henry Wright’s notes, which he had, incredibly, preserved all these years and kindly sent to me, did record a preponderance of second-millennium sherds on that part of the mound.

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I had not been to Iraq for nearly thirty years, and nostalgia has a strange filtering effect. I had no trouble remembering exactly how it felt to be bitten all over by sand-flies, to fight with the stupor induced by brain-frying temperatures and chronic exhaustion, or to exist for months on tinned corned-beef. Somehow, I had forgotten how infuriating the Jemdet Nasr can be. It really should have been no surprise to see it dive for cover as soon as archaeologists turned up. We did a systematic surface survey, and found plenty of worn sherds that would fit into the right style spectrum, or to dates either side. But once we started to excavate, their status became clear. Whatever they had belonged to had been very thoroughly disturbed, probably completely destroyed, by what came after it. It only took a small sounding to establish that any surviving pre-second millennium occupation is now below the water table. The extraordinary public building that dominates Tell Khaiber is demonstrably mid-second millennium, and our remaining seasons of work will concentrate on elucidating what it was for, and how it worked. Daniel Calderbank is the first researcher to base a study on the emerging material from Tell Khaiber, and is embarking on a PhD examining the ceramics. Every so often, among the quantities of mass-produced, neutral-coloured, vegetable-tempered, second millennium sherds, occurs a remnant of something different, something from a previous millennium, when the potter was in less of a hurry: fragments of massive carinated jars, shoulders once splendid with burnish or reserved slip; elegant, sharply bevelled rims; carefully shaped, angular flat bases; and the odd bit of JNP, flaunting its ‘true plum purple’, just to be annoying. One context will have a steady trickle of solid-footed goblet bases and tab-rimmed cooking jars to go with them, pointing straight to an EDI date, but then along comes an Uruk strap handle, to make sure we remain confused. Having listened politely to a brief history of my experiences and opinions with such material Daniel mused succinctly: ‘Could be this Jemdet Nasr just doesn’t want to be found’. So far, we are challenged to find a better explanation for its persistent shape-shifting habit. The pre-second millennium pottery of Tell Khaiber does not represent a coherent assemblage: some sherds are late fourth millennium, some early third, some could be either, and there is no satisfactory stratification. No change there, then. It is no longer beautiful, and is hard to represent adequately. However, it demonstrates what such material looks like in this underexplored region, at the time of exciting developments in literacy and urbanism. So we present it here for the record, as a very small tribute to the other JNP. From the years at Abu Salabikh with him I absorbed a wealth of good excavation practices to adopt and adapt–and noted a couple to avoid. Some of his general approaches to life rubbed off too: when offered the post of Baghdad Secretary-Librarian to the British School of Archaeology in Iraq, I felt it only fair to point out that I could not type. Nicholas dismissed this hindrance by pointing out that ‘it’s just a case of pressing the keys in order one after the other’. The attitude that considers a long drive on a bad road in a brakeless vehicle to be a perfectly acceptable follow-up to sixteen hours on site with no breakfast, is one I have tried not to impose on my own staff, but the benefit of experiences like that has stood me in good stead whenever things get rough. Most of what I have learned about Iraq’s history, language and peoples I owe to JNP, and above all, it was his infectious enthusiasm and deep affection for Iraq that sparked my own. If I can pass on some of that to a new generation, we may solve a few more of Babylonia’s mysteries before oil and gas development sweeps all away. No bets are being taken on the Jemdet Nasr, though.

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The Early Pottery — Daniel Calderbank Retrieval and Analysis Although the majority of pottery produced at Tell Khaiber is second millennium in date, there are also a range of early third millennium types, and even a small number of late fourth millennium Uruk wares. Here, to avoid terminological confusion, this collection of sherds will simply be referred to as ‘early’. Analysis of these early ceramics followed an identical process of collection and recording to that of later wares. Due to the extensive assemblage of often mass-produced ceramics generated at the site, the methodology was necessarily more focused on expediency than exhaustive analyses. Bulk pottery was sorted and recorded, and diagnostics — rims, bases and decorated sherds — were separated for further analysis. Each diagnostic sherd was put through a shape-based typology, and detailed fabric descriptions and illustrations were produced where deemed necessary. Of the 9,481 diagnostic sherds processed in this manner, a small yet conspicuous number are recognisably early, and therefore offer a departure from a principally plain second millennium assemblage. Forms and Fabrics Demonstrably Jemdet Nasr wares are a rarity at Tell Khaiber, with only a few sherds excavated thus far. Nevertheless, a range of vessel types that are consistently found in early third millennium assemblages elsewhere, such as at Abu Salabikh, appear with comparative regularity. Solid footed goblet feet (Fig. 1.1–3, Fig. 2.1–6) form a common element of these early wares. These mass-produced wheel-made vessels have narrow (20–30mm) string-cut bases and are generally made from red-pink coloured fabrics with fine grit inclusions.. Whilst bases are reasonably common, goblet rims are relatively under-represented on account of their fineness and a tendency to fragment into small pieces. Conical bowl rims and bases (Fig. 1.4–7) are also common in this collection. These are generally made of pink-orange, fine grit-tempered clays. Bases are largely string-cut and rims vary greatly in their degree of fineness. Other open bowl forms are also attested to in the assemblage, albeit in limited numbers. These range from simple bevelled rims (Fig. 1.8) to more elaborately treated rims exhibiting incised patterning (Fig. 1.9–10). They are generally shallower than their conical counterparts and demonstrate broad rim diameters. These too tend to be pink-buff wares with fine grit inclusions. Jars, although proportionally less common than bowls, also demonstrate a range of rim types. Pulled-up rims, (Fig. 1.11) hole-mouthed (Fig. 1.12, Fig. 2.9) and ledge-rimmed varieties (Fig. 1.13–14) are all present in limited numbers. There is generally little uniformity in vessel size across these types, as exemplified by the differentiation in rim diameters. Sharply bevelled jar rims are a particularly diagnostic element of the early pottery at Tell Khaiber (Fig. 1.16–17), and combined with plum paint, represent the most diagnostic element of Jemdet Nasr (Fig. 1.18–19, Fig. 3.14–15). The range of rim diameters (80–180mm) indicates that there was little consistency in vessel size. However, despite differences in size, the fabric remains consistent. They are generally pink-grey in colour with heavy grit temper, often containing large sub-angu-

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lar, translucent — perhaps quartz — inclusions, and fine particles of mica. Jar bases seem to exist in two distinct forms: flat and sharply turned or low ring-based (Fig. 1.20–22). The diameters of these bases tend to be quite large, indicating that these vessels once held substantial storage capacities. Unfortunately, however, no bases can be connected to specific rim types, meaning a reliable understanding of complete jar profiles at Tell Khaiber is not possible. Handles are a rare element in the assemblage, but are invariably early in date. They come in a range of types, from strap (Fig. 2.7) and twist types (Fig. 2.12, 14) often associated with late Uruk, to typical Early Dynastic tab-rim types (Fig. 1.15, Fig. 2.13). There is also one example of a pierced lug made of a gritty grey fabric suggestive of an early date (Fig. 1.23). Decoration is found in a range of forms that seem to be primarily restricted to jars. One significant type of decoration is monochrome plum paint, as this is typical of the Jemdet Nasr period. This type of decoration is restricted to jars with sharply bevelled rims and often confined to this area of the vessel (Fig. 1.18–19, Fig. 3.14–15). In addition, incised cross-hatching (Fig. 3.12), incised bands, rope decoration (Fig. 3.6), nail impressions (Fig. 3.2, 4, 5, 7, 8), reserve slip (Fig. 3.13) and simple painted bands (Fig. 3.11, 13) are all present in limited numbers. Other conspicuous elements of the early assemblage are spouts (Fig. 1.24, Fig. 2.11), which are relatively common in a conical form. Also recorded is an isolated Jemdet Nasr bottle neck (Fig. 1.25, Fig. 2.10). Furthermore, fragments of typical, coarse, mould-made Uruk bevelled-rim bowls (BRBs) are present, albeit highly infrequent (Fig. 1.26). As BRBs are overwhelmingly common in most Uruk contexts, their infrequency at Tell Khaiber suggests that Uruk occupation at the site may have been rather ephemeral.

Context and Distribution As previously mentioned, limited soundings at Tell Khaiber suggest that the site’s pre-second millennium levels are practically lost beneath the water table. Consequently, all early wares excavated to date derive either from surface collection or from mid-second millennium contexts. The site’s intermittent occupation, including repeated episodes of building and rebuilding, has resulted in the widespread redeposition of earlier material. It is therefore no surprise that the largest concentrations of early ceramics come from deposits within the large monumental building, as this was the area subjected to the most intensive architectural renovations. One particular room (Area 300), in the southern corner of the building, provides significant evidence for this, as it contains a large number of mid-second millennium tablets, possibly part of a deliberate levelling episode prior to renovation or rebuild. The pottery from this area, however, boasts a range of early forms. Indeed, of the 627 diagnostic sherds that have been collected, 412 (65.71%) are recognisably early. Amongst these, 32 solid-footed goblet bases and 39 goblet rims have been identified, as well as a range of open bowl types and jar bases. Five spouts and a possible Uruk strap handle were also present. Although less pronounced, similar mixed patterns of deposition are found across the central mound of the site. By contrast, smaller-scale domestic exposures to the south-east of the monumental building, away from these extensive stratigraphic disruptions, have produced a more consistent group of second millennium wares. The range of typical vessel types at Tell Khaiber provides evidence for a perhaps discontinuous occupational sequence from late Uruk,

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through Jemdet Nasr, and into Early Dynastic. Unfortunately, however, other than noting its presence in some capacity, the absence of reliable stratigraphic evidence means that a more comprehensive sequential placement of Jemdet Nasr continues to elude us. Table 1. Catalogue of forms shown in Figs. 1–3 Fig. no.

Context– Sherd no.

Type

Rim/Base di. (mm)

Surface/Fabric

Inclusions

Fig. 1.1

1005–18

Solid-footed goblet base

N/A Pink/Pink – String cut

Grit

Fig. 1.2

1010–20

Solid-footed goblet base

25

Red/Red

Grit

Fig. 1.3

1010–32

Solid-footed goblet base

30

Pink/Pink

Grit and chaff

Fig. 1.4

3064–154 Conical bowl rim

200

Pink buff int. & ext. / Pink fabric

White, grey and translucent sub rounded grit (20%). Some mica at x60

Fig. 1.5

3064–48

Conical bowl rim

150

Pale pink ext. /Orange- Some mica at x60 pink fabric

Fig. 1.6

1005–16

Conical bowl base

N/A

Pink/Pink

Fine grit

Fig. 1.7

3002–1

Conical bowl base

N/A

Pink/Pink

Sandy grit

Fig. 1.8

3002–24

Bowl w. bevelled rim

190

Pink/Pink

Grit and chaff

Fig. 1.9

1010–8

Incised bowl rim

290

Pink/Pink

Grit and chaff

Fig. 1.10

3047–75

Incised bowl rim

340

Pink/Grey fabric

White, black and brown grit (30%)

Fig. 1.11

599–4

Pulled-up jar rim

130

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 1.12

3006–17

Hole-mouth jar rim

90

Buff/Pink

Fine grit

Fig. 1.13

1074–24

Ledge rim jar

130

Pale green/grey

Fine black grit (30%. Some mica at x60

Fig. 1.14

4034–11

Ledge rim jar

120

Green reserve slip ext./ Brown, white and Green grey sub angular grit (30%)

Fig. 1.15

1005–2

Tab rim jar

60

Pink/Pink

Sparse grit.

Fig. 1.16

1079–28

Sharply bevelled jar rim

180

Cream buff int. & ext. /Pink

Grey and translucent sandy grit (20%). Some mica x60

Fig. 1.17

3006–23

Sharply bevelled jar rim

70

Pale pink/Pink

Grit and chaff

Fig. 1.18

6041–76

Sharply bevelled jar rim

130

Yellow ext. with plum painted rim/Pink

White, grey and translucent grit (30%)

Fig. 1.19

6000–63

Sharply bevelled jar rim

80

Pink with plum painted White, grey and int. and ext. rim/Pink brown grit (30%)

Fig. 1.20

1010–33

Low ring base

55

Pink slip/Pink

Grit.

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Table 1. Catalogue of forms shown in Figs. 1–3 Fig. no.

Context– Sherd no.

Type

Rim/Base di. (mm)

Surface/Fabric

Inclusions

Fig. 1.21

3006–7

Low ring base

140

Pink/Pink

Sandy grit

Fig. 1.22

3009–59

Low ring base

160

Pale green ext./Pink

Chaff (10%) and grit (10%)

Fig. 1.23

3054–48

Perforated Jug

Grey/Grey

White and grey grit (15%) Some mica at x60

Fig. 1.24

2009–1

Spouted jar

55

Buff/Pink

Grit.

Fig. 1.25

1073–39

Bottle neck

40

Pale pink buff ext. / Grey fabric

White, grey and translucent grit (30%). Some mica at x60

Fig. 1.26

3002–21

Bevelled rim bowl (BRB)

N/A

Not recorded

Not recorded

Solid-footed goblet bases

20–30

Pink/buff

Sandy grit

Not recorded

Not recorded

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 2.1–6 3064 Fig. 2.7

3064–157 Strap handle

Fig. 2.8

4026–1

Plain rim with lug

Fig. 2.9

1037–26

Hole mouthed jar rim 55

Cream buff/Red

Grey, red and white grit inc. (10%)

Fig. 2.10

1073–39

Bottle neck

Pale pink buff ext./ Grey fabric

White, grey and translucent grit (30%) Some mica at x60

Fig. 2.11

1074–28

Spout

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 2.12

1039–103 Twistedhandle

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 2.13

1039–86

Tab rim

Pink

Sandy grit inc.

Fig. 2.14

6037–16

Twisted strap handle

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 3.1

6052–65

Thumbnail-impressed ridges

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 3.2

6040–35

Thumbnail-incised rim

360+

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 3.3

4026–4

Cut-out triangles

90

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 3.4

4001–63

Incised chevrons on shoulder

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 3.5

3057–72

Jar shoulder w. thumbnail-incision

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 3.6

3059–17

‘Rope’ decoration from lower body of jar

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 3.7

1039–95

Small carinated vessel 110 w. thumbnail incision on shoulder

Not recorded

Not recorded

110

40

120

80

Daniel Calderbank and Jane Moon

Table 1. Catalogue of forms shown in Figs. 1–3 Fig. no.

Context– Sherd no.

Type

Rim/Base di. (mm)

Surface/Fabric

Inclusions

Fig. 3.8

3047–139 Jar neck/shoulder w. thumbnail incision on shoulder

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 3.9

6036–88

Plain bowl rim w. thumbnail-impressed ridge below

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 3.10

1074–9

Everted bowl rim w. thumbnail-impressed ridge below

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 3.11

1061–1

Jar sherd w. painted red stripe

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 3.12

3037–12

Jar shoulder w. hatched incision

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 3.13

3026–9

Jar shoulder w. dark paint bands and diagonal reserved slip

Not recorded

Not recorded

Fig. 3.14

6041–76

Sharply bevelled jar rim w. plum paint

130

Yellow ext. with plum painted rim/Pink

White, grey and translucent grit (30%)

Fig. 3.15

6000–63

Sharply bevelled jar rim w. plum paint

80

Pink with plum painted White, grey and int. and ext. rim/Pink brown grit (30%)

360+



Figure 1.

81

82



Figure 2.



Figure 3.

83

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Stolen, Not Given? María Dolores Casero Chamorro It is generally acknowledged that Assyria had its own distinct identity and existence which differentiated it from its neighbours and was carefully maintained throughout the centuries. This assertion served as a starting point for one of Professor J.N. Postgate’s seminal articles, which analysed the transition from Middle-Assyrian to Neo-Assyrian (Postgate 1997: 159). My primary aim in this short note is, in a sense, complementary, focusing indeed on ‘Middle-Assyrian to Neo-Assyrian, one of the aspects of the continuity’ and one of the reasons that guided Assyria’s existence: its love-hate relationship with Babylonia which unavoidably contributed to Assyria’s formation and definition from its establishment as māt Aššur from the II millennium BC on. 1 Babylonia, in its role as a southern neighbour, induced Assyria to build itself up out of alterity and complementarity. From an anthropological perspective, every social group is defined not only by its own characteristics but also by the exclusion of ‘the other’ and the constant comparison with ‘the foreign’. It is this experience of confrontation, of placing oneself in front of ‘the other’, that creates the constitutive elements of identity of a social group, such as language or dialect (Armstrong 1982: 5). The interrelationship between Assyria and Babylonia stems from their geographic proximity, that inevitably conditioned their culture, language and writing. Through mutual conquest and destruction, boundary agreements and treaties, diplomatic marriages and mutual assistance in cases of internal crises, the two countries interwove their history (Galter 2007: 527–528). It is against the backdrop of these historical interactions that I would like to take a new look at K.2673. This tablet 2 contains a brief text of 13 lines whose special interest lies in the fact that it constitutes a link connecting two different eras of Assyria and Babylonia, and represents a clear example of the way in which the two civilizations were interrelated. I here give a transliteration. The translation will appear at the end of the discussion.

1.  [This article underwent double blind peer review–eds]. This aspect will be dealt with in more detail in my forthcoming PhD dissertation. I wish to express my appreciation to the editors for their kind invitation to contribute to this volume honouring Prof. J.N. Postgate, and their careful and patient editorial work; also to Referee 1, whose comments helped me to improve the present pages; to Dr. I. Márquez Rowe, for his valuable suggestions; and to Dr. Jon Taylor and the Trustees of the British Museum, for their kind permission to collate K.2673 in October 2013. Any mistakes, of course, remain my own. This work has been made possible thanks to a scholarship JAE-Pre from the CSIC (Madrid), the cofounding of the FSE and the Spanish Project FFI2011–23981. 2.  Photo: Wiseman 1954: Pl.VIII, King 1904: 163–165 and obverse in http://www.britishmuseum​ .org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details/collection_image_gallery.aspx?assetId=154313 001&objectId=310922&partId=1

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María Dolores Casero Chamorro Obv.  1 [(x) d GISK]IM–MAŠ MAN ŠÁR A dSILIM-nu-MAŠ MAN KUR Aš-šur ⸢ KUR-ti ⸣ KUR Kár-du- mu-né!-kir6 SAR-ia MU-ia Aš-šur dIŠKUR MU-šú KUR-su lu-ḫal-li-qu NA4.KIŠIB an-nu-u TA KUR Aš-šur ana KUR.URIki šá-ri-iq ta-din  5 ana-ku 1.d30–PAP.MEŠ–SU MAN KUR Aš-šur ina 6 ME MU.MEŠ KÁ.DINGIR KUR-ud-ma TA NÍG.GA KÁ.DINGIR us-se-ṣi-áš-šú Edge NÍG.GA Ša-ga-ra-ak-ti–šur!-ia-aš LUGAL KIŠ Rev. d GISKIM–MAŠ MAN ŠÁR A dSILIM-nu– MAN KUR Aš-šur 10 [KUR]-⸢ti⸣ KUR Kár-du-ni-ši mu-né!-kir6 SAR-ia MU-ia Aš-šur dIŠKUR MU-šú KUR-su lu-ḫal-li-qu ⸢NÍG.GA Ša-ga-ra-ak-ti–šur!-ia-aš LUGAL KIŠ _________________________________ šá ina UGU NA4.KIŠIB ša ZA.GÍN

Paleographic and textual remarks: Line 1. The beginning of the tablet is partially damaged; the length of the surface scratch detected in the collation suggests that one or two signs at most are lost. L. 2. The end of the name of Karduniaš is omitted. The sign after MU in mu-né!-kir6 has clearly three wedges. Unlike Grayson and Novotny 2014, I think it should be read as né and not as a correction of DÙ. This number of wedges for the NI sign is attested in MA and can possibly be interpreted as a scribal mistake deriving from copying a text in MA ductus. L. 8. The shape of the ŠUR is anomalous. L. 9. The name of King Shalmaneser is omitted. L. 10. The same sign shape and reading for NI as in L.2. L. 11. The shape of the ŠUR is anomalous as in line 8. This tablet displays some complexity in structure, since it integrates three different inscriptions by three different kings, two from the second millennium BC and one from the first millennium BC. The scheme would be the following: Obverse: I. Lines 1–3: inscription of Tukulti–Ninurta I (1243–1207 BC), 3 king of Assyria. The script is Neo-Assyrian, and the Assyrian scribe made the spelling mistakes previously mentioned. II. Lines 4–7: inscription of Sennacherib (704–681 BC), king of Assyria. The text is also in Neo-Assyrian script. Edge: I. Line 8: inscription of Šagarakti–Šuriaš (1245–1233 B.C.), king of Karduniaš (i.e. Babylonia). The script is archaic, so-called monumental Old Babylonian. 3.  For the chronology and transcription of the royal names I follow Brinkman 1977: 335–348.

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87

Reverse: I. Lines 9–11: same text (and script) of Tukulti–Ninurta I with which the tablet started. II. Line 12: same text (and script) of Šagarakti–Šuriaš as written on the edge of the tablet. III. Horizontal ruling, implying some kind of division in the text. IV. Line 13: subscript in Neo-Assyrian script stating that the text in the foregoing lines reproduces the inscription on a seal of lapis lazuli. As is generally assumed, 4 the tablet was produced at the command of Sennacherib, who would have had a strong interest in presenting the story of the lapis lazuli cylinder seal that he took as a part of the booty from Babylon in 689 BC. In lines 4–7 we are told by king Sennacherib that this lapis lazuli cylinder seal had already spent some time in Assyria as a consequence of Tukulti–Ninurta’s conquest of Babylon in the 13th century. It was he, Tukulti–Ninurta, who had brought it to Assur for the first time, and who re-cut it adding his text to the inscription of the Kassite king. 5 It would therefore not be unreasonable to assume that Sennacherib consciously decided to start his own tablet with an inscription of one of his predecessors from the previous millennium, namely Tukulti–Ninurta I, who entered history as the first Assyrian king to conquer and rule Babylon. The quest for glory and fame drove Sennacherib to the repeated destruction of Babylon and its looting, in order to establish a historical continuum and legitimise his own antiBabylonian policy. This may explain why, after depicting his own justification and proclaiming himself as the heir of an ancestral policy, Sennacherib decided to include in the reverse every word he found inscribed in the Kassite seal of lapis lazuli (see the statement in line 13). The seal was very probably cut for Šagarakti–Šuriaš, whom we can consider as its first documented owner. 6 His inscription is reproduced not only on the reverse of the tablet (after Tukulti–Ninurta’s), but also on its lower edge. What is more, it uses the archaic cuneiform signs typical of Kassite seals, thus in all likelihood reproducing the old, original inscription on the seal. I would now like to draw attention to the event narrated in line 4 of the obverse, and discuss how this cylinder seal reached Babylon, where it was found by Sennacherib. It is at present generally assumed that the seal from the land of Assur ‘was given as a gift’ to Akkad, i.e., Babylonia. The verbal phrase is read šarik tadin, 7 assuming that 1) the first stative is a form of šarāku, ‘to give as a present’, and 2) šarik (‘it was given as a gift’) and tadin (‘it was given’) are a

4.  See Grayson 1972: 127 n. 29 and more recently Grayson and Novotny 2014: 216–217 n. 156. 5.  KAH II 92 is a fragmentary text that includes an inventory of the booty in which someone, perhaps a future prince, is given advice concerning the distribution of this booty. It is remarked in line 7 that the name of Tukulti–Ninurta should be written on it (šumī ina libbe l  [ilṭur]), thus confirming this kind of policy (Weidner 1939: 123–124). 6.  The suggestion of Tukulti–Ninurta I as the first owner (Wiseman 1958: 21) is nowadays obsolete due to the chronological readjustments which have shown that the death of Šagarakti-Šuriaš took place before Tukulti–Ninurta took the crown of Assyria (Weidner 1959: 38). 7.  King’s reading gar-ri ik-ta-din in AKA VI was already replaced by ša-ri-ik ta-din (Peiser 1905: 98).

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sort of hendiadys intended to emphasise the meaning of ‘giving/bestowing’ through the juxtapposition of two semantically similar words. We will argue instead that the first stative should be read as šariq ‘it was stolen’, producing a contrastive meaning for the two verbs. A derivation from šarāqu ‘to steal’ was already posited by Delitzsch (1903: 39), translating dieses Siegel war aus Assyrien nach Akkad gestohlen und verkauft worden, and Weidner (1959: Tukulti-Ninurta number 29), translating dieses Siegel war aus Assyrien nach Akkad entwendet, gegeben worden, 8 following Delitzsch’s interpretation. Most scholars since then appear to have overlooked the possibility, or not thought it worth mentioning (Peiser 1905: 98, Winckler 1905: 331, Luckenbill 1924: 93, Luckenbill 1927: 158–159 n. 359–360, Wiseman 1958: 21, Watanabe 1985: 386, Frahm 1997: 218, Radner 2005: 187). Only Grayson explicitly acknowledged the ambiguity of the spelling, but he ultimately dismisses šariq as ‘less likely’, while acknowledging that šarik tadin is problematic (Grayson 1972: 127 n. 29 and Grayson and Novotny 2014: 215–217 n. 156). Grayson and those who followed him regarded šarik tadin, somewhat unconvincingly, as a euphemism. Hence, when it came to translating, instead of specifying that the seal was given as a gift, they offered unclear and vague alternatives for explaining what happened to the precious lapis lazuli cylinder seal. 9 The meaning of ‘as a gift’ is, in fact, conveyed more frequently and explicitly by the formula kī(ma) šulmānu and its variants from the Amarna Age, as the documentary evidence suggests. 10 In addition, considering the different entries collected in the CAD, we observe that our tablet provides the only instance where the two statives šarik tadin are attested together. By contrast, there are several instances of hendiadys with tadānu in Neo-Assyrian, such as gamāru– tadānu 11 (to pay completely), šaḫāru–tadānu 12 (to give/pay back) and šalāmu–tadānu 13 (to pay/ give something in full), each of which attested more than once. The same cannot, however, be said of the doublet šarāku–tadānu, whose only occurrence is the one here examined. In light of this, šarāku–tadānu, though perhaps idiomatically possible, appears not to have been a favoured construction. 14 The lack of further attestations in the surviving written record raises, therefore, doubts about the validity of its use. 8.  And more recently Chamaza 2002: 320, ‘aus Assyria entwendet nach Akkad hergegeben’. 9.  ‘given as a gift’ as euphemism (Grayson 1972: 27, Grayson 1987: 280 n.28); a freer translation ‘found some hidden way from Assyria to Akkad’ (Luckenbill 1924: 93); ‘dem Smuckstein angebracht oder anzubringen war’ (Frahm 1997: 218); ‘was carried away’ (King 1902: 15); ‘carried off’ (Wiseman 1958: 21–22); ‘taken back’ (Brinkman 1976: 315); ‘somehow found its way back’ (Levine 2005: 418); ‘the ornament had been returned to the Babylonians at some point’ (Frahm 2014: 211). 10.  EA 7: 55 of Burnaburiaš; KAJ 100 ana šulmāni / tattidin Urad–Šerūa, studied by Prof. Postgate (Postgate 1988: 3). In the NA age the testimonies are: K.382 also classified as ADD 640/ARU 45 (Kataja and Whiting 1995: 116 n. 92, Postgate 1976: 111 n. 16) ana širikti issarku 11′; ana šulmāni ša bēltiya . . . ultēbil Ugaritica 5 48: 15, cf. ibid. 28 r. 17, Owen, Tel Aviv 8 8: 39, MRS 12 6: 9, 16 r. 8, JCS 8 9 No. 117: 5 (MB Alalakh), kī šulmānu ana Ezida īpušūnu (ABL 805 r. 11) (all NB) all of them collected in CAD Š/III 245–246. 11.  NARGD 5: 3. 12.  ADD 98. 13.  ADD 112. 14.  I would like to thank Referee 1 for this comment.

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The co-occurrence of šarāku and nadānu (the Babylonian equivalent of Assyrian tadānu) is, to my knowledge, attested only on the Middle Babylonian Hinke kudurru, 15 dated to Nabû– kudurrī–uṣur (1125–1104 BC) and written in archaizing monumental script: A.ŠÀ [KI.ŠUB.BA šuātu. . .] ul šarik ul nadin ul maḫirmi iqabbû

“[This waste] field [. . .] is not given as a gift, not given, not received” they will say.

(Paulus 2014: 495 NKU I.1 IV1 and Hinke 1907: 150–151)

Here, however, we have no hendiadys, but a succession of three separate verbs, with three separate meanings. In fact, the verb nadānum acts as a term of transition between the act of (not) giving a present and (not) receiving it, rather than as term with an emphatic value. By contrast, a search for the occurrences of the verb šarāqu in the same CAD volume (see Š/ii 53) yields several examples from across different periods where šarāqu and nadānu/tadānu are combined. These are mainly related to legal procedures, although it should be noted that in most of them the two words do not assume the same grammatical form, as is the case with our pair of statives. In addition, they can be classified into three sub-groups, based on the meaning of nadānu/ tadānu: steal–pay, 16 steal–give, 17 and steal–sell. 18 Representing precisely the last semantic pair (steal–sell), there occurs in the dictionary an instance of šariq tadin employed as a coordinated asyndeton of two statives. The text in question coincides in time and language (Neo-Assyrian) with our tablet K.2673, occurring in a Neo-Assyrian letter from Kalḫu: 19 haṭṭu tupninnu kanūn parzilli asallu erî ša ekalli šarqū ina kaspi tadnū

(The Baker) said: a staff, a box, an iron brazier and one copper bowl belonging to the palace were stolen and sold (lit., given for silver).

The reading šariq would not be unlikely, considering the account provided by this text about the looting of the palace. Nor is it something new with regard to the cultural context that seals could go missing 20 or that — as shown by relevant certificates — their loss was a grave matter. 21 15.  Written in archaizing Old Babylonian monumental writing and found in Nippur, related to land transactions granted by the king’s command to Nuska–ibni. 16.  These are the OB cases: CH 259: 12 and CH 260: 18 in which it is declared that after having stolen X, Y must be paid as a compensation; or the NA cases SAA 5: 67 n.44 = Rm 165 (ADD 161), SAA 5: 69 n. 45 = BT 140 (Iraq 25 Pl. 6), and the Hittite MIO 1 118: 31. Bogh. Treaty, cf. reciprocal situation ibid. 35. 17.  In OA we find ICK 1 103: 7 and Larsen 1976: 182 n. 67. 18.  ARM 14 51: 7 cf. ibid. 32 (from Yaqqim Addu, end of the reign of Zimri–Lim), HSS 14 21: 5 (MB), ABL 967: 5 (NA). 19.  Published by Saggs in 1952 in the texts of Nimrud with further corrections in CTN 5: 232 = ND 2703 and more recently in SAA 19, 114 with the inclusion of AN.BAR. 20.  These are the cases of BM 117666 ( JRAS 1926, 443) where the king orders Ninurta–šarru–uṣur, Nabû–nādin–šumi and Marduk–ēṭir to look for a seal of Ea whose whereabouts were unknown and proposes to search in shrines, temples and even between the stones, lū ina libbi NA4.MEŠ bu’’âma (21–22, ref. courtesy Yuval Levavi). 21.  Hallo 1977: 55, SEpM14 in Kleinerman 2011: 154, Charpin 2010: 85 and Klengel 1968: 216–219.

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We even find further confirmation in an OB attestation where a certain Sîn–mušallim bought back his father’s seal from a merchant in exchange for silver (van Koppen 2002: 148–15, 22 Harris 1975: 67, 358), thus confirming transactions of buying and selling of valuable cylinder seals. Given these reflections, my proposed translation for the tablet is the following: Obv.  1 Tukulti–Ninurta (I), king of totality, son of Shalmaneser, King of Assyria. Booty of Kardu(niaš). Whoever alters my inscription (and) my name, May Aššur (the god) and Adad make his name disappear from the land! From Assyria to Akkad was this seal stolen (and) sold.  5 I, Sennacherib, King of Assyria, 600 years later I conquered Babylon and from the property of Babylon I have recovered it (the seal). Property of Šagaraktišuriaš, king of totality. Tukulti–Ninurta (I) king of the totality, son of Shalmaneser, King of Assyria. 10 Booty of Karduniaš. Whoever alters my inscription and my name May Aššur and Adad make disappear his name from the land! Property of Šagaraktišuriaš, king of the totality. (This is) was what was (written) on the seal of lapis lazuli. We cannot go further unless new material comes to light. I would like to conclude by adding two more remarks about the event, in favour of the suggested reinterpretation of line 4. First, from my point of view, there is no need to seek complexity, irony, euphemism or metaphor when the Akkadian offers the possibility of a straightforward interpretation that makes sense in terms of historical reality. Second, when we bear in mind the historical circumstances outlined at the beginning of the article, it will be noticed that the political interaction of both powers involved, Assyria and Babylonia, was still quite turbulent from Tukulti–Ninurta’s reign onwards. Specifically, looking at the biased account of the Synchronistic History (Glassner 2004: 176–183), with its markedly pro-Assyrian character, we are told that from Tukulti–Ninurta (I) to Aššur–bel–kala (1073–1056 BC) Assyria and Babylonia went through a series of strenuous conflicts. The peaceful and diplomatic phase did not arrive until much later, when a policy for the voluntary return of goods to Babylonia was achieved. Such is the case of the Marduk statue, also removed in Tukulti–Ninurta’s looting and returned to Babylonia at a later not very well established point, abducted a second time and then returned again to Babylonia in the time of Adad–nerari III (ABC IV 28) or Aššurbanipal (Galter 2007: 533, Bartelmus and Schmitt 2014: 88). 23 What is more, there was no intention of hiding bad relationships in the international correspondence. 24 22.  1 GÍN KÙ.BABBAR Sîn mušallim ana DAM?.GÀR iddin-ma, NA4.KIŠIB šumi ša abišu ipṭur-ma (BM 78356 Obv.12–14). 23.  In all of these cases the action is described with the verb nadānum. 24.  See for example, the letter from the Hittite king to an Assyrian king whose name is lost (KUB 23.102 obv., 9′–18′): ‘For what reason should I write to you about brotherhood? Were perhaps you and

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To conclude, I would like to point out that Sennacherib’s Babylonian policy came to an end with the demolition of the city as a historical reminiscence of the city’s destruction during Tukulti–Ninurta’s reign in the previous millennium — an event that played a very important role in the identity construction process of ‘Assyrianness’. In this context, the concept of the theft would fit perfectly with the propaganda that underlies the Assyrian royal inscriptions from the perspective of the central state ideology (Liverani 2001: 25). 25 The theft narrative would bestow a great amount of glory and prestige to the monarch, who was able to recover such a precious and symbolic object, evocative of the power that Assyria exercised over Babylonia in times past. I born of the same mother? As [my father] and my father’s father did not write to the king of Assyria [about brotherhood], so you are not to write to me about [. . .]’ (Harrak 1987: 77, Mora and Giorgieri 2004: 185–194). 25.  By which the different kings would offer a biased version of the events and behaviour of their own country to the inner audience, different from the one they would make known to the international sphere.

References Armstrong, J. 1982 Nations before nationalism, Ph.D. Diss. University of North Carolina. Bartelmus, A., and Schmitt, A. 2014 Beutestücke aus Babylonien in Assyrien. ZA 104/1: 74–90. Brinkman, J. A. 1977 Appendix: Mesopotamian Chronology of the Historical Period. Pp. 335–348 in Ancient Mesopotamia: Portrait of a Dead Civilization, L.A. Oppenheim. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1976 Materials and Studies for Kassite History Vol.1. A catalogue of cuneiform Sources pertaining to specific Monarchs of the Kassite Dynasty. Chicago: The Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago. Chamaza, V. 2002 Die Omnipotenz Aššurs: Entwicklungen in der Aššur-Theologie unter den Sargoniden, Sargon II., Sanherib und Asarhaddon. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. Charpin, D. 2010 Reading and Writing in Babylon. Cambridge (MA): Harvard University Press. Chicago Assyrian Dictionary 1992 Vol. Š/ii. Eds. Brinkman et alii. Oriental Institute of Chicago. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1992 Vol. Š/iii Eds. Brinkman et alii. Oriental Institute of Chicago. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Delitzsch, F. 1903 Assur. MDOG 20: 30–42. Frahm, E. 2014 Family Matters: Psychohistorical Reflections on Sennacherib and his times. Pp.  164–222 in Sennacherib at the Gates of Jerusalem: Story, History and Historiography, ed. I. Kalimi and S. Richardson. Leiden and Boston: Brill. 1997 Einleitung in die Sanherib-Inschriften. AfO Beiheft 26. Vienna: Institut für Orientalistik der Universität Wien. Galter, H. D. 2007 Looking down the Tigris: The interrelations between Assyria and Babylonia. Pp. 527–540 in The Babylonian World, ed. G. Leick. New York and London: Routledge.

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Glassner, J. J. 2004 Mesopotamian Chronicles. Writings from the Ancient World 19. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature. Grayson, A. K. 1987 Assyrian Rulers of the Third and Second Millennia BC (to 1115 BC). RIMA 1. Toronto-Buffalo-London: University of Toronto Press. 1972 Assyrian Royal Inscriptions I. Records of the Ancient Near East. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz. Grayson, A. K. and Novotny, J. 2014 Royal Inscriptions of Sennacherib, King of Assyria (704–681 BC), Part 2. RINAP 3/2. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Hallo, W. W. 1977 Seals lost and found. Pp. 55–60 in Seals and Sealing in the Ancient Near East, eds. M. Gibson and R. Biggs. BiMes 6. Malibu: Undena Publications. Harrak, A. 1987 Assyria and Hanigalbat: A Historical Reconstruction of the Bilateral Relations from the Middle Euphrates of the Fourteenth to the End of Twelfth Centuries B.C. Texte und Studien zur Orientalistik Band 4. Hildesheim-Zurich-New York: Georg Olms Verlag. Harris, R. 1975 Ancient Sippar. A Demographic Study of an Old-Babylonian City (1894–1592 BC). PIHANS 36. Istanbul: Nederlands historisch-archaeologisch instituut te Istanbul. Hinke, W. J. 1907 A New Boundary Stone of Nebuchadrezzar I. BER 4. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania. King, L. W. 1902 The Annals of the Kings of Assyria. London: Harrison and sons. Kleinerman, A. 2011 Education in Early Second Millennium Babylonia. The Sumerian Epistolary Miscellany. CM 42. Leiden-Boston: Brill. Klengel, H. 1968 Ein Altababylonische Verlustanzeige. OrNS 37: 216–219. Lambert, W. G. 1960 Babylonian Wisdom Literature. Oxford University Press: Oxford. Levine, B. A. 2005 Assyrian Ideology and Israelite Monotheism. Iraq 67/1.2: 411–427. Liverani, M. 2001 International Relations in the Ancient Near East, 1600–1100 BC. Studies in Diplomacy. Hampshire: Palgrave. Luckenbill, D. D. 1924 The Annals of Sennacherib. Oriental Institute Publications II. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. 1927 Ancient Records of Assyria and Babylonia I. Ancient Records. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Lukko, M. 2012 The Correspondence of Tiglath–Pileser III and Sargon II from Calah/Nimrud. State Archives of Assyria XIX. The Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns. Mora, C. and Giorgieri, M. 2004 La lettere tra i re ititti e i re assiri ritrovate a Hattuša. Padova: S.a.r.g.o.n. Editrice e Libreria. Paulus, S. 2014 Die babylonischen Kudurru-Inschriften von der kassitischen bis zur frühneubabylonischen Zeit. AOAT 51. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag.

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Peiser, F. E. 1905 Review of King, L.W. Records of the Reign of Tukulti-Ninib. OLZ 8: 95–100. Postgate, J. N. 1997 Middle Assyrian to Neo-Assyrian the Nature of the shift. Pp. 159–168 in Assyrien im Wandel der Zeiten (XXXIX RAI), eds. H. Waetzoldt and H. Hauptmann. Heidelberger Studien zum Alten Orient Band 6. Heidelberg: Heidelberger Orientverlag. Radner, K. 2005 Die Macht des Namens, Altorientalische Strategien zur Selbsterhaltung. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz Verlag. Saggs, H. W. F. 2001 The Nimrud Letters 1952. Cuneiform Texts from Nimrud V. London: British School of Archaeology in Iraq. van Koppen, F. 2002 Redeeming a Father’s Seal. Pp.147–175 in Mining the Archives Fs. C. Walker, ed. C. Wunsch. Dresden: Islet. Watanabe, K. 1985 Die Siegelung der “Vasallenverträge Asarhaddons” durch den Gott Aššur. BaM 16: 377–392. Weidner, E. F. 1939 Studien zur Zeitgeschichte Tukulti-Ninurtas I. AfO 13: 109–124. 1959 Die Inschritften Tukulti-Ninurtas I. und seiner Nachfolger. AfO Beiheft 12: Graz. Winckler, H. 1905 Zur babylonisch-assyrischen Geschichte. AoF 2/3: 321–359. Wiseman, D. J. 1958 The Vassal-Treaties of Esarhaddon. Iraq 20: 1–99 & plates.

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Are We Any Closer to Establishing How Many Sumerians per Hectare? Recent Approaches to Understanding the Spatial Dynamics of Populations in Ancient Mesopotamian Cities Carlo Colantoni Introduction This paper is a short discussion concerning the estimation of population numbers in ancient Near Eastern settlements. It focuses on the potential that varied recent studies, approaches and applied techniques offer for a better understanding of urban population dynamics: its characteristics, extent, fabric and wider influence on the landscape. As a reference point for this discussion concerning population and urbanism I have taken Nicholas Postgate’s perspicacious 1994 paper How many Sumerians per hectare? Probing the anatomy of an early city: a wide-ranging and thoughtful discussion of the problems encountered when attempts are made to repopulate the social landscape. Postgate (1994: 64) proposed that to reach a more accurate estimate of population it is necessary to question household size and composition, the range of activities and densities of living within a single household, and within a city as a whole. The usual means of calculating settlement populations are founded on relatively simple equations. They fall broadly into two closely related methods. One estimates the total area of residential space in the built environment of a settlement as a proportion of total space per hectare (as opposed to public architecture or shared open space) and then multiplying this base number by a density coefficient based on ethnographic research and textual studies, typically legal inheritance documents, to reach a population density per hectare. A complementary method uses an established average number of people per household. The number of houses per hectare is calculated and this is then multiplied by a culturally specific number of inhabitants per household. In both cases only occupation areas that are considered to be contemporaneous are employed. Thus an approximation is generated. As is clear from these methods, there are many potential variables that may have been miscalculated. They range from the total area of the settlement, the area occupied at any one given time, the number of people in an average household, the amount of dwelling space, and what proportion of the inhabitants lived in nondomestic settings (’institutional residents’, Rees et al. 2004), to whether the sample — usually an excavated area- is representative in character and density to the whole settlement (Postgate 1994: 48; cf. Zorn 1994: 33). When all these variables and possible pitfalls are taken into account a valid question to ask is why attempt it? 95

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Population numbers -how many inhabitants did an urban settlement have?- are a complex proposition. Demographic estimates literally do re-populate ancient space, allowing a better understanding of many of the demands and outcomes of a society. Social pressures affect political, economic and spatial behaviour: communities interact and structure their built environment in different ways; mouths to feed result in food distribution networks and sustaining areas for settlements; religious or administrative institutions require people and resources; economic production and the demand for materials, exchange and trade shape the wider urban landscape. Establishing the size, growth and distribution of an ancient society’s urban population is viewed as one of the fundamental building blocks for understanding societal dynamics and reconstructing early cities and cultures (Zorn 1994; Postgate 1994; Thompson 2004). Gauging the population is deemed important in the interpretation of site function, the socio-political integration with and influence on the surrounding region, as well as forming a basic element in the examination of past economic organisation: production, consumption and land use patterns (Sumner 1989: 631; Kardulias 1992: 276; Whitelaw 2004:153). Population estimates are also valuable for our understanding of the nature of urbanism, family and neighbourhood organisation, occupation densities and how these factors reflect and mould a sense of urban space. The following brief overview will first focus on problems related to population and spatially defining urban settlements, and then turn to recent approaches and the insights they provide to improve our understanding of ancient urbanism and its inhabitants. Settlement population will be approached on three basic scales: household, settlement and wider landscape.

Investigating Population Numbers and the Nature of Urban Environments The problem of determining population numbers is not restricted to studies of past societies. Modern populations are recorded by census — a survey of residents- and correct recording is fraught with problems. There are difficulties defining permanent, semi-permanent and temporary residents (e.g., seasonal workers); the homeless; determining the fluctuations in the numbers of individuals according to seasons or migration; and establishing the full extent of urban areas due to urban sprawl and shanty towns (see Lebon 1953: 223–224; cf. Pasciuti and Chase-Dunn 2002; cf. Rees et al. 2004; Department of Economic and Social Affairs 2010; Lan­ zieri 2013). These modern population dynamics also apply to ancient populations. So, if we have problems in the present calculating the population of households, how can realistic estimations of population numbers be made for antiquity? In the estimation of population in Near Eastern archaeology uniform density standards are used, but these standards can often be subjective and, unless in a framework of equal comparison, may cause fairly significant variations in numbers (cf. Zorn 1994: Table 1 for a summary of various authors’ population estimates). Many recent studies are based on the ubiquitously cited work of Naroll (1963) who estimated a coefficient of 10m2 per person of dwelling space, although McClellan (1997: 45) argues that ethnographic studies display great variation. Højlund’s (1989: 56) account of how various population estimates of Qala’at al-Bahrain range from 1875 to 8000 inhabitants highlights this problem.

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For Southern Mesopotamia Adams (1981: 69, 349), after previous fluctuations (Adams 1965: 123; Adams and Nissen 1972: 29–30), settled on a standard of 125 persons per hectare, whilst Stein and Wattenmaker (1990: 13) advocate population densities of ca. 100 persons per hectare for rural and ca. 60 persons per hectare for urban sites. This mirrors Weiss’ (1986: 95–6) opinion, in relation to work at the site of Tell Leilan, that only 40–60% of built-up city mound areas were comprised of residential structures, or around 60% of 100 persons per hectare. At Tell al-Raqa’i Schwartz and Klucas (1998: 200) applied a figure of 100–200 persons per hectare using a coefficient of 1 person per 6 m2 of roofed space. For the city of Ugarit, Garr (1987) used epigraphic (property lists) and archaeological data to estimate the population at the end of the Late Bronze Age. He calculated that the urban spatial use was 72.5% residential (containing 47.9% enclosed living space) and public/monumental use made up the remaining 27.5%. Garr used a base of 5.25 persons per household (a number excluding servants and presumably any other hard to identify individuals) and a range of population coefficients resulting in a potential population of between 2,200 and 13,780 souls. Whilst at Early Dynastic-Ur III Abu Salabikh, Postgate (1994: 61–62) proposed that population density is unlikely to be uniform across a site, settling on 4–7m2 per person of roofed space and a total population ranging between 3,794 and 18,437. Frankfort (1950) estimated that 3rd millennium BC Mesopotamian cities possessed 20 houses per acre, at 200 m2 per house for a total of 120–200 people per acre, compared to contemporary data from Aleppo and Damascus with densities of 160 per acre. Henry Wright (2013) has used population per inhabited hectare density averages as a basis to calculate entire populations of regional survey areas in Iran in the fourth millennium BC. As we can see from the range of population estimates, potential urban densities and variable house occupancy rates, the evaluation of ancient populations is an inexact science. The range of possible results is wide enough as to render them the appearance of educated guesses. An avenue of investigation that may help refine this variability is one that examines the nature of the built environment as a means of judging not only the size and character of a settlement, but also the demands and constraints faced by ancient urban communities.

Defining Settlements Estimating the correct size of an ancient settlement is problematic. Natural processes such as erosion may remove parts of a site, whilst alluvial deposits may partially or fully obscure sites. This is an occurrence effecting entire small sites in Mesopotamia’s southern alluvium. The fringes of larger sites may lie under thick deposits of eroded wash off: concealing site edges, suburbs and activity areas. Human processes include the ploughing away of sites by modern agricultural practices and damage caused by construction projects (cf. Skuldbøl and Colantoni, 2014). In the case of Abu Salabikh, the site edges are hidden by alluvial deposits that may double the size of the settlement to around 50 hectares (Postgate 1994: 49). The city proper was still bound by the Early Dynastic city wall, but the expanse of archaeological material — trash dumping and activity areas, as well as possible dwellings — extend well beyond this boundary. A similar phenomenon was identified by the Garbage Project Survey at Tell Brak where test coring and soundings suggest a looser, less densely constructed later third millennium BC Outer Town

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with evidence implying common and widespread trash dumping and craft activities (Skuldbøl, Hald and McMahon, in prep.; Colantoni 2012: 54). Many forms of spatial use and population types (e.g., low density, seasonal and nomadic) are hard to define. Likewise, evidence of extra-mural urban sprawl (Smith 2010b; Meyer 2010; see Ur et al. 2011, Skuldbøl and Colantoni 2016) suggests that city walls or the edges of mounds are not reliable indicators of settlement limits. Settlements may also be transformed in size, density and nature with areas considered to be out-lying suburbs or satellite settlements. Areas of this type forming part of the settlement corona around Tell Brak are now thought to be a combination of residential, industrial zones and a burial site, Tell Majnouna (cf. Oates et al. 2007; McMahon et al. 2011; Ur et al. 2011; Skuldbøl, Hald and McMahon, in prep.).

Contemporaneity Attempts to estimate the extent of occupation in settlements must take into consideration the problem of chronological control necessary to establish duration of occupation and its contemporaneity (Paine 2005: 978; Postgate 1994: 50). This fundamental factor acts on two basic archaeological investigative scales. Firstly, the ceramic assemblages collected by surface survey used to date unexcavated areas of a settlement and secondly, those employed to determine whether separate areas or individual structures were contemporaneous (Whitelaw 2004: 150). In fact, how much of any one site was in use at the same time? Apart from the question of whether structures identified as houses were in fact wholly residential, which of them are contemporary and what proportion of the built environment were, either permanently or episodically, disused rooms or buildings? Which shifted function or role? Abandoned properties and abandoned parts of properties can be extremely problematic to distinguish in archaeological record from usual post-occupation abandonment (cf. Sumner 1979: 171; cf. Keith 1999: 75; cf. Baker 2009). Aurenche and Desfarges (1982) point out that village analyses have shown that not all structures were occupied contemporaneously. In addition, assumptions of how much of a dwelling was in use during each phase of occupation and which functional areas were in use at any given time can be unreliable: fine-grained analysis of excavated architecture is required (cf. Postgate 1994: 50). At Abu Salabikh the excavators found it difficult to reliably make contemporary occupation floors contiguous (Postgate 1994: 59). An example of a fine-grained investigation was the deconstruction the Old Babylonian period architectural phases of a residential neighbourhood (Areas BD/G) at Chagar Bazar. The results were a clearer comprehension of building biographies, contemporaneity of occupation, and the shifting roles of individual spaces within the phases of occupation (Colantoni 2005; McMahon et al. 2009).

Population density and the organisation of space There are many complex and interdependent factors that can affect population density in settlements. These range from social factors -such as family size, the numbers of co-residents, and societal customs of demarcation and segregation- to physical factors that include: topography, the division of available residential and shared space, and boundaries created by defensive

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walls and field systems (cf. Pasciuti and Chase-Dunn 2002; Paine 2005: 978; Baker forthcoming). Fluctuating or textually invisible populations, notably nomadic or non-permanent populations and dependents such as servants, are hard to factor into calculations (cf. Baker forthcoming). Internal densities will vary from settlement to settlement. There are many possible reasons for the differences in the density of inhabitation. Arrangement of built spaces hinges upon the influences of unwritten social codes and local spatial customs. It is important to appreciate cultural differences in spatial use and the repercussions this has on the way built environment is patterned — how residential space is used and the number of potential members of a household. Areas of occupation variability within settlements and their peripheries may be the result of differences in status, wealth, household production or length of time that the area was occupied (cf. Henrickson 1981: 76; Kramer 1982: 136). Urban environments are usually assumed to have been densely built. However, this assumption is being challenged by recent observations in the Near East and by studies in other geographical regions, such as Isendahl and Smith’s (2013) analyses of the looser, clustered residential patterning within urban settings at Aztec and Maya agricultural cities. The fact that urban space in Mesopotamia was an uneven quilt work of residential, public, open, communicative and production spaces with varied functions has long been recognised. Postgate (1992: 78) points out that it is a ‘mistake to conceive of the average Mesopotamian city as an unbroken expanse of homogeneous housing neatly filling the space between the city walls and clustered round a central temple or palace.” Recent investigations employing satellite imagery and geophysical studies are providing detailed insights into these variables. Examples are discussed below. In certain cases there is evidence of complex social and spatial arrangements from which population complexities may be inferred. Certain areas in settlements may only have been used at certain times of the year. These may include empty areas within settlements and exterior areas adjacent to settlements, such as nomads’ seasonal camping and non-permanent squatters. An interesting case is that of the lower ‘town’ at the Iron Age Urartian fortress of Kef Kalesi (Alicevas) in eastern Turkey (Öğün 1967), where a citadel overlooks a walled lower town that displays little evidence of having contained more than a few permanent structures. It may have served the role as a refuge in times of stress for the local surrounding settlements or have been involved in complex transhumant pastoral systems. Yet on face value, it would suggest a substantial settlement. A similar phenomenon can be seen with the Southern Extension (Khirbat al-Fakhar) at Hamoukar, which has a looser density deemed ‘proto-urban’ in character (Al Quntar et al. 2011). Inhabited areas may also be outside of the perceived edges of settlements and therefore not as obvious on first inspection: lower towns, extra-mural production areas, areas built of perishable materials, seasonally occupied or with loose urban sprawl. These variations in population densities, such as Tell Brak and Hamoukar with their differences in outlying satellites and looser lower towns, can considerably alter population calculations. Settlements may also differ in population distribution due to a distinct urban fabric: for example, Tell Brak during the Akkadian period was dominated by large ceremonial complexes (Colantoni 2012: 55; Oates et al. 2001; cf. Weiss 1986, above). In addition, areas of ‘disposal and deposition’ pattern the density and use of space within and outside of settlements: trash dumping areas and extra-mural, but not extra-community, burial areas (e.g., Tell Majnouna).

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Assumptions also underpin the interpretation of the density and population numbers of ancient Near Eastern settlements. Ancient cities with substantial and abundant public architecture did not necessarily require the assumed large populations with which to undertake these projects. Webster and Kirker’s (1995) study of the number of inhabitants required for the monumental structures in Maya cities concluded that far fewer workers than expected were necessary.

The Analysis of Urban Space: Arrangement and Density A difficult trait to establish is the conceptual one of the nature of urban living and its resulting spatial use. In essence, what it is to ‘be’ urban rather than rural, and the implications for density, household numbers and the use, structuring and sharing of space within larger settlements. Urban living may presumably have differences in density and numbers per household, yet in ancient contexts rural practices underpinned the society with livestock penning, food processing and storage within urban boundaries distorting the picture (cf. Sumner 1979: 171–172). Settlements consist of complex spatial use with an interplay of built space and open space. There are a wide variety of spatial types and functions. These can include built spaces (houselots and commercial, institutional and non-private structures) and non-built spaces (cf. Baker 2009, 2010). These comprise of intramural gardens, activity and penning areas, unwalled courtyards, empty plots, communicative space (alleyways, streets and processional avenues), communal areas like open ‘squares’, and abandoned areas, trash dumping areas and patches of waste ground: the ‘spaces beyond buildings’ (Hutson et al. 2007) or ‘marginalised space’ (Stanley et al. 2012) that serve as multifunctional areas. The use of space in settlements is complicated, the various forms are hard to identify and, on a settlement level, each case unique. Socio-cultural factors like private:public space, boundaries, liminal space and transitional zones add another psychological layer to our interpretation of spatial constraints and use. In addition to these divisions, it is worth noting that the built environment also has a basic division between permanent structures and non-permanent or temporary structures. These leave negligible archaeological traces as they are often made of perishable materials or are movable. This can complicate the estimation of household numbers with the potential for an overspill of living space into courtyards and activity areas, a situation discussed by Postgate (2013) with regard to evidence at Kilise Tepe in Turkey for non-permanent structures in open forecourts and their role, visible in ethnographic observations, as extended living and activity space. Space in the built environment, whether roofed, unroofed, open, private or public, communal or circumscribed rarely possesses a single function or role; the norm is for multiple roles and temporally shifting periodic and seasonal use and even abandonment (Kramer 1982: 119; Rapoport 1990). Determining the functions of rooms and spaces is vital to understanding occupancy rates and practices. Room functions may be determined by a variety of methods including the correlation of certain artefact types and architectural features with possible activities undertaken in certain spaces. For example, hearths in food preparation areas or exterior courtyards, evidence of commensural practices and the analysis of domestic ceramic assemblages

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that may infer social practices and household composition (Kramer 1979: 159; Postgate 1994: 60; Colantoni and Ur 2011; Ur and Colantoni 2010; McMahon et al. 2009: 161–192). The use of subsurface sampling methods (e.g., micromorphology, microartifact studies, paleoethnobotany and soil chemistry) can assist in discerning surface usage patterns and the functions of rooms and open spaces within houses and activity areas (Kramer 1996; Postgate 1994; Cessford 2003; McMahon et al. 2005; Hutson et al. 2007: 448–449). The spatial organization of a settlement may also be influenced by generative factors, such as cultural practices and social organization, which affect visible spatial patterns in the built environment and shared space (cf. Hillier and Hanson 1984; Colantoni 2005: 42–3). The dialectic between socio-cultural factors, urban form and local economy in the generative process is responsible for culturally specific urban spatial use, patterning and of course, population densities. To a certain extent settlements are formulated according to the inhabitants’ concepts and traditions (Frankfort 1950; Colantoni 2005). Cultural rules and social relationships (such as kinship) have an impact on the organization of space and the location and aggregation of buildings (Anthony 2014: 36; Smith 2010b: 235). The general underlying principle is that people will spatially demarcate their built environment in the manner that they segment their culture, i.e. into areas of social interaction (cf. McClellan 1997; cf. Stone 1999: 211). Variables may also affect proximity and kinship-based collaboration (e.g., household economic units), the sharing of communal space, the density of housing and number of household occupants. Stone’s (1981) work on Old Babylonian Nippur describes neighbourhoods inhabited by groups with close family ties that dominated the division of households and the manipulation of their immediate urban space. Other subtle socio-cultural peculiarities can also constrain and direct spatial development. A case in point, are omen texts that state how houses encroaching on streets (shared public space) would suffer dire consequences (Frankfort 1950:111). On a quantitative level, the visible patterning of the built environment can act as a foundation for comparisons. The proportions of spatial use — roofed, unroofed, open and communicative (as well as identifiable functions of this space)- in a house and its immediate residential area can be viewed as a basic signature specific to local concepts of urbanism and as inherent traits in the way people employed space and felt comfortable in the spatial proportions, boundaries and use of their built environments (Colantoni 2005). People tend to replicate their patterns of spatial use and organisation, and regions and cultures produce different patterning. Thus behaviour can result in the generation of distinct forms and configurations in the built environment: in the way houses are placed, neighbourhoods form and space is used (see Keith 1999:10–12; Colantoni 2005).

Urban Planning Versus ad hoc Development Written into a settlement’s ‘palimpsest’ may be traces of spatial organisation imposed at a community or even supra communal level. Evidence of spatial ordering rather than a purely organic arrangement may be a characteristic deriving from a higher political authority. A possible case may be the spatial intentionality of Old Babylonian Haradum on the Euphrates (Kepinski-Lecompte 1992, 1996). At Titris Höyük the excavators believe that there is evidence for a level of urban planning (Matney et al. 1997: 70). Whether organised by a higher author-

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ity, standardised patterns of accepted spatial use or by commonalities and loose patterns that emerge due to a culturally shared sense of ordering space, the underlying reasons for a settlement’s spatial arrangement cannot be determined without textual evidence. The ownership of land as house lots, including unbuilt privately owned plots, are known from textual sources to have existed within Southern Mesopotamian cities (Postgate 1992; Koshurnikov 1993; Keith 1999: 73; see Hutson et al. 2007 for Maya examples; and Baker 2009). Plots are archaeologically visible at a number of sites in Mesopotamia. Frankfort (1950: 109) recognized the importance in the structuring of urban space by the ownership of house plots in the Larsa period residential housing at Ur. Pfälzner views the concept of ‘Parzellenhäuser’ and the accompanying allotment houses to have occurred at many northern Mesopotamian sites in the 3rd millennium BC, including Tell Chuera, Tell Bderi, Tell Melebiya, Tell Taya, Tell Selenkahiye and Tell Halawa (Dohmann-Pfälzner and Pfälzner 1996: 3–4; Pfälzner 2001: 396–7, 2012). Similar patterns of plot demarcation, and possible correlations in plot sizes, have been argued for in the late 3rd millennium BC at Hamoukar and in the Old Babylonian period at Chagar Bazar and Hamad Aga as-Sagir (Colantoni 2005: 205, 59, 106–7; Colantoni and Ur 2011: 36). Plot boundaries often remained stable due to property rights (Diakonoff 1996) and concomitant spatial constraints as each plot or ‘block in the urban fabric’ affected those surrounding it. Factors like plot sizes assist in determining possible residential density patterns.

Residential Space: The House Houses may exhibit variations according to period, location and the composition of the social unit occupying it: the number of members, economic basis and status, social relationships and kinship relations in the wider community. To correlate a house with the number of inhabitants two steps need to be taken (Postgate 1994: 56). Firstly, the average number of persons per household. These estimates come from a number of ethnographic studies and from textual sources recounting the division of households. Secondly, the average number of houses per hectare. This relates to not only the quantity of the built environment occupied by residential space but also the types of houses themselves (the form of family unit) and the inclusion of storage and activity areas within urban space. Household size reflects complex social dynamics and can be divided on a basic level into nuclear and extended family units (Postgate 1992: 91–94; Diakonoff 1996; Stone 1996). It is thought to be a factor in both determining and generating house proportions (cf. Baker forthcoming). Nuclear families are thought to have smaller houses (Henrickson 1981: 51–56). These smaller households are believed to require a ‘suite’ of spaces: reception rooms, kitchen and a courtyard, that are multiplied and archaeologically identifiable in extended family households (Kramer 1979, 1982: 119; Stone 1981: 29, 31; Kamp 2000; Baker forthcoming). The issue of coresidence in a single house or household may be distinguishable through the identification of these separate living units or suites. Suites complement the evidence from texts for the subdivision of inherited houses by family members (Stone 1981, 1987, 1996; Diakonoff 1996: 56–57; Baker forthcoming). Larger, multi-roomed central-space houses — such as 3rd millennium BC examples at Tell Chuera, Tell Melebiya and Hamoukar (Moortgat-Correns 1983; Lebeau 1993, 1996; Colantoni and Ur 2011)- appear more suited to this requirement of multiple suites for

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extended family units. Identifying the house form and functions of its related spaces may make it easier to predict the likely number of members per typical house within a community. Determining household boundaries, including courtyards and house plots, and their relationship with undefined open areas and spaces shared by the community may lead to a clearer comprehension of the density of residential units in settlements and predictable patterns of spatial use in residential areas. This may allow the extrapolation of more refined population numbers. A possible indicator of household wealth and a perennial problem for determining household sizes are the existence or non-existence of second storeys. They are known from modern ethnographic village studies (Sumner 1989: 632) and from the archaeological record and iconography (see Pfälzner 2012). Precise identification during excavation requires a micro-analysis of the architecture itself, such as whether there are indicators of sufficient structural strength to carry the load of a second story or even the remnants of a staircase. Spatial constraints like plot maintenance may influence their use. As Kramer (1982: 134) perceptively pointed out, the use of a second storey may have been the result of small compound sizes with limited available ground floor space requiring that expansion was only possible upwards to preserve courtyard space. Research, as previously mentioned, is being undertaken to investigate the role of trash deposits in urban and extra-mural locations and the factors that may influence practices linked with the abandonment of urban space, activity area locations and intra-settlement density patterns (Keith 1999: 75; Skuldbøl, Hald & McMahon in prep.; for studies in contemporary Mexico, see Hutson et al. 2007). Discard practices such as the dumping of refuse into adjacent house plots and over courtyard walls, can infer abandonment, unbuilt lots or areas of common wasteland. Real estate documents mention waste ground being sold within cities (Postgate 1994: 55). The practice of trash dumping occurs in residential environments: close to houses and at edges of activity areas, for example the ‘Temple Ash-Tip’ rubbish deposit area at Abu Salabikh (Postgate 1994), at the periphery of settlements and as larger dumping processes taking place outside of settlements (Hutson et al. 2007: 452–3; Postgate 1994: 49, 54: Skuldbøl, Hald & McMahon in prep.).

Complementary Methods Studies employing systematic surface and ceramic density collections, geophysical survey techniques, and remote sensing analyses have shed light on the internal dynamics of ancient settlements.

Rise in Remote Sensing Remote sensing is a tool for spatial and temporal investigations. It includes both aerial photographs and satellite imagery. The use of aerial photography in Near Eastern archaeology dates back to at least 1919 (Wilkinson 2003: 35). Aerial photography from aeroplanes has been supplemented in archaeology by the use of kite photography, for example at Mashkan-shapir (Tell Abu Duwari) where this method was employed to map the site (Stone and Zimansky 1992, 1994), and the recent emer-

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gence of the use of aerial drones (UAVs). Drone imagery offers the potential of a cost-effective, real-time, targeted and high-resolution tool to investigate sites in the landscape, their internal dynamics (architecture and internal spatial use) and to monitor site damage (FernándezHernandez et al. 2014; Skuldbøl and Colantoni 2014). However, the most profound improvement in analytical resources has been the relatively recent growth in the access to commercially available multi-spectrum and high-resolution orbital observation satellite imagery capable of investigating an array of geological and landscape properties. This has stimulated the discipline of landscape analysis in the region (for a discussion, see Wilkinson 2003: 35–7). In the case of CORONA imagery of the 1960s and 70s past satellite-based intelligence can provide information into preserved relic landscapes that existed before modern changes (Ur 2013: 35). This new data resource has furnished invaluable and impressive insights for identification of settlement and their physical extent, landscape features (like irrigation networks, major canal systems and ancient paths of movement) and past landuse patterns (Altaweel 2005; Scardozzi 2011; Ur et al. 2013).

Settlement Space: Recognising Segregation and Variability in Urban Density Relevant to population studies are potential insights into the internal spatial dynamics of Mesopotamian settlements and their repercussions for the understanding of differentiation in urban densities. Open or communicative space within a community will vary according to type of settlement, socio-economic and cultural practices. The demarcation of shared space, such as alleys and large activity areas, by a higher authority or established societal practices has been recognised in studies (see above). Evidence of town planning or at least generative principles created by the specific society is visible, for example at Haradum, in the internal organization at Tell Chuera and of some Neo-Assyrian cities (see below), and at a number of sites with plot divisions. Open space within settlements may be multi-role activity areas, craft, production and processing areas.

Probing the Anatomy: Revealing the Inner Dynamics of Settlements The use of combined methods of investigation are improving our understanding of the internal spatial dynamics of Near Eastern urban settlements. Satellite imagery offers possibilities for the recognition and disassembly of the internal anatomy of urban settlements, revealing the complexity of the urban built environment and differential densities that would have required extensive excavation. The analysis of these images has clarified not just the internal dynamics of the urban environment — areas of visibly higher density, streets and open areas- but also the wider settlement and its full extent. Visible features include circular walls and ditches, central mounds, lower towns and ‘urban sprawl’ on the fringes of the settlement. Multispectrum and CORONA imagery can also identifying the soil signature of anthrosols -areas of decayed and eroded mudbrick and in cases, underlying structures- and the extent of settlements (Wright et al. 2006–7: 9; Menze and Ur 2012; Ur 2013b: 13).

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In the case of Tell Baqrta in Northern Iraq, decayed mud brick structures appear as light areas in the imagery and make visible the sprawl of the lower town encircling the central mound and the probable spatial boundaries of the settlement (cf. Ur et al. 2013: 95, fig.3). Al Quntar et al. (2011: 172, fig. 16) applied this method in combination with sherd densities to estimate probable occupational areas in the predominantly topographically featureless 300 hectare Late Chalcolithic 1–2 Southern Extension of Hamoukar. CORONA imagery has furnished valuable insights into the anatomy of a number of Near Eastern settlements, for example the detailed images of Tell Rifaat in northwest Syria (Vergano 2014) and at Qasr Shemamok where surface finds and satellite image analysis suggest an industrial area to the north — adding a potential 30 hectares to the settlement (Ur et al. 2013: 100– 101, fig. 8). Another example is Jason Ur’s (2013: 32, fig. 7) examination of the Neo-Assyrian capital of Nimrud which has lead to the identification of broad avenues bisecting the city visible as dark linear features, tightly packed residential areas and isolated urban features such as temples and palaces (for multi-spectrum analyses, see Scardozzi 2011). His investigation also covered another Neo-Assyrian capital, Khorsabad, where he proposes the convincing argument that the lack of detail in the images may imply that the newly constructed capital was in fact a near-vacant city, never fully occupied after the death of its founder Sargon (Ur 2013: 32–33). Geophysical survey–including ground-penetrating radar, magnetometry and resistivity survey- in the Near East have produced impressive results. In many cases where these techniques have been utilised we see that spatial organization in an urban environment is a mixture of organic, circumscribed and managed growth. Recent studies allow us to view quarters, roads, gates, and open spaces. Summers and Summers (1998) delineated the internal structure of a large area of the Middle Iron Age Anatolian city of Kerkenes Dağ with the combined use of photographs taken from a hot air balloon and geomagnetic survey. The visually impressive magnetometry work at Tell Chuera has laid bare the internal organisation of an entire 80 hectare third millennium BC Kranzhügel city. Gates, radiating streets, residential and public quarters, as well as a central plaza have been revealed (Meyer 2010). Similarly, at Hamoukar geophysical survey clarifies the spatial structuring of a residential area (Reichel et al. 2012). Another informative example is the Deutschen Archäoligischen Instituts’ 2000–2001 geophysical survey of the western edge of the city of Uruk. The potential of this method is clear; the investigators report how the 9 km long city wall encloses an urban area of approximately 5.5km2, yet the total area of excavation is only 4.5% of the city area (Becker, van Ess and Fassbinder 2013: 355). Published magnetograms combined with satellite and aerial photographs clearly display discernable details of the anatomy of parts of the city: canals, visible walled compounds up against the inner face of city wall, a residential quarter with buildings — several phases of overlapping occupation can be made out–and open spaces and streets, including the main city gates with thoroughfares (Becker, van Ess and Fassbinder 2013: Abb. 62.3–6 and 62.9–10). Also, it is possible by targeting areas that have had ceramic surface collections to date to a certain extent the underlying buildings made visible by magnetometry. Attempts have been made to investigate and dissect entire cities by systematic surface collections: a basic method for identifying the extent of a settlement, potential density of occupation and the relationship between spatial and social organisation. The distribution of artifact classes representing visible indicators of industrial activities, wealth differentiation and admin-

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istrative functions can supply a clearer understanding of the physical dynamics of an urban settlement. Examples include, Stone and Zimansky’s (1992, 1994) work at Mashkan-shapir and Keith’s (1999) study of Old Babylonian Ur. In addition, various archaeological methods have furnished larger exposures of the anatomy of a settlement than traditional restricted vertical excavation methods. Surface scrapping and shallow excavation work have provided large-scale ground plans of houses, streets and open areas, for example Tell Taya (Reade 1973, 1982), Mashkan-shapir, Abu Salabikh, Tell Bazi (combined with magnetometry, Einwag et al. 2001), Habuba Kabira (Kohlmeyer 1996) and Haradum, to name a few. A further insight into population density can be made by examining known divisions within the urban fabric. The division of settlements into wards, or babtum, in relation to city gates (bab) is known from texts and is arguably recognizable in the archaeological record (see below). They probably represent the clustering of kinship groups into residential districts (Postgate 1992: 81; Keith 1999: 80–86, 101–102; for a cross-cultural comparison, see Smith 2010). They may also be responsible for higher or at least variable population densities around settlement entrances. This phenomenon appears to have been relatively commonplace in southern Mesopotamia and in the Diyala region of Iraq in both the Early Dynastic and Ur III periods (Crawford 1977: 32; Henrickson 1981). Two major towns in Syria, Mari and Tell Beydar, also provide evidence of this manner of societal organisation in relation to settlement entrances (Lebeau 1996b; Kupper 1985: 464).

Landscape: Hinterland Factors A vital aspect of population studies, as mentioned earlier, is the identification of the extent of settlements and whether visual evidence of their limits upon first inspection corresponds with further investigation. An impression of the ancient social landscape is being built up through the use of macro-scale studies with survey reconstructing ancient landscapes, settlement hierarchies, communication routes (linear hollows) and agricultural production zones (e.g., routes to surrounding fields, traces and extents of the manuring of agricultural land, water supply and canalization). When examining settlement population it is important to take into consideration sustaining areas–a settlement’s ‘ecological footprint’ (Smith 2010b: 238). A limiting factor to population numbers of any settlement, and in particular an urban settlement, is the capacity to feed the population (for Nineveh, see Oates 1968: 42–49). This creates a demand that may have to be satisfied by the importation of agricultural produce and thus evidence of networks of supporting agricultural communities. Without explicit textual evidence, proxy indicators need to be utilised to understand the demands of a settlement’s population and thus the potential number of inhabitants. Satellite image analysis has increased the identification of manmade landscape features that augment our comprehension of the complex systems of human and environmental interaction necessary to support populations. Irrigation systems in Mesopotamia are good indicators of supply and dependency within settlement patterns (Wilkinson 2000b: 251–252; Wilkinson et al. 2005). Recent work has been

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undertaken on canals systems in Iraqi Kurdistan, especially the Neo-Assyrian heartlands (Ur 2005, Altaweel 2008; Scardozzi 2011; Bonacossi 2014). Artificial water management played an important role in sustaining high urban populations, such as Nimrud and Nineveh, and permitted the dense occupation of the hinterlands (Oates 1968: 49–52; Wilkinson et al. 2005: 34; Ur 2013). Canals also feature in urban environments transecting cities, demarcating sectors of settlements and supplying the population with materials, foodstuffs and water for vegetable gardens and orchards (Keith 1999: 79–80; Stone and Zimansky 1992: 217 for Mashkan-Shapir; Ur 2005) Site catchment areas, whether agricultural, political, economic or communicative form a part of the wider anatomy of an urban settlement and a basis for settlement models (cf. Adams and Nissen 1972; Wilkinson 2003: 119–121; Wilkinson et al. 2007). Physical indicators have been intensively investigated in recent years, the so-called ‘hollow ways’ emanating from settlements. These are considered to be relic tracks that stretch into the countryside, and in many cases end abruptly- in fact, at the extent of a farmer’s daily ‘commute’ into the fields. Scoring the landscape of the Northern Mesopotamian plains are large numbers of these broad, shallow linear depressions or tracks spreading from settlements into the surrounding hinterland and in cases, linking settlements. This landscape phenomenon is particularly visible in the CORONA satellite imagery. Forming part of the local and the wider regional communication routes linear hollows have been the focus of intensive research into ancient landscapes and complex networks have been mapped across Northern Mesopotamia (Wilkinson 1982, 1990, 1993, 2000, 2003:111–17; Wilkinson and Tucker 1995; Kouchoukos 2001; McClellan et al. 2000; Ur 2002, 2002b, 2003; Altaweel 2003; Casana and Cothren 2008). Hollow ways provided access to surrounding agricultural zones and crops, and were means of communication and transit. They may be tied by their role in systems of land-use into the identification and delimiting of site-catchment analyses and subsistence spheres, high-intensity cultivation, pastoral landscapes, regional settlement patterns and population estimates (Wilkinson 1993: 548, 1998: 166–168; Wilkinson et al. 2007: 56–7; Ur 2002, 2002b; Ur and Colantoni 2010: 61–66 and cf. Wagstaff 1987). These features can be divided into two types. The first type of hollow way crosses the landscape over longer distances and had a broader temporal use continuing into later periods. These reflect regional communication and trade routes (Wilkinson 2000: 6; Altaweel 2003). The second shorter type form radial systems emanating from sites; the best cases are thought to be the by-product of Early Bronze Age nucleated settlement patterns that drew a major proportion of the population into large, densely occupied urban settlements (Casana 2013). Examples belonging to later periods have been identified (Scardozzi 2011: 15–16; Casana 2013: 263–266). Hollow ways commonly peter out 3–4.5 km from the fringes of settlements (Wilkinson 1993: 551–558; Casana 2013: 261; Ur 2013: 31). They are thought to be a result of agricultural and pastoral activity, both the constant movement of livestock taken for grazing (so avoiding trampling crops) and people going to work in their fields in the cultivated zone around the settlement. A connection between hollow ways, settlement entrances and wider geographical networks has been recognised for a wide range of periods and walled sites- for example, from Early to Mid Bronze Age Tell Mardikh (ancient Ebla) radiating from known city gates, at early to mid3rd millennium BC Tell Beydar (Bluard et al. 1997, Wilkinson 2000: 6–7), and from the circular

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Iron Age site of Tell Rifa’at in western Syria (Casana 2013: 261–3, fig. 4). In the case of Bronze Age Tell Hadidi on the Middle Euphrates, not only do the hollow ways visible in satellite imagery indicate entrances to the settlement they can also be seen to lead down to pastures adjacent to the nearby river Euphrates, perhaps indicating persistent movement of flocks from the settlement (Casana and Cothren 2008: 15–17). If this interpretation is correct, then the urban fabric would presumably contain areas for the penning of sheep inside the settlement or very close to its immediate fringes. Practices such as these can leave chemical signatures that may indicate animal penning and gardens in urban environments, recognisable via the use of multielement geochemical analysis to identify increased soil phosphate levels (Isendahl and Smith 2013: 137–8; Nielsen and Kristiansen 2014: 390; Wilkinson 1990). Often found in association with hollow ways are field scatters of dense abraded sherds thought to be evidence for ancient manuring (utilising organic household refuse) of land for the intensification of agriculture around settlements (Bintliff and Snodgrass 1988; Ur 2002; Wilkinson 1982, 2003; Nielsen and Kristiansen 2014). They have been identified at sites dating to the mid-third millennium BC from the Syrian Euphrates to northern Iraq (Bintliff and Snodgrass 1988; Wilkinson 1982; 2000b: 228; 2003: 117–118; Wilkinson and Tucker 1995). Evidence of the practice has been intensively studied around a number of Bronze Age sites on the plains of Northern Mesopotamia; for example, Tell Beydar, Hamoukar and Tell Brak (Wilkinson 2000a: 8, Ur Ur 2002: 69, 2002b and Ur et al. 2011). They provide invaluable data as proxy indicators of ancient land-use patterns and may have acted as a vital part of urban sustainability (Smith 2010: 237). Nielsen and Kristiansen (2014) consider that the practice of manuring allows more permanent field systems; a permanence that is perhaps visible in the creation of hollow way systems (cf. Casana 2013: 268). The practice of manuring and how it may be visible in the built environment of a settlement, acting as an indicator of specific activity areas, has been discussed at Hamoukar (Colantoni and Ur 2011: 21; Ur and Colantoni 2010: 70–71). The identification of these landscape features and practices permit the reconstruction of a more complex picture of land-use patterns and the capacity to sustain populations. They are more than simple reminders of past activities: they can also influence and mould the morphology of habitation. Inferences can be made regarding the local economy and when combined with potential indicators like the hollow ways and their probable link to urban-based pastoralist activities and settlement entrances, light can be shed on the demands on spatial use in and around settlements, and in turn the potential character of the density and space available for residential areas.

Conclusions: The Demographic Conundrum Methods for the estimation of urban populations, especially their relative densities, have been extensively discussed in the archaeological literature. Many studies have been undertaken, comparisons and compendia created, and much ink has been spilt discussing their relative merits. Estimates of population densities in antiquity vary hugely, although a common consensus in methodology and applied coefficients is visible. Population estimations typically employ methods using calculations based on individuals per household or average numbers of persons per hectare. But it is the variability in household occupancy and the density of houses within

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urban environments that makes reliable estimations very difficult to achieve, producing ranges of possible populations that may differ widely enough to make them simply ballpark figures. However, direct and indirect inferences can be made by collating various approaches. By combining multi-scalar observations it is becoming possible to develop more adaptable population estimation frameworks that can incorporate a wide range of variables that may refine our understanding and help produce more realistic numbers. These observations, taken in concert, may act as checks and balances for the possible range of inhabitants for a settlement. The discussion has addressed a number of direct and indirect approaches to population estimation. What is clear is that reaching finely tuned estimations of resident population densities and numbers are hard to achieve due to a raft of unknown factors and complex interacting variables. Although plausible and refined methods have been employed in population studies the demographic conundrum remains one that is not easily solved. Quantitive approaches are undermined by an appreciation of the complexity of the factors that are responsible for generating population numbers and densities. These factors that influence and mould the constitution of an urban settlement are more important than just raw population numbers. Grove (1972: 559) believes that calculations of population size are only useful for broad statistical analyses, ‘but cannot reveal the specific character of urban developments’. Whilst Postgate (1994: 51) expressed his doubts to whether there is a way of employing population numbers in a wholly useful way: “the way out of this impasse is of course through more research, specifically by more detailed analysis of the composition and functions of the different settlements in each system being studied. This should give us some idea of the qualitative variation between sites of different size, and help us to form a better idea of the population density from below.” We have seen that population estimates based on perceived settlement size and assumed contemporaneity may be unreliable. Textual evidence cannot accurately paint a definitive picture of numbers per household (Postgate 1994) and neighbourhood population numbers remain uncertain. Many of the population densities and household occupancy calculations have been founded on the results of ethnoarchaeological studies of rural communities (for example, Kramer 1979, 1982, 1983 and Kamp 2000). These presumably produced feasible estimations of household and settlement population densities in what are thought to be comparable premodern communities. But employing a village analogy for an urbanized settlement fabric may not produce directly comparable estimations that reflect the true nature of spatial complexity in an ancient Near East urban settlement (cf. Postgate 1994: 62). As the discussion above illustrates, different types of spatial use and population density are by-products — an ‘artifact’ (Anthony 2014: 36)- of local ecological, socio-cultural and political factors. Reaching a reasonable estimate of an urban population is dependent upon an extensive and clearly phased excavated sample combined with varied methods to assess the full extent, type and density of occupation at a settlement. Common trends can be recognized according to period and region, as communities that live in similar ways generate comparable spatial patterns in the built environment, such as the sharing of similar house forms, which with close examination are distinguishable in the archaeological record (see Colantoni 2005). It becomes possible to see the intricate relationship between public and private uses of space, communicative space, open gathering places, disposal areas, activity areas, craft and household activities. Investigations of the internal workings of urban settlements employing extensive excavations,

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scrapings and geophysical studies suggest that the anatomy of a city is a complex and often shifting entity. Residential areas in urban settlements are rarely arranged according to repetitive institutionally-defined principles, with the notable exception of compelling evidence for standardized land parcelling (house plots) and occasional urban planning, but are varied and more likely to be shaped by social practice and customs. Satellite imagery analysis has assisted in establishing a better context from which to estimate settlement and population size. It demonstrates a community’s wider integration into the landscape, agro-pastoral strategies, and local and regional movement and exchange systems. Hollow ways are potential indicators of urban features and anatomy (gates, streets and internal social organization) and proxy indicators of settlements’ economic activities (herding, field systems, manuring and activity areas within settlements), i.e. the agricultural capacity that sustains and limits populations. Population studies are not insurmountably complex, just inexact and open to continued refinement. The varying scales of analysis, from determining room functions to settlement sustaining areas, discussed in this paper help to refine our understanding of the complexity of the issue of population dynamics. They hold great potential for unlocking some of the complicated relationships between inhabitants and their spatial use, and allow an appreciation of the factors that contribute to create, sustain and transform urban space. By the application of a range of methods -especially those offered by remote sensing and geophysical prospection techniquesit is becoming possible, in suitable cases, to better comprehend spatial use and the extent of settlements. Population studies are still a work in process, as they continue to be refined and difficulties identified. It is clear that a more case-specific approach is favourable as blanket approaches to urban population densities create too wide a range of possible population numbers and lead to the assumption that urbanism is more closely attached to numbers of inhabitants rather than the distinct nature of an urbanised way of living. In conclusion, calculating ancient urban populations requires a culturally specific and holistic approach. Varying scales of investigation individually tailored to each site act as an agglutinative approach, accumulating small details that will better assess a settlement’s population characteristics. As investigative practices continue to develop, we are moving ever closer to being able to answer the question of how many Sumerians per hectare with a greater degree of certainty.

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New Perspectives on ‘Early Mesopotamia’ Harriet Crawford JNP is one of the very few scholars who excels both as an excavator and a linguist. He amalgamates the two types of evidence in a powerful combination through which to attempt to understand the past. Others are more qualified than me to detail his contributions to the study of the texts so this article will begin by describing some of the significant results from his archaeological work in Iraq, especially from his excavations at Abu Salabikh. I owe him a huge personal debt as he gave me my first opportunity to dig in Iraq and allowed me to become his first woman site supervisor at Abu Salabikh, something for which I shall always be grateful. A survey of some of the changes in the field which have taken place in the last twenty years will then follow. The work at Abu Salabikh, sadly interrupted by political events, used a wide range of techniques to extract the maximum information for minimum outlay. For example Postgate used the technique of surface scraping, employed previously by the Germans, to work towards a better understanding of the anatomy of a Sumerian town. The scraping can also pinpoint areas where excavation is necessary to solve specific problems and thus allows scarce resources to be used for maximum productivity. The scraping at Salabikh has given us some of the best information we have on the anatomy of a mid third millennium town, demonstrating the shrewdness with which it was used and the value of this technique. It is especially effective in areas where the architectural remains lie close to the surface and where differences in soil colour, caused by the greater retention of moisture in the mudbrick, can be identified. JNP was quick to realise the potential of this method as it fitted well with his research aims and with the wider shift in academic interest towards domestic housing rather than a concentration on public buildings. The information retrieved from the scraping on the Main mound at Salabikh allowed him to identify a town wall, three possible town gates, and to produce detailed plans of a number of houses. He was also able to identify non domestic buildings, such as a potter’s workshop, and to add to the plan originally uncovered by the Oriental Institute Chicago of what is possibly a large public building in area A (Postgate 1990). In some cases microstratigraphy, at the time a new technique in Iraq, was used in an attempt to suggest the function of individual rooms. Using the data on the use of space within the town walls he published an important paper on population density in built-up areas ( Postgate 1994) based on calculations of the area of non domestic structures and open spaces including streets, which is then subtracted from the total area of the site. Open spaces within the houses, such as courtyards, are also calculated and subtracted from the total. The resulting figure represents the area of the town which was Author’s note:  For ‘Early Mesopotamia’, see Postgate 1992.

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actually habitable space and calculations can then be made using one of the standard estimates of people per hectare of covered space (Kramer, C. 1980 for an example). Numbers like this derived from the excavated area can then be cautiously extrapolated to work towards a total number of inhabitants for the whole site. The houses on the Main mound also provided evidence for an interesting shift from the walled compounds seen on the Uruk mound to the terrace houses in area E, suggesting the possibility of a shift from an extended family compound as the basic unit of society to a more restricted family group living in individual terraced houses. It raises the possibility of important changes in the way that society was organised and even, perhaps, in the composition of the population. Work on the Uruk mound also produced a limited amount of pottery of the early and mid Uruk periods, so beginning to plug the lacuna in the south Mesopotamian sequence (Pollock 1990). Sadly, the scraping on the South mound had only just begun when work had to be suspended, but this too offers a contrast with other areas discussed and seems to house a large public building as well as a number of industrial areas (Postgate op. cit.). A large number of graves were uncovered of men, women, and children, but the poor state of the bones made it impossible to carry out detailed analyses. Most of the burials were under the floors of the houses and consisted of shafts lined with clay or matting, sometimes with a chamber or alcoves for offerings hollowed out at the base. Preliminary analysis shows that the contents were not especially lavish compared with the contemporary graves from Ur, but contained one or two interesting characteristics not commonly found elsewhere on the southern plain, though they do occur in the Diyala and at Kish. These include a number of unshaped stone slabs, one being found in each of a number of graves. Their purpose is unknown and they are simply referred to as grave stones. Two graves, Graves 1 and 26 contained large numbers of conical cups; Grave 1 had more than one hundred and was one of the richest graves. We do not know if these cups represent libations poured into the grave during the interment by friends and relatives or if they were to be used by the deceased for entertaining after their arrival in the underworld. As they are frequently found in stacks of four or five the latter is perhaps more likely ( Postgate 1980, Martin et al. 1985). Feasting the important people in the underworld is known from the texts to have greatly improved your chances of a comfortable afterlife. Work at Abu Salabikh came to a halt when international sanctions and the security situation made it almost impossible for foreigners to work in Iraq, leaving many questions still to be answered.

The Wider View There have been some significant shifts of interest within the study of ancient Mesopotamia over the last forty years or so, approximately the time covered by JNP’s career. Some, like the re-assessment of the extent of private land holding during the third millennium ( Gelb, Steinkeller and Whiting 1991 ) and of the temple as the sole land owner at that time, have not been reliant on new discoveries or new technologies, but other areas are. The end of foreign fieldwork in Iraq has not been an unalloyed archaeological disaster. In fact it is possible to pinpoint two or three areas where there have been positive results from the cessation of excavations. This short article will look at these areas.

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Survey After the invasion of Kuwait and the closure of Iraq, archaeological survey work in the region was perforce concentrated on the data from remote sensing as work on the ground was not possible. Happily, the data from satellite photography began to be declassified by the military and made available in the public domain from 1995. As a result, important insights have emerged in both southern Iraq and north Syria as archaeologists learned to use the new data. For example, the use of satellite data has revolutionised our picture of the extreme south of Mesopotamia at the time of the earliest known sites there in the Ubaid period and has also confirmed the ancient location of the head of the Gulf far to the north of its present position. The findings have also completely changed our view of the importance of the marshes to the early settlers in the region. Work by Pournelle demonstrates that the earliest settlements lie on turtlebacks, raised areas of land, on the edge or actually within the marshes. It is also becoming increasingly clear that the marshes provided almost all the resources that these early settlers required. Fish and game were plentiful, edible tubers provided extra nourishment and the giant reeds provided fodder for animals and the construction material for houses, for boats, for mats and for containers of all sorts. Some of these goods were probably also used for exchanges in order to obtain other materials like bitumen which were lacking. The waterways served as ‘highways’ linking communities and so facilitating the exchange of goods and information. Crops could be grown on the raised ground and the marshes may already have been home to large date groves (Pournelle 2013). This abundance of easily available natural resources raises again an interesting question about the traditional view of the centrality of agriculture in the development of large permanent settlements and the appearance of fulltime specialists. The question has already been raised in relation to Çatal Hűyűk, for example, and Jane Jacobs (1970:18) made a strong case for saying that ‘. . ..agriculture and animal husbandry arose in cities.’ That is to say they should be regarded as a result of large permanent settlements rather than a prerequisite for them. The new data from the satellite photographs of southern Mesopotamia brings the question very much to the fore and strengthens the case for suggesting that agriculture was not a prerequisite for the appearance of all large settlements. Perhaps we could additionally ask if there is a universal rule or whether the situation varied from one area to another depending on the local availability of natural resources. Judging from sites like Eridu, with its sequence of monumental temples, there was a sufficient surplus of essentials in the Ubaid south to allow the emergence of part-time or even full-time specialists earlier than is usually thought possible and without the necessity for agriculture. Even if construction was done by the community as a whole, managers and engineers would have been essential to the success of these huge building enterprises and were probably supported by the rest of the community. Once completed then the temple needed staff who again may have been supported in least in part by the inhabitants of the settlement. If this was the case, then by the early/mid fifth millennium some members of the group were already freed from the necessity of producing their own food, even though agriculture apparently still played a relatively small part in their economy. This freedom is generally seen as an essential

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prerequisite for the development of full time craft specialisation and complex societies. The new evidence indicates that such specialisation may have been possible without agriculture. A second important area where remote sensing is playing a vital part is in assessing the date and spread of urbanism in North Mesopotamia. Increasingly sophisticated use of satellite images here is producing remarkable new data. All parts of the area can be intensively surveyed using only remote sensing data although it is sometimes desirable to check the results by field walking, and this is of course essential if the sites are to be dated. The use of CORONA images taken in the 1960s also enables the archaeologist to study the area of north Mesopotamia before the advent of the intensive farming of recent years which has destroyed parts of the ancient landscape (Ur 2010 for a recent summary ). Sites which can be detected from satellite data include industrial areas, fields, canals, cemeteries and even unmounded sites. These can be identified on CORONA images by differences in colour. It is important to have multiple photographs, in different conditions, as with aerial photographs, in order to get maximum visibility. With these multiple images it is possible to create relief as well as distribution maps even though the relief maps tend to be at a coarser scale than the latter. It is also possible to identify both natural and artificial waterways and socalled hollow ways, old roads or tracks, which link settlements. This information is helping to identify networks of ancient sites and to give us a more complete picture of ancient land usage. The work builds on pioneering work carried out by Wilkinson (1994, 1995) and others largely before the data from satellite images became available. Ur’s work also tends to support Wilkinson’s originally contentious proposal that field scatters represent deliberate manuring rather than the debris from small settlements no longer visible in the archaeological record. The satellite images also show beyond doubt that north Mesopotamia in the mid third millennium was home to a number of urban settlements which were probably the centres of small states. The early flowering of Brak in the Middle Uruk period and of Hamoukar at the same period suggests that urban settlements may have developed at about the same time in both North and South. The unquestioned primacy of Mesopotamia in the civilization stakes, the conventional image of south Mesopotamia as the Heartland of Cities (Adams 1981) can now be looked at again in the light of this new evidence. There are probably no centres as large as Uruk in the north. Braq was perhaps the closest in size to Uruk in the late fourth millennium. It seems likely, as with agriculture, that there may have been a number of different pathways towards urbanism. We have perhaps been rather myopic in our search for universally applicable ‘laws’ or norms.

Work in Adjacent Areas The impossibility of working in Iraq pushed more archaeologists, hungry for new projects, into adjacent areas and this has led to a radical re-assessment of Mesopotamia’s relationship with its neighbours. New work has concentrated on northern Syria and the Gulf leading to considerable readjustments in our view of Mesopotamia’s primacy in two areas, in urbanisation and in long distance trade. The upsurge of work in Syria and the Persian Gulf is causing some of the major tenets of Mesopotamian archaeology to be re-examined. It seems, as we saw above, that the cultural gap

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between north and south was not as wide as we used to think and that parallel growth in the size and sophistication of settlements probably took place. Other assumptions may also need re-examining. For example, the cylinder seal has long been considered an archetypal south Mesopotamian artefact and yet as matters stand at the moment the earliest cylinder seal we know of was found in Middle Uruk levels at Brak ( Oates & Oates 1997:291)). It would be premature to recast our ideas on the evidence of a single example, but the question about the origin of the cylinder seal can now be asked. It should also be remembered that, as yet, there is very little evidence for the Early and Middle Uruk phases in the south and it would be rash to suggest that earlier or comparable evidence will not eventually be found there. A similar re-assessment needs to be carried out for the third millennium too. The pattern of small, often fractious city states on the southern plain is well known, but although a few important towns have been known in the north for a long time, towns like Mari, followed by Chuera and Ebla. It is only recently that it has become clear that a similar pattern of city states existed in north Syria as well. Sites like Beydar, Mozan and Bi’a and remarkable burial complexes like those at Umm al Marra and Banat all point to a similar pattern of small states in the north as well. The structure of these urban settlements is different to that of contemporary sites in the south and most belong to the category of Kranzhűgel sites, sites with a central mound usually with its own fortifications and an outer ring of widely dispersed, but roughly circular settlement, which may also be walled. The urban settlements are smaller than the largest ones in the south, probably because of the less intensive agriculture which made it more difficult to sustain very large settlements, but they too have elaborate administrative systems based on those of the south. It is tablets from Mari and Chuera in particular which are leading to this conclusion. Other differences can also be seen in these northern states where there is more emphasis on animal husbandry and on the nomadic groups who herded them. In the south such groups remain almost invisible. Public architecture shows features not found in the south either such as the Anten temples, with their deep porches, whose architecture looks north rather than south for its parallels. There are also indications that the temples did not wield as much power as in the south. It is undeniable that the north was using the cuneiform script developed in the south, but although it also used the cylinder seal the iconography is distinctively northern and it would seem that sites like Ebla had their own system of measurement, rather than using that found in the south. There was no slavish copying of south Mesopotamia and other influences have to recognised as well. In short a distinctive urban civilization developed in North Mesopotamia at about the same time as in the south. A second area in which south Mesopotamia is traditionally seen as the driver is that of long-distance trade. Her lack of basic raw materials, it has been argued, was the spur which drove traders out into foreign lands from Ubaid times onwards in search of timber, metals and semi-precious stones. Once again these assumptions are being tested by work in areas adjacent to Iraq. The west shore of the Arabian Gulf has seen an enormous upsurge in archaeological work in the last twenty years and as a result a significant amount of evidence has been collected showing clearly that in the Ubaid period the Gulf was far from being the area lightly populated by nomadic groups and ripe for exploitation that is usually proposed (Oates et al.1977). The model of ‘Seafaring merchants from Ur’ in this early period has had to be radically revised.

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Excavations in Kuwait have demonstrated the presence of sedentary or semi-sedentary groups with a distinctive circular stone architecture quite unlike anything in Mesopotamia, a distinctive Arabian flint technology and a range of shell jewellery unmatched further north. They also had ocean-going boats as the remains of deep water fish from these coastal sites demonstrates (Carter & Crawford eds. 2010). It seems that the relationship between these people and their northern neighbours was much closer to being one of equal partners and that the initiative was not necessarily always in the hands of people from Mesopotamia. In the third millennium, too, there is now evidence for a string of settlements down the east coast of the Arabian peninsula as far as Ras al Jinz on its south-eastern tip. Many of them have fine stone tower houses, distinctive burial customs and locally made pottery. The sites at Ras al Jinz seem to have been where the boats from Meluhha, the Indus valley, made landfall. It is not yet clear how far north these ‘Harappan’ traders came in the Early Dynastic period of Mesopotamia. It is possible that the people from the eastern side of Arabia traded the goods north to the head of the Gulf as middlemen. Certainly the boats from Megan, Meluhha and Dilmun came as far as Sargon’s capital in the Agade period, if we are to believe his famous inscription, and it seems that Harappan traders may even have been resident in Mesopotamia, but we know few details about the earlier periods. The new information on the history of the Arabian peninsula would seem to suggest that, generally speaking, from the fifth millennium onwards it is more accurate to see the relationship between south Mesopotamia and the Gulf as closer to one of equals trading for mutual advantage rather than one between civilized people and savages!

Consolidation The pause in foreign fieldwork has also given scholars the opportunity to collate and digest much information already available from earlier excavations. An example of this important work is offered by the volume edited by JNP on the Uruk: Artefacts of complexity and by final reports on some aspects of the work at Salabikh. In addition computer technology has made databases an essential part of any excavation and web publishing can make results widely available at very low cost. Some excellent web resources are also now available with the Oriental Institute of Chicago leading the way.

The Aftermath To balance these positive developments we must not forget the major damage which was done to the heritage of Iraq from 1991 onwards, especially during the period of chaos after the 2003 invasion: the massive looting of museums and sites; the lack of money for the Antiquities service which has to some extent become a political football, and the deterioration of that service due in part to a lack of contact with the outside world for something like twenty years. This isolation resulted from the United Nations imposition of sanctions on Saddam Hussein and has meant that younger members of the Antiquities staff have had little access to new techniques or ideas, to the literature, or to foreign languages. This sad situation will take a generation to mend.

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The Future? It is difficult to see foreign excavations taking place in southern Iraq for some time, although the Ur project had one successful season in 2013 (www.urarchaeology.org ). When it is possible to return there will be many more questions to answer, questions thrown up by the survey work for example. There is much work to be done on the exact nature of the contacts between Sumer and its neighbours, while in the north the chronology of the late third millennium is in urgent need of clarification in order to assess the extent of the spread of the volcanic dust for which evidence was found at Leilan. In the south we are still desperately short of evidence on the pottery sequence from the early and middle Uruk and no Uruk cemetery is known either. It is probably true to say that as fieldwork becomes more and more expensive and grants become ever harder to acquire excavation will become more and more heavily reliant on remote sensing in order to pinpoint where to place small operations designed to tackle very specific problems. As countries in the Middle East become more aware of the political and economic value of their heritage it may well be that the emphasis in the region will shift from excavation to preservation and display of sites, together with public education. This will demand a different set of skills from foreign scholars if they are to continue to assist their Iraqi colleagues. Once stability is restored in Iraq the tourist trade is potentially a massive money spinner, providing jobs for thousands and drawing visitors from all over the world. In divided countries such as Iraq the heritage provides something of which the whole population can be proud whatever their political ethnic or religious affiliation. In this way the heritage represents a powerful unifying factor which may help to heal some of the rifts in society in the region. None of these benefits will be seen until peace is restored in the Middle East and it is recognised that the remains of the past are a finite resource which is in danger of being irreparably damaged.

References Carter, R. and Crawford, H. eds. 2010 Maritime interactions in the Arabian Neolithic. Leiden: Brill. Gelb, I.J., Steinkeller, P. and Whiting, R. M. 1991 Earliest land tenure systems in the Near East. Oriental Institute Publications no. 104. Chicago: Chicago University Press. Jacobs, J. 1970 The economy of cities. London: Cape. Kramer, C. 1980 Estimating prehistoric populations: an ethnoarchaeological approach. Pp. 315–334 in L’archéologie de l’Iraq, ed. Barrelet, M-T. Paris: CNRS. Martin, H., Moon, J. and Postgate, J. N. 1985 Graves 1–99. Abu Salabikh Excavations 2. London: British School of Archaeology in Iraq. Oates, J. Oates, D. 1997 An open gate: cities of the 4th millennium BC (Tell Brak 1997). Cambridge Archaeological Journal 7.2: 287–97. Oates, J. et al. 1977. Seafaring merchants of Ur? Antiquity 51: 221–34.

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Pollock, S. 1990 Archaeological investigations on the Uruk Mound, Abu Salabikh Iraq. Iraq 52: 85–94. Postgate, J. N. 1980 Early Dynastic burial customs at Abu Salabikh. Sumer 36.i-2: 65–81. 1990 Excavations at Abu Salabikh 1988–89. Iraq 52: 95–106. 1992 Early Mesopotamia. Society and Economy at the Dawn of History. London: Routledge. 1994 How many Sumerians to the acre? Probing the anatomy of an ancient city. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 4.i: 47–65. Postgate, J. N. ed. 2002 Artefacts of complexity. Tracking the Uruk in the Near East. London: British School of Archaeology in Iraq. Pournelle, J. R. 2013 Physical geography. Pp. 13–32 in The Sumerian World, ed. Harriet Crawford. London: Routledge. Ur, J. 2010 Urbanism and cultural landscapes in North-East Syria. Tell Hamoukar survey 1999–2001. Tell Hamoukar I Oriental Institute Publications 137. Chicago: Chicago University Press. Wilkinson, T. J. 1994 The structure and dynamics of dry-farming states in Upper Mesopotamia. Current Anthropology 35.5: 483–519. Wilkinson, T. J and Tucker, J. 1995 Settlement development in the north Jazira, Iraq. Iraq Archaeological Reports 3. London: British School of Archaeology in Iraq. Website: urarchaeology.org (accessed 13/8/13)

Of Arches, Vaults and Domes Stephanie Dalley As students in Cambridge studying Assyriology, one year apart, Nicholas and I each had a sister who lived in Oxford. On one occasion we took the coach from Cambridge to Oxford in order to pay our respective visits, and we agreed that dealing with the backlog of unpublished tablets, both from British excavations and in British museums, should be the first task of newly trained Assyriologists. Nicholas produced a fine volume of texts from Nimrud; 1 I published tablets from Tell al-Rimah and then from the Royal Scottish Museum while living in Edinburgh. Meeting briefly at a Rencontre Assyriologique in Birmingham, both of us by then having young children, he with various big responsibilities in teaching and excavating, I offered help in publishing the tablets from Fort Shalmaneser, now CTN III, which he had copied in Baghdad, but could not find the time to complete as an edition. He took up the offer; we agreed to meet occasionally, and laid down the agreement that if our opinions still differed on any point after discussion, we should include both points of view in the publication to avoid falling out–an arrangement that produced the required result. This very short paper is offered in appreciation of a steady, generous and helpful colleague whose interests in excavation as well as in the minutiae of texts may both be satisfied, in a very small way, by this contribution in recognition of his long and fruitful career. Some recent editions of Sir Banister Fletcher’s A History of Architecture have included a magisterial single chapter encapsulating the whole of the Ancient Near East by Charles Burney, who recognized the early development of arches, domes and vaults, built in brick, but was not concerned with ancient Mesopotamian technical terms. 2 Arches, domes and vaults at different periods, such as have been found, for instance, at Tell al-Rimah, Tell Brak, Ur, and Khorsabad, are all attested in excavated temples from at least the Old Babylonian period, and specific Akkadian terms for those three constructions should be identifiable. This short paper attempts to collect, discuss and improve upon identifications of Akkadian words for those constructions. Woolley excavated at Ur an intact dome of stone over the tomb chamber RT 1054, dating to the third millennium BC, and made restoration drawings of a dome on the monumental gate leading to the ziggurat at Ur, and on the temple of Ningal built by Kurigalzu. Domes are shown on an Assyrian sculpture of Sennacherib, on a scene of houses thought possibly to be located at Balaṭay in the area of Eski Mosul. 3 On a relief panel from the throne room in Ashurnasirpal II’s North West Palace, about two centuries earlier (9th century BC) a royal pavilion appears to have a roofing shaped like a low dome, perhaps as a tented structure. 4 One might expect domes to be visible on relief sculptures more frequently; but if they were low, flattish 1.  Postgate 1973. 2.  See C. Burney in Cruikshank (ed.) 1996. He made particular use of Oates 1973. 3.  Barnett, Bleibtreu and Turner 1998:67, no.150 (vol I); 110 (vol.II). 4.  Layard 1849, pl.30.

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domes, they would have been hidden behind parapets and crenellations, and the double pairs of towers that flanked major gateways. They would have been particularly suitable for roofing double gateways, as on the Ziggurat at Ur. Two uncommon words are used together by Esarhaddon in describing how he built the gates for a new palace at Nineveh: se-el-lu MAT-gi-qu GIM TIR.AN.NA ú-sá-as-hi-ra gi-mir KÁ.MEŠ I surrounded all of the gates with an arch (and) a vault like a rainbow Leichty translates sillu / sellu as “arch”, and MAT-gi-qu as perhaps “vault”; he observes that the reading of the first sign may be “kur.” 5 In that suggestion he follows the Chicago Assyrian Dictionary M, 1977, which defines matgiqu as “(part of a gate)”, further noting: “Other readings of the initial KUR sign are also possible.” In the same entry “vaults” is given as the meaning for the adjacent word sillu. The same dictionary in a later volume, S, 1984 s.v. sillu A, translates sillu as “arch, corbel”, and leaves *matgiqu untranslated. The two words are unlikely to refer to the same item (as if the second were explanatory) rather than to two separate constructions, because a royal inscription of Nebuchadnezzar in the British Museum 6 has sillu u SIG7.IGI.KÙ in a similar context with the added copula u, making it likely that KUR-gi-qu is a phonetic reading for SIG7.IGI.KÙ, as suggested by CAD s.v. sillu A. This suggestion can be taken further. As listed by Borger, the sign SIG7 also has the value UKUR5, 7 so one may modify CAD’s suggestion to (u)kur5-(i)gi-kù, making a phonetic word kurgiku or kurgiqu with a pseudo-logographic spelling designed by scholarly scribes to show off their knowledge of esoteric sign values. 8 The verb used by Esarhaddon for putting the structure over all of the gates, sahāru Š-stem, means “to encircle, surround,” which is applicable to a dome (circular) rather than an arch (bow-shaped). Recently Tudeau has suggested the term kippatu means “dome.” 9 She has suggested that sillu / sellu “basket” is used metaphorically for a “basket-arched vault,” 10 since she has claimed the meaning “dome” for kippatu; but the idea of an round, upside-down basket would appear more appropriate for a dome; a vault-shaped basket would be an odd shape. As for *matgiqu, she suggests perhaps ‘archivolt’ (defined by OED as ‘the under curve or inner contour of an arch’), possibly related to the logogram SIG7.IGI for the eyebrow, šur īni. An alternative to Tudeau’s suggested identifications is to take sillu as “basket; dome” and kurgiku as “arch”, with kippatu also referring to the latter. If that is correct, a mathematical use for kippatu with the meaning “the arc of a circle segment” is possible, envisaging the span of the arch, which could be “held” or “seized” by a controlling god, like reins, as described in literary texts. 11 That would allow the word in an architectural context to include also the impost blocks, which in turn might explain 5.  Leichty 2011: 34, 40. 6.  BM 85975, of which a copy by Sidney Smith was published in CT 37, pl.10 ii 5; similarly L. Legrain in PBS 15, 79.i.71. 7.  Borger 2003: 152, no.564. 8.  CDA 2nd edn. lists the word as kur(i)giqu, reading unknown. 9.  Tudeau 2012: 157–59. 10.  Tudeau 2012: 152–53. 11. See CAD K sub kippatu 3a.

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the huge quantity of gold used for the kippatu of Esagila in Ashurbanipal’s inscription quoted by Tudeau. 12 The unexpected use of kippatu for either the whole or a part of a circle, has parallels in mathematics with mithartum and ṣiliptum. 13 Building inscriptions sometimes incorporate metaphors and similes to give a metaphorical or symbolic meaning to architectural elements. It is well known that Mesopotamian temples were personified, as found for instance in personal names and hymns, where the name of the god is sometimes substituted by the name of his temple. Comparable with the meaning “eyebrow” implied by the logogram for kurgiku, as Tudeau has observed, one might compare the suhātu “armpit” which Andrew George has shown also means “alcove”. 14 Tiny stars and sun rays of gold and lapis lazuli, probably from a painted ceiling, were found in the “mausolea” of the Ur III kings at Ur by Woolley, in room 9, 15 so one might expect domes, as symbols of heaven, to be painted in that kind of design, since a dome may symbolize the heavens, as it clearly does in many churches. There might be an oblique reference to colour in the use of the sign SIG7 as part of the logogram for kurgiku, in the sense of arqu, “green-yellow” as the colour of the sky in the daytime, by contrast with uqnû the colour of the night sky. This colour term might be appropriate for the daytime sky on the understanding that dark and light shades of what we understand to be the same colour are often described by entirely different words in other cultures. This difference is explored by one of Nicholas’ students, Guy Deutscher, in his book Through the Language Glass, where he describes how light, “unsaturated” colours may be given a different word from dark, “saturated” colours. 16 One might hope to find an Akkadian cognate with Arabic qubba, which is used, for example, for the vault or dome of heaven and for known Islamic buildings with vaults; or Persian ṭāq “arch.” In Persian too the word gonbad / gumbad has a wider meaning than strictly “dome,” 17 which would support the possibility that a single word was used for domes, arches and vaults. Arabic has a separate word for the arch qaws, cognate with Akkadian qaštu “bow,” but qaštu does not have the architectural meaning “arch.” It is surprising that there is no easily recognizable Semitic term for arch, dome or vault in Akkadian before the Neo-Assyrian period, if sillu and kurgiku have been identified correctly; and it is odd that Persian and Arabic do not have evident cognates, since Achaemenid Persians brought Babylonians to Susa to benefit from their expertise in baked-brick work, which suggests a tradition of superiority emanating from Babylonia. 18 Kurgiku does not appear to be a semitic word, but could be a Sumerian one. An Elamite word is another possibility. Very little certainty is established in Elamite architectural terms, among which several Sumerian and Akkadian loanwords are found. 19 12.  Borger 1966: 139, Prism T 1, 31–34. 13.  See Robson 1999: 43. 14.  George 1995:186. 15.  Woolley 1982, p.161. 16.  Deutscher 2011:38, 71–72. 17.  I thank C. Hillenbrand, C. Holes and E. Tucker for advice on the Arabic and Persian words. 18.  Inscription of Darius I, see e.g., Vallat 1970: 150–54, lines 25–26 and 50–51. 19.  Potts 2010: 49–70.

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One hopes that a text concerning temple brickwork for arches, vaults and domes in ancient Babylonian and Assyrian architecture may come to light, comparable to “The bricks of Esagil” texts in which Andrew George was able to identify technical terms concerning elaborate brickwork in temple façades: for pilasters, for the space between them, for alcoves, and for rabbeted door-jambs. 20 Those texts make it clear that specific technical terms were used. In drawing attention to arches, domes and vaults in this context one is aware of continuity through Sassanian into Islamic brick architecture. Seldom do the structures on the upper parts of brick buildings survive; but the early evidence is now consistent enough to clarify the point raised by Ettinghausen and his co-authors, who wrote in 2001 that it was ‘not clear why brick became such a favorite material’ in eastern Islamic lands. 21 20.  George 1995: 173–97. 21.  Ettinghausen, Grabar and Jenkins 2001:156.

Bibliography Barnett, R., E. Bleibtreu and G. Turner 1998 Sculptures from the Southwest Palace of Sennacherib at Nineveh. Vols. I-II. London: British Museum Press. Borger, R. 1966 Beiträge zur Inschriftenwerk Assurbanipals. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. 2003 Mesopotamisches Zeichenlexikon. Alter Orient und Altes Testament 305. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. Cruikshank, D. (ed.) 1996 Sir Banister Fletcher’s A History of Architecture, 20th ed. Oxford: Architectural Press. Deutscher, G. 2011 Through the Language Glass. Why the World Looks Different in Other Languages. London: Arrow. George, A. R. 1995 The Bricks of Esagil. Iraq 57:173–97. Ettinghausen, R., Grabar, O. and M. Jenkins 2001 Islamic Art and Architecture, 650–1250 2nd ed. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press. Layard, A. H. 1849 Nineveh and its Remains. London: John Murray. Leichty, E. 2011 The Royal Inscriptions of Esarhaddon. Royal Inscriptions of Mesopotamia, Assyrian Periods 4. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Oates, E. E. D. M. 1973 Early Vaulting in Mesopotamia. Pp. 183–91 in Archaeological Theory and Practice: Essays Presented to W. F. Grimes, ed. by D. E. Strong. London: Seminar Press. Postgate, J. N. 1973 The Governor’s Palace Archive. Cuneiform Texts from Nimrud II. London: British School of Archaeology in Iraq. Potts, D. 2010 Elamite Temple Building. Pp. 49–70 in From the Foundations to the Crenelations, ed. by M. J. boda and J. Novotny. Alter Orient und Altes Testament 366. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. Robson, E. 1999 Mesopotamian Mathematics, 2100–1600 BC. Technical Constants in Bureaucracy and Education. Oxford Editions of Cuneiform Texts XIV. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

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Tudeau, J. 2012 Assyrian Building Practices and Ideologies according to the Assyrian Royal Inscriptions and State Archives. Unpublished PhD Thesis, University of Cambridge. Vallat, F. 1970 Table élamite de Darius Ier. Revue d’Assyriologie 64:150–54. Woolley, A. L. 1982 Ur ‘of the Chaldees’. The Final Account, Excavations at Ur, revised by P. R. S. Moorey. London.

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Ethnicity in the Assyrian Empire: A View from the Nisbe, (III) “Arameans” and Related Tribalists Frederick Mario Fales In a first of a series of three essays dealing with ethnicity in the Assyrian empire, 1 I started out from the by now commonly received anthropological definition of ethnicity as a highly flexible notion along both geographical and historical lines — a notion involving the identification of group identities and/or differentiations on the basis of mutual contact, as are observed from the protagonists’ viewpoint or from that of the surrounding social order. 2 I thereupon noted that ethnicity has come to represent a pivotal conceptual and problematic focus of our times, and as such has permeated social and ethno-anthropological studies in their entirety: thus also encompassing the horizon of Antiquity, especially due to the diachronic perspective on the formation and differentiations of identities that the ancient record has to offer, with the intriguing applications and unforeseeable results that may ensue. In this light, it is of obvious interest for Assyriologists and historians of the ancient Near East to single out specific markers of interand intra-group categorisation, embodiment and group perceptions within the domain of the written or iconographic evidence at their disposal. The Assyrian empire between the 9th and 7th centuries BC, with its vast blend of peoples progressively falling under the “yoke of Assur”, 3 and/or being moved to and fro for military Author’s note:  It is with great pleasure that I dedicate this final essay on ethnicity in the Assyrian empire to Nicholas Postgate, with whom I have had the good fortune to enjoy an extended and stimulating venture of collegial text-editorship (SAA 7 [1992]; SAA 11 [1995)]), not only entailing an intense give-and-take on all aspects of Neo-Assyrian “everyday” documents and their translations, but also the friendly exchange of warm hospitality in family homes over the years. To leave but a snapshot of those good times, I would like to recall our savoring of the sweet ovoidal prunes of Cetona (Tuscany), dubbed by locals “scosciamonache” m an irreverent moniker which you, Nicholas, deftly rendered before my mother’s amused gaze as pētēt ḫallī nadiāti. 1.  Fales 2013. It was there announced that only a second article in the series would follow; however, further work on the subject-matter proved that the material to be investigated was so vast and complex as to warrant two more contributions. The second article was thus centered on the “Assyrians”; it also formed part of a Festschrift, dedicated to Mario Liverani (Fales 2015). This introductory paragraph is similar, with limited variations, in all three articles. 2.  This view of ethnicity, which was paradigmatically innovative on previous approaches, is due to Fredrick Barth (Barth Ed. 1969: 9–38). As recalled, e.g., by Emberling (1997: 95), studies on ethnicity may nowadays be subdivided into those preceding or following the Barth paradigm shift (B.B. / A.B. = “before/after Barth”), i.e., between research on “culture as a whole” or, instead, focused on “subgroups of people”. Cf also n. 6, below. 3.  For a general history of the Assyrian empire, cf. Fales 2001; a history of the period (but also of the previous Middle Assyrian one) constituted, in a sort of “patchwork” pattern, by a variety of interrelated perspectives is offered in Postgate 2007.

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and economic reasons, lends itself in a unique manner as observation point for the study of the mechanisms of ethnicity in the ancient Near Eastern context. This is particularly significant because we are nowadays in the position to view this period — in geographical vastness and great socio-economic complexity — not only through the filter of the official discourse of Assyrian royalty, but also through the lens of many hundreds of documents dealing with “everyday” administrative practice, which were retrieved in the archives of capitals and provincial cities.

*   *   * The aim of this article, like the other two in the series, is to investigate the area of “ethnicgroup terms” 4 as identifiers of ethnicity within the Neo-Assyrian empire: in particular, I will focus on toponyms, ethnonyms, and other locational terms in the Assyrian written record to which the ending commonly known as “gentilic” was applied. This is a suffix of relation or pertinence, present in virtually all Semitic languages as afformative for nouns, called “nisbe” (an-nisbah in the original Arabic rendering), which has the form –āy/ -āyum in Akkadian, with a possibly restricted use to designate peoples and inhabitants of specific places. 5 In very essential terms, the nisbe represents an explicit identifier in terms of ethnicity, although — of course — its attestations cannot be expected to yield an “objective” historical picture of the jigsaw puzzle of the ethnicities which formed the Assyrian empire, but merely the totally subjective, and even merely occasional, perception and communication of such ethnicities. 6 For this and other reasons, the range and extent to which the nisbe was applied to different locational and social entities attested in the documentation of the Neo-Assyrian period requires a series of in-depth contextual evaluations. From these we may draw a tentative historical-anthropological framework on how the dominating level of Assyrian society — which constitutes our main “informer” on Assyria itself through its textual material — perceived the existence of “others”, whether living beyond its borders or interspersed in its very midst. The opposite point of view — that of the protagonists themselves on their own identity and, conversely, regarding the Assyrian overlords of their age — would of course also be of the utmost interest; but, due to the general paucity and the nature of the written sources at our disposal, it remains much 4.  For this terminology and its applications, specifically in a linguistic-philosophical perspective, cf. Nuccetelli 2004. 5.  W. von Soden, GAG, §56p. Alongside it, we find the traditional Akkadian ending -ī, -īum, which is of strictly adjectival use (thus taking on full declension), and shows a semantical range extending beyond the mere indication of peoples and inhabitants of specific places, to mark a wider “belonging” of the subject to a specific structure, a profession, or other (ibid.: §56q). For the aims of this paper, it may suffice to note that, at least as regards Neo-Assyrian, there would seem to be a certain overlap between them. 6.  As in the previous article, a Barthian-type approach to ethnicity is followed here, and more specifically a definition of the term which is based on the study of past and present ethnicities by S. Jones (1997: xiii and passim): “all those social and psychological phenomena associated with a culturally constructed group identity” — the latter being the common ground of “any group of people who set themselves apart and/or are set apart by others with whom they interact or co-exist on the basis of their perceptions of cultural differentiation and/or common descent”. For endorsements of — and partial corrections to — this appealing relativistic definition see already Fales 2015, n. 9.

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more elusive, and may be evoked only through brief flashes, with no real consistency over time and space. 7

Arameans and Related Ethnicities: Assyrian Perspectives The particular theme chosen for this essay regards the ethnic-group terms which were applied to the major bracket of “Arameans” appearing in numerous instances within the Assyrian written documentation, as well as to a number of related population groups which may presumed to be of similarly gentilic social structure and tied to a mobile and pastoralist way of life, at least to a certain degree. 8 Thus, to the extent that kinship (whether real or, more often than not, merely assumed/declared) was patently an important “idiomatic” item of social classification and economic organization in all the studied cases — from the smaller gentilic unit to the larger confederation –, nisbes and other forms of description attested in this essay present a number of elements of continuity. On the other hand, as will be seen, their study also brings to light a set of shifts and/or oppositions over time, insofar as diverse spheres of activities and mores — different horizons and markers of ethnicity, as it were — came to the fore in the written record. Thus, altogether, an approach to the “Arameans” and to connected, essentially tribal, population groups along the standard lines of ethnicity yields an interestingly fractured picture of the Assyrians’ perception of them over time; and also allows one to bring forth some novel perspectives regarding one of the most frequently treated topics of Ancient Near Eastern history. 9 The nisbe that is prevalently associated with the noun/adjective “Aram(a)ean” is Ar(a)mayyu/ Ar(a)māyu (normally written Ar-ma-a-a, more rarely Ar-ma-a-ia, fem. Armī/ētu); it may be found both in Assyrian royal inscriptions and in the “everyday” documentation of the Assyrian state and empire. 10 As will be seen, however, the presence and distribution of this ethnic-group term is irregular over the comprehensive gamut of written materials of the NA period, other 7.  As already noted in Fales 2013: 54 n. 17, the written record of this period offers, in the main, only official utterances (in Aramaic, Luwian, Urartian, etc.) that present fleeting and stereotypical political views on the Assyrian Empire, with no real worth from the standpoint of a study of ethnicity in a historical light. See, however, the useful ideological-political results concerning the acceptance of vassalage to the empire reached by Lanfranchi 2009 on the Çineköy Luwian-Phoenician bilingual inscription. Somewhat more satisfactory for the problem at hand is the Biblical record: cf. Machinist 1983. 8.  It may be noted that, not entirely by chance, the present contribution takes up a set of data and issues tackled many years ago by the Jubilar himself in an interesting conference paper (Postgate 1981). This article thus also represents for the present writer a pleasant (and hopefully useful) occasion to update the relevant problem area with a certain amount of recent bibliographical references, mainly (but not exclusively) on the textual side of things. I am very grateful to Dr. Christian W. Hess and to Dr. Ros­ witha Del Fabbro for their kind bibliographical aid from the library stacks of the Freie Universität Berlin. 9.  For general studies of the last quarter century on the Arameans in the Assyrian empire, cf. Bunnens 1999; Dion 1997; Fales 2002a; 2007; 2011b; Klengel 2000; Lipiński 2000; Mazzoni 1994; Millard 1992; 2009; Sader 2000; 2014; Schniedewind 2002; Schwartz 1989; Szuchman 2007; Younger 2007; Zadok 1991; 2012. 10.  For possible, albeit on the whole improbable, antecedents of the name from the 3rd millennium onward, cf., e.g., Lipiński 2000: 26–35.

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designations (of geographical or genealogical nature) also being used in its stead. Accordingly, the following discussion will regard the main clusters of data centering on all definitions of “Arameans”, beginning with the royal inscriptions of the late Middle Assyrian period, and then proceeding in chronological order until the end of the Assyrian empire in 612 BC. The following five sections will deal with various aspects of the complex “Aramean” puzzle from the point of view of ethnicity. Their titles are : (a) Where did the Assyrians place “the land of the Arameans”?; (b) Unraveling nisbes: Aḫlamû, Sutû, and Aḫlamû KURAramayyu; (c) The Jezirah: “Arameans” between mobile gentilic groupings and tribal-based polities; (d) Looking southward: the reapparance of “Aramean” tribesmen; (e) The “Arameans” in Assyria. a.  Where Did the Assyrians Place “The Land of the Arameans”? The earliest mention of groups described as “Arameans” can be dated to the reign of Tiglath-pileser I (1114–1076 BC), who states in a well-known passage of his official inscriptions to have fought against the forces of the Aḫlamû KURAramayyu, pursuing them “in a single day” 11 for a long stretch northwards along the eastern Euphrates riverbank (where moreover a defensive line of Assyrian fortresses was presumably already in place), 12 and then crossing the river to raid six settlements of theirs on the present-day Jebel Bišri. 13 “With the support of the god Aššur, my lord, I took my chariots and warriors (and) set off for the desert. I marched against the Aḫlamû-Aramaeans (a-na ŠÀ Aḫ-la-mì-i KURAr-ma-iaMEŠ), enemies of the god Aššur, my lord. I plundered from the edge of the land Sūḫu to the city Carchemish of the land Ḫatti in a single day. I massacred them (and) carried back their booty, possessions, and goods without number. The rest of their troops, who fled from the weapons of the god Assur, my lord, crossed the Euphrates. I crossed the Euphrates after them on rafts (made of inflated) goatskins, I conquered six of their cities at the foot of Mount Bešri (6 URUMEŠ-šu-nu ša GÌR KURBé-eš-ri), burnt, razed, (and) destroyed (them, and) brought their booty, possessions, and goods to my city Aššur.” 14

11.  The realism of the setting of the episode, as for the temporal dimension (“in a single day”) in relation to the spatial one (“from the edge of the land Suḫu to the city Carchemish” — a distance of some 200 km), has always been questioned: cf., e.g., Fales 2002: 190, n. 22, and more recently Kirleis-Herles 2007: 8, Herles 2007b: 415–416. The latter suggested that more than one contemporaneous Assyrian warring action could have taken place largely at the same time, thus gaining “eine gewisse Wahrscheinlichkeit” for the passage. In this connection, the line of Assyrian fortresses (cf. next footnote) could have played a specific role in a multi-centric offensive undertaking. 12.  For a geographical and archaeological overview of these fortresses, see Herles 2007b: 417ff., and more extensively and in greater detail Tenu 2009, passim; while appealing, Zadok’s view (2012: 577) of such outposts as constituting a veritable limes euphraticus seems slightly exaggerated. 13.  On the Jebel Bišri as the alleged homeland of the Amorites and as a religious reference-point for these population groups since the end of the 3rd millennium BC, cf. the source-material assembled in Pappi 2006. For the strategic role of the Bišri as one of the seats of the Suteans in the Mari period, see Karger-Minx 2013: 366a, Ziegler — Reculeau 2014: 220–221. 14.  RIMA 2, A.0.87.1: 44–63.

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The collective designation Aḫlamû KURAramayyu is here associated with armed groups issuing from (or, at least, referring back to) fixed settlements located on heights at the northern fringe of the Syro-Arabic desert. 15 Thus, it may be asked whether the expression KURAr-ma-ia attached to the designation Aḫlamû (on which we will return in §b, below) should represent something more than a simple, topical, marker of ethnicity, and in point of fact refer to a somewhat more specific spatial notion, a “mental-map”-type construct evoking an actual “land of the Arameans”. This possibility, which has already tempted some previous scholars, will represent one of the leit-motifs of the present essay. 16 For the moment, in any case, the notion of this possible “land of the Arameans” may be limited to settlements of the Aḫlamû located in the overall theater of the Holocene terrace lining the western bank of the Euphrates valley through a large part of its middle course. In a further passage, on the other hand, the same Tiglath-pileser I enlarges the scenario to some extent: “I have crossed the Euphrates twenty-eight times, twice in one year, in pursuit of the AḫlamûAramaeans (KURAḫ-la-me-e KURAr-ma-a-iaMEŠ). I brought about their defeat from the city Tadmar of the land Amurru, Anat of the land Suḫu, as far as the city Rapiqu of Karduniaš. I brought their booty (and) possessions to my city Aššur”. 17

The geographical sector described here for the Aḫlamû of the “land of the Arameans” stretches further westward, reaching Palmyra (“Tadmar”), and southward, attaining Anat of Suḫu and Rapiqu, on the northwestern border of Babylonia. 18 In this light, Tiglath-pileser I’s claims of extensive conquests might take after those of Tukulti-Ninurta I, who had already boasted of victories in the Middle Euphrates catchment region, and specifically in the lands of “Mari, Ḫana and Rapiqu”, as well as in the “mountains/hills (ša-da-an) of the Aḫlamû” in the context of his expedition against the Kassites. 19 To be sure, in a variant version of the same passage of Tiglath-pileser’s text, 20 even the “foot of Mount Lebanon” (GÌR KURLab-na-ni) finds place — but the mention of this mountain range might represent a case of spatial hyperbole, to 15.  For the Jebel Bišri as a “landmark of significant topographical prominence” on the right bank of the Euphrates, overlooking from its height of almost 900 meters the Holocene terrace above the river valley to the east and the vast extents of the Syro-Arab desert to the west, see most recently Lönnqvist 2014: 93. 16.  Cf. already Sader 1987: 271: “L’évidence livrée par les textes médio-assyriens montre clairement qu’Aram était une région, un concept géographique s’étendant de la rive occidentale de l’Euphrate jusquʾau Ḫabūr où le groupe le plus important de la population semble avoir été formé de groupes nomades que nous désignons par le terme Araméens”; see also Schniedewind 2002: 277–279. 17.  RIMA 2, A.0.87.4: 34–36. The first KUR attested here might the product of a scribal slip, since it is almost everywhere absent. As first pointed out by Brinkman 1968: 277 n. 1799, the two denominations Aḫlamû and KURAramayyu should be viewed as forming a single unit, and the final MEŠ “usually suffices for the two names”. 18. For Sūḫu and adjacent areas, see already Liverani 1992: 67–68; and most recently Clancier 2006, Cancik-Kirschbaum 2009: 129–136; Beaulieu 2011–2012. 19.  RIMA 1, A.0.78.23: 69–70, inscription on an alabaster tablet from Kār-Tukulti-Ninurta. According to Tenu 2009: 154 n. 2086, these “mountains of the Aḫlamû” should by and large correspond with the Jebel Bišri of Tiglath-pileser’s annals. A more detailed examination of the passage is provided by CancikKirschbaum 2009: 124–129. 20.  RIMA 2, A.0.87.3: 29–35.

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indicate the northernmost part of the Syro-Arab desert in its entirety through the quote of its most famous landmark to the West. 21 Be that as it may, it seems clear that the territorial scenario of the Aḫlamû KURAramayyu as depicted by the last great Middle Assyrian ruler also extended to a certain sector of the desertic and mountainous hinterland of the Transeuphratene. This westernmost area should thus have overlapped to some extent with the territory of transhumance and/or temporary settlement known for previous West Semitic kinship-based groups — of Amorites and later on of Sutians, starting from the late 3rd millennium BC and during the entire 2nd millennium — as a land of medium-to-high aridity, basically unfit for urbanization and intensive agricultural practice, as well as marginal vis-à-vis the main routes of interregional commercial traffic. 22

*   *   * On the other hand, a totally different outlook, both from the socio-political and geographical points of view, is presented by a fragmentary chronicle text from Assur, first published by E. Weidner, relevant to Assyrian and Babylonian events in parallel. Here, no Aḫlamû are men21.  It may be noted, on the other hand, that the mention of GÌR KURLab-na-ni occurs again in the annals of Aššur-bēl-kala (RIMA 2, A.0.89.6: 10′–15′) in a partially broken context, which leaves the reader in doubt as to whether a slightly muddled chain of geographical traditions could have been employed here. The passage (to be integrated through its parallel, A.0. 89.9: 3′–10′) would seem to imply an initial reprise of the feats of Tiglath-pileser I, with small variations (A.0. 89.6: 6′–9′: “[By the] command of the gods Assur, Anu, and A[dad, the great gods, my lords,. . .] in pursuit of the Aramaeans, which twice in one year [I crossed the Euphrates]. I brought about their [defeat from the city An]at of the land Sūḫu and the city [Tadmar as far as the city Rapiqu of Karduniaš]”). It then continues with the alleged foray to Mt. Lebanon, although the account of the crossing of the Euphrates seems to concern essentially a city (perhaps Pitru) on the Sagurru (modern Sajur) river, a small westward affluent of the main river, lying to the north of the Jebel Bišri (A.0. 89.9: 5′–10′: “The Sutians, Naa[. . .] who [live] at the foot of Mount Lebanon [. . . in rafts] (made of inflated) goatskins [I crossed the Euphrates. I conquered the city. . . which (is) (on the opposite bank of the Euphrates)], on the River Sagurru. At that time the region of [the Aḫlamû which. . .] numerous [. . .] )”. The reconstruction of the action by Herles 2007a: 332, seems complicated, since it would imply an account of the recrossing of the Euphrates in an eastward direction during the return home: “Wenn dieser Bericht ähnlich einem Itinerar gelesen werden darf, so läßt sich vermuten, daß Aššur-bēl-kala — vom Libanon kommend — den Euphrat wieder überquerte und stromaufwärts zog”. For the Sajur, cf. also n. 83, below. 22.  See already Dion 1997: 18: “Comme autrefois ces Amorites, les Araméens peuvent fort bien avoir longtemps vécu dans l’obscurité de l’existence villageoise et d’une transhumance à faible rayon, avant de s’imposer dans l’arène politique du Proche-Orient”. On the other hand, it may be noted that the “land of the Arameans” — as defined in these early sources on the Aḫlamû KURAramayyu — seems to correspond only to a limited extent with the geographical and political confines of the land called “Aram” (ʿrm) in Old Aramaic monumental texts from the 8th century, as far as may be ascertained at present. In these later sources (which even portend a subdivision into “Upper and Lower Aram”, ʿly ʿrm w tḥth, in the Sefire treaty, I A 6), we should be dealing with a mental map centered on the cities and trade routes of western Syria from north to south, with only partial extension eastwards in the Palmyrene — mainly due to the newly-consolidated Assyrian military control of the Euphrates river basin, and possibly also due to the very first movements on the part of Arab tribes in the Syro-Arab desert itself. For the geography of “Aram”, cf., e.g., Lemaire-Durand 1984: 72 ff.; Grosby 1997: 6–17; Kahn 2007. For the identification of ‘Aram’ and ‘Arameans’ with Syria and Syrians tout court in later historiography, cf., e.g., Israel 2001: 281–282, with refs. For the Arabs in 8th-century central Syria, cf. Fales 2002b; in Palestine, Bagg 2010.

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tioned, but the action concerning the Aramayyu is patently located on the Upper Tigris and areas to the east of the river, in present-day Iraqi Kurdistan: 23 “[In the eponymy of. . ., the peop]le ate one another’s flesh [to save (their) lives (?). Like a flood’s (?) ra]ging [water (?)] the Aramean “house(hold)s” (ÉMEŠ KURAr-ma-a-iaMEŠ) [became numerous], plundered [the crops (?) of Assyria], conquered and took [many fortified cities of] Assyria. [People fled to]ward the mountains of Ḫabrūri to (save their) lives. They (= the Arameans) took their [gold], their silver, (and) their possessions. [Marduk-nādin-aḫḫē, king of] Karduniaš, died. Marduk-[šapik]-zēri entered upon hi[s father’s throne]. Eighteen years (of reign) of Marduk-nādin-aḫḫē. [In the eponymy of. . .], all the harvest of Assyria was [ruin]ed. ⸢The Aramean “house(hold)s”⸣ became numerous and seized the b[ank] of the Ti[gris. They plundered. . .], Idu, the district of Nineveh, Kilī[zi. In that year, Tiglathpil]eser (I), king of Assyria, [marched] to Katmuḫu”. 24

Various features of this text are of interest. The first is that it provides a picture of Assyrian frailty and military impotence which we are used to associate with the later “crisis” reign of Aššur-bēl-kala (1073–1056 BC), and not with the unbridled expansive thrust of Tiglath-pileser I as portrayed in his annals. In point of fact, however, since the episode relates to the late years of the earlier king (1083/1082 BC and following), 25 its account offers a clear hint to prefigure and contextualize the reversals which his successor would encounter at the hands of the Arameans. 26 A second feature is the direct connection established by the chronicle text between a prolonged situation of drought and famine and the movement of Aramean population groups. This link has acted as an important testimonial for the well-known reconstruction, first proposed by Neumann and Parpola, correlating climatic change and social/political weakness of the Mesopotamian states during the 11th–10th centuries BC. 27 23.  Idu, known for both the MA and NA period, corresponds to present-day Satu Qala on the Little Zab River, in the province of Erbil; cf. Van Soldt et al. 2013. Kilizu has been long identified with Qasr Šemamok, some 30 km to the south of Erbil: cf. Rouault — Masetti Rouault 2013. Ḫabrūri corresponds to the Ḥerīr plain near the Zagros range, NE of Erbil; cf. Parpola-Porter 2001: 9. 24.  Translation largely based on Glassner-Foster 2004: 188–190, 2′–13′; but account has also been taken of the earliest treatment of the text in Tadmor 1958: 133–134. 25.  On the basis of Babylonian chronology relevant to the kings mentioned in the passage, the successive dates of 1083 and 1082 BC are suggested by Brinkman 1968: 387; whereas Parpola in Neumann — Parpola 1987 has 1082 and “ca. 1080”, resp.  26.  The short reign of Ašarēd-apil-Ekur (1075–1074 BC) has not yielded any royal inscriptions: cf. RIMA 2, ad A.0.88. As aptly noted by Postgate 2013: 60, “These scraps of chronicle are tantalising out of proportion to their size, since they must be the remnants of at least two centuries of annual records maintained by Assyrian scribes in their vernacular dialect, to preserve factual information of a kind we do not find in the self-glorifying texts composed in Babylonian dialect to commemorate royal building projects”. 27.  Neumann — Parpola 1987. It may be recalled that very recent studies based on oceanographic analyses have reached the similar conclusion that “the Late Bronze Age-Early Iron Age transition in the eastern Mediterranean about 1200–900 BC coincided with one of the interglacial Holocene Rapid Climate Changes (RCC event) as documented in about 50 globally distributed climate proxy records” (Rohling et al. 2009: 2), and that pollen analyses from Syria, examined by multidisciplinary teams also comprising Assyriologists, seem to confirm it, with the conclusion that “the abrupt climate change at

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The third feature is represented by the earliest indication that the Aramayyu were organized by bītātu, “house(hold)s” 28. This point might represent a useful antecedent to account for the later partition of the entire Jezirah, from the Upper Tigris to the banks of the Euphrates, into a number of polities of mainly Aramean ethnicity characterized by the common designation Bīt + PN — the same type of designation which was moreover applied to the Chaldean tribes in Babylonia. Finally, we may single out a fourth feature, of specific relevance for the issues of ethnicity and geographical distribution under discussion. The context of this chronicle fragment — referring mainly to areas in Assyrian core territories or in the trans-Tigridian hinterland — may suggest that the “house(hold)s” of the Aramayyu, afflicted by famine, had arrived in the districts of Nineveh and Arbailu by moving upstream along the Tigris. The local Assyrian population was thus forced to flee still further northwards toward the Zagros mountains; while, following the interpretation of J.A. Brinkman, “Tiglath-pileser I beat a strategic retreat” westward to Katmuhu (on the eastern flank of the Kašiyari range, the modern Ṭūr ʿAbdīn), 29 “and left the Arameans in temporary possession of the land”. 30 In a nutshell, the Aramean gentilic groups identified by this text may be understood as engaged in an upriver transhumance or transfer along the Tigris basin, presumably starting out from from the middle/lower sector of the river, where it flows closest to the Euphrates. Now, if we compare this situation with the reports in the Assyrian royal inscriptions seen above regarding the Aḫlamû KURAramayyu, but visualizing the relevant scenario in the opposite geographical order to how it is narrated in these texts — i.e., viewing it in a direction upstream and not downstream as the “Assyro-centric” accounts present it — it may be suggested that the West Semitic population groups named in the latter sources were in the process of moving (or, more probably, had largely already moved and partly settled) from the same general area, but proceeding on the Euphrates “side” in a northwesterly direction. 31 the end of the Late Bronze Age caused region-wide crop failures, leading towards socio-economic crises and unsustainability, forcing regional habitat-tracking” (Kaniewski et al. 2010: 207). Widespread pollen analyses are also at the basis of the study by Kirleis-Herles 2007, who concludes: “As indicated by palaeoecological data, a climatic change towards increasing aridity took place between the 12th–9th centuries BC on a supra-regional scale which encompasses — at least — all the region from central and eastern Turkey and north-western Iran to the Dead Sea. None of the specified pollen diagrams contain data that would suggest, in contrast, increasing moisture or heavy rainfall during that time” (p. 31). 28.  This interpretation of ÉMEŠ tallies in general with that of Lipiński 2000: 36 (“ ‘houses’ or clans of the Aramaeans”), whereas Tadmor 1958: 134, understood them as “tents”, following J.-R. Kupper. Brinkman 1968: 387, speaks of “tribes”. It may be recalled that a Middle Assyrian text (KAJ 39:7; cf. Faist 2001: 156–157) speaks of a “journey (to)/caravan for the ‘house’ of the Suteans” (KASKAL É LÚSu-ti-e) — on which Postgate commented “the term house may be an early instance of a usage which can be partly geographical but need only imply little more than tribe” (1981: 51). 29.  On the location of Katmuḫu, cf. Postgate 1976–80b: 487a-b; Liverani 1992: 29–30. On the importance of the Kašiyari / Ṭūr ʿAbdīn in the MA-NA periods, see Postgate 1976–80c, and most recently Radner 2006, Fales 2012. 30.  Brinkman 1968: 388. 31.  The traditional “Assyro-centric” reading-out of the evidence may be exemplified by the account of Cole 1996: 23–24: “Aramean penetration of Babylonia commenced in the eleventh century BC, and continued into the eighth century. The Arameans seem to have entered Upper Mesopotamia first, along

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*   *   * In a comprehensive territorial view, then, we suggest that the primary zone of (perceived and to some extent actual) Aramean presence was the area around Rapiqu and in the entire (and relatively well-watered) interfluvial plain reaching over to the middle/lower Tigris, 32 i.e., the sector that might be comprehensively dubbed as northernmost Babylonia — which is where, not by chance, later Assyrian rulers, beginning with Tiglath-pileser III, would still/again find and be forced to confront a large number of Aramean tribes (cf. §d, below). 33 As for the inclusion of a certain part of the northern Šamiya desert in the Assyrian mental map concerning the Aḫlamû KURAramayyu — already noted above –, it might reflect a further westward movement of these armed mobile groups, starting out from the banks of the Middle Euphrates around the junction with the Ḫābūr or from points farther north. Alternatively, however, it might simply mirror a confluence/overlap in the Assyrians’ perception of the Aḫlamû KURAramayyu between the groups encountered in the Euphrates basin and other West Semitic populations of gentilic structure already present in the Syrian desert, such as the Sutû (Sutians) known in the area since the 2nd millennium, as, e.g., the story of Idrimi of Alalakh testifies. 34 Finally, it is reasonable to ask how, why and when the lower interfluvial area in question began to be connected to mobile gentilic groups specifically dubbed “Arameans”. No precise answer to these questions may for the moment be provided, either on the basis of historical information or through linguistic data. 35 The origin of the ethnonym might thus be the simple a broad front from the foot of Mt. Lebanon . . . to Carchemish in upper Syria, to Rapiqu in the vicinity of modern ar-Ramadi northwest of Sippar”. Counter to this approach, it may be recalled that Brinkman had long before (1968: 281–285) presented a problematic and sophisticated analysis of “the origin of the Arameans in Eastern Babylonia”, with at least three possible solutions (of which the first and second prove to be not too distant from the one sketched in the present essay). 32.  On this area, cf., e.g., Cole-Gasche 1998. 33.  In this connection, it may be noted in passing that the enigmatic Biblical toponym Qîr, attested in a much-discussed passage of Amos (9:7) as the region whence the Israelite God had drawn the Arameans, i.e., as their alleged original homeland, has most recently been connected with the Assyro-Aramaic word qīru/qyr, “liquid bitumen” and thus referred to the area of the sources of bitumen on the Middle/ Lower Euphrates between Ḫīt and Rapiqu (Elitzur 2012, quoted by Zadok 2014: 5). This identification — although it is no more and no less hypothetical than all previous ones offered (see, e.g., Lipiński 2000: 40–45, who, on the basis of the Aramaic term qīr, “wall”, focused on the fortress Qraya near the Euphrates-Ḫābūr junction) — would have the advantage of tallying by and large with the area of maximal proximity of the Twin Rivers which is suggested here as the locale of primary Aramean presence. 34.  Thus, it is perhaps not by chance that Sutians are said to be living at the foot of Mt. Lebanon in Aššur-bēl-kala’s annals (cf. n. 21, above). 35.  This point was already made by Postgate 1981: 49–50: “To what extent the groups retained a separate identity is impossible to say, especially because we have hardly any legal and administrative documents to illustrate internal conditions in Assyria after the reign of Tukulti-Ninurta I” — although the documentary situation has much improved in recent decades (see now Postgate 2013: 260–326). Some attempts to focus on the “rise” of the Arameans have been made proceeding from onomastics, a field which retains a difficult relation with ethnicity studies (see already Fales 2013: 51–52 n. 11). Thus, e.g., the parallels which have been observed between West Semitic (“Amorite”) onomastic data from the Late Bronze Age and Aramaic personal names of the Iron Age (cf. especially Zadok 1991: 114; and most recently 2012: 570), may be certainly interpreted as marking lines of basic cultural continuity between the

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product of a re-denomination, such as may be envisaged also taking into account the templates of social and economic divisions, splits, and reconstitutions which are attested for nomads of recent periods. 36 Moreover, the populations of this “land of the Arameans”, insofar as it seems to have been characterized by a certain fluctuation in space and in demographic consistence over time, might have periodically been expanded by components drawn from sedentary areas and societies, in the wake of war or serious socio-economic crises. If considered acceptable, the “multi-polar” view of Aramean spread in the northern SyroMesopotamian region propounded here — starting from a common location on the middle/ lower reaches of the Twin Rivers, with presumable mass movements upriver along the parallel axes of the Euphrates and Tigris — would entail a number of consequences for a comprehensive tracing of “Aramean” ethnicity in the sources from the late 2nd millennium to the end of the Assyrian empire. These consequences may be presented first in tabular form, with reference to the following sections in the article (§b-§e, in the right-hand column) where they will be taken up in detail (see fig. 1). b.  Unraveling nisbes: Aḫlamû, Sutû, and Aḫlamû KURAramayyu This section will deal with the issues summarized in points (1)-(3) in Fig. 1, i.e., it will dwell to some extent on the use of the term Aḫlamû by itself in the Middle Assyrian sources, on its random use in parallel with the moniker Sutû, “Sutian”, and on the possible relation with the complex Aḫlamû KURAramayyu examined above. As clarified in detail by numerous authors, Aḫlamû proves to have a long history, going back to the Old Babylonian period, and geographically reaching down to the southernmost limits of Mesopotamia. 37 However, restricting our gaze to times closest to the already quoted annals, it may be noticed that Middle Assyrian royal inscriptions from the 13th century onward mention groups of Aḫlamû, alone or in connection with other entities, as entering into armed conflict with the Assyrian state. Thus, Adad-nīrāri I (1307–1275 BC) places the Aḫlamû in the general area of Katmuḫu (modern Ṭūr ʿAbdīn), already quoted above (§1a). The king flaunts his military prowess in the following terms: Conqueror of the land Kutmuḫu and its entire allies, the hordes of the Aḫlamû (and of the [?]) Y(a)urian Suteans (  gu-un-nu Aḫ-la-mì-i Su-ti-i Ia-ú-ri), together with their lands (KUR.KURšu-nu), extender of borders and boundaries. 38 two periods, but no more than this (cf. on this count Sader 2014: 19; and see already Millard 1992: 348). As for the origin of the Aramaic language in itself, we may note the recent pessimistic statement by a specialist: “Aramaic cannot be directly connected to any of the Bronze-Age manifestations of Northwest Semitic. . . . One may thus assume that Aramaic, like Canaanite, took on its distinctive shape at some point in the Bronze Age but remained unwritten, and hence invisible, for several centuries” (Gzella 2014: 71–72). 36.  On such patterns, cf., e.g., Wossink 2011. 37.  Cf. Herles 2007a, with an overview of all relevant sources, as well as of earlier literature; also, most recently, Streck 2014: 302–303. 38.  RIMA 1, A.0.76.1, 18–24.

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(1) The designation Aḫlamû KURAramayyu could be even more tightly related to the moniker Aḫlamû by itself, as it is found in Middle Babylonian sources relevant to the southern Mesopotamian alluvium — possibly as a socially descriptive marker for “nomad, drifter”.

§b

(2) In Middle Assyrian sources regarding the northern Mesopotamian sector, the term Aḫlamû by itself should in various cases refer to mobile, kinship-based groups of West Semitic affiliation (even possibly as shorthand for the later coupling with the “Arameans”), but need not be seen as doing so consistently, i.e., it might also refer to non-Semitic populations.

§b

(3) Similarly, the relation of the Aḫlamû with other well-defined West Semitic gentilic groupings of local mobility, such as the Sutû in Middle Assyrian sources, should not be taken as univocal but should be analyzed in detail, according to context and circumstances — with an ensuing picture of the two groups sometimes associated by the Assyrians along lines of common hostility, but at other times (and in fact prevalently) viewed in opposition, as representatives of resp. hostile and amical relations with the Assyrian state.

§b

(4) From the 11th century onward, the progressive but inexorable abandonment of the designation §c Aḫlamû KURAramayyu in favor of other markers for “the land of the Arameans” or of no markers at all, may be related to new identities taken on by, and perceived for, West Semitic-language/culture groups as constituents of distinct polities (almost exclusively dubbed as Bīt + PN), in which real/fictitious agnatic kinship and tribal/clanic solidarity of long standing were but some of the factors of statehood involved, alongside (re-)urbanization and mercantile activities.a (5) If, on one hand, these polities are clearly identified in Assyrian sources down to Shalmaneser III’s §c–d reconquista of Northern Mesopotamia, on the other hand residual tribal complexes of “Arameans” seem to continue their foraging and bellicose activities in the central-southern Jezirah. This activity, scarcely publicized officially by a progressively enfeebled Assyrian state, is clearly brought forth by the Babylonian texts dubbed “annals of Sūḫu” of the early 8th century. (6) From the mid-8th century onward, Assyrian sources assign a purely “Aramean” identity almost §d exclusively to tribes along the Middle/Lower Euphrates and Tigris and points south. These tribes will attempt to resist the Assyrian offensive by moving around in the area and through varying alliances, but in the end will be slaughtered and/or deported en masse, while some groups or parts thereof — most prominently, the Itu’ — will find a functional incorporation within the armed forces of the Assyrian state.b (7) Within the Assyrian administration of the late 8th and 7th centuries, the nisbe originally meaning §d–e “Aramean” (Aramayyu) lived on in two different acceptations: (a) with reference to specific corps included in the Assyrian army and (b) with reference to the use of the Aramaic language and its alphabetic script. On a more learned level, even the term Aḫlamû was employed as a synonym for “Aramaic” in a linguistic sense. a.  A similar general shift to kinship-based polities (also dubbed Bīt + PN) founded on integrated agriculture and breeding activities, fortified settlements and an extended mercantile program might be seen as accompanying the formation of the Chaldean confederations (which eventually came to number only three constituents) to the south of the zone identified above as the primary area of the Arameans, and specifically all along the lower Euphrates and in parts of Central Babylonia down to the Persian Gulf. These polities are mentioned in Assyrian sources only from the early 9th century onwards, but could have already been in progressive aggregation for about a century; their links with West Semitic linguistic and cultural traditions appear to be(come) much more tenuous than for the northern groups. Cf. the overview by Fales 2007, with previous bibl. b.  Thus, e.g., from the archives of late 8th-century Nippur, a certain admixture of ethnicities (especially of Chaldeans and Arameans) may be observed within the Babylonian region, albeit in connection with quite different social and political mores and tendencies (cf. §d, below).

Fig. 1.  Consequences of a “multi-polar” view of the spread of the Arameans (from lower Mesopotamia northwards along both Euphrates and Tigris) for the history of Aramean-Assyrian relations (especially 11th–7th centuries BC).

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The double denomination Su-ti-i Ia-ú-ri given here surely forms a single entity, since it shows a few parallels in MA documents; these attestations may thus be checked, in attempting to elucidate the relationship between Aḫlamû and Sutû in the above inscription. From ancient Kulišḫinas, 39 a text records the acquisition of a sheep by one Ubru from a Su-ti-e I-ia-ú-ra-ie, “a Yaurian Sutian”, 40 while a tablet from Tell al-Rimah (ancient Qatara) describes the receipt of customs duty payable on a donkey which a government agent bought from another Su-ti-e Ia-ú-ra-ie-e. 41 It may thus be asked whether Ia-ú-ri/(I)-ia-ú-ra-ie(-e) represented a toponymic characterization, perhaps referring to the preferred region of residence, 42 or rather a tribal subdivision of the Sutians. The former view might fit other such designations, all marked by a nisbe, referring to essentially peaceful dealings with the Middle Assyrian state on the part of (e.g.) “Taḫabean Sutian(s)”, 43 “Qattunean Sutians”, “Nešḫaean Sutians”, 44 “Qairanean Sutians”. 45 In the latter perspective, instead, E. Lipiński viewed the Aḫlamû in the quoted passage of Adad-nīrāri I as the more comprehensive entity, since it is placed in an isolated initial position; consequently, he suggested an interpretation of this term as “a general designation of these nomadic populations . . . while Yauru is a Sutean tribe”. 46 If so, the case would not be unique: it may be recalled that, e.g., also the Niḫsanu, mentioned in the texts from Tell Sabi Abyad, 47 constituted a particular Sutian tribal or clanic unit (possibly designated by the term palgu, said to be Amorite in origin). 48 A treaty established 39.  On the identification of ancient Kulišḫinas with the site of Tell ʿĀmūda, see Maul 2004: 130, with previous bibliography. This identification for the ancient site is now considered unlikely, however (cf. Postgate 2013: 100 n. 29). Moreover, the relevant tablet was acquired on the antiquities market, and thus has no specific archaeological provenance (cf. Faist 2001: 186 n. 180). 40.  Cf. Jakob 2003: 171 n. 10; Zadok 2012: 570. 41.  TR 2059: 3–4. The text, first mentioned but not transliterated or copied in Saggs 1968: 168, and subsequently commented upon in Postgate 1981: 51 and Faist 2001: 187 n. 184, has finally been given in full transliteration and translation by Postgate 2013: 267. 42.  As suggested in the past by a mention of a land [I]a-ri in the annals of Aššur-bēl-kala (RIMA 2, A.0.89.7, 21 : campaign against the Arameans ìna URU ma-ag-ri-si šá KUR[I]a-ri). For the suggestion of a different reading of the toponym, i.e., KUR[M]a-ri, cf. Fales 1992: 106. 43.  Documented at Tell al-Rimah (TR 2083A): cf. Kärger-Minx 2011–2012: 368a. 44.  Both these groups are listed in MARV 2, 22: cf. Postgate 2013: 158. 45.  Cancik-Kirschbaum 1996, no. 13: 19–20. For all mentions of Sutians in the letters from DurKatlimmu on the Ḫābūr, cf. ibid., 103 ad l. 41. See also Wiggermann 2000: 208, ll. 27–28; Faist 2001: 136 on the “Qairanean Sutians”. 46.  Lipiński 2000: 39; cf. also Szuchman 2007: 114. 47.  The texts from Tell Sabi Abyad, discovered in the late Nineties, have, unfortunately, still not been made available in their entirety through publication. Only a selection of the documents has been presented here and there by the philologist F.M. Wiggermann (Wiggermann 2000: 205–210, 217–222 = 12 texts, plus random quotes ibid., 172ff; Wiggermann 2006 = 1 text; Wiggermann 2008 = 2 texts and 3 inscribed fragments; Wiggermann 2010 = 1 text). 48.  Cf. Kärger-Minx 2011–2012: 368a, with ref. to West Semitic (but actually only Phoenician!) plg, DNWSI, 913. According to these authors, the expressions palgu rabû and palgu ṣeḫru, followed by counts of people, attested in Cancik-Kirschbaum no. 17: 10, 13, resp., should not refer to Akk. palgu, “canal”, but to this West Semitic homonym. The word itself in connection with tribal entities seems to be attested at Sabi Abyad: cf. previous footnote.

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around 1200 BC by Ili-ipadda, the sukkallu dannu, “Grand Vizier” and šar Ḫanigalbat, “king of Ḫanigalbat”, i.e., the royal official with the highest political and military authority in the western sector of the Middle Assyrian reign, 49 indicates clearly the Niḫsanu as a gentilic subdivision per se, although it goes on to dub them as simply “Sutians” in the articles of the treaty itself   50 — thus creating a clear opposition between the ethnicities of “Sutians” and “Assyrians”, such as we may also find expressed elsewhere in the texts of this age. 51 However, as this may be for the two interpretations just examined — with additional sources being required to decide between them in the future –, a further possibility concerning the Adad-nīrāri passage may also be taken into account: that Aḫlamû did not refer to a separate political/military group, but that it was employed as a mere adjectival marker (“semi-nomad” or similar) applied to the “Yaurian Sutians”. 52 This possibility brings us back to the overall interpretation of the term Aḫlamû as a purely social denomination, which has been shared — with different nuances — by a number of authors throughout the century-old tradition of relevant studies. 53

*   *   * The appellative Aḫlamû has been discussed, ever since Sina Schiffer’s pioneering study on the Arameans of a century ago, 54 in its possible nature as an actual ethnonym or instead as a socially descriptive marker, e.g., somewhat similarly to the term ḫabīru, “outcast, social rebel” in the Late Bronze Age. In this connection, it may be recalled that a social interpretation of the term was not only endorsed by Schiffer himself, 55 but that this scholar suggested an addi49.  Cf. most recently Fales 2012, with previous bibl. 50.  For the English translation of §§5–6 of the treaty, cf. Fales 2014: 234. 51.  On this opposition, cf., e.g., Postgate 2013: 13. For a more advanced notion, based on a variety of perspectives, that “the Suteans, and the land they controlled, were not part of the Assyrian polity. On the contrary, it seems that the Assyrians themselves did not view them as part of their political system”, see Brown 2013: 105. 52.  I.e. that there would be no need to consider that Aḫ-la-mì-i Su-ti-i Ia-ú-ri implied two different entities (with an implicit “and” linking them) but only one. 53.  On the various Semitic etymologies proposed for the term Aḫlamû, see the overview by Younger 2007: 135. He however omits the one suggested by Streck 2000: 335, which goes back to a proposal by I. J. Gelb, of deriving the word from *ḥlm, “to be strong”, as an ʾaqtāl form representing a South Semitic broken plural, “der nicht ohne weiteres für das Amurritische vorausgesetzt werden kann”. Thus, with the required reservations, Streck renders Aḫlamû as “die sehr Starken (?)” (ibid., and 402). In any case, and preliminarily to the discussion on Aḫlamû which follows, it may be observed that none of the hitherto suggested etymologies yields a result which may be tout court, and ad litteram, applied (1) to the Aḫlamû in themselves, as protagonists of the MB texts from southern Mesopotamia, or (2) to the Aḫlamû KUR Aramayyu in Assyrian texts from the MA or later periods. In practice, therefore, it should be (made) clear that from the very beginning most attempts to interpret and translate the term Aḫlamû have been ad sensum, i.e., as suggestions deriving from the presumed semantics of the relevant contexts. In this light, even the purely social (and in no way ethnically connotated) appellation “drifter” might be added to “nomad” with reference to some attestations of Aḫlamû in isolated contexts in Middle Babylonian texts. 54.  Schiffer 1911. 55.  Pacē Kirleis — Herles 2007: 9, n. 8, who believe that this author was a woman (“She dedicated an own [sic] chapter” etc.), Sina Schiffer was (as much more likely for the times!) a man, “geb. 1878, Sohn des

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tional connotation of contempt on the part of the Assyrian scribes, understanding the word Aḫlamû to have had a “Bedeutung wie Barbaren”. 56 While countering a possible etymology of the term from Arabic ḫilm (broken plural aḫlām) as meaning “companions, confederates”, S. Moscati (1959) suggested to the opposite that “Aḫlamū is to be regarded as the proper name of a population-group. . . and that the Aḫlamū are independent, in origin and in nature, of the Aramaeans, who can neither be identified with them nor regarded as forming part of them”. 57 However, a rebuttal of this view of Aḫlamû as an ethnonym was expressed by J.A. Brinkman (1968), who went back to the earlier interpretation: “one could raise the question whether the name might not rather refer to a certain type of semi-nomad, whatever his ethno-linguistic affiliation, somewhat as Sutû and Ḫapiru were used at various times”. 58 More recent opinions prove to be basically in line with Brinkman’s: thus, according to G. Schwartz (1989) “the term Ahlamu-Aramaean probably means ‘nomad Aramaean’ and need not signify an identification of the Aramaeans with the Ahlamu nomads of the mid-second millenium B.C. or a confederation of two nomadic groups”, 59 while A.K. Grayson (1991) took up again Schiffer’s interpretation “nomad, barbarian” in his apparatus, moreover noting that “originally, of course, it was a gentilic but this is obviously not the case in our inscriptions where gentilics are always preceded by KUR and generally followed by MEŠ”. 60 Finally, Herles (2007) indicates that “mit dem Begriff aḫlamû keine Ethnie, sondern vielmehr der Zusammenschluß verschiedener Volksangehörigen gemeint war”. 61 Even more broadly, R. Zadok has considered the terms “Sutian” (or “Sutean”) and Aḫlamû as parallel (and even overlapping) general designations for “(Semitic) semi-nomads” in Assyrian sources of the late 2nd millennium BC; this brought him to envisage the constructs of “Yaurian Sutian” and “Aramean Aḫlamû” as similarly formed by specific tribal “labels” (Yaurian/ Aramean) added to the names of the two main seminomadic population groups. 62 In a nutshell, the social interpretation of Aḫlamû proves to be widely accepted, albeit with some oscillations between an adjectival or a nominal function for the term. Thus, all said and done, even a translation of the quoted Adad-nīrāri passage as “the hordes of semi-nomad Yaurian Sutians” may not be completely ruled out, although elsewhere — admittedly — the use of Aḫlamû by itself in MA official sources rather points to the name of a specific mobile armed group, formed at least in part by tribal-based elements. Thus, a passage from the annals of Shalmaneser I (1274–1245 BC) indicates clearly that the last ruler of Ḫanigalbat, Šattuara II, Jonas Schiffer aus Wadowice, schrieb 1908 in Leipzig seine Dissertation über die Geschichte der Aramäer und war in Paris tätig” (http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinai_Schiffer, final section: “Abgrenzung”). 56.  Schiffer 1911: 17. 57.  Moscati 1959: 307. 58.  Brinkman 1968: 277 n. 1799. 59.  Schwartz 1989: 286 n. 1. 60. RIMA 2, 23 ad V 46. On Aḫlamû as morphologically corresponding to an original gentilic, which however “was perceived among the sedentary population of Babylonia as a proper name”, cf. Lipiński 2000: 37. 61.  Herles 2007a: 322. 62.  Zadok 2012: 570. However, this parallel may be questioned, since — as seen above — the notation KUR Aramayyu does not seem in any way referrable to a specific tribal entity or partition. For E. Lipiński’s view, cf. n. 46, above.

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confronted the Assyrians with a double armed force, formed by “Hittites” and Aḫlamû (ÉRINan ḫa-ti-i ù aḫ-la-mi-i): I marched to the land Ḫanigalbat, I opened up most difficult paths (and) passes. Šattuara, king of the land Ḫanigalbat, with the aid of the armies of the Hittites and Aḫlamû, captured the passes and watering-places (in) my (path). When my army was thirsty and fatigued (lit., ‘because of the thirst and fatigue of my army’) their army made a fierce attack in strength. But I struck (back), and brought about their defeat. I slaughtered countless numbers of their extensive army. . . . I slaughtered like sheep the armies of the Hittites and Aḫlamû, his allies. At that time I captured their cities (in the region) from Taʾidu to Irridu, all of Mount Kašiyari to the city Eluḫat, the fortress of Sūdu, the fortress of Ḫarrānu to Carchemish which is on the bank of the Euphrates. I became ruler over their lands and set fire to the remainder of their cities. 63

As described here by the Assyrians, the (presumably large) enemy host which confronted them was formed of sedentary conscripts from the Hittite empire and other more mobile groups of combatants. The employ of the latter by the last Hurrian king might have been based on their particular aptitude in roaming the Kašiyari range and adjoining regions — comprising the Upper Tigris area, the Ḫābūr triangle, and the territories westward leading to the Euphrates. 64 A further point to be raised, however, is whether the Aḫlamû in this geographical context were univocally of Semitic origin, as implied by most of the above-quoted scholars, or could have instead comprised “drifters” of various ethnicities — perhaps even former military of Hurrian stock, such as may be made out in the background of the letters from Dur-katlimmu. 65 The same approach may be taken for a later Middle Assyrian account of struggle with the Aḫlamû in the annals of Aššur-rēša-iši I (1132–115 BC), for which the geographical setting is unknown: . . . murderer of the extensive army of the Aḫlamû (and) scatterer of their forces. 66

On the other hand, more likely equations of the Aḫlamû with actual “(Semitic) semi-nomads” may be culled from other written material of the late 2nd millennium, 67 most notably from a passage in a letter from Emar dated to the reign of Tukulti-Ninurta I (Emar VI/3, 263): Moreover, two Aḫlamû (LÚAḫ-la-mu-ú) have arrived (at Emar) from Suḫu; this is what they say: ‘the prefect (?) of Suḫu, with his chariots and his footsoldiers, has violently plundered the land of Qaṭni(?)/Mari(?)’. I will write to my lord all the booty that they have pillaged as a consequence of this action. 68 63.  RIMA 1, A.0.77.1, 58–69, 78–87. 64. On the areas indicated in this passage, cf. most recently Fales 2011: 10, 48, with previous bibliography. 65.  See Cancik-Kirschbaum 1996, nos. 7–9. 66.  RIMA 1, A.0.86.1:6. 67.  Cf. specifically Faist 2001: 226ff., Herles 2007a: 322–328. 68.  Most recent edition in Durand — Marti 2005. The text dates to after the Assyrian victories in Babylonia (of which Sūḫu was an ally) or right at the end of the reign of Tukulti-Ninurta I, is discussed ibid., 126–127, also in relation to the names mentioned elsewhere in the letter. Problematical points in this passage regard : (a) the title (ZA-kìn) of the official from Suḫu, in which the authors envisage a form *sakin with the translation “Prince”; (b) the locale of the Suḫean attack, which the earliest edition understood as KUR.Qa-aṭ-naKI, and which had prompted two distinct identifications, viz. with Tell MishrifehQatna in central-western Syria, some 200 kms. from Sūḫu across the Syro-Arabic desert, and — altogether

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As may be seen, this text points to the undisturbed transit of peoples in the territory between the main bend of the Middle Euphrates, the lower reaches of the Ḫābūr, and the riverbank northwest of the confluence of the Bālīḫ where Emar lay, under the control of Karkemish. In practice, the Aḫlamû here described moved along a stretch of the Euphrates valley by and large corresponding to the one later pinpointed by Tiglath-pileser I for the Aḫlamû Aramayyu. It thus seems reasonable to identify them with the kinship-based peoples of Semitic ethnicity attested a century or so later.

*   *   * To sum up for the time being, the overall picture for the use of the term Aḫlamû in Middle Assyrian sources of official or “archival” nature, whether by itself, or in connection with Sutû, and finally in its relation to the complex Aḫlamû Aramayyu to be found in the annals at the end of this period, is still at present marked by a number of ambiguities. Such ambiguities comprise an element of actual semantic obscurity as well as the possibility for partial, but multiple, overlappings between denominations. I have attempted to summarize the relevant possibilities in Fig. 2. An additional comment may be reserved for the third column from left, regarding the persistence of the three terms after the turn of the millennium. As is well known, the denomination Aḫlamû used by itself seems to lose all of its original significance and resonance, and only after a long documentary gap it is revived as a general descriptive term (in some cases of learned origin) for basically hostile –and “uncivilized”– tribal groups in the Babylonian area from the mid-8th century onward. 69 In this late manifestation, moreover, the term rejoins that more plausibly, in view of the consistently Euphratic setting between Sūḫu and Emar — with Qaṭni on the Ḫābūr, the Qaṭṭunan of the Mari period, possibly to be identified with Tell Ašamšani or Tell Fadġami on the eastern bank of the lower reaches of this affluent (cf., e.g., Morandi Bonacossi 1996: 216–217). A further possibility is offered by Durand-Marti, with the new reading KUR.Ma-ri-ʾi KI, which would point to the territory of the MA dynastic reign of “Mari”, comprising the city of Ṭābete on the same lower Ḫābūr, but in a more northward position, known from locally discovered texts dating between the 13th and the 11th centuries BC: cf. essentially Maul 1992, 2005, Shibata 2007. In this light, there would be no fundamental structural difference between the older and the new interpretation of the toponym: the political scenario would be in any case that of a Kassite-sponsored military foray of the Suḫeans against a scarcely protected western Assyrian outpost, or against an Assyrian-affiliated polity, in the steppeland near the Ḫābūr. 69.  Cf. Herles 2007a: 334–337. The sole exception to this statement is represented by the mention of Aḫlamû in Tiglath-pileser III’s royal inscriptions, and in particular in the Mila Mergi rock relief regarding the expedition of his 7th palû against Ulluba (RINAP 1, no. 37: 19: “The Aḫlamû, who do not bring gifts, (and) do not recognize [authority]”). The ethnicity of these people might coincide at least in part with the Ullubeans themselves, but in any case they constituted a specific mobile group, as the king states (ibid., 20: “they roamed about like deer and ibexes in the mountains”). A further mention is in the account of the 8th palû, in which the officials of the king are sent to the Lower Zab “to subdue the LÚAḫla-am-Ak-ka“ (RINAP 1, no. 13: 13): here the connection of these “Babylonian Aḫlamû” with West Semitic peoples is ensured by the subsequent mention of the tribe of Gurumu, elsewhere attested within Tiglath-pileser III’s list of Aramean tribalists, as well as of the A-ru-mu in their own right (ibid., 13–14). Streck 2014: 303 would understand this designation as standing for “Arameans east of the Tigris”.

(1) Aḫlamû

✓

✖

non-specific (but Semitic in part)

(2) Sutû

✓

✖

West Semitic in kinship-based mainly amical, the main (by tribes/areas, sometimes tied to hostile territory)

(3) Aḫlamû Aramayyu

✓

fluctuating, partly kinship-based

West Semitic in kinship-based ✓ (mobile, (rare) the main

armed, partially settled)

hostile, rarely amical

consistently hostile

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Accepted/ possible interpretation(s) of the term

Source-attested relationship with Assyria

Social status (as deduced from the sources)

Ethno-linguistic connection (as deduced from the sources)

Term

MA Sources (official / administrative) Early NA Sources (1100850 BC)

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“(semi-) nomad (combatant), drifter” [noun or adj.] overlaps with 2 and 3 “ ‘Sutian’ / general West Semitic (semi-) nomad” overlaps with 1 (and 3?) “ ‘Aramean’ (semi-)nomad” overlaps with 1 (and 2?)

Fig. 2.  Presence of the denominations Aḫlamû, Sutû, and Aḫlamû Aramayyu in Middle Assyrian and early NeoAssyrian source-material and their possible interrelations.

of Sutû “as an archaic designation for nomad populations in both historical and “literary” (e.g., omen) texts”. 70 The couplet represented by the Aḫlamû-Arameans also shows a waning popularity: it is still present in Aššur-bēl-kala’s annals, albeit in secondary position vis-à-vis the many mentions of the Arameans by themselves, 71 and it is attested in a general summary of conquests by Adad-nīrāri II, in some contiguity with the Middle Euphrates area (“(I who) brought about the defeat of the steppe-troops of the Aḫlamû-Arameans; (I who) received the tribute of Sūḫu”). 72 Finally, it 70.  Postgate 1981: 49. Its final application to indicate the Aramaic language (point no. 6, above) will be discussed sub f, below. 71.  Cf. n. 21, above. 72.  RIMA 2, A.0.99.2: 33. As noted by Herles 2007a: 332 n. 72, the specification ÉRINMEŠ EDIN is rendered by Grayson as “field troops”, while Schwartz 1989: 281 prefers “people of the steppe” (which is more in keeping with Brinkman’s “country folk”, 1968: 286). My own translation, “steppe-troops” represents a mix of the two, meaning to underscore both the military character of the Aḫ-la-me-e KURAr-ma-a-ia and the environment to which they are connected by the Assyrians. The same line of reasoning might apply to a much later passage, from Sargon’s annals, with reference to Marduk-apal-iddina’s mustering of ‘Sutians’: is-ḫur-ma LÚRu-u8-a LÚḪi-in-da-ru LÚ.KURIa-ad-bu-ru/i LÚPuqu-du gi-mir LÚSu-ti-i/Su-te-e ÉRINMEŠ EDIN it-ti-ia ú-šam-kir-ma “he antagonized against me the Ruʾūʾa, the Ḫindaru, the people of the land of Yadburu, and the Puqūdu, all the Sutians, steppe-troops”, Fuchs 1994: 136–137, Annals no. 258.

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appears once in Aššurnaṣirpal’s annals: here Aḫ-la-me-e KURAr-ma-a-ia is used to describe standing military corps of 1,500 men serving the (West Semitic-named) ruler of Bît-Zamani, which the Assyrian king disbanded and deported to his capital city. 73 After this, the designation disappears from all types of Assyrian texts. c.  The Jezirah: “Arameans” between Mobile Gentilic Groupings and Tribal-based Polities This section will deal with points (4) and (5) summarized above. Differently from the case of the couplet Aḫlamû Aramayyu, the “Arameans” tout court prove to continue their itinerary of ongoing recognition through the Mesopotamian sources, albeit under a variety of onomastic guises, mainly of geographical nature. In point of fact, after the age of Tiglath-pileser I, the original gentilic KURAramayyu(MEŠ) is abandoned in the Assyrian royal inscriptions, although it will be employed again in later archival documents, as stated below; but the notion that the Arameans were in some way to be referred to through mention of the “land” *Arumu/Aramu, with slight variants (which becomes Arimi/Areme with probable vowel harmony in the oblique case), 74 persists. The presence of both initial KUR and final MEŠ in numerous cases makes it very likely that this formation had more or less the same value as the previous KURAramayyu(MEŠ). In Aššur-bēl-kala’s annals, the Assyrians engage in multiple battles against troops referring back to KURA-ra-me (variants: KURA-ri-me, KURA-ri-mi MEŠ, also simply A-ra-ma). 75 In particular, on the basis of the data on the “Broken Obelisk” it has been suggested that such troops were intent on a steady advance from west to east, with the aim of reaching the heartland of Assyria itself. 76 On the other hand, in the light of the quoted chronicle fragment dating to a mere few decades earlier, the possibility that the West Semitic armed groups were in the process of engaging the Assyrians through a comprehensive, albeit unplanned and uncoordinated, pincer movement (W→E and E→W at the same time) cannot be ruled out. We are then forced to skip directly to the period of the Assyrian reconquista (mid-10th to mid-9th century) to find further mentions of the “Arameans”, always indicated as “(the people of) the land Aramu”, or similar. The groups — apparently still organized by kinship ties as well as by planned military objectives — seem still active to a certain extent within the Jezirah or in the adjacent piedmont areas to the north, and the royal inscriptions are quick to point out their (past) felonious subjugation of lands which had once belonged to the Middle Assyrian state (thus justifying the bellicose reactions in the present).

73.  RIMA 2, A.0.101.19: 95–96. On this episode, cf. most recently Szuchman 2009: 57. 74.  For a bird’s-eye view of the sources, see Parpola 1970: 35–37 s.v. arumu. 75.  One might ask whether this A-ra-ma with no determinative might not represent a truncated form of the older nisbe-type formation. 76.  RIMA 2, A.0. 89.7: iii, 1, 2, 8, 10, 12, 13 (for an emendation of the relevant toponym, cf. Fales 2012: 103–105), 18, 19, 21, 22, 23, 25, 26, [27, 29], 30. This progressive W–E movement of the Arameans (and the ensuing withdrawal eastward of the Assyrian army) was most recently pointed out by Zadok 2012.

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Thus, valuable booty i]š-tu ŠÀ KURA-ri-mi — and specifically the herds and flocks from the rural settlements of the Yausu tribe, which had the audacity to move upstream along the Tigris — is gained by Aššur-dān II (934–912 BC). 77 The same king elsewhere says he plundered KUR I]a-ha-a-nu KURA-ru-mu ša ku-tal KURPi-[x x], which had been part of Assyria in the times of his predecessor Aššur-rabi II (1012–972 BC). 78 In the subsequent reign of Adad-nīrāri II (911–891 BC) “Arameans” (KURA-ri-me) are said to be a part of the population of Temannu, a polity in the general area of the land which still bore the name Ḫanigalbat, around the present-day Ṭūr ʿAbdīn. 79 Undoubtedly a population of “Arameans” (KURA-ru-mu) was the main component of the local city of Gidara, which — as the Assyrian text explains — they had renamed Raqammatu upon its conquest after the reign of Tiglath-pileser I. 80 The specific connection of “Arameans” with heinous deeds of appropriation of previous Middle Assyrian settlements and fortresses continues in the annals of Assurnaṣirpal II (883–859 BC). In Bīt-Zamani, in the context of quenching a revolt against the pro-Assyrian vassal Ammebaʾlī 81, the Assyrian king recaptured with relish cities in the Upper Tigris area which had been 77.  RIMA 2, A.0.98.1: 15, and cf. the previous account, ll. 6 ff. 78.  Ibid., 23 and ff. Unfortunately, no royal inscriptions are known for this ruler (cf. RIMA 2, ad A.0.95). However, almost a century later Shalmaneser III also mentioned the reign of Aššur-rabi II as the one in which the cities of Pitru (URUPi-it-ru) and Mutkinu on opposite banks of the Euphrates were lost (cf. n. 83 below). In this light, it would be tempting to suggest a restoration of KURPi-[x x] in the Aššur-dān II passage taking account of the later mention of Pitru; however, it is obvious that the determinatives do not match. Moreover, it is uncertain whether the area described here was on the eastern flank of Assyria or to the west. 79.  Cf. Lipiński 2000: 109–110, for a derivation of Temannu (with the nisbe Temanayyu applied to the ruler’s name) from Aramaic tym, tymn, “south, southern” — thus implying “a distinction between clans settled south of the Ṭūr ʿAbdīn and another group, called ‘northern’.” The passage (RIMA 2, A.0.99.2: 50–51) is somewhat ambiguous: “Trusting in his fortified city, his strong bow, his extensive troops, and the Aramaeans, he rebelled against me (a-na URU dan-nu-ti-šú GIŠBAN-šú dan-ni-ti / ÉRINHI.A.MEŠ-šú DAGALMEŠ ù KURa-ri-me it-ti-kil-ma it-ti-la ib-bal-kit)”. One may wonder whether the “Arameans” fulfilled the same function of select mobile troops of kinship-based status as in the passage of Shalmaneser I quoted above regarding the Hittites and the Aḫlamû, i.e., as counterpart to a standing army of sedentary origin, or — more or less to the contrary — whether they merely represented the general population base, as a source of manpower which could be called to fight alongside a professional corps at the disposal of the ruler. In different terms, the problem was already posed by Schwartz 1989: 282, who assumed that the Arameans were soldiers hired by the ruler of Temannu; contra, Lipiński 2000: 115 suggested that they were “tribesmen not living in the city but still pursuing a nomadic or seminomadic way of life”. 80.  RIMA 2, A.0.99.2: 52–53. In fact, both of these toponyms should be of West Semitic etymology. On Gidara reflecting the well-known word gdr, “wall, enclosure”, cf. Lipiński 2000: 114 n. 29; whereas Raqammatu recalls the Aramaic name of Petra, rqm (cf. Dion 1997: 32 n. 30). The variant URURa-dam-ma-te in l. 57 of the same text now seems to be the mere outcome of a scribal mistake, and not a writing leading back — through the vagaries of Aramaic phonology encoded in cuneiform script — to a possible root with etymological Ḍ (*RḌM) as previously believed, since no such root is attested anywhere (Lipiński 2000: 115). On the location of Raqammatu, cf. discussion in Fales 2012: 109 n. 60; for an Assyrian province by this name, cf. Radner 2006–2008: 52 no. 24. 81.  Amme-baʾlī had in point of fact been subjugated and forced in pro-Assyrian vassalage through a treaty by the previous Assyrian ruler, Tukulti-Ninurta II (890–884 BC): on this episode, cf. most recently Szuchman 2009: 56–57, and ibid., 58, for the locations of Sinabu and Tīdu. Perhaps it was out of spite for

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incorporated into Assyria by his ancestor Shalmaneser I (cf. §1b, above), and which now lay in ruins: “The cities Sinabu (and) Tīdu — fortresses which Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, a prince who preceded me, had garrisoned on (the border of) the land Nairi (and) which the Aramaeans (KURA-ru-mu) had captured by force — I repossessed. I resettled in their abandoned cities (and) houses Assyrians who had held fortresses of Assyria in the land Nairi (and) whom the Aramaeans (KURA-ru-mu) had subdued”. 82

The last of such references to previous Aramean conquests — and to vigorous Assyrian reactions of reconquest — may be found in the annals of Shalmaneser III (858–824 BC). In a well-known passage, this king provides an interesting intimation concerning the linguistic and political history of two strongholds facing each other as “bridgeheads” on the banks of the Upper Euphrates close to Til-Barsip (present-day Tell Aḥmar in N Syria): “At that time the city (Ana)-Aššur-utēr-aṣbat, which the people of the land Ḫatti call Pitru (and) which is on the River Sagura [by the opposite bank] of the Euphrates, and the city Mutkīnu, which is on this bank of the Euphrates, which Tiglathpileser (I), my ancestor, a prince who preceded me, had established — (and which) at the time of Aššur-rabi (II), king of Assyria, an Aramean king (MAN KURA-ru-mu) had taken away by force — these cities I restored. I settled therein Assyrians”. 83

As may be made out from the text, 84 it was “the people of the land Ḫatti” who had given the name Pitru to a site on the small river Sagur/Sajur — an affluent joining the Euphates from the west — which may at present be identified with Tell Awšariye, excavated in part by a Danish expedition. 85 On the basis of monumental Luwian hieroglyphic inscriptions which were retrieved in the main regional site of Til-Barsip, dating from the late 10th century BC onward — when it was dubbed Masuwari by its ruling dynasty of Anatolian origins spanning some four generations — 86 it may be suggested that Shalmaneser’s scribes specifically attributed the naming of Pitru to this Luwian occupation of the area. In parallel, the text indicates that at the site of Mutkinu on the opposite (eastern) bank, a ruler of KURA-ru-mu had replaced Assyrian overlordship — which the overall precarious fealty of the local ruling house that Assurnaṣirpal chose to definitely disband the corps of 1,500 Aḫlamû Aramayyu still in attendance at the Bīt-Zamani court. 82.  RIMA 2, A.0. 101.19, 92–95. 83.  RIMA 3, A.0.102.2: 35–38. Grayson’s translation of line 38 reads thus: “at the time of Aššurrabi (II), king of Assyria, the king of the Aramaeans had taken (these two cities) away by force”: but the ekīmūni here is clearly linked to the previous ša . . . ušaṣbitūni (l. 37), which only refers to Mutkinu, and thus the clause need not regard both cities –especially since the unifying link represented by the renewed Assyrian conquest is made clear immediately after, with URUMEŠ-ni šu-nu-ti a-na áš-ri-šú-nu ú-te-ra. For the Sagurru/Sagura (modern Sajur) as already occupied by the Assyrians in Aššur-bēl-kala’s time, cf. n. 21, above; and for a possible mention of Pitru in connection with Aššur-rabi II, cf. n. 78, above. 84.  And as already illustrated in Fales 2011b: 217–218, albeit viewing the inscription from the particular standpoint of the history of Til-Barsip. For previous literature, cf., e.g., Lipiński 2000: 163–164; Radner 2003–2005. 85.  The main archaeological and philological results of this expedition may be viewed at http:// aushariye.hum.ku.dk/. 86.  Cf. Fales — Bunnens 2014: 35.

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dated as far back as the age of Tiglath-pileser I — “at the time of Aššur-rabi, king of Assyria”. 87 In my opinion, this reference need not be taken to mean that the later Assyrian king was present with his armies on the spot, losing this specific stronghold in battle; it should rather denote the general eastward thrust of Aramean armed groups from the Euphrates riverbank toward the inner Jezira which occurred during his reign. Moreover, if — as the archaeological finds at Til-Barsip imply — Mutkinu was at that very time under the local Luwian dynasty of Masuwari, the fact that the name of the alleged Aramean culprit king is not given in Shalmaneser’s text might be explained as a pure and simple manifestation of contempt for the people of KURA-rumu, which he adopted from the writ of his predecessors.

*   *   * Despite their individual interest, it must be admitted that the mentions of “Arameans” in the Assyrian royal inscriptions of the early 1st millennium are on the whole scanty. The reason for this change along the lines of perceived and described ethnicity is customarily attributed to new social and political identities which were taken on by the West Semitic-language/culture groups in the northern Jezira (and the corresponding Transeuphratic area) as constituents of distinct polities from the late 10th–early 9th century onward — and which the Assyrians recorded in sufficient detail as to make them intelligible. 88 The polities constituted at this time by the Arameans — which may be singled out by the distinctive onomastics of the local rulers or chiefs — often betray by their very toponymy (formed along the pattern Bīt + PN, with PN indicating an eponymous ancestor) an origin in a sphere of kinship and tribal/clanic solidarity of long standing. 89 On the other hand, the information on settlement patterns portended by both the textual and the archaeological record points by and large to developments entailing a progressive loss of group mobility, and the fixation of individual communities in specific territorial niches centering on urban emplacements, whether newly founded or reconstructed from the remains of earlier periods (and in this case, at times aggrandized with public buildings and fortification works). 90 The overall process of formation of these “segmentary states” 91 seems to have brought about a consequent increase 87.  On Mutkinu, cf. Kessler 1993–1995; Lipiński 2000: 166, who notes that if Pitru is Tell Awšariye, the site on the opposite bank “would . . . be practically at the gates of Til-Barsip”. 88.  Cf. Liverani 1992a: 125, who points out the consistency of terminology regarding local settlements in Assurnaṣirpal’s annals. 89.  Correspondingly, their rulers are regularly indicated in the Assyrian record by the formula mār PN, “descendant (lit., ‘son’) of PN”. Bīt-Ḫalupē presents the unique case of an eponymous ancestress, as may be deduced from the expression mār MÍḪa-lu-b/pé-e in Adad-nirari III’s inscriptions (RIMA 2, A.0. 99.2: 114): cf. Liverani 1992: 33; Lipiński 2000: 78–82. 90. New foundations in the area of our concern comprise, e.g., Guzana/Tell Ḥalaf (capital of Bīt Baḫyani, and Ḫadattu/Arslan Taš in Bīt Adini (although the main input would seem to regard later Assyrian occupation), whereas refoundations of preexisting centers have a good example in Til-Barsip/ Tell Aḥmar: see Mazzoni 1994, Novák 2013a, 2013b. 91.  This definition — which substitutes previously accepted ones, such as “tribal state” — is currently at the center of debate on the issue: cf. Routledge 2000: esp. 239–246. Its degree of applicability to the horizon under examination lies beyond the scope of the present essay.

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in the overall number of settlements, as well as their functional differentiation and subdivision along economic and strategic lines. In this light, the classing of enemy locations portended by the Assyrian royal inscriptions along a three-tiered template, comprising “royal cities”, “fortified cities”, and “settlements in the neighborhood” — which applies with hardly any exception to the main polities of the Bīt + PN type in northwestern Mesopotamia and the northern Transeuphratic area — points to an altogether standard pattern of territorial occupation, albeit presumably marked by a certain sparsity and non-homogeneous distribution of individual sites, as the archaeological (survey) record intimates. 92 The “regeneration of complex societies” which has been viewed as occurring in the early centuries of the 1st millennium in these areas (but not exclusively here) would also seem to find one of its mainstays in a renewed development of trade. Thus, a close analysis of the lists of booty and tribute taken by the Assyrians from the Aramean polities of the Jezira points to a multi-faceted economic and commercial horizon, implying varying typologies of native/imported products which entered a circuit of widespread trade/exchange of commodities, both mutually and with the adjacent regions (from the Phoenician coast to the Anatolian and Urartian mountainous areas). From furniture in wood and ivory, to textiles in multi-colored wool and linen, to precious metals and ceremonially prized metal products (cauldrons, chariot and horse ornaments, bowls, etc.), to semi-precious stones, the entire gamut of luxury commodities may be traced back as input or output of these polities, alongside the more ubiquitous products from agriculture and breeding. 93 This system of numerous adjacent regional centers in the northern Jezira and along the Upper and Middle Euphrates was destined to be swept away by the Assyrian conquest, especially after Shalmaneser III definitely secured the river-crossing for the northern Mesopotamian state, allowing armies and courtiers alike continuous and convenient access to the Levant. Thus the polities ruled in this vast plain by the Arameans through a shared memory of kinship ties, after having been vanquished one by one, were absorbed into “Assyria proper”; their populations came to be integrated within a multi-cultural body of Assyrian subjects, to which the repeated and plentiful additions of manpower caused by mass deportations would provide an even greater internal variety. A similar fate would befall in the 8th century the residual polities in the Transeuphratic area, from Samʾal/Yaʾdi to Arpad to Hamath to Damascus, which may be more precisely identified as of Aramean ethnicity, to the extent that they committed their official records to the Aramaic language and its alphabetic script, and that they made occasional reference to the geographic-political concept of a “Land of Aram”. In the Assyrian heartland (which now comprised once more the entire area between the Tigris and Euphrates), on the other hand, an Aramean identity would survive essentially in linguistic-cultural terms, as will be said below, ad e.

92. See Morandi Bonacossi 2000; 2012–2013; 2014 Ed., passim; Ur 2002; Wilkinson 2000; Wilkinson — Barbanes 2000; Wilkinson et al. 2005. 93. Cf., e.g., Liverani 1992: 157–162, for the presence of commodities in the booty lists of Assurnaṣirpal II; Bär 1996 for the depiction of booty and tribute in Assyrian bas-reliefs; Winter 2010 (but originally 1988), for the categorization of goods from North Syria.

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d.  Looking Southward: The Reappearance of “Aramean” Tribesmen 94 Mainly due to the political developments in the upper Jezira, the ethnonym “Aramean” — in its multiple manifestations — disappears from Assyrian royal inscriptions for a longish period after Shalmaneser’s account on Pitru and Mutkinu. 95 On the other hand, other official records of the early 8th century BC, of both Assyrian and Babylonian origin, allow us to trace some of the struggles against a number of tribes — of the lower Jezira and the middle/lower reaches of the Twin Rivers — which will be later lumped together as constituting the major population group of “Arameans”. This is, e.g., the case of the Utuʾu/Ituʾu, 96 who had been already encountered in 885 BC by Tukulti-Ninurta II in a location on the Tigris between the Wadi Tharthar and Dūr-Kurigalzu: “I approached the Tigris and captured the rural settlements of the land of the Utu’, together with their villages, (maš-ka-na-a-te šá KUR Ú-tu-ʾu a-di URUkap-ra-ni-šu-nu) which were situated on the Tigris. I massacred them (and) carried off much booty from them”. 97

In the first decades of the 8th century, the powerful turtānu Šamši-ilu inscribed his military feats on two colossal stone lions from the strategic emplacement of Til-Barsip (renamed KarShalmaneser). His expeditions far and wide (from Guti to Namri, to Musku and Urarṭu) also extended to the Utuʾ and other Aramean tribes in the lower Jezirah around the Tigris basin (“devastator of the lands Utû, Rubû, Ḫaṭallu, (and) Labdudu, who established their defeat”). 98 It is thus possible that more than one (if not all) of the following Assyrian expeditions recorded in the “Eponym Chronicle” against the U/Ituʾ — probably as shorthand for a larger group of Aramean tribes — may have been led by the poweful field-marshal, since the relevant dates (reigns of Adad-nīrāri III, Shalmaneser IV, and early years of Aššur-dān III) coincide with the first part of his very long career, as reconstructed at present: 99 94.  This section will deal with points (5) and (6) of the summary given above. 95.  It does not, however, disappear from the administrative texts of the early 8th century, especially from Nimrud/Kalḫu: in the Nimrud Wine Lists (NWL, passim; and cf. Fales 1994: 364–366 for the dates) the gentilic KURAr-ma-a-a is appended to various professional names, such as leather-workers, singers, palace servants, and a specific prefect (cf. TFS, 281, for the attestations of (KUR)Aramayyu in these lists), while in the archive from the local Governor’s Palace, one 1Si-li KURAr-ma-a-a is a recipient of debts paid off by the governor (GPA no. 90:11). 96.  On the Ituʾu, see Postgate 1976–1980a; Lipiński 2000: 437–438. 97.  RIMA 2, A.0. 100.5: 49–50. Lipiński 2000: 438, renders maškanāte as “encampments”, following Postgate 1976–1980: 221 (“lit., ‘tents’ ”), thus making the U/Ituʾ into a population with a clear double morphologie sociale (tents and villages). But what I rather believe to be described are the “agricultural settlements” annexed to a number of small (mud-brick) hamlets on the Tigris riverbank, as rendered by Grayson (cf. also CAD A/1, 370b, with quote of this passage). Moreover, a meaning “tent” for maškanu seems applicable in the main to the Assyrian royal canopy or similar (ibid., 372a). 98.  RIMA 3, 104.2010: 10–11. For the location of these tribes in NE Babylonia, cf. Brinkman 1968: 283–284. But in fact, U/Ituʾ is named as a district fully under the jurisdiction of the province of Assur for the years 804 and 748 BC, as can be seen from the stelae of the religious capital of the empire (Andrae 1913, nos. 37, 38; cf. Postgate 1976–1980a: 221). 99.  On Šamši-ilu, cf, recently Baker 2006–2008. On his expeditions against the U/Ituʾ, cf. Liverani 2008: 756. Fuchs 2008: 73, 84 attributes the multiple Assyrian expeditions against the Ituʾ and other

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Frederick Mario Fales [790] [ditto] Šēp-Šamaš, (governor) of Isaana, (campaign) against Ituʾa (KURI-tu-uʾ-a). [783] ditto Inūrta-nāṣir, (governor) of [Māz]amua, (campaign) against Ituʾa (KURI-tu-ʾu). [782] ditto Iluma-lēʾi, (governor) of [Naṣ]ibīna, (campaign) against Ituʾa (KURI-tu-ʾu). [777] ditto Nabû-išdēya-ka’’in, the chamberlain, (campaign) against Ituʾa (KURI-tu-uʾ-e). [769] ditto Bēl-ilaʾa, (governor) of Arrapḫa, (campaign) against Ituʾa (KURI-tu-ʾu). 100

These data still today represent “the only sure references in Assyrian sources to Aramean tribes in eastern Babylonia before the before the age of Tiglath-Pileser III”. 101 However, the Ḫaṭallu, equally attacked by Šamši-ilu, also recur prominently in the official inscriptions (published in 1990) of Ninurta-kudurrī-uṣur, a prince (but technically hereditary “governor”) of Sūḫu, 102 an independent polity mainly under Babylonian influence, to be dated around 750 BC. 103 Ninurta-kudurrī-uṣur relates that “at the beginning of my governorship” the Ḫaṭallu, with a total force of 2,000 men, arrived to plunder the Middle Euphrates territory of Laqû, seizing 100 villages and devastating the countryside. 104 Painstaking care is taken to note that all clans of the tribe were represented (“from the Sarūgu to the Minuʾû”), 105 and that a leader among them was chosen in the person of Šamaʾ-gamni of the LÚSa-ru-gu. 106 Further items of significance are represented by the modes of battle: counter to the quasi-absence of descriptions regarding

tribes to a lack of control of the Babylonian-Assyrian frontier area on the part of Babylonian political authorities. 100.  Millard 1994: 36–40, 58–59; Glassner — Foster 2004: 168–169: 29, 36′, 37′; 170–171: 42′, 50′, resp.  101.  Brinkman 1968: 284. 102.  On the title šaknu at Sūḫu, cf. n. 68, above. 103.  Most recent edition: RIMB 2, S.0. 1002.1–8. The mention in the text of Sîn-šallimanni, known as the Assyrian eponym for 747 BC, provides a general chronological framework for the text before Tiglath-pileser III’s reign. 104.  RIMB 2, S.0. 1002.1: 19–24. In a variant account (S.0. 1002.2: 21), the force is described as formed by “2,000 Arameans” (LÚA-ra-mu). For the localization of Ḫaṭallu in the general area of the Wadi Tharthar, cf. Liverani 1992b, and esp. the map on p. 40; Lipiński 2000: 426. It may be noticed that Sūḫu and Ḫaṭallu are mentioned as being on opposite points of the steppe (mudaburu) in a letter from Sargon’s reign reporting a vast fire which affected the province of Assur (GPA 188). For the Assyrian province of Ḫaṭallu under Assurbanipal, cf. Radner 2006–2008: 64, no. 69. 105. I am not convinced that this tribal name necessarily had anything to do with the toponym Sarūgu in the Ḫarrān region (=SAA 11, 182 for references), against Cole 1996: 25, who states that the “tribesmen moved from Sarūgu, near Carchemish, in the Aramean domain of Bīt-Adini, and attacked the territory of Laqê on the Lower Khabur”; see also Lipiński 2000: 427, who however also quotes a Safaitic parallel for the name. Historical-anthropological surveys indicate that the vagaries of tribal names and identities are structurally very complex and may present recurrent formations, both in modern and ancient times (cf., e.g., Khoury-Kostiner 1991; Wossink 2011: 262). Moreover, the polity of Bīt Adini was long dead and gone by the time of Ninurta-kudurrī-uṣur. 106.  Ibid., The name of the leader seems quite similar to that of Š/Samaʾgunu, known from letters and annals (PNA 3/II, 1187–1188), especially if one considers that a form *Šamaʾgawni could have been implied in the writing given here. In the quoted variant account (S.0.1002.2, 17) a further leader is named, “Iâʾe, son of Balammu, of the Amatu tribe”; cf. also S.0. 1002.3: 8 for the variant Baliammu. For the relevant onomastics, cf. Lipiński 2000: 428, albeit with a prevailing bias in favor of North-Arabian parallels.

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pitched battles in the Assyrian royal inscriptions, the Suḫean prince is instead quite explicit and precise on the forces involved, 107 and on the locations of the encounter: “I went up to the steppe against them with 105 chariots, 220 mounted soldiers, and 3,000 footsoldiers. . . . I waited at the well Ṣumūa for one (whole) day and (then) they — 2,000 of them (including) archers — arrived at the well Makiru. I fell upon them and killed 1,716 of their men. From the well Makiru as far as the well Gallabu and the well Suribu, I defeated them. I filled the mountains and the wadis with their skulls. Moreover, I removed the arms and lower lips of 80 of their men and let them go for my praise. 200 soldiers from among them got away alive”. 108

Elsewhere in his account, Ninurta-kudurrī-uṣur underscores with some relish the fact that Assyrian governors of adjacent provinces (Laqû, Raṣappa) were fully impotent or insufficiently supplied with men to face the warmongering Ḫaṭallu, and thus fawningly applied to him for help. 109 This account may be essentially the product of a rhetoric of self-aggrandizement, as has been convincingly suggested. 110 It also points clearly, however — together with the data on the Ituʾ of the Eponym Chronicle and with Šamši-ilu’s military accounts — to a prolonged crisis at the very top of the Assyrian political system during the early 8th century BC, to the related breakdown of military control over the traditional borders between Assyria and Babylonia, and finally to a renewed strengthening of the fully tribal, mobile, and armed, element within single niches of the Jazira, and especially in its traditional strongholds between Rapiqu and DūrKurigalzu — the old “land of the Arameans”. 111

*   *   * It thus comes as no surprise that one of the main and long-term strategic objectives of Tiglath-pileser III (745–727), the ruler who came to the Assyrian throne through a coup d’état in 746, 112 was a comprehensive repression of the by now widespread territorial occupation of 107.  Notice in particular the numbers punctually given: 2,000 Arameans, out of which 1,716 were killed, 80 were maimed and left alive on purpose, and sent back home as an example of the governor’s “glory”, 200 who “got away alive”. In the quoted variant account, even the Suḫean wounded are counted: “They wounded 38 men from among my forces, (but) not one person among them fell dead in the steppe” (S.0.1002.2: ii, 4–5). However, the general count of the enemy slain given here presents numerous differences vis-à-vis the parallel one: 304 enemies “had quickly retreated before me”, of which 40 “perished due to thirst”, whereas 254 got away, thus yielding a grand total of 1,846 slain (S.0. 1002,2: ii, 17–21). Moreover, there is no mention of the explicitly maimed captives. 108.  RIMB 2, S.0.1002.1, 32–39. 109.  Ibid., 24–28. For the localization of these provinces, cf. Liverani 1992b, map on p. 40. 110.  Fuchs 2008: 91. 111.  It may be recalled that unrest of the Arameans is recorded also to the south of this area around the same time: thus, Erība-Marduk of Babylonia (ca. 760 BC) was forced to drive the Arameans away from the fields and orchards of the citizens of Babylon and Borsippa, as the Eclectic Chronicle records; and his successor Nabû-šuma-iškun tells of Arameans and Chaldeans fighting over the fields of Borsippa with the local citizens; cf. Brinkman 1968: 223, 225; Frame 2013: 93. 112. On the political and military circumstances through which Tiglath-pileser III came to the throne, cf. most recently Zawadzki 1994; Fuchs 2008.

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the Aramean tribes, with their noxious foraging and plundering activities along the routes to Babylonia and on the fluctuating border between Assyrian and Babylonian spheres of influence on the Tigris. The king himself summarized his extensive military activity against “the Arameans” (LÚA-ru-mu) with the following list of 35 tribes which he vanquished along the banks of the Twin Rivers and of the smaller related watercourses Surappu and Uqnû: 113 “From the beginning of my reign until my 17th palû, I captured (and) defeated the (tribes) Ituʾu, Rub/puʾu, Ḫamarānu, Luḫuʾatu, Ḫaṭallu, Rubbû, Rapiqu, Ḫirānu, Rabi-ilu, Naṣiru, Gulusu, Nabātu, Raḫiqu, Kapiru, Rummulutu, Adilê, Gibrê, Ubudu, Gurumu, Ḫudadu, Ḫindi/ aru, Damunu, Dunanu, Nilqu, Radê, Da[. . .]nu, Ubulu, Karmaʾu, Amlatu, Ruʾuʾa, Qabiʾu, Liʾtaʾu, Marusu, Amatu, Ḫagarānu, (and those living in) the cities of Dūr-Kurigalzu and Adinni, the fortresses of Sarragitu, Labbanat, (and) Kār-bēl-mātāti, all of the Arameans (LÚA-ru-mu) on the banks of the Tigris, Euphrates and Surappu rivers, as far as the Uqnû river, which is by the shore of the Lower Sea. I annexed to Assyria the Arameans, as many as there were (LÚA-ru-mu ma-la ba-šu-u), and I placed a eunuch of mine as provincial governor over them”. 114

To grasp most clearly the range and significance of Tiglath-pileser’s list — the longest of its kind – 115 it may be useful to compare it directly with the individual entries or shorter lists of Aramean tribes which appear in the annals of the king’s two successors, Sargon II and Sennacherib. Specifically, Sargon names a number of tribes piecemeal in his annals and and related texts, dubbing them at times “insubmissive Arameans”, more rarely “Sutean ṣābē ṣēri ”; 116 of particular interest in these official inscriptions are some connections between tribal territories and the adjacent settlements indicated by name, and said to be ruled by sheikhs (nasīku). In a nutshell, Sargon’s texts allow a reconstruction which sets apart tribes attested in the Tigris 113.  Fuchs 1994: 459, 466–467, suggested that the Uqnû be identified with the eastern branch of the Tigris, and the Surappu as one of its tributaries, in the region of Gambulu, perhaps the Rudḫane-ye Čangule; cf. also Faist 2011–2012. However, Cole — Gasche 2007: 30, 32, 35 (and cf. Fig. 71) have brought forth the fully alternative identifications of the Surappu with the Nahr aṭ-Ṭib, of the Tupliaš with the Dawairij, and of the Uqnû with the ancient course of the lower Karun, also taking account of its whereabouts in antiquity. This identification of the Uqnû is endorsed by Frame (2013: 89, and n. 11). 114.  RINAP 1, no. 47: 5–10. A number of similar but shorter lists is given in variant texts, listed most recently by Streck 2014: 300. These texts form the main basis of the (geographical-“hierarchical”) classification in Zadok 2013: 276–277. As for this larger list of hostile Arameans, this author’s comment is given ibid., 274: “On the whole it seems that the tribes, whom the Assyrians encountered in Upper Mesopotamia near Assyria proper, were listed at the beginning”. This would explain the status of Puqūdu (on the Elamite border) which occurs only later in the main list itself, but is comprised among the “Ara­ means” in variant lists. 115.  As pointed out by Frahm 2003: 151, the list of Tiglath-pileser presents the names of tribes, attributing them altogether to “the banks of the Tigris, Euphrates and Surappu rivers, as far as the Uqnû river, which is by the shore of the Lower Sea”, but it is not completely to be ruled out that an order of sorts along the geographical parameters represented by the different riverbanks may have been behind the array of tribal names. 116.  Streck 2014: 304, who gives the relevant references, poses the question whether a difference could have been perceived between “all the Arameans who live on the shore of the Tigris, Surappu, and Uqnû” and “the Sutians, steppe-fighters (cf. n. 72, above) of the land of Iadburu”, on the basis of a suggestion first made by Brinkman 1968: 285–287, that the label “Sutian” here referred to more mobile elements.

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catchment area from those on the Surappu and Uqnû, whereas the Euphrates seems to be hardly represented. 117 Finally, Sennacherib, in the context of his first campaign against Marduk-apla-iddina, sets forth a threefold distinction between Aramean tribes: those on the banks of the Tigris (Tu’umuna, Riḫiḫu, Iadaqqu, Gibrê, Maliḫu), on the banks of the Surappu (Gurumu, Ubulu, Damunu, Gambulu, Ḫindaru, Ruʾuʾa, Puqudu) and on the banks of the Euphrates (Ḫamrānu, Ḫagarānu, Nabatu, Liʾtaʾu). 118 The same list is given again in the account of the king’s victorious return march, after having appointed Bēl-ibni as king of Babylon: On my return march, I defeated all together the Tuʾumuna, Riḫiḫu, Iadaqqu, Ubudu, Gibrê, Maliḫu, Gurumu, Ubulu, Damunu, Gambulu, Ḫindaru, Ruʾuʾa, Puqudu, Ḫamrānu, Ḫagarānu, Nabatu and Liʾtaʾu, insubmissive Arameans, who do not know (fear of) death. 119

Whereas the annals of Esarhaddon omit any mention of “Arameans”, and present only random conventional references to “Sutians”, 120 those of Assurbanipal refer again extensively to the Babylonian theater, albeit focusing on a reduced number of Aramean tribes. 121 Among these are the Puqūdu, who inhabited the region of marshes in eastern Babylonia near the Elamite border, but who seem to have also moved westwards to Nippur and Uruk. The tribe — certainly of vast dimensions — would seem to have shown divided loyalties during the Šamaš-šumu-ukīn revolt: an extispicy query by the king indicates the fear that the Puqūdu should side with the rebels on the occasion of an attempt by Tammaritu of Elam to invade Assyrian territory, 122 and a further text expresses the worry that the southernmost branch of the tribe — together with the entire Sealand — should abandon the alliance with Assyria, if Assurbanipal appointed Sîn-šarrauṣur, the governor of Ur, over them. 123 The other large tribal community attested in Assurbanipal’s reign is that of the Gambulu. 124 This tribe is first mentioned in the annals of Sargon, who after despoiling its territory on the Uqnû (710 BC) made the latter into an Assyrian province, which also included Iadburu and bordered on Elam to the east. 125 The provincial governor’s residence was at Dūr-Abi-ḫarâ, renamed by the Assyrian king Dūr-Nabû; 126 in later reigns, the province is no more mentioned. Deportees from Gambulu to the northwestern Jezira dating 117.  Fuchs 1994: 422–423. 118.  RINAP 3/1, no. 1: 12–13, with parallels passim. In this light, there is ground to soften somewhat the distinction made by Brinkman 1984: 12, n. 46: “In broad terms (and with obvious exceptions), the Arameans were settled principally along the Tigris and its tributaries, whereas the Chaldeans were grouped primarily along the Euphrates”. 119.  RINAP 3/1, no. 1: 14–16, with parallels passim here and in RINAP 3/2. The sole epithet ša la idû mitūtu, “who do not know (fear of ) death”, is bestowed on the Arameans, e.g., in RINAP 3/1, 213: 14. 120.  Cf. n. 158, below. 121.  Frame 1992: 43–48. 122.  SAA 4, 289: rev. 1–5. 123.  Ibid., 302:1.4. On the interpretation of this text, cf. however the doubts expressed by Frame 1992: 164 n. 153. 124.  Lipiński 2000: 472–479, and passim. 125.  Cf. Brinkman 1984: 50–52; Fuchs 1994: 399–405; Radner 2006–2008a: 65 n. 74. 126.  Cf. Parpola 2002: 567 n. 19 for the correct reading of Dūr-Abi-ḫarâ (but see Lipiński 2000: 472–473 n. 528, quoting a similar, and much earlier, suggestion).

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from Sargon’s reign are attested in the “Ḫarran census”. 127 In the reign of Esarhaddon, the Gambulian leader Bēl-iqīša submitted to the Assyrians, but his betrayal to Elam in 653 BC caused the destruction of his main city Šapi-Bēl by Assurbanipal. During the Šamaš-šum-ukīn revolt, the town of Ḫil(im)mu, part of Gambulu, was encouraged by the neighboring Elamites to aid the rebel brother, but its chieftain Parû was defeated and killed by the Assyrians. No further anti-Assyrian role seems to have been played by the tribe.

*   *   * To these official records regarding southern Mesopotamia during the period 747–627 BC, a number of “everyday” documents bearing references to some of the named tribes may be added. 128 For Tiglath-pileser’s time, the letters from Nimrud/Kalḫu 129 represent an enlightening complement; there are some texts directly bearing on the Babylonian campaigns of the king (against the Chaldean Mukin-zēri, chief of Bīt-Amukkani: 731–729 BC) 130, and others in which some idea of the mechanism of deportations of tribal communities of Arameans toward Assyria is to be gained. 131 Further, these letters are the earliest to describe “Arameans” as active troops within the Assyrian army, 132 thus anticipating the information to be gained (again from Nimrud/Kalḫu) from the following reign of Sargon, in which an “Aramean” contingent may be clearly set apart within this king’s armed forces. 133 A final point of interest in these epistolary texts regards the U/Ituʾu: this particular tribal segment may be viewed through the correspondence in the process of shifting from a status of antagonism to a position of cooperation with Assyrian power. As is well known, this shift would lead the U/Ituʾu to rise to the rank of main auxiliary force of the Assyrian empire, with functions comparable to a military police corps, capable of operating far and wide in individual

127.  See SAA 11, 207: rev. iii 4′; 219 ii 27. 128.  For the history of Babylonia and its social/political components during the period concerned, cf. in general Brinkman 1968, 1984, Frame 1992. More recent approaches and/or bibliographical references are portended by the historical introductions to SAA, vols. 15–19, and RINAP, vols. 1, 3/1–2, 4. On the Neo-Babylonian texts to be dated to the period 721–626 BC, cf. Brinkman-Kennedy 1983, 1986. 129.  First published in article form by H.W.F. Saggs in the journal Iraq, then in a comprehensive edition (2001), also based on numerous suggestions by the Jubilar; and most recently (2012) by M. Luukko et al. within the SAA series. 130.  Cf. the texts from SAA 19 in Fig. 2, below. Other texts concerning in general LÚA-ri-me / LÚAri-mi / LÚA-ru-mu-ú in a hostile context are SAA 19, 82, 86, 125. On the war between the Assyrians and Mukin-zēri, see Fales 2011c; SAA 19, xxviii–xxx. 131.  Of particular interest is the letter SAA 19, 18, in which the king issues the order that “the Arameans” (KURAr-ma-a-a) should “be made to take wives in marriage”, but the parents of the chosen women request a brideprice, to be paid by the State: cf. Fales — Lanfranchi 1992: 126–127, 164; Saggs 2001: 92. A letter on Arameans (LÚA-ru-mu) to be deported might be no. 164. 132.  See SAA 19, 17 (provisions for LÚERIMMEŠ KURÁr-ma-a-a) 133.  See TFS, 36 on this “Aramean unit” within Sargon’s army, which is parallel to “city units” from the Assyrian homeland and to a “unit of deportees”. The relevant texts for the units which include LÚGAL ki-ṣirMEŠ Ar-ma-a-a are ibid., nos. 102, ii, 20′–28′; 108, ii, 9–15, while its members may be traced in other lists of the group TFS nos. 101–108.

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units of no more than a few hundred men, and even endowed with a particular apparel so as to be immediately identifiable. 134 Letters from Nineveh on the Arameans in Babylonia have come down to us from the late 8th to the late 7th century, and may be subdivided according to dialect (NA/NB). Although no collective mention of “Arameans” appears in the epistolary texts in NA from the eastern frontier dated to Sargon’s reign, 135 we find some mentions of those tribes challenged some decades earlier by Šamši-ilu, such as the Ḫaṭallu, the Rub/puʾu, and the Labadūdu 136. As for the Ituʾeans, they are by now described as full-fledged auxiliary troops of the Assyrian army, and even employed along the eastern frontier and the southern areas, i.e., near their old homeland. Thus, e.g., they are portrayed as standing guard under Assyrian command in the present-day Diyala area, manning a fort in the environ of Laḫiru, accompanying Assyrian magnates in the planning and provisioning of forts in northern Babylonia, and proceeding to a fortress near Babylon. 137 In some of these actions they were accompanied by Gurreans or Qurreans (LÚGurra-a-a and variants): 138 but there is no concrete proof that these other auxiliaries were also of Aramean stock. 139 The NB letters from the reigns of Sargon and his successors 140 have, instead, a mainly southern Mesopotamian focus, and are thus richer in data on the Aramean tribesmen. Specifically, “Arameans” in general are singled out as troops or components of civilian population (see, e.g., SAA 17, 22, Rev. 6–8: 1Ḫ[a-s]i-ni DUMU 1Ia-a-šu-mu a-di LÚqin-ni-šú ù LÚA-ra-mi-šú), at times enjoying good political relations with Marduk-apal-iddina, the main opponent of both father and son (see, e.g., SAA 17, 124, on some Arameans of Urukean origin, LÚA-ra-mu ša ultu UNUGKI ú-ṣu-ú [Obv. 6–7], who are considered “not reliable” and thus worthy of being uprooted [Rev. 9′–14′]). Perhaps the situation may be summarized best by generalizing the question LÚA-ra-mi ni-de-e-ma, “Do we know the Arameans?”, posed in the fragmentary letter SAA 17, 176: 6: it is clear that the tribes had mixed (and possibly varying) allegiances with Marduk-apaliddina, and that the Assyrians were forced to verify their (level of) fealty in individual cases. In 134.  Cf. Postgate 1976–1980a, on the Ituʾ in general; Reade 1972, on their distinctive apparel as portrayed in Assyrian bas-reliefs; also Postgate 2001. 135.  The letters considered here are published in SAA 15 (Fuchs — Parpola 2001). 136.  SAA 15, nos. 15, 121, 122, 167, 186, 187, 231. 137.  SAA 15, nos. 14, 60, 136, 166, 238, resp.  138.  Cf. SAA 15, p. 238a, and notice also the spellings LÚGur-ra-a-a-e-a, LÚQa-mur/ḫar-ra, LÚQur-mur/ ḫar-ra-a, LÚQur-mur/ḫar-a-a-e-a. Other spellings occur in the administrative texts from Nineveh: various hundreds of wraps are provided for the KURQu-ra-a-a (SAA 7, 112, r. 2) or simply Gur-ri (ibid., 115, ii 18). The latter abbreviated writing is given in reference to a prefect of this corps (ibid., 5 ii 20), in parallel with a prefect of the Ituʾ (ibid., ii 11). The text known as the “itinerary to Mazamua” comprises a halt at the “fortress of the Gurreans” (URUḪAL.ṢU ša Gur-ra-a-a, SAA 11, 14 rev. 10–11). But probably the bestknown document mentioning this corps is a letter to Sargon from Nimrud (NL 89 = SAA 5, 215) bearing a roster of the troops at Mazamua, which comprises “630 Assyrians, 360 Gurreans (LÚGur-ru) and 440 Ituʾ (KURI-tú)” (ll. 21–22). The ethnonym is discussed at length in Postgate 2000: 92; for the passage, see also Fales 2010: 108–110. 139.  Agreeing in this with Lipiński 2000: 482, who suggests a possible Iranian basis for the ethnonym. 140.  Published by M. Dietrich in SAA 17 (Sargon and Sennacherib) and F. Reynolds in SAA 18 (Esar­ haddon and Assurbanipal)

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any case, the complexities of local situations remained fully in place even after the demise of Marduk-apal-iddina at the hands of Sennacherib’s troops. Thus, a full half-century later, during the Šamaš-šumu-ukīn revolt, a letter of warning was issued by the officials and inhabitants of Nippur to Assurbanipal, with the following message: Everything that the Arameans and the Chaldeans (LÚA-ra-mu u LÚKal-du) keep writing to the king our lord, and everything they are saying to the king’s servants — not a word of it is true. They have made peace with the enemy. 141

The city of Nippur, due to its particular geographic position in the central Babylonian plain, was cast in the role of intense social and political interactive point between the natives, the Arameans, and the Chaldeans; this may be best observed from the letters deriving from the “Governor’s archive” of the city, to be dated from Tiglath-pileser III’s reign through the entire 7th century BC. 142 The Aramean tribes mentioned in this archive are the Dunanu, the Ḫindi/aru, the Puqūdu, the Rub/puʾu, and the Ubulu. 143 More in general, the archive provides random but interesting items of information on the collectivity of “Arameans”. Thus, we learn that the geographical designation A-ram/LÚA-ram should have indicated the rural territory around Nippur itself, inhabited by tribesmen; 144 that (at least during the Mukin-zēri rebellion) the Arameans (LÚA-ram) were expected to act as go-betweens between the citizens and the Chaldeans; 145 that the Arameans, and specifically the Puqūdu, headed by their sheikhs, were in the habit of visiting the city for religious festivals; 146 and that the shearing of the Arameans’ flocks (U8.UDUḪI.A ša LÚA-ra-mu) was at times performed in Nippur itself. 147 The aggregate of data provided above in comments, quotes, and references, may at this point be summarized in a comprehensive synoptical chart (Fig. 3, reproduced, for reasons of space, as an Appendix to the main text). This chart represents the attempt to visualize the main Aramean tribal groups encountered by the Assyrians south of the border of Assyria proper, and all through Babylonia, in their attestations in official and “everyday” texts, within a chronological framework and with connected geographical attributions (as indicated by the texts themselves). 148 141.  SAA 18, 199: 11–13. 142.  The texts were published by S.W. Cole in OIP 117; a historical analysis is provided in Cole 1996. 143.  A brief overview of the texts from the Nippur archive dealing with these tribes is given in Cole 1996: 26. On the Puqudeans at Nippur, see also SAA 18, 76 (carrying off of dates). 144.  OIP 114, 4: 22–23; 96:25. 145.  Ibid., 18:8. 146.  Ibid., 27. 147.  Ibid., 47: 4–5. 148.  See already the list of Aramean tribes in the royal inscriptions of the mid-8th and 7th centuries BC given in Frahm 2003: 153, of which the present one is an expanded version. The chart is also based on Brinkman 1968: 270ff.; Zadok 1985, s.v.; Fuchs 1994: 422–423 and passim; Lipiński 2000: 409–489, Zadok 2013: 276–277, and Streck 2014: 305–316 (with prev. bibl.). The main additions here are represented by updates concerning the quotes of NA/NB texts according to their editions in recent SAA volumes (elsewhere given by older ABL or CT 53/54 numbers), and by the references to the “Annals of Sūḫu” and to OIP 114. Further updated bibliography is indicated in individual footnotes. For the onomastics of the tribal names and their prevailing linguistic connection with the Aramaic language, cf. Zadok 2013: 271–274.

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*   *   * A conclusive assessment on the “Arameans” as a social and economic force of decided relevance during the fully imperial phase of Assyrian history must start out from the fact that a certain number of tribal and clanic units not only still existed in the Southern Mesopotamian alluvium in the mid-8th century, but were quite active as mobile elements oscillating between animal husbandry and small-scale agriculture in the catchment areas of the Twin Rivers and their affluents. Their very location at the northern border of the Babylonian region and possibly also their overall size was seen by the Assyrian state as an obstacle to be removed for the planned takeover of Babylonia by military and political means. 149 Thus, from Tiglath-pileser III’s reign onward, these Aramean tribes were targeted for specific aggression; and although they seem to have provided various instances of a rough-and-ready armed response — whether primary and direct or in the wake of vaster upheavals in the area, from Mukin-zēri’s insurgency to Marduk-apal-iddina’s resistance — so as to temporarily hinder Assyrian attempts at penetration during the next half-century or so, in the long run this vast and possibly desperate effort proved strategically ineffectual. In general, as has been noted, “by the third quarter of the eighth [century] . . . Arameans [were found] ranging over a significant portion of the alluvial plain — concentrated especially along the middle Euphrates above Sippar, across the northern end of the alluvium (perhaps even as far as the Lower Zab), around Nippur, and along the banks of the lower Tigris extending into the Elamite plain (modern Khuzestān)”. 150 The case made in the present contribution is that this comprehensive geographical picture does not present true/basic oppositions on the one to be evoked for the so-called “land of the Arameans” in earlier centuries, save for a possible extension to the south and southeast. On the other hand, looking at the period from Tiglath-pileser III onward, it is difficult to ascertain, in view of the varying geographical attributions of the tribes to specific riverbanks or environs of cities (which moreover present their own problems of location/identification), 151 to what extent the Arameans moved autonomously 149.  It is worth recollecting the dire picture of the region painted by Sargon in a remarkable passage from a Nimrud cylinder (D, vii, 45–72): “At that time the track which (goes) from . . . . . . . . to approach Babylon, the cult-center of the deities Enlil and Ninlil (?), was not open, its road was not passable, the country was desert from days (long past), and in the middle of it going was quite cut short, the way was most difficult, and there was no path prepared, (in) the inaccessible tracts, thorn thistles, and jungle prevailed over (all) of them, dogs and jackals assembled in their recesses, and huddled together (?) like lambs. In that desert country Arameans and Sutians, tent-dwellers, fugitives, treacherous, a plundering race (57–59: LÚA-ra-me / LÚSu-ti-i a-ši-bu-ut kuš-ta-ri / mun-nab-tu sa-ar-ru DUMU ḫab-ba-ti), had pitched their dwellings, and brought passage across it to a stop. (There were) settlements among them which for many days past had lapsed into ruin, over their cultivated ground channel and furrow did not exist, (but) it was woven (over with) spiders’ webs. Their rich meadows had become like a wilderness, their cultivated grounds were forlorn of the sweet harvest song, grain was quite cut off. The jungle I cut down, the thorn and thistles, with flames I burned; the Arameans, a plundering race, I slew with arms; as for the lions and wolves, I made a slaughter of them” (adapted from Gadd 1954: 192–194, plate L). The motif of the tribesmen “who live in tents” recurs again in the annals of Esarhaddon (RINAP 4, 1: v 15, for the Sutians). 150.  Cole 1996: 18. 151.  This geographical uncertainty concerning the Arameans’ locations constitutes a central theme in the recent overview of the historical situation by Frame 2013.

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around the southern Mesopotamian alluvium for strategic or economic reasons, or were instead driven from one place to another by the impact of enemy invasion (and/or Chaldean backlash). To be sure, the overall impression to be gained of these Aramean tribes moving hither and thither in the southern alluvium — divided along habits of transhumance, occasions of appropriation or pillage, and interested alliances with the more sedentary communities — is that they represented the “odd man out” in a struggle which ultimately opposed only the two best-organized protagonists, the Assyrians and the Chaldeans, with only one of them destined to win out. What is clear, in any case, is that after 700 BC the dozens of small/medium-sized Aramean kinship-based groups inhabiting the lower Euphrates and Tigris valleys some 50 years before seem to have been largely neutralized, through the combined actions of outright annihilation, mass deportation, and partial integration within the surrounding social/political systems of greater import (Assyrian or Chaldean). A possible process of spontaneous coalescence within broader tribal ensembles might have done the rest: thus, in Assurbanipal’s time, the sole major Aramean protagonists remaining on the Babylonian scene prove to have been the vast tribal assemblages of the Puqūdu and the Gambulu. Not by chance, therefore, the later list of the so-called Hofkalender of Nebuchadrezzar’s court still comprised within its second group — the “territorial leaders of Babylonia” (rabûtu ša māt Akkadi), i.e., the governors of the most prominent territories and cities of the land — both Bēl-šumu-iškun of the land (māt) Puqūdu (l. 24), and Marduk-šarru-usur of the land (māt) Gambūlu (l. 27). 152 e.  The “Arameans” in Assyria The subject of this final section has been taken up by the present writer on many previous occasions, as well as repeatedly touched upon by the feted scholar himself, so it may be pared down to just a few remarks, basically focusing on the matter of ethnicity. As stated above (§d), the ethnonym “Aramean” is applied in 8th-century “everyday” documents from Assyria to denote military groups in the process of incorporation into the armies of Tiglath-pileser III and Sargon II, as well as civilian deportees on their way to their final destinations within Assyrian territory. On the other hand, after the formation of the extensive system of provinces under these very rulers, the appellation “Aramean” survives sparsely in the documentation regarding Assyria proper, and in these cases presumably with reference to peoples of the northwestern Jezira — such as “a certain Aramean in the city of Ḫarrān” (LÚAr-ma-a-a šu-u ina URUKASKAL) attested in a list of debts from Nineveh — 153, but is otherwise absent, in a paradoxical counterpoint to the major diffusion of individuals with patently West Semitic, and mainly Aramaic, personal names in the 7th century BC. 154 152.  Cf. Beaulieu 2013: 34–35. If, as believed by many, the future king Nergal-šarru-uṣur/Neriglissar may be identified as the son of Bēl-šumu-iškun of Puqūdu, we would have the sole (although very belated) case of a ruler of Babylonia of Aramean descent (cf. ibid., 36). In the Hofkalender, two Chaldean tribes are also named, Bīt-Dakkuri and Bīt-Amukani: whether by chance or by design, this foursome refers back to the main pivots of anti-Assyrian struggle in the century prior to Nebuchadrezzar’s ascent to the throne. 153.  SAA 11, 26: r. 6. 154.  In somewhat oblique terms, this paradox is noted by Nissinen 2014: 283, who states that “the exact demographic counterpart of the designation ar(a)māyu/arumu is difficult to discern”, since “it may

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However, the nisbe itself survives as a purely linguistic-cultural marker: (KUR)Aramayyu comes to mean precisely “versed in the Aramaic script and language”, and is thus applied to scribes — LÚ DUB.SAR(MEŠ) or LÚA.BA(MEŠ) — and to scholars (ummânu), within the social/cultural framework of a factual Assyrian/Aramaic bilingualism for the implementation of administrative, legal, and possibly epistolary documents of public and private scope on multiple media — from clay tablets to writing-boards of wood or ivory, to leather parchments and papyrus scrolls — and for the execution of cylinder seals. 155 In this connection, the case of the list SAA 7, 24 of female palace personnel from Nineveh, which presents MÍÁr-ma-a-a-te alongside women of other ethnicities as female singers and musicians, may be briefly taken up again. 156 Were these women singled out for reasons of mere geographical provenience (i.e. as women of “Aramean”, etc., ethnicity), or rather on the basis of the different traditions which were expressed in their song and sound? The latter solution would, to be sure, resemble the case of the contemporaneous Aramayyu scribes — thus lending, moreover, a particularly genteel character to the forms of entertainment of the Assyrian kings.

*   *   * In sum, the people called “Arameans” all but disappear, after a long history going back to the Aḫlamû and to an assumed KURAramayyu, from the horizon of the inner empire — they are all “Assyrians” now — but Aramean ethnicity survives in the form of a distinctive language with its attendant cultural contents, involving cultic choices and religious expectations in public, and surely a vast number of specific habits and traditions in the domestic sphere. 157 To conclude, the “Arameans” in 7th-century Assyria had become similar to present-day linguistic/cultural minorities such as “Basques” or “Catalans” or “Friulians”, but — differently from their modern counterparts — entertained no prospect, or even dreamed, of living/dying as representatives of an own identity, set apart from that of the dominating social/political establishment. 158 cover the West Semitic population somewhat more broadly than the current scholarly definition of ‘Aramaean’ ”. 155.  For the Aramayyu scribes, cf. Radner 1997: 83 n. 434; Fales 2007. For their counterpart, the “Assyrian” scribes, see most recently Fales 2015. 156.  See already Fales 2013: 64–66. 157. The mutqītu Armītu (“Aramean sweets”), quoted along their Aššurītu counterparts in a list of edibles from Nineveh (SAA 7, 145: 7–8) seem to be a casual example of these traditions. See Fales 2015 for a more detailed interpretation. 158.  In point of fact, it may be asked whether — counter to the prevailing idea of a spirit of archaizing intellectual finesse — the resuscitation of the gentilic Aḫlamû in learned Assyrian and Babylonian quarters of the 7th century and later to designate the Aramaic language and/or script (cf. CAD A/1, 192–193), should not be viewed as a covert attempt to vilify and distance the latter to some extent, perhaps owing to its growing diffusion among the populace. Supplementary note: As this article was in proofs, the book by K. Lawson Younger, A Political History of the Arameans, Atlanta (SBL Press) 2016, appeared. The manuscript of this essay had been sent to Prof. Younger, who refers to it in his book.

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Appendix Fig. 3.  Synoptical chart of the major Aramean tribes of the middle/lower Mesopotamian alluvium in official Assyrian records and in the contemporaneous “everyday” NA and NB documents (late 8th–late 7th century). Assyrian Royal Inscriptions  a

Name of Tribe  1. Adilê  2. Amatub  3. Amlatu  4. Da[. . .]nu  5. Damūnu

c

 6. Dunanu

(* = Tribe within Summaries of ‘Arameans’)

Other Texts (SAA series and elsewhere)

Area(s) of Attestation (river valleys or cities)

TP III I*

unspecified

TP III*

unspecified

TP III*

unspecified

TP III*

unspecified

TP III* Sennacherib*

SAA 15, 153 (Sg.) SAA 17, 96;97;120 [friendly to Assyria] (Sg./Senn.) SAA 18, 113 (Esarhaddon) [in Assyrian employ]d

TP III*

 7. Gambūlu Sargon* [province of G. established] Sennacherib* Assurbanipal [defection to Elam; punishment]

 8. Gibrê (Kiprê) TP III*

Sennacherib*

 9. Gulusu 10. Gurru

Letters (edition: SAA series)

Uqnû area (Sg.) Surappu area (Senn.)

OIP 114, 60; 61 SAA 19, 119 (TP III) [deportees?] SAA 15, 145 (Sg.) SAA 17, 176 (Sg./Senn.) SAA 18, passim (Esarhaddon) [alliances with locals and Chaldeans]

SAA 15, 258 (Sg.) [captured]

TP III*

SAA 11, 96; 207; 219 (Sg.)

unspecified

Uqnû area (Sg.) Surappu area (Senn.)

Tigris area (Senn.) unspecified

SAA 15, passim (Sg)

SAA 7, 5; 112; unspecified 115 SAA 11, 14; 228

a.  Note: ARI = Assyrian royal inscriptions (by name of issuing ruler); detailed attestations for the ARI may be sought in the indexes to the individual text-editions. The vertical spacings between royal names in the “ARI” column are to be viewed as primary indicators in relation to further attestations in the remaining columns, with their relevant chronological subdivisions. b.  Also attested in a NB document (Zadok 1985: 22). c.  See most recently Stockhusen 2013. d.  Mentioned together with no. 7.

Ethnicity in the Assyrian Empire: A View from the Nisbe, (III)

Assyrian Royal Inscriptions  a

Name of Tribe 11. Gurumu

(* = Tribe within Summaries of ‘Arameans’)

TP III* Sargon Sennacherib*

12. Ḫagarānu

TP III* Sennacherib*

13. Ḫam(a)rānu

TP III* Sennacherib*

14. Ḫamuru 15. Ḫaṭallu

TP III* Sargon Sennacherib*

16. Ḫindi/aru

Letters (edition: SAA series)

Other Texts (SAA series and elsewhere)

167

Area(s) of Attestation (river valleys or cities)

Surappu area (Senn.) SAA 18, 170 (Assurbanipal) [culprits] SAA 19,127; 128 (TP III)

Euphrates area (Senn.)

SAA 15, 244 (Sg) SAA 17, 7; 8 (Sg./Senn.)

Tigris area, Sippar (Sg.) Euphrates area (Senn.)

SAA 17, 69; 81 (Sg./Senn.) SAA 18, 123 ( Esarhaddon)

unspecified

SAA 15, 15; 167; 231 [cf. Tuʾmanu](Sg.) SAA 17, 7; 17 (Sg./Senn.)

TP III * SAA 19, 104; 167 (TP III) Sargon [4 sheikhs]* SAA 17, passim (Sg./Senn.) Sennacherib*

Annals of Sūḫu (near Wadi Tharthar?) Tigris area (Sg.)

OIP 114, 13 Uqnû area (Sg.) Surappu area (Senn.)

17. Ḫirānue 18. Ḫudaduf

TP III*

unspecified

TP III*

unspecified

19. Iadaqqu 20. Iadburu

Sennacherib*

Tigris area (Senn.)

Sargon [6 sheikhs]* SAA 15, 69 [Medes] (Sg.)

Uqnû area (west of Elam) (Sg.)

21. Iasūbu / Iašūbu

22. Ituʾu

SAA 19, 10 [deportees] (TP III) SAA 7, 58 SAA 17, 172 (Sg./Senn.) SAA 11, 1 Tukulti-Ninurta II (Šamši-ilu) TP III* Sargon

unspecified Tigris area (Tuk-Nin,)

SAA 19, passim (TP III) SAA 15, passim (Sg.) [cf. Rub/puʾu, Kiprê] SAA 17, 75 (Sg./Senn.) SAA 16, 154 (Esarhaddon) [Ituʾu-land in Babylonia?]

SAA 7, 5 SAA 11, 1

Tigris area (TP III ) Tigris area (Sg.)

e.  Zadok 1985: 162, points out a homonymous town in NB documents, probably not far from Sippar. f.    Zadok 1985: 164, indicates the town(s) Ḫudada/Ḫudadu, the first of which should be between Sippar and the Tigris, the second in N Babylonia.

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Assyrian Royal Inscriptions  a

Name of Tribe 23, Kapiru 24. Karmaʾu 25. Lab(a)dudu

26. Liʾtaʾu / Liʾtamu

(* = Tribe within Summaries of ‘Arameans’)

Letters (edition: SAA series)

Other Texts (SAA series and elsewhere)

Area(s) of Attestation (river valleys or cities)

TP III*

unspecified

TP III*

unspecified

(Šamši-ilu) TP III  g Sargon TP III* Sennacherib*

SAA 15, 121; 122; 187 (Sg)

Tigris area (Sg.)

SAA 19, 81[deportees?]; 98; 128; 134 [sheikh] (TP III) SAA 15, 186 (Sg) [cf. Rub/puʾu] SAA 17, 106; 197 (Sg./Senn.)

Tigris area (Sg.) Euphrates area (Senn.)

h

27. Luḫuʾatu / Liḫuʾati

TP III*

28. Maliḫu/ Malaḫu

Sennacherib*

Tigris area (Senn.)

29. Marusu 30. Nabātu

TP III*

unspecified

TP III* Sennacherib*

31. Naṣiru 32. Nilqu 33. Puqūdu 

i

34. Qabiʾu

unspecified SAA 15, 166 [fort]; 231 (Sg.) SAA 17, 7; 8; 172 (Sg./Senn.)

Euphrates area (Senn.)

SAA 15, 77 (Sg)

TP III*

unspecified

TP III*

unspecified

TP III  

SAA 19, 56 (deportees); 131 (TP III) Sargon (5 sheikhs)* SAA 15, passim (Sg) [E group friendly; W group fears deportation]  k Sennacherib* SAA 17, 142;152 (Sg./Senn.) [problems in alliances with Assyria] SAA 18, 76 (Esarhaddon) SAA 18, 176; 187 (Assurbanipal) [prefects of the P.] j

TP III*

OIP 114, passim Surappu-Uqnû area (Sg.); Surappu area (Senn.)

SAA 4, 289; 302 (Assurbanipal)

Nippur (Esarh.) frontier with Elam; Sealand (Asb.)

unspecified

g.   RINAP 1, 47: 14–15, indicates the deportation of the Labadudeans (cf. also Zadok 2013: 274). h.  The letter presents no tribal names, but — as noted in the introduction to SAA 19, xxxvii and lxiv — the annals of Tiglath-pileser III (RINAP 1, 39: 12f.) explicitly mention deportations of the Puqūdu, Ruʾuʾa, and Liʾtaʾu. i.   Cf. Radner 2006–2008b for this tribe and its attestations. j.   RINAP 1, 47:13–14: “I overwhelmed the Puqūdu like a (cast) net, defeated them, and carried off much booty from them. These Puqūdu. . . I annexed to Assyria”. k.  Cf. specifically SAA 15, 221, with the comments in the introduction, p. xxi.

Ethnicity in the Assyrian Empire: A View from the Nisbe, (III)

Assyrian Royal Inscriptions  a

Name of Tribe

(* = Tribe within Summaries of ‘Arameans’)

Letters (edition: SAA series)

Other Texts (SAA series and elsewhere)

Area(s) of Attestation (river valleys or cities)

35. Rabi-ilu

TP III*

36. Radê 37. Raḫiqu (= no. 37?)

TP III*

unspecified

TP III*

unspecified

38. Rapiqu 39. Riḫiḫu / Raḫiḫu (= no. 35?)  l

TP III*

40. Ruʾūʾa / Ruʾūja  m

TP III* Sargon*  n Sennacherib*

169

unspecified SAA 17, 7 (Sg./Senn.)

SAA 17, 75 (Sg./Senn.) SAA 18, 196 (Esarhaddon) [Euphrates] cf. GPA 194(?) SAA 15, 186 (Sg) [cf. Rub/puʾu]

unspecified Tigris area (Senn.)

Sennacherib* SAA 19, 81 (deportees?);100 (TP III) SAA 15, passim (Sg) [attempts at alliance] SAA 17, 204 (Sg./Senn.)

Tigris, Uqnû area (Sg.) Surappu area (Senn.)

41. Rub/puʾu

TP III* Sargon

42. Rubbû  p 43. Rummulutu

TP III*

unspecified

TP III*

unspecified

44. Tuʾmuna / Tuʾmana

Sennacherib*

45. Ubudu

TP III* Sennacherib*

46. Ubulu

TP III* Sargon Sennacherib*

SAA 15, 186 (Sg)  o

SAA 15, 157 (Sg) [cf. Haṭallu; Assyrian attempts at alliance]

OIP 114, 6; 83

(Annals of Sūḫu)

Near Rapiqu (TP III); Tigris area (Sargon)

Tigris area (Sg.) Tigris area (Senn.) Tigris area (Senn.)

(SAA 15, 179) [cf. Puqūdu?]

OIP 114, 32; 98 Tigris area (Sg.) Surappu area (Senn.)

l.    The identity of the two names is suggested by Frahm 2003: 153; but Streck 2014: 314 indicates two distinct entries. m.  Cf. Streck 2006–2008b on the name and its attestations, entailing one of the transcriptions given here. n.  Named with nos. 16, 20, 33. o.  Named with nos. 22, 26, 39 as allies of Marduk-apla-iddina. Cf. OIP 117, p. 49, for the different locations of this tribe, from the Euphrates to the Tigris catchment areas. p.  Cf. Streck 2006–2008a for the distinction between this tribe and the one previously listed.

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Neumann, J. and Parpola, S. 1987 Climatic Change and the Eleventh-Tenth Century Eclipse of Assyria and Babylonia. JNES 46: 161–182. Niehr, H. (Ed.) 2014 The Arameans in Ancient Syria. Leiden: Brill. Nissinen, M. 2014 Outlook: Arameans outside of Syria: 1 Assyria. Pp. 273–296 in Niehr (Ed.). Novák, M. 2013a Between the Mušku and the Arameans: the Early History of Guzana/Tell Halaf. Pp. 293–307 in Across the Border: Late Bronze — Iron Age Relations between Syria and Anatolia, ed. K. A. Yener. Leuven and Paris: Walpole. 2013b Gōzān and Gūzāna. Anatolians, Aramaeans, and Assyrians in Tell Halaf. Pp. 259–279 in 100 Jahre archäologische Feldforschungen in nordost-Syrien — eine Bilanz, ed. D. Bonatz and L. Martin. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Nuccetelli, S. 2004 Reference and Ethnic-group Terms. Inquiry 47: 1–17. NWL = J.V. Kinnier Wilson 1972 The Nimrud Wine Lists. London: British School of Archaeology in Iraq. OIP 117 = Cole, S. W. 1996a The Early Neo-Babylonian Governor’s Archive from Nippur. Chicago: Oriental Institute. Pappi, C. 2006 The Jebel Bišri in the Physical and Cultural Landscape of the Ancient Near East. Kaskal 3: 241–25 Parpola, S. 2002 A Letter to Sennacherib Referring to the Conquest of Bit-Ha’iri and Other Events of the Year 693. Pp. 559–580 in O. Loretz et al., Ex Mesopotamia et Syria Lux. Festschrift. . .M. Dietrich. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. Postgate, J. N. 1976–80a.  Ituʾ. Pp. 221–222 in RlA 5. Berlin and New York: De Gruyter. 1976–80b.  Kašīaru. Pp. 460b in RlA 5. Berlin and New York: De Gruyter. 1976–80c.  Katmuḫu. Pp. 487–488 in RlA 5. Berlin and New York: De Gruyter. 1981 Nomads and Sedentaries in the Middle Assyrian Sources. Pp. 47–56 in Nomads and Sedentary People (=30th International Congress of Human Sciences in Asia and North Africa), ed. J. Silva Castillo. Mexico: El Colegio de México. (=Postgate 2007, 61–70). 2000 The Assyrian Army in Zamua. Iraq 62: 89–108. (=Postgate 2007, 261–280). 2001 Assyrian Uniforms. Pp. 373–388 in Veenhof Anniversary Volume, ed. W. H. Van Soldt et al. Leiden. (=Postgate 2007, 287–330) 2007 The Land of Assur & the Yoke of Assur. Studies on Assyria: 1971–2005. Oxford: Oxbow Books. 2013 Bronze Age Bureaucracy. Writing and the Practice of Government in Assyria. Cambridge: CUP. Radner, K. 1997 Die neuassyrischen Privatrechtsurkunden als Quelle für Mensch und Umwelt. Helsinki: The Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project.. 2003–2005  Pitru. Pp. 585–586 in RlA 10. Berlin and New York: De Gruyter. 2006–2008a  Provinz. C. Assyrien. Pp. 42–67 in RlA 11. Berlin and New York: De Gruyter. 2006–2008b  Puqūdu. Pp. 113–115 in RlA 11. Berlin and New York: De Gruyter. 2006 How to Reach the Upper Tigris: the Route Through the Ṭūr ‘Abdīn. SAAB 15: 273–305. Reade, J. E. 1972 The Neo-Assyrian Court and Army: Evidence from the Sculptures. Iraq 34: 87–112.

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RIMA 1 = A. K. Grayson 1987 Assyrian Rulers of the Third and Second Millennia BC (to 1115 BC). Toronto: University of Toronto Press. RIMA 2 = A. K. Grayson 1991 Assyrian Rulers of the Early First Millennium BC (1114–859 BC). Toronto: University of Toronto Press. RIMA 3 = A. K. Grayson 1996 Assyrian Rulers of the Early First Millennium BC II (858–745 BC). Toronto: University of Toronto Press. RIMB 2 = G. Frame 1995 Rulers of Babylonia from the Second Dynasty of Isin to the End of Assyrian Domination (1157–612 BC). Toronto: University of Toronto Press. RINAP 1 = H. Tadmor and Sh. Yamada 2011 The Royal Inscriptions of Tiglath-pileser III (744–727 BC), and Shalmaneser V (726–722 BC), Kings of Assyria. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns. RINAP 3/1 = A. K. Grayson and J. Novotny 2012 The Royal Inscriptions of Sennacherib, King of Assyria (704–681 BC), Part 1. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns. RINAP 3/2 = A. K. Grayson and J. Novotny 2014 The Royal Inscriptions of Sennacherib, King of Assyria (704–681 BC), Part 2. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns. RINAP 4 = E. Leichty 2011 The Royal Inscriptions of Esarhaddon, King of Assyria (680–669 BC). Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns. Rohling, E. J. et al. 2009 Holocene climate variability in the eastern Mediterranean, and the end of the Bronze Age. Pp. 2–5 in Forces of Transformation. The End of the Bronze Age in the Mediterranean, ed. C. S. Bachhuber and R. G. Roberts. Oxford: Oxbow Books. Rouault, O. and Masetti Rouault, M. G. 2013 La mission 2013 à Qasr Shemamok — Kilizu (Kurdistan irakien), ArchéOrient-Le Blog (Hypotheses.org), 5/7 2013: http://archeorient.hypotheses.org/1302. [Accessed 9 July 2014.] Routledge, B. 2000 The Politics of Mesha: Segmented Identities and State Formation in Iron Age Moab. JESHO 43: 221–256. SAA 4 = I. J. Starr 1990 Queries to the Sungod: Divination and Politics in Sargonid Assyria, Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. SAA 5 = G. B. Lanfranchi and S. Parpola 1990 The Correspondence of Sargon II, Part II: Letters from the Northern and Northeastern Provinces. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press.. SAA 7 = F. M. Fales and J. N. Postgate 1992 Imperial Administrative Records, Part I: Palace and Temple Administration. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press.. SAA 11 = F. M. Fales and J. N. Postgate 1995 Imperial Administrative Records, Part II: Provincial and Military Administration. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. SAA 15 = A. Fuchs and S. Parpola 2001 The Correspondence of Sargon II, Part III:Letters from Babylonia and the Eastern Provinces. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. SAA 16 = M. Luukko and G. Van Buylaere 2002 The Political Correspondence of Esarhaddon. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press.

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SAA 17 = M. Dietrich 2003 The Political Correspondence of Sargon and Sennacherib. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. SAA 18 = F. Reynolds 2003 The Babylonian Correspondence of Esarhaddon, and Letters to Assurbanipal and Sin-šarru-iškun from Northern and Central Babylonia. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. SAA 19 = M. Luukko 2012 The Royal Correspondence of Tiglath-pileser III and Sargon II from Calah/Nimrud. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. Sader, H. 1987 Les états araméens de Syrie depuis leur fondation jusqu’à leur transformation en provinces assyriennes. Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner. 2000 The Aramean Kingdoms of Syria: Origin and Formation Processes. Pp.  61–79 in Bunnens (Ed.). 2014 History. Pp. 11–36 in Niehr (Ed.). Saggs, H.W.F. 1968 The Tell al Rimah Tablets, 1965. Iraq 30: 154–174. 2001 The Nimrud Letters, 1952. London British School of Archaeology in Iraq. Schiffer, S. 1911 Die Aramäer. Historisch-geographische Untersuchungen. Leipzig : Hinrichs. Schniedewind, W. 2002 The Rise of the Aramean States. Pp. 276–287 in Mesopotamia and the Bible, ed. M. W. Chavalas and K. L. Younger, Jr. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker. Schwartz, G. 1989 Origins of the Arameans in Syria and Northern Mesopotamia: Research Problems and Potential Strategies. Pp. 275–291 in To the Euphrates and Beyond. Archaeological Studies in Honour of M. Van Loon, ed. O. M. C. Haex and P. M. M. G. Akkermans. Rotterdam: A.A. Balkema. Shibata, D., 2007 Middle Assyrian Administrative and Legal Texts from the 2005 Excavation at Tell Taban: A Preliminary Report. Pp. 169–180 in Excavations at Tell Ṭaban, Hassake, Syria, ed. H. Numoto. Tokyo: Kokushikan. [Also appeared in Al-Rafidan 28 (2007), 63–74.] Stockhusen, M. 2013 Nomadisierende Stammesverbände im Babylonien der neuassyrischen und neubabylonischen Zeit: das Beispiel der Damūnu. Pp. 223–245 in Berlerjung and Streck (Eds.). Streck, M.P. 2000 Das amurritische Onomastikon der altbabylonischen Zeit. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. 2003–2005  Patti-Enlil. P. 366 in RlA 10. Berlin-New York: De Gruyter. 2006–2008a.  Rupūʾu. P. 463–464 in RlA 11. Berlin-New York De Gruyter. 2006–2008b.  Ruʾūja, Ruʾāja. Pp. 470–471 in RlA 11. Berlin-New York De Gruyter. 2014 Outlook : Aramaeans outside of Syria. 2 Babylonia. Pp. 297–318 in Niehr (Ed). Szuchman, J.J. 2007 Prelude to Empire: Middle Assyrian Hanigalbat and the Rise of the Aramaeans [Phd Dissertation, UCLA]. http://jeffszuchman.files.wordpress.com/2011/11/prelude-to-empire.pdf. [Accessed 9 July 2014] 2009 Bit-Zamani and Assyria. Syria 86: 55–65. Tadmor, H. 1958 Historical Implications of the Correct Rendering of Akkadian dâku. JNES 17: 129–141. Tenney, J. S. 2011 Life at the Bottom of Babylonian Society: Servile Laborers at Nippur in the 14th and 13th Centuries B.C. Leiden and Boston: Brill

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Tenu, A. 2009 L’expansion médio-assyrienne: approche archéologique. Oxford: Archaeopress, TFS = S. Dalley and J. N. Postgate 1984 The Tablets from Fort Shalmaneser. London: British School of Archaeology in Iraq. Ur, J. A. 2002 Settlement and Landscape in Northern Mesopotamia: the Hamoukar Survey 2000–2001. Akkadica 123, 57–88. Van Soldt et al. 2013 Satu Qala: a Preliminary Report on the Seasons 2010–2011. Anatolica 39: 197–239. Wiggermann F.A.M. 2000 Agriculture in the Northern Balikh Valley: The Case of Middle Assyrian Tell Sabi Abyad. Pp. 171–231 in Rainfall and Agriculture in Northern Mesopotamia, ed. R. M. Jas. Leiden: NINO. 2006 The Seal of Ilī-pada, Grand Vizier of the Middle Assyrian Empire. Pp. 92–99 in The Iconography of Cylinder Seals, ed. P. Taylor. London and Turin: Nino Aragno. 2008 Cuneiform texts from Tell Sabi Abyad Related to Pottery. Pp. 559–564 (Appendix E) in K. Duistermaat, The Pots and Potters of Assyria. Turnhout: Brepols. 2010 Wein, Weib und Gesang in een midden-assyrische nederzetting aan de Balikh. Phoenix 56: 18–60. Wilkinson, T. J. 2000 Regional Approaches to Mesopotamian Archaeology: the Contribution of Archaeological Surveys. Journal of Archaeological Research 3: 219–267. Wilkinson, T. J. and Barbanes, E. 2000 Settlement Patterns in the Syrian Jezirah during the Iron Age. Pp. 397–424 in Bunnens (Ed.). Wilkinson, T. J. et al. 2005 Landscape and Settlement in the Neo-Assyrian Empire. BASOR 340: 23–56. Winter, I. J. 2010 North Syria as a Bronzeworking Centre in the early First Millennium B.C.: Luxury Commodities at home and abroad. Pp. 335–379 in I. J. Winter, On Art in the Ancient near East. Leiden-Boston: Brill. Wossink, A. 2011 Tribal Identities in Mesopotamia between 2500 and 1500 BC. Pp. 261–268 in Correlates of Complexity: Essays. . . Diederik J.W. Meijer, ed. B. L. Düring et al. Leiden: NINO. Younger Jr., K. L. 2007 The Late Bronze Age / Iron Age Transition and the Origins of the Arameans. Pp. 133–174 in Ugarit at Seventy-Five, ed. K. L. Younger Jr. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns. Zadok, R. 1985 Geographical Names According to New- and Late-Babylonian Texts. RGTC 8. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. 1991 Elements of Aramean Pre-History. Pp.  104–117 in Ah Assyria. Studies . . . Hayim Tadmor, ed. M. Cogan and I. Ephʾal. Jerusalem: Magnes Press. 2012 The Aramean Infiltration and Diffusion in the Upper Jazira, ca. 1150–930 BCE. Pp. 569–579 in Galil et al. (Eds.). 2013 The Onomastics of the Chaldean, Aramean, and Arabian Tribes in Babylonia during the First Millennium. Pp. 261–336 in Berlerjung and Streck (Eds.). 2014 Ḫīt in Sūḫu. Kaskal 11; 1–22. Zawadzki, S. 1994 The Revolt of 746 BC and the Coming of Tiglath-pileser III to the Throne. SAAB 8: 53–54. Ziegler, N. and Reculeau, H. 2014 The Sutean Nomads in the Mari Period. Pp. 209–226 in Morandi Bonacossi (Ed.) 2014.

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Instruktionen Tukultī-Ninurtas I. Helmut Freydank Dem hoch geschätzten Kollegen J. N. Postgate sei der folgende Beitrag aus andauernder Ferne und Nähe freundschaftlich zugeeignet. Gern nimmt der Vf. eine Gelegenheit wahr, über Zweifel und Korrekturen an eigenen Interpretationen zu sprechen, deren Klärung das Wort des mit dieser Festschrift Geehrten immer befördern wird. Bei der kürzlich versuchten Deutung der als MARV IV 119 publizierten Urkunde 1 hatte der Vf. aufgrund einer vermutlich zutreffenden Ergänzung und Lesung den Schluss gezogen, der assyrische König Tukultī-Ninurta I. (1233–1197 v.  Chr.) habe einem Provinzgouverneur eine Rechtsbefugnis übertragen, um einem Missstand zu begegnen. Dem hatten sich Erwägungen über den Charakter der Urkunde angeschlossen. 2 Erst später hatte sich im Vergleich mit anderen Erlassen 3 die Frage gestellt, ob zu erwarten sei, dass der Text dem Beamten eine Sanktion für den Fall der Nichtbefolgung androht. Hätte man also die letzten Zeilen des Textes MARV IV 119 — die Richtigkeit der Lesung vorausgesetzt — unter diesem Aspekt als gegen Bēr-išmanni gerichtet auffassen müssen: 31) [I.]dBe-er-iš-ma-ni 32) [a-m]a-ár DI uš-šu-ru? Dann schiene der Gouverneur des Landes Katmuḫu einen Prozess zu gewärtigen, falls auch nur eine Person auf seinem Territorium in der vom Erlass beschriebenen Weise tätig würde. In der Folge wären einige, wenn auch nicht alle aus MARV IV 119 gezogenen Schlüsse fragwürdig geworden. 4 Da indessen keinerlei Anzeichen und auch nicht der Tenor der Urkunde auf ein bereits eingetretenes oder potenzielles Fehlverhalten des Beamten schließen lassen, kann es sich letztlich nur um eine Instruktion handeln, eine Anleitung durch den König, wie in einer außergewöhnlichen Situation zu verfahren sei. Gehorsam wird dabei vorausgesetzt, so dass es sich erübrigt, dem Beamten mit Bestrafung zu drohen. Vielmehr schreibt die Instruktion vor, wie mit den Zuwiderhandelnden zu verfahren sei. Damit dürfte der Charakter des „Erlasses“ soweit gesichert sein, und es bietet sich an, die fragmentarische Urkunde MARV VIII 76 5 heranzuziehen, da sie die Sicht auf MARV IV 119 erweitern könnte. 1.  Freydank 2012: 226–234. 2.  Die Erklärung als „Protokoll einer königlichen Selbstverpflichtung“ (ebd. 233) benennt gegenüber der jetzt bevorzugten Kategorisierung nicht den Zweck des Dokuments und entfällt. Ferner ist es mehr als zweifelhaft, dass der Text etwas widerspiegelt, das „beim König erwirkt“ (ebd. 226, vgl. MARV IV S. 21) wurde. — Auch die Vermutungen über die Motivation der Krieger im Fall ihrer strafbaren Handlungen (ebd. 228) sind infrage zu stellen. 3.  Vgl. ders. 2009: 68–73. 4.  Irrelevant ist es nun ohnehin, dass der angesprochene Beamte für die Verhältnisse im Land „nach Lage der Dinge keine Verantwortung trägt.“ (ders. 2011: 227). 5. Eine Assur-Fundnummer fehlt. Die Herkunft auch dieses Erlasses aus Kār-Tukultī-Ninurta (Tulūl al-‘Aqar) ist wahrscheinlich. Der obere und der untere Rand der Tafel sowie Teile der Seitenränder sind beschädigt, so dass namentlich im mittleren Teil des Dokuments etwa vier Zeilen (s. u.) fehlen.

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Vor einem Deutungsversuch und Vergleich wäre aber zu prüfen, inwieweit dieser Text aufgrund seines Erhaltungszustandes verständlich wird, ob er eine ähnliche Funktion erfüllt und welche Situation aus ihm abgeleitet werden kann. In der Inhaltsübersicht MARV VIII S. 11 bleibt das Anliegen des „Erlasses“ unerwähnt. Es wird lediglich erwogen, ob der angesprochene Beamte Ninurta-ālik-pāni, rab alāni ša URUKurda „Dorfinspektor der Stadt Kurda“ 6, mit dem aus Kār-Tukultī-Ninurta bekannten Funktionär gleichen Namens identisch sein könne. Ein Beweis dafür ist aber nicht zu erbringen. Ebenso wäre im Fall einer Identität die zeitliche Abfolge der beiden Funktionen nicht zu sichern, wenngleich Vermutungen darüber möglich scheinen. Auch MARV VIII 76 gibt sich, worin es mit MARV IV 119 übereinstimmt, als königliche Rechtssetzung in einer speziellen Situation zu erkennen. Beide Urkunden verpflichten die angesprochenen Beamten, in ihren Bereichen, also im Land Katmuḫu bzw. in den „Dörfern der Stadt Kurda“, auf einen jeweils genau definierten Fall mit jeweils ebenso genau definierten Handlungen zu reagieren. Es versteht sich von selbst, dass damit eine Ordnung wiederhergestellt und entsprechende Störungen künftig unterbunden werden sollten. Als gemeinsames Merkmal der Urkunden fällt auf, dass die zu ergreifenden Maßnahmen in erster Linie gegen Angehörige des assyrischen Heeres gerichtet sind. Sowohl im Einzelnen als auch bezüglich des allgemeinen Zusammenhanges gibt MARV VIII 76 seine Zweckbestimmung nicht ohne Weiteres preis. Deshalb scheinen Fehlschlüsse nicht nur aufgrund der Textverluste, sondern auch wegen der lückenhaften Kenntnis der Hintergründe kaum vermeidbar. Ungeachtet dessen ist damit zu rechnen, dass nicht erst in der Regierungszeit Tukultī-Ninurtas I., sondern bereits unter den Vorgängern eine zielgerichtete Expansions- und rigide Bevölkerungspolitik den Boden dafür bereitet hatte, dass am Ende mit Instruktionen wie MARV VIII 76 und MARV IV 119 bestimmten Tendenzen entgegen gewirkt werden musste. So zeigt sich in unterschiedlichen Quellen, dass die Deportierten unter Tukultī-Ninurta I. offenbar einen maßgeblichen gesellschaftlichen, d. h. wirtschaftlichen und militärischen Faktor darstellten. 7 Da auch der Erlass MARV IV 151, der die Entschuldung des Aššur-nādin-apli, des Sohnes des Aššur-tišamme und Enkels des Šamaš-aḫa-iddina durch den König zum Gegenstand hat, auf Belange der Umgesiedelten antwortet 8 und eine allgemeine Praxis beispielhaft vertreten könnte, sei er hier hinsichtlich der vorliegenden Problematik nochmals resümiert. 9

6.  Der PN ist in den mA Schriftquellen nur bedingt singulär (Saporetti 1970 I u. Freydank/Saporetti 1979), denn ein ideografisch geschriebener, beschädigter Beleg mit nicht sicher lesbarer Filiation (MARV II 1 VII 1) könnte auf einen weiteren Namensträger, einen „Mann des Königs“ (ebd. VII 26) zu beziehen sein. Der dagegen aus KTN bekannte Ninurta-ālik-pāni, ša rēš šarri „Vertrauter des Königs“, darf als bewährter Beamter gelten, und sein wechselnder Einsatz sollte nicht ausgeschlossen werden. — Zu Kurda s. Nashef 1982: 173, Postgate 1995: 14 u. Llop 2012: 97f. 7.  Freydank 1975: 55–63. 8. In diesem Sinne beruhen die Erklärungsversuche auf der Annahme, dass die Umsiedlungs­ politik spätestens seit Salmānu-ašarēd I. auf dem gesamten Territorium des assyrischen Staates praktiziert wurde. 9.  Zum Inhalt von MARV IV 151 s. zusammenfassend sowie zu einem Teilaspekt Freydank 1997: 106–108, ferner ders. 2005: 64–66 nochmals zu dem Text und den Modalitäten der „Umsiedlungen“.

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Die Repräsentanten der drei Generationen einer Familie, die zur assyrischen Führungsschicht gehörte, waren diesem Erlass zufolge anscheinend aufgrund ihrer militärischen Funktionen und im Zuge militärischer Unternehmungen damit befasst gewesen, Bevölkerungen umzusiedeln bzw. zu deportieren (nasāḫu). Anlässlich dieser Maßnahmen hatten sie, wie sich zeigt, Darlehensverträge geschlossen, auf die sich MARV IV 151 bezieht. Aššur-tišamme, der Vertreter der zweiten Generation hatte sich am Ende mit der Bitte an den König gewandt, die aus den Verträgen folgenden Verpflichtungen zu übernehmen. Nachdem man den Umgesiedelten bei ihrer Deportation für den zurückgelassenen bzw. übertragenen Besitz Schuldurkunden ausgehändigt hatte, waren sie nun, zu einem deutlich späteren Zeitpunkt, 10 mit dem Erlass (MARV IV 151) aufgerufen, innerhalb einer bestimmten Frist ihre Forderungen beim Palast geltend zu machen und in Silber begleichen zu lassen. Gegenstand der einzulösenden Urkunden waren, wie aus Z. 12–22 hervorgeht, jegliche Güter, die zu einem bäuerlichen Anwesen gehören konnten. Sie umfassten Immobilien wie auch lebendes Inventar und verschiedenste Objekte und Materialien von Wert. Offenbar sollten die von der Krone betriebenen Umsiedlungen mit der daraus folgenden Trennung von Haus, Hof und Boden nicht als Enteignungen aufgefasst werden, sondern de iure als Darlehen gelten, indem man den — mutmaßlich unfreiwilligen — Besitzübertragungen Vertragsform verlieh. Da eine Wendung (MARV IV 151:60) die zur eigenen Verschuldung führende Tätigkeit der genannten Assyrer als nasāḫu „herausreißen“ zu erkennen gibt, steht diese Urkunde notwendig, obgleich mittelbar, auch in einer Beziehung zu MARV VIII 76, wenn der Text mit der zweimaligen Verwendung des Verbs auf Probleme des „Umsiedelns“ anspielt. Die beiden vorliegenden Beispiele dieser Kategorie „Erlass“ (MARV IV 119 und MARV VIII 76) sind Grund genug zu vermuten, dass sie nicht die einzigen ihrer Art waren, mit denen sich der König an seine Beamten wandte. Formal und inhaltlich betrachtet, vertreten sie also eine eigene Gattung, die als „persönliche Instruktion“ oder „bindende Weisung“ definiert werden kann. 11 Die Hauptteile gehen auf eine wörtliche Rede des Königs zurück (mā . . .), sind aber jeweils weder als Brief noch als Befehl stilisiert. Nach dem ähnlichen Textaufbau zu urteilen, sind innerhalb dieser Rede spezifische Elemente kombiniert. Die kasuistische Form lässt den Einfluss, wenn nicht das Vorbild der Gesetze bzw. Rechtsvorschriften erkennen. 1. Eidesleistung des Königs, 2. Verpflichtung des zuständigen Beamten, 3. Beschreibung der Situation, 4. Beschreibung des Wiederholungsfalls, 5. Vorschriften für die Reaktion des Beamten auf den Wiederholungsfall. MARV VIII 76 zeigt mit Ausnahme der Eidesleistung, die an erster Stelle erscheint, denselben Aufbau wie MARV IV 119. Am Textanfang wären die Notiz über eine Siegelung 12 der Tafel

10.  MARV IV 151:5 u. 75 nennt den Eponymen Ilī-padâ, der sein Amt in einem der späteren Jahre Tukultī-Ninurtas I. ausübte. 11.  Die bei Freydank 2012: 233 gegebene Definition setzt ein Eigeninteresse des Bēr-išmanni, des Statthalters von Katmuḫu, voraus, über das letztlich doch nichts Gewisses gesagt werden kann. 12.  Vgl. MARV IV 119:1: [KI]ŠIB m.dBe-er-iš-ma-ni.

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durch Ninurta-ālik-pāni und die Siegelabrollung zu erwarten; beides ist nicht zu sichern. 13 In Rs. 15′f. sind die wichtigsten Teile des Datums zerstört. Der Text ist wie folgt gegliedert: Vs. 1′f. : –  Eidesleistung (des Königs) 2′–5′ –  Verpflichtung des Ninurta-ālik-pāni 6′–9′+x –  Schilderung der Situation durch den König Rs. 1′–10′ –  Protasis 11′–14′ – Apodosis ___________________________________ 15′(f.) – Datum MARV VIII 76 (VAT 20425) Umschrift: Vs.  1′ 14 [ ]x nap-ša-a-te š[a?] DING[IR?]-š[u?]   2′ [ ]x-šu it-ta-ṣar  3′ [I.]dNIN.URTA-a-lik–pa-ni   4′ [GA]L URUDIDLI ša URUKur-da  5′ ur-ták-ki-is  6′ ma-a lu-ú [ ]x x x[ ]  7′ lu-ú ÉRINMEŠ x x[ ]  8′ ù-lu-ú x[ ]  9′ ma?-a? ma-am-ma [ ]x[ ] Rs.  1′ [šùm-ma ]x x[ ]x[ ]  2′ lu-ú ša ka-b[i?-i]t!?/t]e!? ÉRINM[EŠ]  3′ lu-ú ša GIŠGIGIRMEŠ  4′ ù-lu-ú UR na-as-ḫu  5′ ma-am-ma i+na URUDIDLI  6′ ša ḫal-zi URUKur-da  7′ A.ŠÀ am-mar a-ba-at ŠE e-ṣ[i!??-id?]  8′ ki!?-m[a?] ša la-a it-ta-ás-ḫa-x-x[-ni]  9′ [a?-na? UR]UDIDLI a-šar tar-ṣu-ú 10′ [ ] e-tar-bu 11′ [ I.]dNIN.URTA-a-lik-pa-ni 12′ [ ]x-šu i-nap-pu-lu 13′ [ -]tu?!-šu ma-am-ma 14′ [ ]x i-ṣa-ba-at 13.  Die Kollation zeigt, dass mindestens eine Zeile gänzlich verloren ist. Da sie bereits auf der Rundung der Tafel zum oberen Rand hin gestanden hätte, bliebe kein Raum für eine Siegelabrollung, so dass diese fraglich wird ebenso wie damit auch der Siegelvermerk selbst. Zwischen Vs. 9′ und Rs. 1′ scheinen auf dem unteren Rand vier Zeilen zerstört zu sein. — Dem Kustos des Vorderasiatischen Museums, Herrn Prof. Dr. Joachim Marzahn, danke ich herzlich für den abermals gewährten Zugang zu der Tafel. 14.  Ergänze in der vorangehenden Zeile etwa LUGAL oder — weniger wahrscheinlich — den PN Tukultī-Ninurta. Nach den geringfügigen Spuren lässt sich kein Zeichen identifizieren.

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___________________________________ 15′ [ITU]x-x-te? U4.2?3.K[ÁM] 16′ [li-mu . . .] Übersetzung: Vs.   1′ [ ]. . . dem Leben sei[nes] Got[tes]   2′ sein(e)(n) [ ]. . . hat er geschützt.  3′ Ninurta-ālik-pāni,   4′ den Dorf[insp]ektor der Stadt Kurda,   5′ hat er sich? verpflichtet   6′ folgendermaßen: Sei es, dass entweder [ ]. . .[ ]   7′ oder Truppen . . .[ ]   8′ oder . . .[ ]  9′ folgendermaßen?: Irgend jemand [ ]. . .[ ] Rs.  1′ [Gesetzt?, ein? ]. . .[ ]. . .[ ],   2′ sei er von der Haupt[mach]t? der Fußtruppen,   3′ sei er von den Streitwagen(kämpfern)   4′ oder eine umgesiedelte Person,   5′ irgend jemand in den Dörfern   6′ des Distrikts der Stadt Kurda   7′ Feld, soviel wie ‚Angelegenheit‛ der Gerste (ist), hat er ab[geerntet??],  8′ (und)? wi[e] (jemand), den man nicht umgesiedelt [hat(?)], 15  9′ [in? die Dör]fer, wo es geeignet ist(?), 10′ [heimlich?] sind sie eingedrungen, 11′ [so werden die . . . des] Ninurta-ālik-pāni 12′ sein [ ]. . . zerstören; 13′ sein [ ] . . . wird 14′ nie[man]d ergreifen. — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — 15′ [Monat] . . ., 2?3. Tag, 16′ [Eponym (ist) . . .] Vs. 1′f.: Der König erwähnt seine Eidesleistung (vgl. MARV IV 119:29f.) und die damit verbundene Absicht, etwas oder jemanden zu schützen. Vs. 3′f.: Zum Auftreten des PN Ninurta-ālik-pāni s. u. die Tabelle, zur Funktion rab alāni s. Jakob 2003: 160–166. Vs. 5′: Vgl. die Verbalform MARV IV 119:5. Auch hier könnte urtakkis die gegenseitige Bindung betonen, indem der König dem Beamten Weisungen erteilt und damit Befugnisse überträgt, die diesen befähigen, im Interesse der Krone zu handeln. Vs. 6′–9′: Eine Ergänzung der Zeilen entsprechend Rs. 2′–4′ wird nicht versucht. — Dem Formular (s. o., vgl. MARV IV 119) gemäß war von hier an die nicht tolerierbare Situation 15.  Etwa im Sinn von „als hätte man ihn nicht umgesiedelt“?

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beschrieben, über die wegen der Beschädigung der Tafel wenig zu erfahren ist. Die Zeichen lassen erkennen, dass dieselben Personengruppen wie in Rs. 2′–4′ genannt waren, nämlich Angehörige der Fußtruppen und Wagenkämpfer sowie umgesiedelte Personen als potenzielle Verletzer von Normen. Vs. 7′: Der Reihenfolge in Rs. 2′–4′ entsprechend hätte hier ÉRINMEŠ GIŠGIGIRMEŠ gestanden. — Auf der beschädigten Tafeloberfläche sind dem Vf. trotz Zeichenspuren Identifikationen und Lesungen nicht möglich. — Vs. 9′ verallgemeinert mit mamma ebenso wie Rs. 5′ die Aussage zu den möglichen Akteuren. Rs. 1′: Am Anfang wahrscheinlich šùm-ma zu ergänzen. Rs. 2′–4′: Parallele zu Vs. 6′–8′. — Die Nennung der ÉRINMEŠ am Ende von Z. 2′ setzt nach lu-ú ša ein Wort voraus, dessen Lesung unsicher bleibt, aber einen Vergleich mit MARV VIII 51:17 nahe legt. Dort geht es um den Transport der „. . . (Leder)panzer des?/der? . . . des Königs“ (. . . 16) ša sa-ri-a-n[i] 17) ša!? ka!?-bi-it?!/te?! LUGAL), die auf Eseln nach Babylonien transportiert werden sollen. Die sicher lesbaren Zeichen beider Wörter lassen daran denken, dass an beiden Stellen das mA bisher nicht bezeugte Wort kabittu (AHw 417b: „Hauptmacht, Hauptkorps“; CAD K 21: „main body of the army“) vorliegen könnte. Rs. 4′: UR für a’īlu ungewöhnlich. Lesung? Der Status des UR na-ás-ḫu ist womöglich nicht auf diesen allein beschränkt, wenn Angehörige des Heeres infolge der üblichen „Umsiedlungen“ vermutlich in größerer Zahl gleicher Herkunft sein konnten (s. dazu unten). Rs. 5′f.: Die Tätigkeit der unbefugt Handelnden betrifft, wie anzunehmen ist, die Dörfer der Stadt Kurda, die bäuerlichen Anwesen und landwirtschaftlichen Nutzflächen, die den Distrikt um das Zentrum Kurda bilden (s. Anm. 6). Rs. 7′: Augenscheinlich wird A.ŠÀ „Feld“ durch ammar abāt ŠE „soviel wie ‚Angelegenheit‛ der Gerste (ist)“ spezifiert, was man als „soviel mit Gerste bestellt wird/worden ist“ auffassen könnte. Im Kontext der von hier an aufgeführten Übertretungen wäre, zumal an erster Stelle, die Aneignung der Feldfrucht Gerste nicht auszuschließen, während eine Lesung und Ergänzung als e-t[a!-mar] gemäß amata amāru (CAD A2 19b f.: b) to see a legal case settled) zu keiner verifizierbaren Interpretation führen dürfte. Rs. 8′ könnte einen Schlüssel zum Verständnis der Situation bieten, falls am Anfang ki!?m[a?] . . . richtig gelesen ist. Der Subjunktivsatz beschriebe dann das Tun des Unbefugten: „wie eines, den man nicht umgesiedelt hat“. Hiernach hätte sich nasāḫu (Rs. 8′: ša it-ta-ás-ḫa-x-x[-ni]) logisch auf Angehörige aller genannten Gruppen beziehen können. Die Interpretation führte dann zu dem Schluss, dass es Versuche gab, den Umsiedlungen und deren Folgen — und damit etwa auch deren rechtlichen Grundlagen(?) — zuwider zu handeln. Diese Zuwiderhandlungen bestanden anscheinend darin, Anwesen oder Teile davon in Besitz zu nehmen, was aber wegen der Textlücken nicht genauer erkennbar wird. Auffällig ist in der Strafbestimmung die zweimalige Verwendung des Possessivpronomens . . .-šu „sein . . .“ (Rs. 12′f.), das sich nur auf den Unbefugten beziehen kann. Rs. 9′f.: Vor erābu (e-tar-bu) ist als Ergänzung kī raqā’e „heimlich“ (vgl. MARV IV 119:23 u. 27) nicht auszuschließen. Rs. 11′: Mit der Nennung des Ninurta-ālik-pāni beginnt die eigentliche Instruktion. Ergänze davor möglicherweise ÉRINMEŠ (ša) oder etwa LÚMEŠ (ša)? Die 3. Pers. Pl. in Z. 12′ legt ein pluralisches Subjekt nahe.

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Rs. 12′: Der Verwendung des Verbs napālu zufolge (vgl. AHw 733bf. u. CAD NI 272b-275b) kommt für die Ergänzung eine Baulichkeit infrage. Wie angedeutet, scheint das Possessivsuffix -šu für ein in diesem Kontext anwendbares Besitzverhältnis zu sprechen, das ebenso im Fall von -šu in Z. 13′ anzunehmen ist. Rs. 13′f.: Die Apodosis stellt neben der „Zerstörung“ vermutlich das generelle Verbot einer Inbesitznahme fest: „sein [. . .] wird [niemand] ergreifen“. Dem entsprechend wäre la-a vor ṣabātu (i-ṣa-ba-at) anzusetzen, wodurch der plausiblere Sinn entsteht gegenüber „sein [. . .] wird (irgend) jemand [. . .] ergreifen“. Zu ṣabātu „ergreifen“ für die Inbesitznahme einer Siedlung (URU), s. MARV IV 119:22 u. 26. Rs. 16′: Wegen der ähnlichen Problematik in MARV IV 119 und der Nennung von Kurda ebd. Z. 8 ist eine zeitliche Nachbarschaft jener Urkunde (Eponym: Ninu’āju) zur vorliegenden nicht gänzlich auszuschließen. Das würde bei einer — nicht beweisbaren! — Identität des ša rēš šarri, des Funktionärs in Kār-Tukultī-Ninurta, mit dem rab alāni ša URUKurda die Konsequenz haben, dass Ninurta-ālik-pāni letztere Funktion später ausübte (s. Tabelle) und Ninu’āju als Jahresbeamter später als Salmānu-šuma-uṣur anzusetzen wäre.� Freydank 2012: 228 verweist auf die zweifache Funktion der waffenfähigen Männer als Ackerbauern und dienstpflichtige Krieger auf königlichen Domänen und ihre Rolle in MARV IV 119. Als Ursache für den betreffenden Erlass kämen reale Vorfälle und das potenzielle Verhalten der „Bogenschützen“ in Betracht. Der in eine weitere assyrische Provinz und damit ebenfalls in ein Ackerbaugebiet mit dörflichen Siedlungen führende Erlass MARV VIII 76 nimmt demgegenüber ausdrücklich auf umgesiedelte Personen Bezug. Damit stellt er zugleich eine Verbindung zu der möglichen Vorgeschichte her, wie sie aus MARV IV 151 abgeleitet werden kann. Das gibt Anlass zu der Frage, ob hinter den in MARV IV 119 mit Sanktionen bedrohten Handlungen Versuche Einzelner stehen, in angestammte Wohn- und Arbeitsorte zurückzukehren oder etwa fremde in Besitz zu nehmen und folglich ein aufgezwungenes Regime als umgesiedelter, von der Krone abhängiger landwirtschaftlicher Produzent und „Bogenschütze“ zu verlassen. 16 Einer solchen Tendenz musste die Krone notwendig zu begegnen suchen. Deshalb scheint es eine Erwägung wert, ob sie folglich in den benachbarten Regionen aufgrund variierender Bedingungen mit vaiierenden Sanktionen auf ein im Grunde identisches Phänomen reagiert hat. In diesem Sinne wäre daran zu denken, dass selbst die „Entschuldung“ durch den einzigartigen Erlass MARV IV 151 mit den daraus folgenden Kompensationszahlungen an die Gläubiger derselben politischen Absicht gedient hätte. Kaum bezweifelbar ist am Ende die simple Folgerung, dass nach der fehlgeschlagenen Beherrschung Babyloniens und dem hohen Einsatz aller Ressourcen des Reiches auch die mit aller Vorsicht gedeuteten „Instruktionen“ und deren Ursachen als Anzeichen für eine krisenhafte Entwicklung etwa im letzten Drittel der Regierungszeit Tukultī-Ninurtas I. zu werten sind. Die folgende Tabelle erfasst die vergleichsweise wenigen Belegstellen für die Träger des PN Ninurta-ālik-pāni. Die Identität mit dem Namensträger der Nrn. 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7 u. 8 ist für Nr. 3 unwahrscheinlich, für Nr. 9 u. 10 wahrscheinlich, aber nicht zu sichern. 16.  Anders Freydank 1991: 46. — Zu beachten ist aber das Fehlen des līmu Ninu’āju in den Texten aus Dūr-Katlimmu (Röllig 2004; Röllig 2008: 4).

Helmut Freydank

186

PN 1

Filiation/Funktion

Belegstelle

NIN.URTA-a-lik–pa-ni

-

MARV (I) 1 I 36′

2 [I.d]NIN.URTA-a-lik–[p] a-ni I 3 MAŠ-D[U]-IGI

-

MARV (I) 1 IV 1 MARV II 1 VII 1 MARV II 20:12, 32

I.d

4

I.d

NIN.URTA-a-lik–pa-ni

5

I.d

S. d. . . . ÉRIN LUGAL ša SAG LUGAL

NIN.URT[Aa-lik–pa-ni] 6 I.dNIN.URTA–a-lik–pa-ni -

NIN. qēpu (qe-pu-tu) URTA–a-lik–pa-[ni] 8 I.d!NIN.URTA–a-lik–pa-ni 7

I.d

9 [I.]dNIN.URTAa-lik–pa-ni I. d 10 ] NIN.URTAa-lik–pa-ni

[GA]L URUDIDLI ša Kur-da do.

URU

Tätigkeit

Eṭel-pîAššur, S. d. Kurbānu do.

(Namensliste)

?

Empfänger von Gerste in Kār-Tukultī-Ninurta zur Verteilung (Namensliste)

Abī-ilī, S. d. Katiri

MARV IV 14:11 MARV IV 31:7 Empfänger von Gerste zur Verteilung MARV IV 39:4 do. MARV IV 102 IV 4′ MARV VIII 76 Vs. 3′ MARV VIII 76 Rs. 11′

Eponym

(Empfänger von Gerste zur Verteilung) do. ?

? Abī-ilī, S. d. Katiri ?

verfügt über zehn ? Mann Adressat des Erlasses ? do.

?

Bibliographie CAD

The Assyrian Dictionary of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago (CAD), Chicago(/-Glückstadt) 1956–2011. Freydank, H. 1975 Die Rolle der Deportierten im mittelassyrischen Staat. S. 55–63 in Die Rolle der Volksmassen in der Geschichte der vorkapitalistischen Gesellschaftsformationen, hrsg. J. Herrmann/I. Sellnow. Berlin. 1982 Mittelassyrische Rechtsurkunden und Verwaltungstexte (MARV) II. Vorderasiatische Schriftdenläler, N.F. V (XXI). Berlin. 1991 Beiträge zur mittelassyrischen Chronologie und Geschichte. Schriften zur Geschichte und Kultur des Alten Orients 21. Berlin. 1997 bitqī batāqu, „Abschneidungen abschneiden“? AoF 24: 105–114. 2001 Mittelassyrische Rechtsurkunden und Verwaltungstexte (MARV) IV. Tafeln aus Kār-Tukultī-Ninurta. Wissenschaftliche Veröffentlichungen der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft 99. Saarbrücken. 2005 Beispiele von Kulturkontakten aus mittelassyrischer Zeit. S. 59–76 in Motivation und Mechanismen des Kulturkontaktes in der späten Bronzezeit, hrsg. D. Prechel. Eothen 13. Firenze: 59–76. 2009 Kār-Tukultī-Ninurta als Agrarprovinz. AoF 36: 16–84. 2012 MARV IV 119 — ein Vertrag? AoF 39: 226–234. Freydank, H. und Saporetti, C. 1979 Nuove attestazioni dell’onomastica medio-assira. Incunabula Graeca LXXIV. Rom.

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Freydank, H. und Feller, B. 2007 Mittelassyrische Rechtsurkunden und Verwaltungstexte (MARV) VIII. Wissenschaftliche Veröffent­ lichungen der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft 119. Wiesbaden. Jakob, S. 2003 Mittelassyrische Verwaltung und Sozialstruktur. Untersuchungen. Cuneiform Monographs 29. Leiden/Boston. 2009 Die mittelassyrischen Texte aus Tell Chuēra in Nordost-Syrien. Vorderasiatische Forschungen der Max Freiherr von Oppenheim-Stiftung 2/III. Wiesbaden. Llop, J. 2012 The Development of the Middle Assyrian Provinces. AoF 39: 87–111. Nashef, Kh. 1982 Die Orts- und Gewässernamen der mittelbabylonischen und mittelassyrischen Zeit. Répertoire Géographique des Textes Cunéiformes 5. Wiesbaden. Postgate, J. N. 1995 Assyria: the Home Provinces. S. 1–17 in Neo Assyrian Geography, ed. M. Liverani. Quaderni di Geografia Storica 5. Roma 1995. 2008 The Organization of the Middle Assyrian Army: Some Fresh Evidence. S. 83–92 in Les armées du Proche-Orient ancien (III e–I er mill. av. J.-C.), hrsg. Ph. Abrahami/L. Battini. BAR International Series 1855. Röllig, W. 2004 Eponymen in den mittelassyrischen Dokumenten aus Tall Šēḫ Ḥamad/Dūr-Katlimmu. ZA 94: 18–51. 2008 Land- und Viehwirtschaft am Unteren Ḫābūr in Mittelassyrischer Zeit. Berichte der Ausgrabung Tell Šēḫ Ḥamad/Dūr-Katlimmu (BATSH) Band 9/Texte 3. Wiesbaden. Saporetti, C. 1970 Onomastica medio-assira I/II. Studia Pohl 6. Rom. von Soden, W. 1965 (1959)–1981 Akkadisches Handwörterbuch (AHw). Wiesbaden.

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Gods, Temples, and Cult at the Service of the Early Hittite State Marie-Henriette Gates Abstract Hittite written documentation on religious matters gives exceptional detail about rituals, temple furnishings and the names of deities, as well as the responsibilities toward cultic behavior that were assumed at every level of Hittite society. Whereas the relevant texts date primarily to the last phase of the Hittite state, archaeological evidence now attributes the formative stage of this religious program to its earliest rulers, in the Old Kingdom. The first royal annals already alluded to the ideological features of this official cult. As recent discoveries show, its implementation was achieved through innovative temple architecture, and elaborate ceremonies like the ones depicted on ritual vessels. This paper will discuss the early Hittite kingdom in the light of contemporary material evidence, to suggest by what means its kings introduced religious institutions that continued to define Hittite statehood throughout its four centuries. The memory attached to these monuments and rites may also have been instrumental in placing Hattušili I and his kin at the foundation of the Hittite state. Assessing the emergence of an official cult in Hittite Anatolia benefits from viewing texts and archaeology together — an integrated approach of which Nicholas Postgate is a master. His ease in combining the two sources, to show how ancient regimes put their authority into practice, has provided insight and inspiration. This essay on religion and the state is offered in thanks for his contributions and guidance in reconstructing the ancient Near East.

A First Hittite State in the 16th Century BC? — The Historical View The official historiography of the Hittite court during the Empire period, its last florescence in the 14th and 13th centuries BC, celebrated Hattušili I and his immediate ancestors as founders of its dynastic line in the capital city Hattuša, three hundred years earlier. 1 His 1.  This paper follows a low archaeological chronology; for absolute historical ones, see Veenhof 2011: 35–36. Occasional references to Middle Bronze (MB) periods wish to avoid the site-based system imposed by Kültepe. Periodization and dates are tentative: MB I, ca. 2000–1775 BC = Kültepe 10–9/Karum IV-III + Assyrian Colony Period 1: Kültepe 8/Karum II MB IIA, ca. 1775–1650 BC = Assyrian Colony Period 2: Kültepe 7/Karum Ib MB IIB, ca. 1650–1525/1500 BC = Hittite Old Kingdom (includes Kültepe 6/Karum Ia) “Hittite” refers here to the culture of second millennium Anatolia (Güterbock 1957), except in cases concerning language (Nešite), and ethnicity (Hittite as distinct from Luwian, Hattian, Hurrian, etc.).

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presence was indeed assured by written testimonials, preserved today in the names and number of rulers who preceded king Telipinu, four or so generations after Hattušili (CTH 19: Beckman 2000: 24–27; Bryce 1998: 66–67); and in the filiation recorded by the late 14th-century king Muršili II on an elaborate seal (Dinçol et al. 1993). Hattušili’s pre-eminence can also be inferred from multiple copies of his Annals (CTH 4) and Testament (CTH 6), written in the imperial court’s administrative and diplomatic languages — Hittite and Akkadian — and stored in the state archives at Hattuša (Imparati and Saporetti 1965; Beckman et al. 2006: nos.105 and 106). 2 Hattušili’s historical cursus was not unique among the Hittite archival accounts involving legendary figures, however. Another composition in annalistic genre, but exclusively in the Hittite language, proclaimed the military and regal exploits of king Anitta, who succeeded his father in the city of Kaneš/Neša one century before Hattušili’s rule (CTH 1: Neu 1974; Beckman et al. 2006: no. 104). According to their heroic narratives, Anitta and Hattušili shared many identifying features. Both declared themselves kings of Kuššar(a), their native city and the dynastic seat through the reign of Telipinu, at the end of the Old Kingdom. Both ruled from a city that was not their father’s center of power, presumably after an initial appointment there as royal offspring. Anitta’s father had captured Kaneš/Neša, apparently in ruins, and resettled it as a stronghold for his son. Hattušili chose to administer his territory, the “Land of Hatti,” from a repopulated Hattuša that Anitta himself had razed four generations earlier. 3 Thus Anitta and Hattušili together claimed the same legitimacy of kingship — the Kuššar(a) dynasty — while transferring it to different new capitals that each associated specifically with himself. Nor were they alone in their accomplishments. During the century separating these two iconic personalities ruled other kings whose activities followed similar patterns, but whose achievements have been obscured by poor documentation and repetitive titles, notably Tabarna/Labarna. 4 The historical contexts surrounding all of these figures reflect the persistent rivalries that opposed central Anatolia’s small territorial centers before — and during — the eventual emergence of the single dynastic state acknowledged by imperial Hittite tradition. The selection of Hattušili I as the state’s founding father invites discussion, however, not least because “Old Hittite” compositions, including his and Anitta’s, have lately come under further scrutiny concerning their original date and language. This new round of questioning reopens the considerable discussion that has involved bilingual texts, such as the Hattušili Annals, since their first publications, with opposing sides taken on whether they were authentically 2.  See http://www.hethport.uni-wuerzburg.de/CTH/ for S. Košak’s invaluable concordance to Hittite texts (= CTH n: Laroche 1971). 3.  Forlanini 1995: 128–31 first traced the generational sequence from Anitta’s steward Tudhaliya to Hattušili I. He now replaces Tudhaliya with Huzziya of Hatti, descendent of Zalp(uw)a’s king and Anitta’s foe by the same name, in accordance with the succession on the cruciform seal (Forlanini 2007: 274, n. 56; Forlanini 2010: 116–17; Beckman 2000: 27). The time span remains the same with either scheme. According to his Testament, Hattušili’s grandfather ruled from Šanahuitta, where he appointed his successor Labarna [I] (CTH 6, col. iii 33–45 [para. 20]). Hattušili’s throne name, meaning “man of Hattuš,” may commemorate his restoration of the city for his new capital (Ünal 1980/1983, with references), or his selection of the city for that same purpose (Forlanini 2010: 117, n. 17, citing Beal). 4.  For events involving Huzziya, king of Hatti, and his adopted son and successor Labarna, prince of Hurma, see Forlanini 2007: 273–78. They include Huzziya’s eastern campaigns as far as Aleppo, long before his [grand]son Hattušili; and an administrative presence at Hattuša (2010: 117, n. 17).

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Fig. 1.  Cadastral tablet İK — 174-66 with anonymous Tabarna seal, from İnandıktepe (Hittite Old Kingdom, 16th c. BC) . Seal diameter is 2.6 cm. Drawings by N. Yılmaz, after Balkan 1973: figs. 1, 8.

bilingual; were composed in one language, and (soon or much) later translated into the other; and which language was the primary one — Hittite or Akkadian (e.g., Melchert 1978). The reintroduction into Anatolia of the cuneiform script, clay tablets and the Akkadian language is still attributed to the first named Hittite kings, Hattušili and Muršili I, returning from their Syrian wars with scribes trained in that region’s bureaucratic system (Rüster and Neu 1989: 15; Klinger 1998: 369–71). However, this record-keeping system may in fact have preceded the writing of Hittite by a century or more. It is increasingly claimed that the Hittite (Nešite) language of Anitta’s and Hattušili’s annals did not come into official use until the end of the Old Kingdom, under the reformative regime of Telipinu, and did not acquire enough fluency to become the exclusive written language of Hittite bureaucracy until the reign of Tudhaliya I, ca. 1400 BC (van den Hout 2011a). The earliest securely-dated texts in the modified script of Hattuša are a characteristically Hittite class of tablets that registered state land grants to individuals. These tablets, their anonymous royal (“Tabarna”) seals, and their Hittite script were initially attributed to the era of Telipinu and his Middle Kingdom successors (Güterbock 1967 [1940–42]; Wilhelm 2005: 272– 73). All were written in the Akkadian language. Later, on the strength of one example from

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İnandıktepe (Fig. 1), their date shifted upwards to Hattušili I and even earlier (Balkan 1973: 72–77). That the original attribution was correct has been confirmed by recently excavated cadastral tablets from Boğazköy, and by bullae from Kuşaklı, ancient Sarissa. Tabarna seals of identical type, on the cadasters and the bullae, were being stamped by known Middle Kingdom officials, including those belonging to the “House of Hatti in Sarissa” (Wilhelm 2005: 274–76; Bawanypeck 2006: 118–19). 5 Before them, Old Kingdom administrators would have issued few documents meriting long-term storage — or few dating to this period in an original form that has survived (van den Hout 2011a: 902).

Office Procedures, from Kültepe to Boğazköy According to van den Hout’s arguments, the cuneiform script imported from Syria evolved at Old Kingdom Hattuša over several generations, and became the modified Hittite version in offices that were issuing documents in the Akkadian language (2011a: 904). The Syrian scribes who introduced it were trained in a bureaucratic system of Babylonian derivation, from syllabary to tablet standards, and adapted it to suit the requirements of the newly-formed Hittite state. The Hittite system — it has been repeatedly declared — marked a complete change from Old Assyrian conventions applied by businessmen in central Anatolia during Anitta’s time, who returned to Assur taking all knowledge of Mesopotamian record-keeping with them (van den Hout 2011a: 900–902). The century between the era of Anitta and the Old Kingdom is therefore assumed to represent a sharp historical break, implying a cultural void after the Assyrians had departed. 6 This perception of a cultural and intellectual break separating the two eras is surely incorrect. Certain distinctive features of the older scribal tradition did reappear at Hattuša, and show that some ties were maintained between them. The cadastral tablets, for instance, are characterized not only by script, language and seal iconography, but equally by their idiosyncratic 5.  Wilhelm concurs that the İnandık tablet, the earliest of the series, dates to the generation of Huzziya and Telipinu, or one generation earlier (Ammuna); those with anonymous Tabarna seals ended in the next generation with Alluwamna (Wilhelm 2005: 275–76, following Riemschneider). Cadastral tablets were stored for three centuries in the archives of the capital and elsewhere: an exceptional collection was discovered in the 1990/91 excavations of the Westbau (Nişantaş) at Boğazköy, with several thousand bullae bearing the names of kings, queens and officials. The tablets’ seal impressions span the Middle Kingdom (15th century): from Tabarna seals like the Kuşaklı examples, to the named seals of Alluwamna’s successors through the time of Muwattalli I (Herbordt 2006: 96–99; Bawanypeck 2006: 110, 118). The bullae begin with Šuppiluliuma I, and continue to the very end of Empire and the building’s destruction. A similar distribution of cadastral tablets and bullae, from the smaller archive in Büyükkale’s Building D first published by Güterbock (1967 [1940–1942]), covers the same chronological span. Seriation patterns suggest that land grants from the New Kingdom/Empire were recorded on perishable materials sealed with bullae, replacing the tablets with their integrated seal impression (Bawanypeck 2006: 114–17; cf. van den Hout 2011b: 65). Did the change coincide with the shift from the Akkadian to Hittite language for official written procedures? 6.  At Kültepe, the Assyrians’ departure and the site’s destruction were followed by a poorly-defined archaeological phase identified with squatters (Kültepe 6/Karum Ia: T. Özgüç 1999: 136). Other sites continued without interruption, and are discussed below.

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Fig. 2.  Iqqātē-contract Kt k/k 1, stamped by the authority of prince Zuz(z)u, from Kültepe (Level 7/Karum Ib, late 18th c. BC). Diameters of the two obverse seals are 0.7 cm; the reverse seal’s diameter is 0.8 cm. Drawings by N. Yılmaz, after T. Özgüç 1986: pl. 44, 1a — 1b; and N. Özgüç 1996: fig. 8.

format: small, plano-convex, and impressed with a round stamp seal in the center of the convex face. This easily-recognizable type recalls the iqqātē contracts drawn up by royal officials for residents in Kültepe Karum Ib and Alişar. 7 Similarities are well illustrated by examples that date most closely to each other: the Tabarna cadaster from İnandık (Fig. 1), and iqqātē contracts of Zuz(z)u, king of Alaḫzina, and last attested ruler at Kültepe after Anitta (e.g., Kt k/k 1 in Donbaz 1989: 83, and pl. 16; Kt 89/k 369 in Donbaz 1993: 143–45, and pl. 29: 1a-c) (Figs. 2–3). 8 Tablet shape, tablet size, and the placement of the stamp on these contracts followed a shared office procedure, which even extended to their language. 9 The visual image of what constituted a royal seal was also transferred without change from the Central Anatolian offices overseeing Assyrian businessmen, to those later serving the Hittite court. The stamp seal tradition was invariably preferred for local transactions in both eras, over the Mesopotamian cylinder type favored by foreigners; and its circular design, enclosing the bearer’s name or symbol in its center, continued to convey central authority. On the two iqqātē contracts cited above, Zuz(z)u’s round seal contained a sacred bull as single element 7.  Average sizes for Hittite cadastral tablets: ca. 8 × 6 cm to 10.5 × 8 cm, based on examples in Die Hethiter und ihr Reich 2002: 551 (Bo. 750/90 [Tabarna], 728/90 [Hantili], 758/90 [Hantili]; see also van den Hout 2011b: 51). Iqqātē contracts are mostly smaller, when dimensions are published: ca. 6 × 5 × 2–3.5 cm (Donbaz 1989: passim). Height-to-width proportions are comparable for both sets. 8.  The İnandık tablet İK 174–66 measures 6 × 5 × 3.2 cm (Balkan 1973: 42, n. 5a), with 14 lines of text on each side. Kt k/k 1 measures 6.5 × 4.4 × 2.2 cm, close to the İnandık tablet (Donbaz 1989:83). The other Zuz(z)u tablet, Kt 89/k 369, larger to accommodate 19 lines per side, is 7.7 × 5.7 × 1.9 cm (N. Özgüç 1996: 272). 9.  Zuz(z)u’s tablets were stamped on both sides, the Old Assyrian practice for witnessed documents. For Zuz(z)u’s historical context, see Forlanini 2005: 129–30, 2010: 122; Kryszat 2008: 161–65.

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Fig. 3.  Iqqātē contract Kt 89/k 369, stamped by king Zuz(z)u of Alaḫzina, from Kültepe (Level 7/Karum Ib, late 18th c. BC). Seal diameter is 1.4 cm. Drawings by N. Yılmaz, after Donbaz 1993: pl. 29, 1a and 1c; and N. Özgüç 1996: fig. 9.

when he was prince (Kt k/k1); once he became king (Kt 89/k 369), the bull was enclosed by a two-stranded braid, set concentrically inside a guilloche border (N. Özgüç 1996: 273, 277, figs. 8b, 9) (Figs. 2–3). The same effect was achieved by the Tabarna seals, which placed their central motif inside two concentric bands that declared “Seal of Tabarna, Great King,” accompanied by a caution against defacement (Fig. 1). 10 The Tabarna seals remain the earliest ones yet attested for Hittite officialdom, and those of Zuz(z)u their nearest historically-dated precursors. A continuity in glyptic tradition from Kültepe Karum Ib to the Hittite period has long been acknowledged in iconographic studies (e.g., N. Özgüç 1968: 42; 1980: 70–78). Equal attention should be given to what it implies about continuity in bureaucratic practice, including stamping 10.  V. Müller-Karpe (2009: 197–200) proposed that the running spiral/guilloche border on Assyrian Colony stamp seals designated kings and their officials. On the İnandık tablet, the cuneiform legend in the seal’s concentric border was written with upright signs, as if this seal type were still in its experimental stage (Wilhelm 2005: 274), one step beyond a guilloche. The damaged central motif is supplied by other Tabarna seals: a single rosette, or a rosette, ankh, and triangle (Dinçol 2002: 89).

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the seal in the center of a legal document. However, unequivocal evidence is needed to fill the one- to two-century hiatus that currently separates these two periods of scribal activity. Challengers to the Hittite script’s slow evolution note the absence at Hattuša of training manuals, such as syllabaries, to convert Syro-Babylonian cuneiform for a different language; and the presence of epigraphic features in the Hittite script that would predate a 17th/16th-century Syrian model. They conclude that Hittite cuneiform must have developed in another Anatolian city, before Hattušili I and/or before the establishment of state archives at Hattuša (Klinger 1998: 368–69, 372, 374; Archi 2010). One or several significant Hittite-speaking centers certainly existed after the destruction of Kültepe/Kaneš, according to places listed in Hattušili’s Annals, and in the early historical story known as the Tale of Zalpa (CTH 3: Hoffner 1980: 289–91; Forlanini 2010: 121–23). They would be likelier places to devise an archival system for the “Hittite” (Nešite) language than the Hattic court and capital at Hattuša. 11 The sites have still to be located, like most of those named in the Old Assyrian and Hittite texts. 12 But the archaeological definition of settlements whose MB II occupation levels extended beyond the destruction of Kültepe under Zuz(z)u, and without interruption into the Old Hittite period, is coming into focus. At Kayalıpınar, on the Halys/Kızılırmak near Sivas, the earliest Hittite cultural stratum (level 5) spanned the later Assyrian Colony ( = Kültepe 7/Karum Ib) into the Old Kingdom period, according to statistical frequencies of ceramic types, and to seals. 13 Similarities to pottery and seal assemblages at Karahöyük-Konya and İkiztepe would confirm a longer, post-Kültepe duration at those sites also (V. Müller-Karpe 2009: 200–201). It can therefore be expected that the transitional century between Zuz(z)u and Hattušili I will resurface from the archaeological record, once it gains autonomy from the historical framework that prevailed, until recently, over Hittite material culture. This intermediary period may eventually provide developmental contexts for Hittite writing. Even without it, the evidence has long been sufficient to show that the cultural, social and political conditions in Central Anatolia proceeded from Anitta’s Kültepe to Hattušili’s Hattuša without interruption, untouched by specific events. Anitta and Hattušili I belonged to a familiar political sequence with a shared cultural background, and could thus play complementary 11.  According to their throne names, Hattušili I, Muršili I and Telipinu were Hattian, like their city Hattuša (Goetze 1964: 24). Goetze also considered Labarna to be a Hattian name, but this is contested (see references in Bryce 1998: 68, n. 16). Tabarna is probably Hattian too (Hoffner 1980: 296). 12.  Only Zalpa, in the Upper Land to the Black Sea, is occasionally identified with a particular site: usually İkiztepe near Bafra, without much approval, even the excavator’s (Bilgi 2001: 40); Acemhöyük has also been proposed (Steiner 1993). Forlanini (2007: 279) hopes the discovery of Hurma, city of Labarna I, will produce archives from the Hittite dynasty’s source. 13.  Kayalıpınar, where excavations began in 2005 after two survey seasons, is now securely identified with Šamuha, in Durmitta province, which Hattušili III governed for his brother Muwattalli. The place-name was confirmed by epigraphic finds in 2014 (A. Müller-Karpe, personal communication). Tablets and seal impressions connected with official buildings show close involvement with the Hittite capital as early as the 15th century, and are written in the Hattuša script (Rieken 2006; 2009: 213–14). Correspondence about military affairs indicates the site served as a military post and garrison (A. MüllerKarpe in A. Müller-Karpe et al. 2009: 184–85; 190–93). A Hurrian letter about a campaign to Kizzuwatna, Alalakh, and other places in the south would date to the reign of Tudhaliya I, or his successors until Šuppiluliuma I (Wilhelm in A. Müller-Karpe et al. 2009: 233–36).

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roles in the 13th-century archival versions of their annals. Assuming that these texts were composed during their reigns, they acquired literary distinction over the centuries to enhance their historic merit (cf. Singer 2011: 745). 14 Why were Hattušili and Anitta retained together among other possible early models? Forlanini proposed that the two figures became emblematic for several generations of territorial rivalry in the Halys basin before Hattušili I came to power. His northern family line, descending from Huzziya of Zalpa, eventually defeated the southern claimants from Kaneš/Neša, the ones who traced their ancestry to Anitta and his father Pithana. The annals of Hattušili and Anitta championed conflicting factions that were still hostile when the Tale of Zalpa was written down (2010: 122–25; 130). 15 That these two heroes took opposing sides was, with time, glossed over in literary memory, and the epics took their place together in the capital’s libraries.

Divine Patronage of Kingship and the Old Hittite State Nonetheless, from today’s vantage point, kings Hattušili I and Anitta seem equally suitable candidates for the official start of the Hittite state tradition (Hoffner 1980: 289–90). Hattušili I’s prominence in the imperial archives as the dynasty’s nominal founder, to the exclusion of Anitta and despite fundamental shifts in the succession of ruling families,  16 has invited political explanations. For instance, the interest of his 13th-century name-sake Hattušili III may have been responsible, linked moreover to reinstating the capital at Hattuša (Ünal 1980/1983: 381). 17 It has also been proposed that Hattušili I’s annals became a template for an ideal formulation of Hittite kingship, inspiring later kings to venerate his memory (Masson 1995: 261). They were recognizing that his reign announced a new ideological era, distinct from what Anitta had conceived and ruled (Starke 1979: 118–20). These are all reasonable explanations, but they are difficult to substantiate. In contrast, a convincing basis for Hattušili I’s consecration in the realm of religious affairs finds support from several perspectives, at different levels of evidence. Its ideological components have long been familiar from texts, and form the background to his “manly deeds,” as his annals were called (Hoffner 1980: 298). Like others with an ambition to consolidate their terri14.  If these works were composed during their protagonists’ lifetimes, it is difficult to reconcile their languages — Hittite for Anitta, Hittite and Akkadian for Hattušili — with current thoughts on writing Hittite. Most commentators explain the Akkadian translation of Hattušili’s annals as a literary classic for the Hattuša archives, like the legends about Naram-Sin and Sargon, to whom Hattušili compared his exploits (e.g., Güterbock 1964:107–109; Melchert 1978: 5–6). 15.  For the role of oral tradition in transmitting early historical, cultic and mythological accounts in the Hittite (Nešite) language during the Old Kingdom, see Archi 2010: 42–44. Writing on perishable materials cannot be discounted either: an early alternative script is suggested by hieroglyphs scratched on a Kültepe Karum Ib pitcher (Hawkins 2011), and stamp seals with hieroglyphs from Karahöyük-Konya (Alp 1994: 281–86; Klengel 2002: 103, n. 7; cf. Yakubovich 2008: 10–11). 16.  The Hattian Old Kingdom rulers were succeeded by kings with Luwian names, in turn followed by Hurrian kings (generations 12 to 19) who chose venerable Hattian throne-names (Goetze 1964: 24; Beckman 2000: 26–27). Neo-Hittite kings, by emulation and with similar dynastic interests, preferred different forebears: Labarna and Suppiluliuma (Weeden 2013: 12–16). 17.  Hattušili III traced his royal title to “Hattušili, king of Kuššar,” his first named ancestor. Ünal notes that texts of Hattušili I in the archives at Hattuša were all copies from Hattušili III’s reign.

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tory, Hattušili I related his military successes to divine approval, in the hands of three Hattian deities introduced in his annals: a mother-daughter pair from Arinna, Urunzimu [Wurunšemu] and Mezzulla; 18 and a Storm-god whose identity is concealed by the 13th-century logographic spelling of his name. 19 These three deities rose to the elevated rank of state cult, overriding the competitive interests of the kingdom’s many local gods, including Hattuša’s city goddess Inar(a), and her thirty companions worshiped in the Old Hittite capital (Haas 1994: 618–20). The divine patrons singled out by Hattušili were to retain their status, over four centuries and despite many religious permutations, by overseeing affairs beyond the daily concerns and rivalries of Anatolian communities. Likewise, the king whose annals proclaimed the eminence and official cults of these gods, came to be remembered as dynastic founder of the Hittite state (e.g., Hutter 1997: 78–79). Earlier generations may have favored the same deities; but Hattušili’s annals provided the historical reference for their cults. Anitta’s divine patrons, in contrast, did not convey the same impact. 20 This textual tradition has recently been strengthened by archaeological findings, which explain further the longevity of Hattušili’s deities and the persistence of their cults. Their enduring status was integrated with the profound physical transformations that Old Kingdom rulers brought to their capital city, territory and landscape. Iconographic, architectural and urban forms long identified with Hittite material culture in its later stages, particularly its last two centuries, can now be assigned to the first manifestations of the Hittite state. 21 It determined a fixed visual context for the buildings in which the cults were celebrated; and the dissemina18.  Hattušili’s Sun-Goddess of Arinna, dUtu urutúl-na (KBo 10.2, l.11), has been identified with the Hattian goddess Urunzimu, a chthonic deity (Haas 1994: 128, 421). In another, perhaps later tradition, she assimilated with Wurunšemu, “Mother of the Land,” and consort of the Hattian war-deity and Stormgod Wurunkat(t)e, “King of the Land” (Gurney 1977: 11–12, Taracha 2013: 374; cf. Haas, post-Old Kingdom). At her main cult center Arinna, a locality whose deities were all female (even its mountain), she was worshiped with Mezzulla, a mother-daughter pair reminiscent of Demeter and Kore (Haas 1994: 426–7). Mezzulla’s name was written syllabically in the texts (dMe-iz-zu-ul-la: KBo 10.2, l.13): her personality stayed intact, without parallel in the Mesopotamian pantheon of logograms. 19. von Schuler 1965: 209. Hattušili’s Storm-god dIškur (KBo 10.2, l. 12) and Storm-god of the Heavens (nepišaš dU in KBo 10.2, l. 36) are harder to extricate from later manifestations and avatars. Are they the same deity, or two separate ones? A Hattian version would be expected, like Hattušili himself, his capital, and his other deities (Taracha 2010: 859): perhaps dIškur is the capital’s local Storm-god. The Storm-god of the Heavens may be the same Tarhun(na) of Kuššar(a) as Anitta’s dIškur-aš (see below, n.20), ranking above a city-god. Tarhun(na)/Tarhunta is Hittite; other forms were Hattian Taru; and Luwian Tarhunt/z- (Schwemer 2008: 18–19). 20.  According to the orthography of his proclamation, Anitta’s deities were Tarhun(na), Storm-god of the Heavens and patron of the Kuššar(a) dynasty (KBo 3.22, ll. 2, 51: nepišaš dIškur-unnaš); Our God/ Our Šiu, city god (or goddess?) of Neša (KBo 3.22, l. 40: dŠiu — šummiš); and the divine throne Halmašuit of Hattuš, who gave up her city to follow Anitta (KBo 3.22, l. 47: dHalmaš[uiz]) (Singer 1995). A decrease in the number of gods invoked in Karum Ib contracts of Anitta’s time points to a religious reform like Hattušili’s (Kryszat 2006: 116–121): changes included a Storm-god hidden behind a logographic appellation dIm [Iškur] (= Hittite dU/ d10), replacing Karum II’s head god Nipas (from Hittite nepiš, “the Heavens”?) (Kryszat 2006: 106–107, 113; cf. Schwemer 2008: 19–20). 21. Summarized in Schachner 2009, 2010. New dates result from German projects revising sequences at Boğazköy and other Hittite sites, independent of historical attributions (e.g., Mielke 2006a, 2006b; Seeher 2006). All Hittite material culture is affected by these revisions, which must be taken into

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tion of approved cultic practice throughout Hittite territory. Unlike Anitta, who declares that he built five temples in Kaneš — perhaps in emulation of Assyrian kings — Hittite kings carried out their responsibilities for temple building and maintenance anonymously (Beckman 2010). 22 That the characteristic design of temples was a development of the Old Kingdom could only be determined by archaeological means; as a time-honored tradition, however, it would have stayed vivid in the historical perception of later rulers.

A Metropolitan Standard for Temple and Ritual The oldest datable Hittite temples have been excavated at Kuşaklı, ancient Sarissa, at the eastern reaches of Old Kingdom territory, where a small administrative center was founded according to metropolitan standards in the last quarter of the 16th century BC. From the moment its plan was laid out, the town’s existence was tied to the authority of Hattuša and its state. Sarissa served as a provincial center until the end of the Hittite empire; its Storm-god witnessed imperial treaties; and it participated in the festival circuit of Hittite kings (A. Müller-Karpe 2002; Mielke 2006a: 89). Indeed, Hattuša is prefigured by the civil and military architecture of Kuşaklı’s earliest phase: already fully mature, and recognizably Hittite, by the time the site was conceived. Because of these circumstances, Kuşaklı gives exceptional insight on early construction and urbanism in the capital itself. The larger of Kuşaklı’s two temples, Building C, was prominently situated on an elevation, in alignment with the city’s southeast and northwest gates (Fig. 4). The building’s foundations were terraced, and covered an overall surface area of nearly 4,700 m2. Its 84 ground-floor rooms were arranged with self-assured precision around four sides of a large court (A. MüllerKarpe 2000: 314–17 and 313, fig. 2). Building C’s architectural features are specific to formal Hittite design, which first laid out an orthogonal open space as the plan’s core, and moved outwards from it by attaching rooms to the sides, without concern for a unifying axis. Two sides of the court were shaded by porticos, placed along adjacent, rather than opposite, walls (east and south); rooms, doors and entrances were asymmetrically distributed in each of the building’s wings; and one exterior wall line (the south face) was broken by several projecting rooms. 23 On a larger scale, these design principles characterized Hittite palatial compounds, like the citadels at Alaca Höyük and Hattuša (Büyükkale): traffic circulated up a central sequence of terraces, which were lined with porticos, and irregularly flanked by entire buildings (Naumann 1971: 396–97, fig. 533, 402, fig. 536). But the pattern is especially familiar from Hittite temples: it was immediately recognized that Building C’s plan, scale, terraced foundations, elevated setting and visibility are closely matched by the temples at Boğazköy and elsewhere (A. Müller-Karpe 2000: 323). The similarities apply equally to Kuşaklı’s other excavated temple, the somewhat smaller account for archaeological finds (especially pottery: Schoop 2006) published before 2005. Outliers with Hittite cultural material, like Tarsus, also need revising. 22.  Hittite building rituals are the main written source, in the absence of foundation texts, or statements by Hittite kings. The rituals state that the deity constructs the temple, to his/her specifications. Three early texts reflect Old Kingdom procedures (Beckman 2010: 72, 77–78). 23.  The usual and universal approach first marks out a building’s surface area, then divides it into spaces. Exterior walls follow straight lines: the building is enclosed by and within them, instead of projecting out from its contours.

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Figs. 4–5.  Left: Building C, Kuşaklı (Old Kingdom, 16th-15th c. BC); Right: Temple 1, Boğazköy (Empire, 13th c. BC). Plans by N. Yılmaz, after A. Müller-Karpe 2000: 313, fig. 2, by gracious permission; and Neve 1999: 148, fig. 72a. The scale is the same for the two buildings.

Temple I inside the town’s northeast gate (Neve 1999: 155–56; V. Müller-Karpe 2006). 24 Dendrochronological dating of Building C’s foundation beams, in the 1520s BC, attributes the temple’s construction, and the town itself, to the last rulers of the Old Kingdom. Temple and town then maintained their original form until a devastating fire in the early 14th century, when Building C was abandoned, and the Storm-god’s cult moved to an aniconic (huwaši) open-air sanctuary on a hillside outside the town (A. Müller-Karpe 2000: 323). Scale, location and textual references would designate Building C for Sarissa’s Storm-god and patron deity, and his cult room in the south wing’s largest unit. 25 The disposition of rooms in the temple’s four wings, and the placement of the cella off-center, inevitably recall Hattuša’s largest structure, the Lower City’s Temple 1, which was dedicated — it is assumed — to the heads of the 13th-century Hittite state’s pantheon: the Storm-god of Hatti (Teššub) and Sun-Goddess 24.  Temple façades with projections belong to the earliest phases of Boğazköy’s Upper City, beginning with Temple 4. Revised dating of temples in the Upper City may place the earliest ones in the 15th century BC. The archetype, Temple 1 in the Lower City, is still traditionally dated to the 13th century BC (Neve 1999: 146, 148, fig. 72a, 152; Seeher 2006: 204–206). 25.  Room 4–5′s basement foundations supported the ground-level floor of a single room. They were heavily reinforced, as if to withstand the great weight of the cult room’s furnishings (A. MüllerKarpe 2000: 318).

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of Arinna (Hepat) (e.g., Haas 1994: 624–26). Although their proportions were also comparable, Kuşaklı’s Building C was nearly twice as large (Fig. 5). 26 As the earliest example of a Hittite temple to a city’s Storm-god, and because it survived into the early empire, Building C’s plan can be considered a legitimate precursor for Hattuša’s Temple 1. Its presence in a provincial town implies that Kuşaklı’s Building C represents the Old Kingdom architectural template for cult centers to Storm-gods, based on a model that was developed and finalized before 1525 BC. Kuşaklı’s excavator rightly noted that the site’s two temples echoed the monumentality of Kültepe’s level 7 citadel; and in turn provide an unbroken connection to Hittite architecture of later centuries (A. Müller-Karpe 2000: 323). The plans of Hittite temples are strikingly different from the buildings at Kültepe, however: the Waršama palace, a square, fortress-like structure, most resembles the contemporary Old Palace in Assur; and the enigmatic twin “temples” could have been inspired by MB II temples in the Levant. 27 On present evidence, there are no stylistic precedents for Hittite religious architecture. The Old Kingdom temple instead created a new architectural standard for the earthly domains of Hittite gods. The early versions at Kuşaklı, because they were built under state oversight, link this sacred model to state-sanctioned worship. To which of the Old Kingdom rulers can this official religious practice be attributed? Hattušili’s annals imply that his divine patrons were already well installed in their houses, at the time their king delivered to them the spoils and gods captured in his military campaigns. 28 The appearance, builder or architectural tradition that served Hattušili’s deities cannot be proposed, since Hittite kings were reticent about their building activities. It was administrative policy by members of his dynasty, however, that gave Hittite religious institutions their recognizable architectectural form, and prescribed the spatial contexts in which sacred rites were to be celebrated. The sophistication of Old Kingdom temple design both reflects, and suits, the intricate ceremonies that occur in early Hittite religious texts.

Regulating the Performance of Ritual In addition to standardizing the settings that housed the state’s religious ceremonies, it was necessary to bring together the cultic traditions of the new Hittite state’s many localities into 26.  Kuşaklı’s Building C, with 84 rooms: 61.5 × 76 m; ratio of width : length = 1 : 1.23; surface area, 4,674 m2 (A. Müller-Karpe 2000: 314); Boğazköy’s Temple 1, with 51 rooms: ca. 42 × 65 m; ratio of width : length = 1 : 1.54; surface area, 2,730 m2 (Neve 1999: 148, fig. 72a). The surface area of Building C is 1.7 times larger than Temple 1′s. 27.  Level 7 Kültepe’s Waršama palace was a 100 × 110 m enclosure, divided into rooms — four or more units deep — on its better-documented north side (Özgüç, T. 1999: 79–81; for the Old Palace at Assur, also 100 × 110 m, see Pedde 2003: 119–21). Level 7′s two “temples,” preserved as shallow foundations, have the same size (ca. 27 × 22 m) and plan: a square central unit flanked on either side by an aisle or stairwells, for a maximum of three rooms; square reinforcements (for towers?) sit at the four corners (T. Özgüç 1999: 117–19). They have no parallels in Anatolia; for possible Syrian comparisons, see Naumann 1971: 464–65. 28.  The many cult places of Urunzimu and Mezzulla did not include Hattuša; the temple/s to which Hattušili refers in his annals were therefore in Arinna (Haas 1994: 426–27, 586; cf. Güterbock 1997a: 82, in Hattuša). No location is given for the Storm-god(s) residence(s) (see above, n. 19).

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a harmonious, unified practice conducted by the king (Archi 1993: 3). Festivals whose ceremonial rites are described in texts as a long sequence of steps, covering many days, acquired their complexity through this accumulative process. Ritual texts survive in impressive and significant numbers in the archives at Hattuša (Gurney 1977: 25). They have been variously defined as “handbooks” to assist provincial centers in performing their local ceremonies properly (Hutter 1997: 82); or as “aide-mémoire” for reference purposes only, since temple personnel mastered the rituals through repetitive training, not research (Beckman 2010: 72). A pious interest in maintaining the accuracy and antiquity of religious practices over the centuries also led to registering them in some permanent form. The languages and performances described in the ritual texts do preserve archaic religious traditions, and ritual texts are among the earliest class of Hittite documents (Popko 1995: 64–65; Archi 2010: 43). They are also the most common type of cuneiform text found at Hittite sites outside the capital. Placing the Old Hittite king at the head of official festivals required considerable initial organization on the ground (Hutter 1997: 82). In particular, deliberate tactics were needed to instruct the territory under Hattuša’s control into accepting, and following, the liturgy of the newly-inaugurated state cult. Basic furnishings for the new temples could respect familiar Anatolian types and forms: the sacred items taken by Hattušili from temples in Zalpa, for instance, conform to the repertoire of ritual equipment and offerings listed in temple inventories four centuries later. 29 Rituals would also have followed the traditional activities of “sacrifice, feasting, and an entertainment” (Gurney 1977: 28). Nevertheless, a new religious order needed to pronounce on correct ritual behavior. This concern could have been answered by written instructions disseminated to regional centers (cf. van den Hout 2011a). At least as effective, perhaps, was another category of cult equipment that coincides with the Old Hittite period, and disappears in the following century: cult vessels with relief bands depicting religious ceremonies. Of these, the near-complete İnandık Vase is best known (T. Özgüç 1988: 100–104) (Fig. 6). The notoriety of its concluding scene, however, has drawn attention away from viewing it beside other examples of its type, as a group with a specific purpose. These vessels did not merely “illustrate” ritual practice: they also served as “aide-mémoire” in the provincial centers to which they were distributed. 30 Old Hittite relief vessels derived from a class of medium-to-large cultic jars characteristic of MB IIA “Assyrian Colony” sites. Their shape, handle type, zoomorphic spouts inside the rim, appliquéd ornamentation, glossy red surface treatment, and size (ca. 85 cm) find parallels in jars from Kültepe 7/Karum Ib (T. Özgüç 1986: 53–54; 1988: 104; 1999: 100 and fig. B 109; Yıldırım 2008: 838). This ritual equipment embodied a same symbolic moment: when liquid was poured 29.  KBo 10.2, l. 12: a silver bull and a silver gešpu-weapon for the Storm-god [of Hattuša?] (Imparati and Saporetti 1965: 45), typical for Storm-gods in inventories of the late Empire (Güterbock 1983: 204, 211–14, where gešpu is considered a body part). Earlier MB cult places in Anatolia were similarly furnished (Popko 1995: 58–60, with cautions). 30.  Studies on Hittite religion all discuss the İnandık Vase and its Bitik relative, which indeed illustrate religious festivals (e.g., Haas 1994: 523–24; Boehmer 1983: 19–21). They rightly observe that the scenes on these vessels resemble the ritual texts (T. Özgüç 1988: 126, citing Güterbock and Bittel; Yıldırım 2005: 769); and announce the start of monumental Hittite art (Schachner 2010: 675). Their role in promoting the Old Kingdom cult is not addressed.

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Fig. 6.  Relief vase from İnandıktepe (Hittite Old Kingdom, 16th c. BC). Drawings by N. Yılmaz, after T. Özgüç 1988: figs. 64, 65. Restorations are shaded, with thanks to T. Moore.

into a slot in the rim, a mystical stream flowed from the heads of bulls into the vessel, like rain from the Storm-god’s sacred animals. In contrast to the Kültepe vessels’ single motifs, however, the decorative concept of the Old Hittite vessels was unprecedented: a narrative spelled out in sequential registers over the entire vessel. Their figures and other elements were stamped out singly from individual molds, and applied on the vessel surface to create each intended scene. Similarities in figural types, thematic compositions, clays, and potting techniques convince specialists that the jars were manufactured in a single center — or even a single workshop, notably in Hattuša (Boehmer 1983: 19; T. Özgüç 1988: 85, 104; Yıldırım 2005: 769). 31 At Hattuša, stratified examples all came from temple contexts (Boehmer 1983: 19). The distribution pattern of relief vessels outside the capital is also instructive: they were sent to places of Hittite administrative interest, and in very small numbers. 32 Their contexts can be understood from a set of complete, restorable examples, found in similar settings at the sites of İnandıktepe, and Hüseyindede: two small, administrative compounds, on the outskirts of a larger settlement. 33 Both recall the 31.  Exceptions are few: fragments of two vessels from Alaca Höyük (T. Özgüç 1993: 476–83); and a third from Eskiyapar, in a micaceous gray fabric attested for household ceramics at Alaca Höyük. Four other Eskiyapar examples belong to the standard group (T. Özgüç 1988: 117–22). 32.  Small numbers of fragments were excavated in Alişar, Eskiyapar, Alaca Höyük, Boyalı Höyük, and Karahöyük/Elbistan, and surface strays from Kabaklı near Kırşehir (Boehmer 1983: 22; T. Özgüç 1993: 476–83; Sipahi 2013: 259). The Bitik Vase was found before formal excavations began (T. Özgüç 1958: 1). The sites were old, established centers within the Hittite heartland, and on its eastern border (Elbistan). 33.  İnandıktepe’s Hittite level IV was a single-period compound, on a hilltop overlooking a contemporary settlement at Termehöyük, 115 km northwest of Boğazköy. First identified as a temple, and

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Fig. 7.  Relief vase from Hüseyindede (Hittite Old Kingdom, 16th c. BC). Drawings by N. Yılmaz, after Yıldırım 2008: figs. 3–8; and 2013: 233, fig. 8d, by gracious permission. Restorations are shaded.

locales where rural administrators held festivals within the ritual cycle of the Hittite state (Archi 1993: 4–5). Near-identical vessels from the two sites underline the similarities of their narratives and the reasons why they differed in some of their details (Yıldırım 2008). The İnandık Vase illustrates a religious festival consisting of twelve to fourteen episodes, possibly extending over as many days (Fig. 6). 34 Its participants prepare and serve food, eat, and drink (register 1); make a libation to one deity (a goddess in human form), and a sacrifice to another (a bull on a pedestal) (register 2); parade while holding special objects aloft (a lituus, a throne or brazier?, two swords) (register 3); and perform entertainment: music, dance, and acrobatics (register 4). The episodes take place in different settings: inside, outside and on top of buildings, with seats and altars of various sizes transported here and there. Because the participants are not individualized by dress or attributes, it is difficult to recognize recurring figures in these scenes, or even which of them are deities (T. Özgüç 1988:100). This blurring of ranks was intentional: it placed the celebrants in the forefront, the deities themselves being known entities. The vase reliefs provided officiants with visual sketches, narrating briefly — like the written rituals — the festival’s proper sequence. dated by its cadastral tablet to Hattušili I (T. Özgüç 1988: 67–68, 128; see above), it is now considered an isolated estate, occupied in the mid-16th century (Mielke 2006b: 260, 270–71). Hüseyindede is another small, Old Kingdom compound, on a hillside above a large settlement at Boyalı Höyük, ca. 45 km northeast of Boğazköy, and 60 km east of İnandık (Yıldırım 2008: 836; 2013: 228–31). Relief vessels at both sites were found in a storeroom with other items, some of them cultic. 34.  T. Özgüç (1988) gives excellent descriptions and discussion. The lower two registers divide into four episodes each, according to the way the figures face, and in alignment with the four handles. The upper two registers are not continuous either, with two or three episodes each.

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The episodes depicted on the İnandık Vase and a recently-discovered mate from Hüseyindede thus corresponded closely, like two instruction manuals for related liturgical procedures (Fig. 7). Local divinities and customs dictated a few differences: for instance, in the sacrificial animals illustrated by register 2 (“presentation of offerings to the deity”); and in register 4 (“the festival concludes”), where the Hüseyindede vase substitutes an ox-drawn wagon transporting two women, for the serenaders and erotic pair of the İnandık vase (Yıldırım 2005: 768–69; 2008: 841–43, 849–50, figs. 3–6). Because their third registers are nearly identical, the betterpreserved version from Hüseyindede reveals the startling fact that both figures seated on the bed inside the temple are female, attended by a standing male; this must also be the case at Bitik (Yıldırım 2008: 844, 850, fig. 5). They do not illustrate a “sacred marriage,” a rite unattested in Hittite writings. 35 Instead, the vases outlined procedures regulating religious practice in the provinces, according to norms broadcast from the court in Hattuša. They also supplied the standard equipment. In sum, the vases’ primary character and purpose was to ensure ritual accuracy, not to express reverence for the divine.

Model kings for the Hittite state The first Kings of Hatti are indeed to be credited with introducing the ideological roots of official Hittite religion, because they formulated a ceremonial program that weathered, and endured, the entire lifespan of the Hittite state. While written testimony may contain later biases, the contemporary contexts for this ordered religious practice can be recovered from the architectural and visual record of the Old Kingdom. Its kings commanded temples whose scale and plan lent the appropriate dignity to royal festivals. Royal authority likewise succeeded in reshaping ritual behavior throughout Hittite territory, so that local practice became absorbed into an elaborate official liturgy. The rulers of the Hittite empire chose their dynastic models among these early kings, with Hattušili I the strongest competitor for first place. The agents of Old Kingdom achievements in the realm of religious affairs currently remain anonymous, however. In the absence of personalized royal seals, building inscriptions, or the declarations of individual kings, the founders of this state system cannot be verified beyond their MB IIB cultural horizon, and their 16thcentury date. They have nonetheless attained increasing prominence over the past two decades, and will continue to do so, thanks to archaeological research — like Nicholas Postgate’s at Kilise Tepe — on the formation and maintenance of the Hittite state. 35. T. Özgüç 1988: 102–103, noting firm scholarly opposition to a “sacred marriage” in Hittite religion. The İnandık Vase evokes CTH 633, Güterbock’s “initiation rites for a Hittite prince” (1997b: 111–13), even if recent readings turn the prostitutes into honest women, and bowdlerize proceedings (Taggar-Cohen 2010; Mouton 2011). From Hüseyindede, a smaller cult vessel with a single register depicting bull-leaping, music and dance, recalls CTH 771.1, The Luwian rituals of Ištanuwa and Lallupiya (Sipahi 2001: 115).

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Yakubovich, I. 2008 Hittite-Luvian Bilingualism and the Development of Anatolian Hieroglyphs. Acta Linguistica Petropolitana 4.1: 9–36. Yıldırım, T. 2005 Hüseyindede Tepesinde Bulunan Yeni bir Kült Vazosu. Pp. 761–78 in V. Uluslararası Hititoloji Kongresi Bildirileri. Acts of the Vth International Congress of Hittitology, ed. A. Süel. Ankara: Çorum İl Özel İdaresi. 2008 New Scenes on the Second Relief Vase from Hüseyindede and their Interpretation in the Light of Hittite Representative Art. SMEA 50: 837–50. 2013 Hüseyindede. Pp. 228–37 in Hititler Bir Anadolu İmparatorluğu. Hittites An Anatolian Empire, ed. M. Doğan-Alparslan and M. Alparslan. İstanbul: Yapı Kredi Yayınları.

The Ending of the Çineköy Inscription David Hawkins The discovery in 1998 and prompt publication in 2000 of the colossal ÇİNEKÖY statue and its base with bilingual Hieroglyphic Luwian-Phoenician inscriptions (Tekoǧlu and Lemaire 2000) have inspired many scholars in the years since to offer their own — frequently diverging — interpretations of its historical background, context and dating. The inscription, relatively well preserved Hier. Luwian version and partially lost Phoenician, was the work of “Warika king of Hiyawa” (Phoen. “W[. . .] king of DNNYM”), grandson of [Muk]sa” (Phoen. “descendant of MPŠ”). The text is clearly loosely connected with that of KARATEPE 1 bilingual in content and phraseology, though showing some significant differences in sign-forms (cursive as against KARATEPE’s largely monumental), and in Phoen. DNNYM with Hier. Hiyawa as against KARATEPE’s Adanawa. From the outset it was clear and hardly to be disputed that Hiyawa must be the origin of the Assyrian term Que designating the country of Plain Cilicia, as against Adanawa, the name of its capital city Adana; also that ÇİNEKÖY’s presentation of [Muk]sa/MPŠ as the ancestor of the Hiyawan king was reflected in KARATEPE’s designation of the Adanawan royal line as the “house of Muksa” (Phoen. BT MPŠ). Discussion since then has focused on three points: (1) whether, or to what extent, Muksa/ MPŠ may be connected with the legendary hero of Greek tradition Mopsos/Moxos; (2) whether and how the toponym Hiyawa may be connected with the country Ahhiya(wa) attested in the Hittite texts of Boǧazköy and now generally accepted as referring to the Mycenaean Greeks; (3) whether Warika king of Hiyawa may be identified with KARATEPE’s Awariku king of Adanawa, and further, whether either or both names may refer to Urikki king of Que known from the inscriptions of Tiglath-pileser III and Sargon II of Assyria. The views taken by scholars on these questions have naturally led to different reconstructions of the historical contexts of the ÇİNEKÖY and KARATEPE texts. I have given my own opinion (Hawkins 2007; 2009; and in addition I was asked to give a translation in TUAT NF 2 (Gütersloh, 2005), pp.  155–56). Others have proposed widely differing alternative scenarios. It is not my purpose in the present paper to re-enter the debate, though it may be useful here to give references to the main treatments. A thorough re-examination of these questions may be found in Gander (2012), who lists the principal earlier contributions in his bibliography: see especially Lemaire (2006), Finkelberg (2007), Lanfranchi (2009), Bryce (2010), Hajnal (2011), Simon (2011). One must also note a development in Luwian studies which affects the question: the identification in Hier. Luwian of the graphic practice designated initial-a-final (Melchert 2010), which has bearing on the supposed aphaeresis of initial a in Awariku/Warika and Ahhiyawa/Hiyawa. While I must concede that these alternative reconstructions may offer perfectly plausible interpretations of the limited data at our disposal, I do not find any compelling arguments to 211

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shift me from my original understanding of the situation: namely, that Awariku/Warika do refer to Urikki king of Que (minimum dates, c. 738–709 BC), and that he promoted Azatiwada of KARATEPE to a position of authority, from which after Urikki’s disappearance he was able to seat the latter’s posterity on its paternal throne; further that this royal line of Hiyawa/Que claimed descent from Muksa/MPŠ, whose existence was commemorated in some of the stories attaching to Mopsos/Moxos, specifically his leading of colonists from western Anatolia through Pamphylia to Cilicia, where he founded cities; further, that this migration carried the name of Ahhiyawa from the west to reappear as Hiyawa/Que of the Iron Age, which finds some corroboration in the Greek tradition that the Cilicians were previously known as Hypachaeoi. Thus while not here re-entering the debate, I would like to make some observations on the text of ÇİNEKÖY, in particular a new interpretation of the end. I hope that these may be of some interest to my old friend and colleague, Nicholas Postgate, offered in admiration of his wide-ranging scholarship, which has illuminated so many aspects of the ancient near east, not least Cilicia itself. For discussion and advice on the surviving Phoen. text, I am much indebted to Professors Maria Giulia Amadasi Guzzo and André Lemaire, to whom I extend my heart-felt thanks.

ÇİNEKÖY, comments (see also my translation in TUAT NF 2) Numbering of clauses. It does not seem that Editio Princeps is justified in restoring as two clauses either §§II–III or §§VIII–IX, both of which may be taken as one clause. At the same time, §XI may be divided into two clauses. Clause numbering should thus be: §2 (§§II–III), §3 (§IV), §4 (§V), §5 (§VI), §6 (§VII), §7 (§§VIII–IX), §8 (§X), §9 (§XIa), §10 (§XIb), §11 (§XII). §2 It seems that the circular shield hanging on the back of the chariot would have extended far enough down to interrupt reverse l.1, thus leaving no space for the restoration of Editio Princeps. §7. “So I smote fortresses . . .” (// Phoen. l.10, “. . . and I built fortresses”). Editio Princeps sought to remedy the discrepancy by restoring (§§VIII–IX) “. . . [strong and I built] . . .” on the area of poor stone surface (basalt vesicles), but this is hardly satisfactory: there is probably not enough space, and in any case, Phoen. still lacks “I smote”. Much more satisfactory is a solution proposed by Goedegebuure and van Exel in a forthcoming article on the practice of ancient scribe-masons avoiding poor stone surface: they suggest emending (or re-reading) Phoen. bn, “build”, to ‘n, “subdued”, as in KARATEPE 1, §XXV (as against §§XIX and XXIII). Thus §7 runs all the way to “. . . seven fortresses”, and subsequent clause numbers are reduced by a further one. §§8–11. (Editio Princeps, §§X–XII). It is a re-examination of these clauses that is the main purpose of this contribution. §8. “LOCUS”-tà!-tà-za (for Editio Princeps pa-tà-za): the pa- always seemed dubious and even on the photograph tà looked more probable, which has been confirmed by collation in Adana Museum in 2012 with Mark Weeden. We thus have “LOCUS”- tà-tà-za (dat. plur.), = Phoen. l.13 bqm[mm], paralleled by KARATEPE 1, §171–172, á-pa-ta-za (-pawata) “LOCUS”-TA4-za, “in (those) places . . .” An occasional confusion between tà (read da) and TA4/TA5 (now read la/i) need occasion no surprise since Rieken and Yakubovich (2010).

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“LOCUS”-tà-tà-za | za-ia . . . : KARATEPE’s “in those places which were . . .”, Phoen. bmqmm ’š kn, suggested the emendation of za-ia to REL-ia, but collation confirms the correctness of Editio Princeps. We may however understand the same sense slightly differently expressed: “in the places — these were . . .”. (“FLUMEN”) sa-pa+ra/i-wa/i-ni-zi: a more straightforward reading than that of Editio Princeps, this yields Sapara-waninzi, “(the river) Sapar-ean”, nom. (acc.) plur. MF of the ethicon in -wani-. For the river name and identification, see below. MAGNUS+RA/I.FONS.SCALPRUM-zi! (collation confirms -zi: the (zi+)a of Editio Princeps is chance damage): the sense of §8 now emerges clearly: “In the places — these were the MAGNUS+RA/I.FONS.SCALPRUM’s (nom. (acc.) plur. MF) of the river SAPARA”. One may propose to understand the three logograms literally, as occasionally elsewhere in Hieroglyphic, to express ideographically an abstract concept, so that “great.pool.stone” ’s would render “dams, barrages (of the river S.)”. This can be supported by the contextual sense which it gives to the following §§8–9: “making lands (by irrigation), and settling towns (in the lands so won)”; cf. KARATEPE 1, §XLVIII, “every river-land”. (“FLUMEN”)sa-pa+ra/i : one may conclude this argument by proposing to realise this rivername as Sabri and to identify this with the Cuneiform Hittite ÍDŠamri (Šunaššura treaty, CTH 41, Akkadian version), the boundary between Hatti and Kizzuwatna, normally identified with the river Seyhan, classical Saros (cf. Trémouille 2008, for bibliography). Further, Phoen. l.13 may show the letters šwry (last re-read), which might be identifiable as the Phoen. version of the river name, thus Šawri (it would be in approximately the right place). §9. wa/i-a, connective particles: the establishment of the initial -a- final rule, which included a usual exception in the introductory a-wa/i, left a small group of the reversed wa/i-a (see CHLI, p. 19; SHEIZAR, §2, to which this attestation may now be added; and now in general Melchert 2010: esp. 149). á-mi–ia-ti COR-na-ti, “by my person/personally”: examples of atri-, with variants atli- and atni-, have been increasing since the publication of CHLI (where see pp. 446f., §§4, 5, 9), with the present attestation, perhaps ALEPPO 6, §§2–3 (Hawkins 2011: 41–45), and now JISR EL HADID 4, §§2–3 (Dinçol, Dinçol, Hawins, Peker 2014). The form here matches á-mi-ti “COR”na-ti (KÖRKÜN, §2), and a variant COR-la-ti (KULULU 4, §5). i-zi–ia⟨ha⟩, “⟨I⟩ made”: although no trace of verb ending is visible, a 1st person singular may be confidently restored, following amu amiyati COR-nati. §10. This poorly preserved clause is shown by collation to be as copied in Editio Princeps. The verb surviving only as the logogram SOLIUM may be confidently restored as some writing of isanu(wa)ha, “I settled”. This could find a correspondence in Phoen. l.16, . . . yšbt š[m . . .], “I settled the[re]” (cf. KARATEPE 1, §XXXI), but for the suggestion of an alternative Hier. correspondence, see discussion of §11. §11. [. . . -z]a[ . . . ] ARHA (BONUS)u-sa-nu-mi-na: this is all that survives of this final clause which is followed by uninscribed space. The phrase ARHA usanuwami- , here acc. sing. MF, is attested once in KARATEPE 1, §LI. 285–286, as an epithet of Tarhunza, corresponding to Phon. b‘l krntryš (the latter word being much, but inconclusively, discussed). usanuwami- is taken as the participle of a verb translated by Phoen. brk, “bless” (KARATEPE 1, §XLIX.274), and is approximately understood as “highly (ARHA) blessed”. The appearance

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of this epithet on ÇİNEKÖY suggests the restoration [Tarhun]za[n] to precede it, the object of a lost verb, and sense similar to KARATEPE 1, §XLVII, “and I made Tarhunza dwell therein”. Phoen. correspondence: l.16 shows a probable . . .yšbtš[xxx]b‘l, “I made dwell the[re] Baal”, which could correspond to what is reconstructed for Hier. §11. Phoen. l.17 is given in Editio Princeps as krštqyš‘ šb‘ w[ . . . ]n‘m, divided by the editor as (b‘l) kr štq yš‘ šb‘ w-[kl] n‘m, “(Baal) de KR. tranquillité, délivrance, abondance, et [tout?] bien”. Yet [Tarhun]za arha usanu(wa)mimight lead one to expect the KARATEPE Phoen. correspondence b‘l krntryš, so I wondered whether it might be possible to read b‘l krn?!tr !yš b!-šb‘. . . , emending š to n (difficult), and rereading q as r and ‘ as b. However Professor Lemaire after re-examining the photographs and squeeze did not feel that the correction of these three letters was acceptable, for which advice I am most grateful. Hier. §11 ends, perhaps unfinished, at this point, where the Phoen. continues for a further line, thus lacking any Hier. corresponding text. On Phoen. l.16 Lemaire identified the first three letters as ’sm/n, tentatively rendering “(ceux qui sont) opprimés/à l’étroit”. As I understand the sense of the damaged Hier. passage, I can suggest no restoration which would reflect this. To summarise, I offer the following readings and translations of ÇİNEKÖY Hier., §§8–11. Little enough of the corresponding Phoen. text is preserved, but some may be considered. (right side, l.3) §8. | REL-pa-wa/i “LOCUS”-tà-tà-za | za-ia (“FLUMEN”) sa-pa+ra/i-wa/i-ni-zi (front, l.1) MAGNUS+RA/I. FONS.SCALPRUM-zi ! | á-sa-tá    In the places — these were the barrages of the river Sabri – (Phoen., l.13) w-b-mq[mm . . . . . . ]šwry §9. (l.2) | wa/i-a | á-mu | á-mi–ia-ti COR-na-ti (l.3) (“TERRA”)ta-sà-REL+ra/i-zi   | i-zi–ia⟨-ha⟩    I by myself made lands, (Phoen. ll. 14–15) – §10. a-wa/i URBS+mi-ni-zi. SOLIUM [. . .    and [I] settl[ed] towns, (Phoen. ?) §11. [ . . . right side, l.4] [ . . . z]a [ . . . ] ARHA u-sa-nu-mi-na    [and therein I made dwell(?) Tarhun]za the Highly Blessed . . . (Phoen. ll.16–17) . . . yšb š [m . . . ] b‘l kr . . .

Conclusion Çineköy, the find-spot of the monument, lies only some 3km east of the lower reaches of the river Seyhan (Saros/Šamri/Sabri) in a plain with high water-table. In antiquity the mouth of the river was probably much closer, but is now removed by silting, and the area may well have been marshy. The hydraulic works referred to in the inscription, the reclaiming and resettling of the land, would seem appropriate to such a location. As for §11, speculatively restored as

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Fig. 1.

recording the establishment of “[Tarhun]za the Highly Blessed”, we may well suppose that this refers to the statue with base itself, which seems never to have reached its intended destination but to have been abandoned, probably in the immediate vicinity.

Bibliography Bryce, T. 2010 The Hittite Deal with the Ḫiyawa-Men. Pp. 47–53 in Pax Hethitica: Studies on the Hittites and Their Neighbours in Honour of Itamar Singer, ed. Y. Cohen and G. Amir. Wiesbaden. Dinçol, A., Dinçol, B., Hawkins, J. D. and Peker, H. 2014 A new Hieroglyphic Luwian inscription from Hatay. Anatolica 40: 61–70. Gander, M. 2012 Aḫḫiyawa — Ḫiyawa — Que: Gibt es Evidenz für die Anwesenheit von Griechen in Kilikien am Übergang von der Bronze- zur Eisenzeit? Studi Micenei ed Egeo-Anatolici 54: 281–309. Hajnal, I. 2011 Namen und ihre Etymologien — als Beweisstücke nur bedingt tauglich? Pp.  241–263 in Lag Troia in Kilikien? Der aktuelle Streit um Homers Ilias, ed. R. Rollinger. Darmstadt. Hawkins, J. D. 2007 Que. A. Geschichte. Pp. 191–195 in Reallexikon der Assyriologie, ed. D. O. Edzard et al., vol. XI. Berlin. 2009 Cilicia, the Amuq, and Aleppo. Near Eastern Archaeology 72: 164–173. 2011 The Inscriptions of the Aleppo Temple. Anatolian Studies 61: 35–54. Lanfranchi, G. B. 2009 A Happy Son of the King of Assyria: Warikas and the Çineköy Bilingual (Cilicia). Pp. 127–150 in Of God(s), Trees, Kings and Scholars. Neo-Assyrian and Related Studies in Honour of Simo Parpola, ed. M. Luukko, S. Svärd and R. Mattila. Helsinki. Lemaire, A. 1983 L’insciption phénicienne de Hassan-Beyli reconsiderée. Rivista di Studi Fenici 11: 9–19. 2006 La maison de Mopsos en Cilicie et en Pamphylie à l’époque de Fer (XIIe-VIe s. av. J.-C.). Res Antiquae 3: 99–107.

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Melchert, H. C. 2010 Spelling of Initial /a-/ in Hieroglyphic Luwian. Pp. 147–157 in ipamati kistamati pari tumatimis. Luwian and Hittite Studies Presented to J. David Hawkins on the Occasion of his 70th Birthday, ed. I. Singer. Tel Aviv. Rieken, E. and Yakubovich, I. 2010 The new values of Luwian signs L. 319 and L. 172. Pp. 199–219 in ipamati kistamati pari tumatimis. Luwian and Hittite Studies Presented to J. David Hawkins on the Occasion of his 70th Birthday, ed. I. Singer. Tel Aviv. Simon, Z. Tekoǧlu, R. and Lemaire, A. 2002 La bilingue royale louvito-phénicienne de Çineköy. Pp. 961–1007 in Nomades et sédentaires dans le Proche-Orient ancien. Compte rendu de la XLVIe Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, Paris, 10–13 juillet 2000. Amurru 3, ed. C. Nicolle. Paris. Tremouille, M.-C. 2008 Šamri. Pp. 628–629 in Reallexikon der Assyriologie, ed. D. O. Edzard et al., vol. XI. Berlin.

A New Palatial Ware or a Case of Imitation of Egyptian Pottery? The Brownish Red Slip (BRS) from Qatna and Its Significance within the Northern Levantine Ceramic Tradition of the Mid-Second Millennium BC Marco Iamoni Abstract In recent years the study of the ceramic horizon characterizing the end of the MBA and the LBA has made substantial progress thanks to the excavation of a crucial sequence from the site of Qatna. The following study aims at discussing in more detail the so-called Brownish Red Slip (BRS) pottery that has been identified by the author during the study of the ceramic assemblages excavated in Qatna throughout the 2000–2010 years. The focus of this work is thus the prominent features of the Brownish Red Slip: form and fabric types, functional contexts where it has been retrieved, and reasons that may have led to its production. In particular, the paper will discuss the possibility that the BRS imitates Egyptian ceramics, and the socio-political implications of such an interpretation 1.

Introduction Despite the significant continuity that characterises the ceramic traditions of the Middle and Late Bronze Ages in the Northern Levant, the use of decorative painted patterns is significantly different. The MBA shows distinctive painted pottery traditions, e.g., Syro-Cilician Painted Ware, Levantine Painted Ware, Inner Syrian Painted ware, whose occurrences are mostly concentrated in the early-mid MBA and always in very low percentages–sometimes giving the impression that the MBA is a “colourless” period. The LBA, on the contrary, sees, a widespread diffusion of painted decorated pottery, especially during the LB II, whereas much less is known for the early phases of the period. The reasons for this floruit of decorated pottery must be sought in the widespread net of political, diplomatic and commercial contacts that characterised the full LBA (in particular, the Amarna Age, 15th — 14th centuries BC, which has 1.  It is a pleasure for me to offer this contribution to Nicholas: I am particularly in debt to him for all his help and his kindness during my PhD at Cambridge. I hope this contribution will repay him (at least in part) for his many counsels and suggestions and for the brilliant lessons in Old Babylonian and Middle Assyrian I had the luck to attend!!

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also been rightly termed the “International Age”): these in turn stimulated a much wider production of decorated vessels. By contrast, the MBA, albeit distinguished by exchanges between major Amorite dynasties which controlled some of the most important cities of ancient Syria, was much less involved in long distance contacts comparable to those described in the famous Amarna archives. This discontinuity between the MB and LB ceramic decorated traditions is further increased by the dearth of archaeological evidence (and thus of ceramic data) concerning the end of the MBA and, in particular, the beginning of the LBA in the Northern Levant. Recent investigation from ancient Qatna, might help to fill this gap. Thanks to its position at the crossroads of the main routes connecting the Northern and Southern Levant and the Euphrates Valley/ Jezirah, the site became a major commercial centre, especially during the LBA. This fortunate feature permitted the site to be at the centre of many different influences that stimulated constant innovation in material culture at the site. The ceramic tradition seems to reflect this characteristic: the so-called Brownish Red Slip Ware (henceforth BRS) might be a further proof of it. Its identification is thus of particular importance since it mirrors a number of socio-political dynamics that affected Qatna as well as the surrounding region; furthermore, the restriction of its occurrence to specific phases at Qatna suggests a high relevance of BRS as chronological marker for the beginning of the LBA (and possibly the MB III). Its study sheds light on an intricate phase of the Northern Levant by adding data on the ceramic tradition in use throughout the 16th and 15th century BC and qualifies it as one of the most important ceramic productions of the Levant.

Archaeological Contexts The identification of BRS has been possible mainly thanks to the excavations carried out by the Italian Mission of the University of Udine of two public buildings located in the acropolis (Operation T) and in the lower city of Qatna (Operation K, see Figure 1). The first is the socalled “Eastern Palace” (Fig. 2), a large building located a few dozen metres east of the Royal Palace. A joint excavation by the Syrian and Italian Mission in Mishrifeh between 2006 and 2010 has almost completely uncovered the remains of this large building which so far numbers 26 rooms in use during the main occupation phase of the building (currently dated to the MB II, with a partial reoccupation of its central and southern sectors during the LBA). The building stratigraphy and the several architectural modifications that brought two different pre-existing buildings to be joint into a new single structure (the Eastern Palace) have been already described 2 in some detail and there is no need to repeat them here; a final publication is planned for the final study of the Eastern Palace sequence and its assemblages of materials 3. The relevant aspect of the Eastern Palace’s stratigraphy for the present work is that, on the basis of the evidence to hand, the Eastern Palace as a proper public building was in use only during the MB II. During the MB III it seems that the building was partially abandoned (though this aspect is still in need of further investigation before a final confirmation can be given), 2.  Iamoni 2012a, 2015a; Morandi Bonacossi, Da Ros, Garna, Iamoni and Merlino 2009. 3.  The study of the data is currently ongoing and will be published as a monograph in the series Studi Archeologici su Qatna (SAQ).

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Fig. 1.  Topographic map of Qatna (by A. Savioli).

to be re-used, probably during the LB I, as a workshop for the production of metal artefacts, among which toggle pins may have played a significant role, since a conspicuous assemblage of them has been found in Rooms P and N 4. Most relevant in this phase is the presence of furnaces (for casting copper and perhaps also silver), which thus make the building (or at least part of it) as very important workshop for the production of important metal items (like the above mentioned toggle pins). It is unclear whether any metallurgical activity was carried out also during the earliest phase of the building: though many elements point in this direction, the interruption of the excavation in 2011 has prevented the exploration of the levels below the metallurgical workshop. The Eastern Palace was a public building of clear social importance; its relevance was exemplified also by its layout, that well fits into the palatine architectural tradition of Western Syria 5. The prestigious role that the building had, first as palace and then as metallurgical workshop for the production of high status items, together with its chronology will be fundamental 4.  Iamoni 2012b. Room N occurs in a later phase of the Eastern Palace and is not visible in the current plan (which shows only its earlier phase during which it was subdivided into Rooms AH and AI) 5.  Iamoni 2015a.

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Fig. 2.  The Eastern Palace of Qatna (schematic plan). Note Room E (perhaps the palace’s shrine) in the central sector of the building).

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to understanding the role and the genesis of Brownish Red Slip Ware in the ceramic tradition of the second millennium BC Northern Levant. The second source of information is the Lower City Palace, a monumental building excavated by the Italian Mission between 2000 and 2010 (Figure 3). It is so far the largest public building uncovered at Qatna after the Royal Palace. At present it numbers almost 60 rooms arranged in different sectors with specific functional traits (official, domestic, private). Similarly to the Eastern Palace, the Lower City Palace has shown in its stratigraphic sequence a number of modifications that have changed its architectural layout throughout its period of use. The latter, as has been discussed in preliminary publications 6, is dated mainly to the LB II, whereas the earliest palace level may date to the very late LB I. The number of different finds suggests that the building served multifunctional purposes (administrative/bureaucratic as well for crafts). It is not within the scope of this article to discuss them in detail 7 since this seems to be of minor relevance for the study of the BRS ware. The most relevant trait of the Lower City Palace is its paramount importance within the administration of Qatna: texts recovered from its rooms suggest that the building hosted highly qualified members of the Qatna bureaucracy, whose function was to control the access to the city — most likely from the northern gate 8. At the same time, very important craft activities concerning the working of ivory and bone characterised some sectors of the building 9, which was thus devoted also to the production of luxury items 10. The Eastern Palace and the Lower City Palace seem to have been residences of elite sectors of the Qatna society that, albeit with different functions and roles, controlled significant aspects of the economic and administrative life of Qatna. It must be underlined once more that the two buildings’ main period of use is different (mid/late MBA/ LB I of the Eastern Palace vs LB II of the Lower City Palace).

The Brownish Red Slip The assemblage herewith presented comes from these two buildings: its analysis, though still preliminary in absence of the full publication of the two archaeological sequences, follows an initial study where the main characterising traits were discussed 11. The aim of this paper is to add more details concerning forms and fabrics for a better identification of this new kind of decorated pottery, and ultimately to explore any functional interpretations of its use. The corpus of pieces identified so far numbers about 150 pieces, though this possibly may increase as the study of the materials from the Eastern Palace and the Lower City Palace continues 12.

6.  Luciani 2003; Morandi Bonacossi 2015. 7.  For a recent discussion of the different activities carried out in the Lower City Palace see Morandi Bonacossi 2015. 8.  Eidem 2003; 2007. 9.  Luciani 2006; Turri 2015a. 10.  See for example the recovery of the an egyptianizing mask in elephant ivory (Luciani 2006; Turri 2015a). 11.  Iamoni 2012a. 12.  The tragic events that have hit Syria since 2011 have forced the Italian Mission of the University of Udine to stop archaeological research on the site. We can only hope that future events will lead to

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Fig. 3.  The Lower City Palace (schematic plan).

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Table 1:  Distribution of Fabric Macrogroups in the BRS Types.

Since one of the main purposes of this study is to explore the origin of BRS, it seems useful to focus on the ceramics thus far excavated in the Eastern Palace, thanks to its longer excavated sequence that starts during the full MBA; the above-discussed data from the Lower City Palace will be however integrated into the final discussion, in order to more correctly interpret the role of BRS within Qatna’s ceramic tradition. The fabrics in use show some variations in types that seem to depend on a slight level of standardisation in the manufacturing process. From the point of view of macrotypes, that is, a macro subdivision simply based on the presence/absence of vegetal temper in the ceramic fabrics, the production sees a clear prevalence of mineral-only tempered fabrics (more than 65% of the total amount of sherds analysed here) with a smaller group of sherds which show vegetal tempers (about 35%). If one looks at a more detailed classification of the fabric types 13, no specific macrogroup predominates in the assemblage (Table 1): 2 and 8 are the most frequent (the latter has been divided into its subvariants 8A and 8B since these are the result of different firing temperatures, whose variation depends on a change in the production technology during the mid/late MBA) 14. The macrogroup types that have been documented do not seem to belong to specialised productions nor to any class of luxury/elite ware. The sub-macrogroups 8A and B are the types that recur most frequently in most of the MB and LB ceramic production thus the resumption of peaceful conditions in the country and permit the Syrian people to live freely and in peace. 13.  These have been determined through comparison with a set of fabric samples whose characteristics have been identified by means of petrographic and chemical analysis and then synthesised into macrogroups (see Besana, Da Rosa and Iamoni 2008; Iamoni 2012a; Maritan et al. 2005; Maritan, Mazzolo and Speranza, 2007). It must be stressed that there is no relationship between the two types of subdivisions, since macro types are based on direct observation of the presence absence of vegetal tempers, whereas macrogroups are based on petrographic and chemical analysis. 14.  Iamoni, 2015b.

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far studied at Qatna 15 and are particularly widespread in the production of common ware. The absence of a specific fabric type for BRS is a first good element for a more precise understanding of BRS pottery, since it suggests that BRS belonged to the common ware rather than any kind of special ware. This, however, contrasts with the specific treatment that characterised BRS and that gave the name to this class of ceramics. As its name indicates, BRS pottery is a class of vessels characterised by the presence of a very thin layer of slip — which in some cases even resembles a simple wash treatment — whose colour ranges from brilliant red to a darker brownish tone (hence the definition of BRS). The slip usually covers the inner as well as the external side of the vessel (when this occurs on open forms, whereas in the very few jar/pot cases it characterises only the outer surface). Occasionally, traces of burnishing can be detected, but this surface treatment seems to be an exception (maybe destined only to some specific vessel types), rather than a common practice in the production of BRS. With reference to the form types, BRS occurs on a restricted number of open forms. These are mainly plates and shallow bowls with wide diameters (usually at least 20 cm) and internally swollen or short upright rims. These vessels are quite common in the Northern Levant throughout the second half of the second millennium BC and are characteristic of the ceramic horizon of Qatna, though they have been found in contexts that span from the Northern Levant to the Upper Syrian Euphrates area 16. At the same time their chronological relevance is quite low, since they occur quite frequently throughout the MB III–LBA. The first (pl. 1: 3, 6–8, 9–11; pl. 2: 1–3, 11) has a broad diffusion throughout the late MBA and LBA whereas the second type (short upright rim bowls/plates, pl. 1: 1–2, 13–14; pl. 2: 8, 12) is more restricted, chiefly to the MB II–MB III (with a specific occurrence in the LB I for the plate type) 17. It is also worth observing the very limited occurrence of BRS on in-turned rim bowls (pl.1: 12; pl. 2: 10), which used to be considered a hallmark of the MB II 18 but have now been assigned to the entire late MBA (with a likely continuation into the LB I) 19. A last ceramic form which shows BRS treatment are the bowls/plates with high and sharp carination and short upright or externally swollen rims (pl. 2: 4–5, 9). These are in general of slightly smaller sizes than the previously discussed vessels, and are well-known, though with gentler profiles and flaring rims, during the MB II 20. The types here discussed seem to be a later variant which occurs with non-trivial percentages at Qatna during the LBA 21; it has not been 15.  Iamoni, 2012a. 16.  See for examples their attestations in Hadidi (Dornemann 1981, figs. 4: 2; 10: 5; 13: 30, 32) and Ebla (Pinnock 2005, pl. VI: 9; pl. VII: 3; LXXVIII: 8–10; LXXI: 8–9), but note the significant presence of only the internally swollen rim bowls in the Royal Hypogea (Nigro 2009: fig. XXIX: 2; XXXIV: 3–4). 17.  Iamoni 2012a: 109–112; 114–115; 125–128 18.  This was largely based on the MBA evidence of Ebla (Nigro 2002a; 2002b). Yet, recent analysis of post MB destruction layers of Ebla have demonstrated the occurrence of this form type also in those levels (Colantoni 2010), in substantial agreement with other LB contexts, like Qatna and Tell Hadidi (Dornemann 1981; Iamoni 2012a). 19.  Iamoni 2012a: 110, 125–128; Colantoni 2010: 666–667. 20.  Besana, Da Ros and Iamoni 2008; Iamoni 2012a: 110; Nigro 2002a; Peyronel 2008; Pinnock 2005. 21.  Iamoni 2012a: 110, 126. For the presence of such types in LB context see their presence in the Royal Hypogea (Paoletti, 2011: 300, fig. 11: 8–9)

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Fig. 4.  BRS jar with corrugation.

possible to refine this dating in the absence of more precise data. Interestingly, this type is less common in the Northern Levant, whereas in the Southern Levant some parallels have been found (especially for pl. 2: 4, that seems to be the most reminiscent of an earlier MB tradition) with internal red slip and burnished treatment in MB II contexts 22. BRS on closed forms (Fig. 4), as said above, is very rare and seems at present to be a phenomenon more common during the LBA, when BRS becomes more widespread in the ceramic horizon. In the assemblage currently under examination only one example is present: it is a globular jar with out-turned oblique square rim and corrugated decoration. This type has a wide occurrence throughout the LBA, though one has to keep in mind the long time of use that generally characterises jars, and makes them of minor relevance for dating purposes 23.

Origin, Function and Meaning of the Brownish Red Slip Ware: An Egyptian Influence on Ceramic Production at Qatna? The discovery of this distinctive type of pottery at Qatna, and its study in relation to the first available data from the archaeological contexts, suggest some considerations about the role of BRS within the ceramic tradition thus far studied in Qatna and in the Northern Levant. With reference to the origin, the two archaeological contexts (the Eastern Palace and the Lower City Palace) where BRS has been found in significant quantities point to the mid LBA as the period of major diffusion. However, there are indications that production began already in the very early LBA, if not even during the MB III. The first concerns the vessel forms which show BRS: these are types that, although also occurring in the LBA, show significant attestations during the late MB III — LB I. In more detail, the plates with short upright rim are more diagnostic of the LB I, whereas plates with internally thickened rim occur over longer periods 24. The majority of BRS forms are non-carinated, so that an LBA horizon fits much better: in the light of the above discussed types, the first consistent appearance of BRS most likely occurred during the LB I (15th BC), with a substantial continuation during the LB IIA 25. The second indication of later chronology for BRS is the predominance of mineral-only tempered fabrics: recent analysis of ceramics from Qatna have demonstrated the prevalence of mineral tempers in the ceramic production of the LBA at Qatna 26. 22.  Beck 1975: fig. 8: 10. More recently see Kochavi and Yadin 2002. 23.  Iamoni 2012a: 171–172; McClellan 1984–85: p. 51. 24.  Iamoni 2012a: 175–176. 25.  Iamoni 2012a: 176. 26.  Iamoni 2012a: 107, fig. V.14; 2014, p. 11, fig. 1.

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Fig. 5.  Two LB II fragments of BRS (a jar with a corrugated decoration and a large BRS bowl).

The long sequence excavated in Qatna on the top of the Central Hill gives a broad confirmation of the chronology proposed above. The recovery of a long sequence of pottery workshops (that have resulted crucial in the ceramic seriation of Qatna ceramics as well as in the determination of the most diagnostic ceramic types of the Northern Levant 27) has shown the presence of BRS (albeit very sporadically) in the LB II phases of the sequence (Fig. 5). Unfortunately, the absence of well-preserved LB I context in the workshop sequence 28 does not allow for a further confirmation of a first substantial production stage of BRS already in the 15th century BC. The timespan of BRS occurrences might be seen in some changes that occur in the rendering of BRS treatment: some BRS sherds show a different colouring that might be consequence of a development in the production technique. On the basis of very preliminary data, it seems that the latest (LB II) BRS sherds have a more uniform and homogeneous reddish colour (Fig. 5), sometimes as a consequence of a careful burnishing, whereas the earliest specimens vary more easily between a more brownish and brownish-red hue. If this evidence is confirmed by future results, this might denote a relationship between BRS and other MB ceramic traditions attested at Qatna as well as in Western Syria. Among these, the Brown Burnished Ware (BBW) characterises a number of bowls and plates which were possibly used for cooking 27.  Besana, Da Ros and Iamoni 2008; Bonacossi 2008; Da Ros and Iamoni 2003; Iamoni 2012a: 70–75. 28.  The latest bronze age phases of J ( J7) were initially dated to the LB I (Besana, Da Ros and Iamoni 2008: 140–141) and it is only recently that it has been re-dated to the LB II on the basis of a more careful analysis of its ceramic assemblages (Iamoni, 2012a: 169). The absence of LB I contexts is probably due to an absence of new structures (e.g., pottery kilns) and thus of substantial archaeological deposits. It is possible that during the LB I the production area shifted to other — as yet unexcavated — sectors of the Central Hill (which was extensively used in this sense, see Al-Maqdissi and Badawi, 2002). The later re-use during the LB II, combined with soil erosion and the Iron Age re-occupation of the area, must have been responsible for the absence of any clear evidence of LB I occupation. With regard to the very limited presence of BRS within the ceramic assemblages excavated in the pottery workshop, this is not surprising since the analysis of the pottery produced in the workshops has already demonstrated that the latter were specialised in the manufacture of very common ware — in particular, closed forms — (Besana, Da Ros and Iamoni 2008).

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purposes 29; though their fabrics and treatments are different and the pottery does not display traces of slip, the common presence on bowls and plates (with similar types like the internally thickened rim plates) might imply some kind of relationship between the two. The presence of four specimens that have been classified as cooking ware (pl. 1: 4, 8; pl. 2: 6–7) is perhaps an element pointing in this sense. Furthermore, the occurrence of very dark BRS types (see for example pl. 2: 7) might derive from the attempt to imitate the more common BBW, with the aim of producing a more sophisticated (and, perhaps, more attractive) type of ware for everyday use. Due to the paucity of available data, this interpretation is at present destined to remain a simple hypothesis that will be tested in the future re-examination of the Eastern Palace sequence. With reference to the function, a coherent picture emerges from a first analysis of the information thus far collected. First of all, the fabric types used to produce BRS are common (and also quite varied, as the different macrogroups attest to, see Table 1): this implies the absence of a specific production (hence the classification of BRS not as a self-standing ware, but rather as a more elaborated type of common ware). Nevertheless, BRS’s low frequency in the ceramic horizon thus far excavated suggests that this type of pottery was far less frequent in the ceramic repertoire and thus had to play some kind of special role. Two elements strengthen this idea. The first is that BRS occurs at Qatna almost exclusively in palatial contexts. Although with different periods of use, BRS comes, at present, mostly from the Eastern Palace and the Lower City Palace: thus far it has not been detected in domestic contexts. This points to a special role played by BRS and seems to qualify it as a high quality ceramics. The study of its presence within the Eastern Palace and the Lower City Palace is still ongoing and it is not possible to propose further interpretations, especially until a complete and definitive analysis of the stratigraphic sequences of both buildings has been done. Yet, preliminary data from the Eastern Palace suggest a concentration of BRS in Room E (Fig. 6), which played a crucial role in the architectural plan of the palace. Room E was built to connect two pre-existing structures and create a new public building, the so-called Eastern Palace 30; its function (Fig. 6) has yet to be definitely ascertained, yet in the light of its rectangular form with longitudinal access as well as of the presence of benches along the long walls and the eastern side, a cultic/ritual function (perhaps the Eastern Palace’s shrine?) has been put forward as working hypothesis 31. The significant presence of BRS in Room E might suggest a connection to ritual and cult, and consequently further strengthen the special role of BRS within the ceramic horizon of second millennium Qatna. BRS occurrences in MB III/LB I private contexts must be still tested, but a preliminary assessment of the excavated contexts suggests the lack of a clear correlation. The Eastern Palace sequence, though still in need of a definitive study of the excavated stratigraphy, shows an almost complete absence of BRS from phases T10 and T9, during which the building became a metallurgical workshop (T10), which was later re-used by squatters 32. Furthermore, BRS has not been apparently found in the LB IIB houses that were built after the destruction of the Royal 29.  Similar types have been found at Ebla, though there they are slipped (Nigro 2009: 270, 399, 432–433; fig. XXIX:2; fig. XXXIV: 1–6) 30.  Iamoni 2015a; Morandi Bonacossi et al. 2009. 31.  Iamoni 2015a. 32.  Morandi Bonacossi et al. 2009: 76–77; Iamoni 2012b: 81–85; Iamoni 2015a: 452.

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Fig. 6.  SU 7570 in Room E from which a considerable amount of BRS sherds have been recovered

Palace 33. The relationship between BRS and public architecture seems thus to be solid and suggests a role for BRS strictly interconnected with the functions carried out by these building. The second important aspect for determining the function of BRS is its presence mostly on open forms, i.e., on vessels for everyday consumption (and consequently with display value). The occurrence of BRS on such vessel types further underlines the significance that BRS’s visual impact had on visitors/hosts (and inhabitants) of the public buildings. BRS occurs mostly on plate and bowl types that have had a great success throughout the late MBA — LBA in the Northern Levant. The internally thickened rim plates in particular are very common from the late MBA to the early LB II 34: the presence of BRS on these vessel forms further stresses its use on the most “successful” pottery types, thus underlying its special role in the ceramic production. BRS was not adopted on very restricted and specific vessel types, but rather on bowls and plates that were very common during the second half of the second millennium BC. The likely intent was to diffuse it and make it as recognisable and widespread as possible: this might ultimately have been an attempt to strengthen ties and social contacts, or, perhaps, to display/communicate in some way a new precise socio-political condition. 33.  Morandi Bonacossi et al. 2009: 93–117. 34.  Iamoni 2012a: 175–176.

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In this respect, the recent publication of imitations of Egyptian pottery from LB strata at Tell Dan offers a significant ceramic parallel that may open BRS’s study to new interpretations 35. The type of slip as well as of colour of the Tell Dan vessels bears strong similarities with Qatna’s BRS, suggesting a clear link between the two typologies. LB imitations of Egyptian ceramics with red slip are also known from other sites in the Southern Central Levant 36: they show a colouring that, on the basis of the description, closely resembles BRS (colour tones that span from a simple red to a darker brownish variant). If this similarity is confirmed, and thus an Egyptian inspiration underlies the production of BRS, the latter might thus be seen as the result of Egyptian influence over Qatna’s ceramic tradition and material culture. Frequent contacts between Qatna and the Egyptians are documented in the Amarna letters, although the site was known to the Egyptians already during the Middle Kingdom 37. The links are also clear in the archaeological record thanks to the numerous discoveries of Egyptian artefacts at the site (see in particular, in chronological order from the MBA to the LBA: the ivory sphinx and a stone vessel bearing the name of the princess Itakayet, the Egyptianised ivory artefacts and scarabs/sealings with, in particular, the cartouche of Pharaoh Amenhotep III from the Lower City Palace and a clay sealing bearing the throne name of the pharaoh Akhenaton from the Royal Palace 38). BRS might thus be seen as a further proof of a much deeper Egyptian “presence/influence” at Qatna. The presence of “Egyptian inspired ceramics” at Qatna might ultimately lead to a new interpretation of the site’s political position, especially in the light of BRS chronology, which shows a significant diffusion in the LB I, with a possible initial production in the MB III. Still little is known from the site as well as from the Northern Levant for the 16th and 15th centuries 39 and the publication of the Eastern Palace sequence may tell much about it, but a fall of Qatna at the edge of the sphere of influence of a newly rising Egyptian kingdom (or maybe for a limited period even within it ?), as a consequence of the military campaigns of the 18th dynasty pharaohs (in particular Tuthmosis III) 40 in the Levant does not seem unlikely. From this standpoint, the particular recurrence of BRS during the LBA might fit very well in the well-known “internationalism” that characterised the area and led to the formation of hybrid styles 41 in the production of luxury goods, e.g., ivory objects or stone vessels 42. The same dynamics might have also brought about the success and diffusion of less valuable types of artefact, like this special class of common ware: BRS, if it is a result of Egyptian influence on pottery, might thus be a perfect case-study of hybridity in popular forms of craft, where 35.  Ben-Dov 2011: 313–314; Martin and Ben-Dov 2007. 36.  Martin 2011. 37.  Turri 2015b. For the Amarna Age see in particular the letters EA 52 and EA 55 that discuss peaceful relationships between Egyptian pharaohs and the kings of Qatna (Moran 1992). For the Middle Kingdom evidence see Boschloos 2012: 118. 38. Boschloos 2012; Luciani 2006; Turri 2015a; Boschloos 2015; Du Mesnil du Buisson 1928; Ahrens 2010; Ahrens, Dohmann-Pfälzner and Pfälzner 2012. 39.  For the relative and absolute chronology of the Northern Levant see Iamoni 2012a: 161–170. 40.  Bryan 2000; Klengel 1992: 92. 41.  Feldman 2006. 42.  Ahrens 2008; Turri 2015a; Luciani 2006.

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Egyptian traits (red slip) have been used and applied on the production of local ceramic forms. The latter phenomenon of hybridity would underline once more the role of Qatna as one of the main centres of the LBA international network that particularly characterised the Levant. At the same time it would reveal an unexpected impact of the Egyptian contacts in the sphere of everyday use material culture. According to the Amarna archives 43, Egyptian messengers and court officials stayed at Qatna for certain amounts of time, so the adoption/display of a specific class of vessels recalling pottery commonly in use in Egypt could be seen as a rather normal, maybe perhaps unusual but not for this reason less effective, “act of diplomacy” carried out at the lower level of artefacts of everyday use. However, two considerations encourage extreme caution before accepting the “Egyptian effect” as a reason behind BRS production. First, BRS forms do not seem to recall Egyptian types (like in the case of Tell Dan): they fall very well into a local horizon; second, the chronology of the Egyptianised pottery in the Southern Levant is generally lower (end LB IIB) than that here proposed for BRS, though the Egyptian imitations found at Tell Dan might be contemporary with BRS 44. The paucity of case studies and the still ongoing investigation of the archaeological contexts as well as of the entire body of BRS data hampers a deeper exploration of the social meaning that BRS might have played. In this sense, the Egyptian inspiration, though possible in the light of the above-cited sustained contacts with Qatna, thus requires further investigations. Yet, the available hints suggest that a socio-political role of BRS deserves future attention and might be crucial for the full comprehension of this class of ceramics within the ceramic tradition of second millennium BC. With reference to the possible relationship of BRS with other ceramic traditions, apart from the above-mentioned Egyptianising red slipped pottery retrieved at Tell Dan, vessels displaying a similar treatment/decoration have been found at Umm al Marra (Schwartz et al. 2003, fig.30: 4 and G. Schwartz pers. comm.) as well as at Tell Nebi Mend. At the latter site, these vessels start in MB III phases, peak during the LB I and disappear during the LB II, thus showing a trend similar to what emerged in Qatna (S. Bourke, pers. comm.) A production of red slipped pottery is known to have been in use in the Southern Levant/Jordan Valley during the second millennium, yet — unlike BRS — this is frequently burnished and mostly seems to characterise the early/mid MBA, with much lower occurrences in the LBA 45. In the Northern Levant/ Western Syria, red burnished slipped pottery has been found with jugs in Ebla and it has been considered as a luxury ceramic class due to its careful manufacture and the particular refined fabric 46. Further north the so-called Red Lustrous Wheelmade Ware is known to characterise LBA, yet this class of ceramics occurs mostly on jugs and bottles. Recent studies suggest Cyprus as area of origin/provenance thus making any relationship with BRS (that should then be seen as a local imitation of Red Lustrous pottery) very unlikely 47. In the eastern Jezirah, types similar 43.  See in particular EA 53 and 55 where messengers and troops of Pharaoh are said to have stayed at Qatna (Moran 1992). 44.  Ben-Dov 2011: 313. Martin and Ben-Dov 2007: 192–193. 45.  Cohen 2002: 117; Kochavi and Yadin 2002: 198–219; Nigro 2000: 1193–1194; 2007: 379–380. 46.  Nigro 2009: 389. 47.  Knappet et al. 2005.

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to BRS do not seem to be common: a production of red slipped pottery is known to occur in LBA levels, but it is characterised by a thick slip with a brilliant red colour. Although a generic resemblance to the BRS might hypothetically be proposed (especially with the LB II BRS specimens, if the distinguishing brilliant red colouring will be definitely confirmed), the different form types 48 demand a more cautious approach. To sum up, a local origin (i.e. at Qatna itself or in the region around it) seems still to be the most likely explanation for the introduction of BRS: the peak of its diffusion around the LB I/ LB II A might indeed be seen as a result of the frequent exchanges that see the Levant (and Qatna) playing a pivotal role in diplomatic and commercial contacts that characterised the so-called Amarna Age. Whether then BRS appears during the early LBA (if not already in the very late MBA) as an innovation derived from internal dynamics in Qatna’s ceramic horizon (as prestige ceramic production for internal consumption within palatial elites,) or as a result of a resumption of large-scale contacts and/or of influences of rising supra-regional powers, e.g., Egypt, during the 16th/ 15th centuries BC, as seems also possible, is an issue that it will be possible to resolve definitely only in future, with a wider basis of data.

Acknowledgments I am very grateful to the late Sharon Zuckerman, Stephen Bourke, Glenn Schwartz, David Ilan, Aren Maeir, Hanan Charaf, Karen Kopetzky, Fabrizio Venturi and Costanza Coppini for their kind help in discussing the occurrence of possible BRS parallels in Southern/Northern Levant and Eastern Syria. I thank also Luigi Turri for his comments about the relationship between Qatna and Egypt and the anonymous referees for their suggestions and advices. I am also deeply in debt to the volume editors, who proofread the text. It goes without saying that any errors must be ascribed to the author. 48.  Duistermaat 2008: 64; Oates, Oates and McDonald 1997: 74.

References Ahrens, A. 2010 A Stone Vessel of Princess Itakayet of the 12th Dynasty from Tomb VII at Tell Mišrife/Qatna (Syria). Egypt and the Levant XX: 15–29. 2008 Egyptian and Egyptianizing stone vessels from the royal tomb and palace at Tell Mišrife/Qatna (Syria): imports and local imitations. Pp. 93–106 in Proceedings of the 5th International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East, eds. J. M. Cordoba, M. Molist, M. Carmen Perez, I. Rubio and S. Martinez. Madrid: UAM Ediciones. Ahrens, A., Dohmann-Pfälzner, H. and Pfälzner, P., 2012 New Light on the Amarna Period from the Northern Levant. A Clay Sealing with the Throne Name of Amenhotep IV/Akhenaten from the Royal Palace at Tall Mišrife/ Qaṭna. Zeitschrift für Orient-Archäologie, 5: 232–248. Al-Maqdissi, M. and Badawi, M. 2002 Rapport préliminaire sur la sixième campagne des fouilles syriennes à Tell Mishrifeh/Qatna. Pp. 25–62 in Excavating Qatna I, eds. M. Al-Maqdissi, D. Morandi Bonacossi, P. Pfälzner, M. Luciani and M. Novák. Damascus: Salhani.

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1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14

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External Colour

Internal Colour

Firing

10 R 5/6 R 2.5 YR 5/4 RB 2.5 YR 5/4 RB 10 R 6/4 PR 2.5 YR 6/6 LR 2.5 YR 5/6 R 10 R 4/6 R 2.5 YR 4/6 R 10 R 4/6 R 10 R 5/6 R 10 R 4/6 R 2.5 YR 5/6 R 7.5 YR 6/4 LB 10 R 5/6 R

10 R 5/6 R 2.5 YR 5/4 RB 2.5 YR 5/4 RB 5 YR 7/6 RY 2.5 YR 6/6 LR 2.5 YR 5/6 R 10 R 4/6 R 2.5 YR 4/6 R 10 R 4/6 R 10 R 5/6 R 10 R 4/6 R 2.5 YR 5/1 RG 5 YR 6/4 LRB 10 R 5/6 R

H H R H H R H H H H H H H R

Macro- Vegetal Extern. Intern. group temper Surface Surface Tech.

2A 8B 8A 3B 8B 8A 1D 1A 2A 5 2A 2A 2A 2A

yes no no no no no yes no yes no yes yes yes yes

S S S S S S S S S S S S S S

S S S S S S S S S S S S S S

W W W W W W W W W W W W W W

Ceramic class

common common common cooking common common common cooking common common common common common common

Extern. Intern. Treatm. Treatm.

SM SM B SM SM SM SM B SM SM SM SM SM SM

SM SM B SM SM SM SM B SM SM SM SM SM SM

Beck, P. 1975 The Pottery of Middle Bronze Age IIA at Tell Aphek. Tel Aviv, 2(2): 45–85. Ben-Dov, R., 2011 Dan III: Avraham Biran Excavations 1966–1999. The Late Bronze Age. Jerusalem: Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion. Besana, R., Da Ros, M. and Iamoni, M. 2008 Excavations on the Acropolis of Mishrifeh, Operation J: A New Early Bronze Age III — Iron Age III Sequence for Central Inner Syria. Part 2: The Pottery. Akkadica, 129(2): 129–180. Boschloos, V. 2012 Scarabs from Tell Mishrifeh/Qatna (Syria) Excavated by the Italian Component of the joint Syrian-Italian-German Project (campaigns 2005–2010). Akkadica, 133(2): 109–121. 2015 A Scarab of Amenhotep III in Qatna’s Lower City Palace. Pp. 19–24 in Qatna and the Networks of Bronze Age Globalism, eds. P. Pfälzner and M. Al-Maqdissi, Qatna Studien Supplementa 2. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag Bryan, B.M. 2000 The 18th Dynasty before the Amarna period. pp.  218–271 In The Oxford History of Ancient Egypt, ed. I. Shaw. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Cohen, S. L. 2002 Middle Bronze Age IIA Ceramic Typology and Settlement in the Southern Levant. Pp. 113–132 in The Middle Bronze Age in the Levant, ed. M. Bietak. Vienna: Verlag der Österreichen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Colantoni, A. 2010 A preliminary Account on the Late Bronze Age Pottery Production at Tell Mardikh/Ebla. Pp. 663–674 in Proceedings of the 6th International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East. 5 May — 10 May 2008, Sapienza Università di Roma (Vol. I), eds. P. Matthiae, F. Pinnock, L. Nigro and N. Marchetti. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. Da Ros, M., and Iamoni, M. 2003 The Bronze and Iron Age Pottery: a preliminary account. Akkadica, 124(2): 177–196.

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Macro- Vegetal Extern. Intern. Ceramic Extern. Intern. External Colour Internal Colour Firing group temper Surface Surface Tech. class Treatm. Treatm 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13

10 R 5/6 R 10 R 5/6 R 2.5 YR 6/6 LR 10 R 5/6 R 2.5 YR 6/6 LR 10 R 5/4 WR 7.5 YR 4/3 DG 10 R 5/6 R 10 R 5/6 R 2.5 YR 5/4 RB 5 YR 5/6 YR 2.5 YR 6/6 LR 10 R 5/6 R

10 R 5/6 R 10 R 5/6 R 2.5 YR 6/6 LR 2.5 YR 5/3 RB 10 YR 3/1 DG 2.5 YR 5/6 R 7.5 YR 4/1 DG 10 R 5/6 R 2.5 YR 5/3 RB 2.5 YR 5/4 RB 5 YR 5/6 YR 5 YR 7/4 P 10 R 5/6 R

H H H H H H H H H H H H H

5 8A 2A 1C ? 3A 3B 8B 1C 8A 1B 2A 8A

no no yes no ? no no no no no no no no

S S S S S S S S S S S S S

S S S S S S S S S S S S S

W W W W W W W W W W W W W

common common common common common cooking cooking common common common common common common

SM SM SM SM SM SM SM SM SM SM SM SM SM

SM SM SM SM SM SM SM SM SM SM SM SM SM

Dornemann, R. 1981 The LB Pottery Tradition at Tell Hadidi. Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 241: 29–47; 59. Duistermaat, K. 2008 The pots and potters of Assyria : technology and organisation of production, ceramic sequence and vessel function at Late Bronze Age Tell Sabi Abyad, Syria. PALMA Near Eastern archaeology : papers on archaeology of the Leiden Museums of antiquites. Turnhout: Brepols. Du Mesnil du Buisson, R. 1928 L’ancienne Qatna ou les ruines d’El-Mishrifé au N.-E. de Homs (Emèse) : deuxième campagne de fouilles (1927). Syria, 9(1): 6–24. Eidem, J. 2003 The Cuneiform Tablets. Akkadica, 124(2): 164–167. 2007 Notes on the Topography of Late Bronze Age Qatna. New Evidence from the “Lower City Palace” Tablets. Pp. 297–303 in Urban and Natural Landscapes of an ancient Syrian Capital. Settlement and Environment at Tell Mishrifeh/Qatna and in Central-Western Syria, ed. D. Morandi Bonacossi, SAQ 1. Udine: Forum. Feldman, M. H. 2006 Diplomacy by design. Luxury Arts and an “International Style” in the Ancient Near East, 1400–1200. Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press. Iamoni, M. 2012a The late MBA and LBA pottery horizons at Qatna. Innovation and conservation in the ceramic tradition of a regional capital and the implications for second millennium Syrian chronology, SAQ 2. Udine: Forum. 2012b Toggle pins of the Bronze Age at Qatna: a matter of style, function or fashion? Pp. 349–363 in LEGGO! Studies presented to Prof. Frederick Mario Fales on the Occasion of his 65th Birthday, eds. G. B. Lanfranchi, D. Morandi Bonacossi, C. Pappi and S. Ponchia. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag. 2014 Transitions in ceramics, a critical account and suggested approach: case-study through comparison of the EBA–MBA and MBA–LBA horizons at Qatna. Levant, 46(1): 4–26.

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2015a The Eastern Palace of Qatna and the Middle Bronze Age Architectural Tradition of Western Syria. Pp. 451–466 in Qatna and the Networks of Bronze Age Globalism, eds. P. Pfälzner and M. al-Maqdissi. Qatna Studien Supplementa. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag. 2015b Pottery production during the third and second millennium BC in Western Syria. The development of the ceramic technology as a result of the rise of Qatna as regional capital. Pp. 183–206 in Proceedings of the conference “The Distribution of technological Knowledge in the Production of Ancient Mediterranean Pottery.”, eds. W. Gauss, G. Gauss and C. Von Rueden. Athens: Verlag der Österreichischen Wissenschaften. Klengel, H. 1992 Syria 3000 to 300 B.C. A Handbook of Political History. Berlin: Akademie Verlag. Knappet, C., Kilikoglou, V., Steele, V. and Stern, B. 2005 The circulation and consumption of Red Lustrous Wheelmade ware: petrographic, chemical and residue analysis. Anatolian Studies, 55: 25–59. Kochavi, M. and Yadin, E. 2002 Typological analysis of the MB IIA Pottery from Aphek according to its Stratigraphic Provenance. Pp. 189–225 in The Middle Bronze Age in the Levant, ed. M. Bietak. Vienna: Verlag der Österreichen Akademie der Wissenschaften. Luciani, M. 2003 The Lower City of Qatna in the Late Bronze and Iron Ages: Operation K. Akkadica, 124(2): 144–163. 2006 Ivory at Qatna. Pp.  17–38 in Timelines. Studies in honour of Manfred Bietak, eds. E. Czerny, I. Hein, H. Hunger, D. Melman and A. Schwab. Orientalia Lovaniensa Analecta 149. Leuven: Peeters Publishers. Maritan, L., Mazzoli, C., Michielin, V., Molin, G., Morandi Bonacossi, D. and Luciani, M. 2005 Provenance and production technology of Bronze and Iron age pottery from Tell Mishrifeh/ Qatna (Syria). Archaeometry, 47(4): 723–744. Maritan, L., Mazzoli, C. and Speranza, F. 2007 Archaeometrical Study of Bronze and Iron Age Pottery from Tell Mishrifeh/Qatna and Archaeomagnetic Data. Pp. 207–216 in Urban and Natural Landscapes of an Ancient Syrian Capital. Settlement and Environment at Tell Mishrifeh/Qatna and in Central-Western Syria, ed. D. Morandi Bonacossi. SAQ 1. Udine: Forum. Martin, M. 2011 Egyptian-type Pottery in the Late Bronze Age Southern Levant. Vienna: Austrian Academy of Sciences Press. Martin, M.and Ben-Dov, R. 2007 Egyptian and Egyptian-Style Pottery at Tel Dan. Egypt and the Levant XVII: 191–203. McClellan, T. 1984–85  El-Qitar: Second Season of Excavations, 1983–1984. Abr-Nahrain 23: 39–72. Moran, L. 1992 The Amarna Letters. Baltimore : Johns Hopkins University Press. Morandi Bonacossi, D. 2008 Excavations on the Acropolis of Mishrifeh, Operation J. A New Early Bronze Age III–Iron Age III Sequence for Central Inner Syria. Part 1: Stratigraphy, Chronology and Architecture. Akkadica, 129(1): 55–127. 2015 The Lower City Palace at Qatna. Pp. 359–376 in Qatna and the Networks of Bronze Age Globalism, eds. P. Pfälzner and M. Al-Maqdissi. Qatna Studien Supplementa 2. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag. Morandi Bonacossi, D., Da Ros, M., Garna, G., Iamoni, M. and Merlino, M. 2009 The “Eastern Palace” and the Residential Architecture of Area T at Mishrifeh/Qatna. Mesopotamia, XLIV: 61–113.

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Nigro, L. 2000 Coordinating the MB I Pottery Horizon of Syria and Palestine. Pp. 1187–1212 in Proceedings of the 1st International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East, eds. A. Enea, L. Peyronel and F. Pinnock. Rome: Università degli Studi di Roma “La Sapienza”. 2002a The MB Pottery Horizon of Tell Mardikh/Ancient Ebla in a Chronological Perspective. Pp. 297– 328 in The Middle Bronze Age in the Levant, ed. M. Bietak. Vienna: Verlag der Österreischen Akademie der Wissenschaften. 2002b The Middle Bronze Age Pottery Horizon of Northern Inner Syria on the basis of the Stratified Assemblages of Ebla and Hama. Pp. 97–128 in Céramique de l’Âge du Bronze en Syrie I. La Syrie du Sud et la vallée de l’Oronte, eds. M. al-Maqdissi, V. Matoïan and C. Nicolle. BAH 161. Damascus: IFAPO. 2007 Towards a unified chronology of Syria and Palestine: the beginning of the Middle Bronze Age. Pp.  365–389 in From Relative Chronology to Absolute Chronology: The Second Millennium BC in Syria-Palestine, eds. P. Matthiae, L. Nigro, F. Pinnock and L. Peyronel. Rome: Bardi. 2009 I corredi vascolari delle tombe reali di Ebla e la cronologia ceramica della Siria interna nel Bronzo Medio. MSAE VIII. Rome. Oates, D., Oates, J., and McDonald, H. 1997 Excavations at Tell Brak. Vol. 1: The Mitanni and Old Babylonian periods. McDonald Institute Monographs. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Paoletti, V. 2011 Die keramischen Funde der Königsgruft von Qatna. Pp.  293–309 in ed. P. Pfälzner, Inter­ disziplinäre Studien zur Königsgruft von Qatna. Qatna Studien 1. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag. Peyronel, L. 2008 Area P. pp. 21–69 in Tell Tuqan. Excavations 2006–7, ed. F. Baffi. Lecce: Congedo Editore. Pinnock, F. 2005 La ceramica del Palazzo Settentrionale del Bronzo Medio II. MSAE VI. Rome. Schwartz, G. M., Curvers, H., Dunham, S. and Stuart, B. 2003 A Third-Millennium B.C. Elite Tomb and Other New Evidence from Tell Umm el-Marra, Syria. AJA, 107: pp. 325–361. Turri, L., 2015a Ivory, bone and antler inlay in Late Bronze Age Qatna. Pp. 297–310 in Qatna and the Networks of Bronze Age Globalism, eds. P. Pfälzner and M. Al-Maqdissi. Qatna Studien Supplementa 2. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag. 2015b “Vieni, lascia che ti dica di altre città”. Ambiente naturale, umano e politico della valle dell’Oronte nella Tarda Età del Bronzo. SAQ 3. Udine: Forum Editrice.

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Building on the Past: Gertrude Bell and the Transformation of Space in the Karadağ Mark Jackson The ancient volcano known as the Karadağ located 25 km NNW of Karaman in southern Anatolia dominates the southern part of the Konya plain. For nearly three thousand years, a series of structures each important in their own time has stood at Mahaletch the highest peak of the Karadağ. On the very summit of Mahaletch at about 2,271 m today is a modern Turkish communications building. Visible from a considerable distance, this post is situated right over the western end of a Byzantine ecclesiastical complex which in turn is located in close proximity to, and possibly also over, a cult place of pre-classical times. Studied in isolation these remains provide interest for specialists of particular periods, studied together they tell a rich and important story about the changing role of the mountain over long periods. We can question the extent to which buildings, co-located in significant places, but constructed at different times were related to and influenced by each other. Each new building phase has obscured and remodelled elements of what went before. These physical remains offer us an opportunity to consider an example of the way that the construction of new monuments transforms topographically distinct places. This paper will consider the Byzantine ecclesiastical buildings located on the mountain top at Mahaletch. It will question whether this Byzantine complex was constructed with intentional reference to the earlier cult site there and what its purpose may have been. Much of the evidence for this was collected by Gertrude Bell and William Ramsay who worked at Binbirkilise briefly in the first decade of the twentieth century. The Gertrude Bell Archive, given in 1926 to Newcastle University when it was Armstrong College Durham by Elsa Richmond Gertrude Bell’s half-sister, provides a rich resource for study. Her library of books and her papers and photographs have supported generations of academics and students of Byzantine and early Islamic archaeology both at Newcastle University and beyond, especially since the placement of most of the archive online during the late 1990s (Ritchie and Jackson 2015). Gertrude Bell’s interest in Binbirkilise was sparked during a journey that she made in 1905 from Syria to Constantinople during which she travelled along the Cilician coast visiting sites such as Kanlıdıvane, the Corycian Cave (Cennet ve Cehennam), Corycos (Kiz Kalesi) and Silifke (Bell 1906a-e, 1907). Her journey from the coast at Silifke to Karaman on the Konya plain took her over the Taurus, not as the main road goes today through the Göksu pass via Mut, and Alahan, or Dağpazarι, but via Kırobası. Bell made a detour to visit the Karadağ because it was famed for Binbirkilise (the Thousand and One Churches). Having spent several days there, she continued to Konya where by chance she met the New Testament scholar and Historical 239

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Geographer William Ramsay. The two of them discussed an inscription from the Karadağ published later that year by Ramsay (Ramsay 1905; 1906: 258–9); and they resolved to work there together in 1907. Between May and June 1907 they conducted an expedition to record the churches, forts, monasteries and houses on the Karadağ known as Binbirkilise, The Thousand and One Churches (Ramsay and Bell 1909). The main Byzantine settlement at Binbirkilise was at Madenşehir at the foot of the Karadağ. The other was a substantial complex of large, probably monastic, buildings or elite residences at Deǧle which was located on a promontory on the north side of the volcanic crater some way up the mountain. Ramsay and Bell also recorded many of the smaller church buildings and complexes located elsewhere on this and neighbouring mountains, especially those constructed high on the peaks. One of the most interesting of these churches was the Byzantine ecclesiastical complex planned by Bell at Mahaletch (Fig. 3). The lines of the walls on Bell’s plan can be made out on the satellite images in Google Earth but as is clearly visible from the satellite imagery a modern communications building was constructed over the western part of the area planned by Bell (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 239, Fig.198; Google Earth 2014). This recent development serves to illustrate how a building, in this case the modern installation, can be sited at a significant place without any reference, or indeed apparent concern, for what went before but can nevertheless, even inadvertently, impact upon it physically. By contrast, a building complex might directly reference earlier remains through its construction, as was the case for the Byzantine architects who seem to have taken into consideration the earlier pre-classical remains such as Ramsay and Bell discovered in 1907.

The Discovery of the Hieroglyphic Luwian Inscriptions at Mahaletch In June 1907 Sir William Ramsay, Lady Ramsay and Gertrude Bell climbed to the top of the Karadağ, to the peak which Bell called either Mahaletch or Mahlech. Bell records in her diary and in a letter for the 17th June that in addition to recording the Byzantine church, they had been working also at the “Hittite chamber” located nearby on the top of the mountain. The Karadağ and Kızıldağ inscriptions (Karadağ1–2 and Kızıldağ 1–3) belong to king Hartapus and his father Mursilis who bore the significant titles “Great King, Hero” (Hawkins 2000a: 429). They represent probably an early western group of indigenous Hieroglyphic inscriptions of the Iron Age, when the Neo-Assyrian kings accessed the southern part of the Anatolian plateau referred to as the land of Tabal via routes through the Taurus (Hawkins 2000a: 425). This western group of inscriptions, whose dating is controversial, provides some of the only archaeological, historical or epigraphic evidence for Tabal for the three centuries after the fall of the Hittite empire c. 1200–900 B.C., since, unlike the other Tabal inscriptions, it appears to date to earlier than the 8th century B.C. (Hawkins 2000a: 426, 429). The inscriptions have been well published recently and are not our concern here (Hawkins 2000a: 436–44), rather I wish to consider firstly the purpose of the Byzantine masonry which Ramsay and Bell cleared from the place where they were found. Ramsay and Bell recognized at the site in 1907 that the Byzantines had modified the area where the earlier Karadağ inscriptions were found. Their record, although somewhat patchy, may have some bearing on interpretation of the place as a whole. Ramsay notes, “In the rocks

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Figs. 1 and 2.  The chamber/passage at Mahaletch during excavation June 1907 (Newcastle University, Gertrude Bell Archive, G_93 and G_94).

that support the church on the north side is a passage, partly natural, partly artificial, now to some extent narrowed by walls of the Byzantine period. On the rock walls of this passage, perhaps formerly hidden by Byzantine building are two inscriptions in ancient hieroglyphics. . .” (1908: 159). A month earlier, Bell had made a plaster cast of the main inscription from Karadağ [Kara Dagh] (British Museum, Cast Nos., C.217; Bell, Diary, 19 May 1907; Hawkins 2000b: Plate 241), and nearby Kızıldağ [Kizil Dagh] (Cast Nos., C.216, C.215, C.214) which she donated to the British Museum in April 1908 (British Museum, ANE Correspondence 1908, q.v.  Bell 1 April, 6 April; Hawkins 2000b: Plates 236–237). Ramsay and Bell’s description of the site leaves some questions unanswered. One of the most intriguing is their suggestion that some of the masonry associated with the earlier inscriptions belonged not to the period of the hieroglyphic Luwian inscription but to modifications during the Byzantine period. With the help of workmen, Ramsay and Bell excavated this Byzantine masonry so their record of the process is important. The operation is recorded in two photographs of the men in action G_93 and G_94 (Figs. 1 and 2). Bell’s diary [17 June 1907] records, Sir W. [William Ramsay] and Lady R and I went to the top of Mahlech and cleared the Hittite chamber. It has Byzantine walls inside and a Byz gate to the W–apparently they turned it into some sort of a sanctuary. Rock cut steps to the N, perhaps the beginning of a Hittite altar. . . . He [Ramsay] dismisses the theory of a Hittite fort and thinks it was merely a High Place.

Bell wrote in The Thousand and one Churches, We cleared out the chamber W. of the Hittite inscriptions and found the masonry to belong to the Christian period. The rock on the N. side of the hill, E. of the chamber, forms an angle on the farther side of which the surface has been smoothed and a few Hittite characters inscribed on it. W. of the angle the rock has been cut away so as to form the S. wall of a short passage. The opposite wall of the passage is hewn out of a low ridge that crops out of the ground and

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Mark Jackson on the upper part of this ridge is the second inscription. The northern ridge ends in a pair of rock-cut steps (an altar?). In Christian times the rock walls were supplemented by masonry and the passage so formed was closed by a wall to the W. with a door in it (Fig. 212). The Christian building must have swept away all traces of older construction; of the Hittite shrine there remains only the rock-cut walls and the rock-cut steps. The latter had either been covered by the Christian wall or had broken the line of it. The Hittite passage had had the appearance of a large natural gateway; the Christian walls emphasised its character by prolonging the passage and setting a door at the end of it (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 255–56).

Ramsay wrote, The church on the summit of the Kara Dagh (p.241) seems to have been built on the site of an old Hittite High Place which was almost totally destroyed or covered up. The only remnant of the High Place is found on the N. side about 20 or 30 feet below the summit, where a narrow passage running E. to W. between rocks bears two inscriptions, one on each side, in the Hittite hieroglyphics. This passage was partly, if not wholly, lined with Byzantine masonry, which was perhaps intended to conceal the evidence of heathen worship and writing; but most of the masonry has fallen. The passage was entered by a Byzantine door E., and by openings, now free from masonry, on N. and E. On the N. wall is an inscription in one line of incised hieroglyphs: opposite on the S. wall is a short inscription in relief, four symbols between columns (Fig. 374 b and c). This latter . . . (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 505).

This hieroglyphic Luvian inscription would appear to have been part of the entrance way to an earlier cult building complex perhaps a shrine or sanctuary located probably beneath the ruins of the Byzantine church (Hawkins 1992: 268; 2000: 436). It survives because rather than destroy the inscription, the Byzantines seem to have employed masonry to cover it up. What is interesting is that they also seem to have built walls to monumentalize the space where the inscription was found. We might question why in the Christian period this earlier structure became the focus of such attention. Why for example had they sought not to destroy the inscription but to conceal it behind masonry walls forming a chamber with a doorway at the same place? We must suppose that Ramsay and Bell knew well the character of Byzantine masonry and were able to recognize it. By 17 June 1907, Bell had spent a month, describing, drawing, and photographing the churches and associated buildings at the Karadağ. Indeed Bell was primarily concerned with architectural remains; she was influenced by scholars at the time who often described their approaches as art history rather than archaeology, for them architectural style was important. One of her particular concerns when recording Byzantine buildings was to characterize the nature of the stonework. This was done to group the churches into types and to inform her interpretations about the chronology of the buildings. We can be fairly sure therefore from her identification that this was indeed Byzantine masonry and a Byzantine gateway that Ramsay and Bell found built into the chamber where the Luwian Hieroglyphic inscription was found. It seems important, therefore, that we should accept their interpretation that this earlier structure was indeed modified by the Byzantines. Their second interpretation surrounding the Luwian discovery was that the Byzantine construction removed what had existed before (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 256). And yet clearly the very obvious inscription, which might easily have been removed, if that had been what was thought necessary, was left undamaged.

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Fig.3. Plan Mahaletch (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 239, Fig. 198).

Although most of the earlier remains were “swept away” as Bell puts it (ibid.), the description also makes clear that there was a narrowing and lengthening of the passage through the addition of masonry to the rock-cut walls, and the adding of a door. From Bell’s description, this earlier “passage had the appearance of a large natural gateway; the Christian walls emphasised its character by prolonging the passage and setting a door at the end of it” (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 255–56). There seems, therefore, to have been both a deliberate embellishment of the earlier character of the building, by the construction of new walls and a doorway which

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suggests that the older space was not suppressed entirely beneath masonry, but was monumentalized and transformed. Ramsay and Bell’s description of this space both as a chamber but also as a passage would suggest that it was used as a Byzantine monumental entranceway.

The Byzantine Church Complex at Mahaletch There were, by the time Bell found and recorded it, multiple ruined but related Byzantine structures on the Mahaletch peak covering several phases. To the east was a church, cruciform in plan, which would have been topped with a dome. This building was extended to the west in a later phase with a narthex and subsequently the addition of an exo-narthex. A covered passageway (cryptoporticus) connected the north-west corner of the exo-narthex of the church to a second very small cruciform chapel, while a second longer passageway, built on a retaining wall, connected the south side of the narthex to a group of buildings located about 32m to the west of the main church. The buildings located to the west were not as well constructed as the church but consisted of a series of rooms covering an area of at least 15m x 20m, that is, a greater area than the church. These rooms would have enabled people to reside at the top of the mountain and to communicate with the church without going outside. Gertrude Bell described the situation to her stepmother Florence Bell, I found a roofed passage between the church and the monastery which somehow throws a queerly human ray of light on the poor monks up there, snowed up for 4 months of the year and creeping to their prayers along the narrow stone passage. (Bell, Letter, 17 June 1907)

As Bell noted, the corridors would have enabled people to move from the building to the west of the church, to the church itself and the chapel without venturing outside. This network of interrelated interior spaces, framed by the stone walls of the buildings, offered the potential for confinement and isolation at a place which was in other aspects very exposed. The church’s location commanded a view over a huge territory and would have been subject to all the elements from rain, sun and snow, to wind, thunder and lightning. Its elevation placed it high in the air away from the land where most people dwelt. The walls, therefore, would clearly have provided a practical barrier against the elements but they would also have helped to shape the community living there. In the space between the church and the annexe buildings to the north of the passageway was a vaulted cistern and another such building on the south side, both associated in the early 20th century at least with stone troughs for watering animals. South of the church, at a lower elevation is a small apsed building abutting a square chamber which may have been a tomb. To the south of this chamber was a cave, in which Bell found evidence for two burials (Bell, Diary, 18 May 1907). Although Bell’s published plan does not distinguish between phases of masonry, in fact her photographs, her field drawings and the descriptions that she and Ramsay made, reveal that the main building had at least four phases. Bell’s photographs G_75 and G_69 show that the arms of the cross predate the north and south walls of the church to their west (Royal Geographical Society, Bell notes 1907: 3/11).

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Fig. 4.  The chamber/ passage at Mahaletch during excavation June 1907, view to the west, with chapel in background (Newcastle University, Gertrude Bell Archive, G_92).

The first phase of the main building was the cruciform church. The second phase was the addition of a substantial narthex running the width of the building that was constructed onto the west side of the original cruciform structure presumably at the same time as the north and south walls were added. The narthex was oriented north-south with two transverse arches dividing it into three parts and the whole narthex roofed by a north-south barrel vault. The south side of the narthex provided access through a doorway to the north side of a long passage which communicated with a complex of buildings 32m to the west of the church. The third phase was a tripartite exo-narthex, which spanned the entire width of the building, and was built up against the west side of the narthex, (Ramsay 1909: 254). The west wall of

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Fig. 5.  The ‘Leo’ chapel at Mahaletch, view from the northeast (Newcastle University, Gertrude Bell Archive, G_87).

the exo-narthex was itself remodelled in antiquity in a fourth phase, when the original triplearched entrance built on double columns was modified so that the outer arches no longer existed and in their place there were stone walls fitted around the springing stones (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 241–242). The passage to the chapel located 4m to the north-west of the church allowed movement from the north wall of the exo-narthex to the east wall of the southern arm of the cruciform chapel. This was a memorial chapel perhaps to a certain Leo who is recorded to have been buried there by an inscription on the outside of the east wall (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 556). Ideally given the relatively good state of preservation of the buildings, the site would benefit from the checking of some of these details; a detailed buildings survey, for example, would be desirable. The plan published by Ramsay and Bell puts the chamber some 21m north of the church, but Bell’s photograph G_92 (Fig. 4) would appear to show the east end of the memorial chapel to Leo (compare G_087, Fig. 5) in the background behind the steps of the chamber. This would suggest that the chamber was due east of the small chapel and north of the main church.

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I think this would agree with Hawkins’ description but close examination on the ground is needed to establish whether Bell has the chamber correctly positioned or not.

St Michael Mahaletch, the name of the mountain, as recorded by Ramsay and Bell (1909) may suggest a former relationship, as they noted, to St Michael. Ramsay tentatively suggests two very fragmentary Byzantine inscriptions at Mahaletch that may also relate to the Archangel Michael but this is based on a very partial preservation of στρ which might be αρχιστρατηγος (i.e., the archistratgeos, commander of the hosts of angels, Michael) and an initial M located next to the fresco of a figure in black in the apse. It is noted that Michael also features (more clearly!) in an inscription and fresco in Church no 8, an octagonal church with cruciform projections at Madenşehir, the town at the foot of the mountain (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 538, no. 26). St. Michael has been the name connected with mountains all over Europe since the Medieval period (Bouet et al. 2007), and he became of considerable significance during the late Antique period in Asia Minor. Ideas about Michael imported to Asia Minor, Mango has argued, were fused with the ancient local cult of Cybele and Attis, who were associated with mountains and springs of water; they can also be connected to the cult of Men (Mango 1986: 61; Niewöhner et al. 2013: 109). Furthermore, exported to Asia Minor, “he [Michael] belongs squarely to the world of Judaism, and more to that of Jewish-Babylonian magic than to the Bible; which is why his original role in Christianity, a role condemned by the official Church, was that of healer and guardian against the occult powers of evil.” (Mango 1986: 61). As Mango and Ramsay have noted, angels were venerated in western Asia Minor by Jews, Christians and pagans. Paul warned the Colossians against angel worship (Colossians 2:18); it was also prohibited by canon 35 of the Council of Laodicea in Phrygia about AD363 and Theodoret’s commentary of the letter to the Colossians spoke against the worship of angels in Phrygia and Pisidia, Lycaonia and neighbouring regions. Michael is testified to by church dedications and by epigraphic evidence (Ramsay 1907: 477 and Mango 1986: 53–54). The Archangel Michael figures, for example, with Gabriel on the doorway between the nave and the narthex at the West Church at Alahan (Gough 1962: 131, fig. 2)). Mango (1991: 300) has proposed that Alahan was a healing shrine perhaps dedicated to the Archangel. A pre-Christian precedent can often be identified for places identified with St Michael (Niewöhner et al. 2013). Healing centres such as the important pilgrimage centre at Germia (Yürme) in Galatia and the greatest Byzantine cult centre of St. Michael at Colossai were closely connected with water (Mango 1986: 53; Niewöhner et al. 2013). The irregular plan of the West Church at Alahan which suggests that the building was designed carefully to fit the existing topography, may be interpreted as evidence that the building was referencing an earlier cult place (Gough 1962: 179–180). This idea is reinforced by the carved reliefs of the Archangels Gabriel and Michael apparently “trampling down the enemies of Christ” (Gough 1962: 180). Ramsay proposed that, under threat from the Arab raids in the 7th to 9th centuries, the local people venerated Michael, commander of the heavenly hosts, and other saints on the mountain tops of the Karadağ as part of their local defence strategy (Ramsay 1908: 158), but Michael was also venerated in western Asia Minor primarily as a wonderworker. If indeed the

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mountain was dedicated to him as elsewhere then his shrine at the mountain might have been also connected with healing. There are cisterns at Mahaletch, but unsurprisingly so high up there is no spring, and there remains Michael’s connection with mountains. In speculating why these buildings might have been used here, we might wonder whether they were visited by people from the surrounding area. It is possible that the buildings next to the church at Mahaletch were for accommodation not just for those who were directly connected to the church but also for pilgrims or for the sick who journeyed up the mountain. Incubation was a common feature of Byzantine healing sanctuaries, as at the Michaelion in Constantinople, where the sick would sleep at the sanctuary of St Michael, in the hope of a manifestation of the heavenly physician. As Niewöhner et al. have recently argued for Germia, the distinctive topography of certain ‘definite places’ against the uniformity of much of the plateau provides some sites an enduring significance (Niewöhner et al. 2013: 130). Ramsay and Bell recognized that the mountains of the central Anatolian plateau seem to have served to give narrative to the people of central Anatolia over many centuries.

High Places As Bell demonstrated, the placement of churches on high peaks is a regular feature of the Byzantine period in southern Anatolia. She noted that cruciform churches very similar to that at Mahaletch were located at the summits of three of the other highest mountains in the region notably: at Hasan Dağı located 125km to the north-east of the Karadağ; at Kurshundju on the Karacadağ some 70km to the north and at Hayyat on the Ali Sumas Dağı above Kilistra ca. 90 km to the north-west. The latter two are both associated with complexes of rooms which developed around them (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 348–351). Part of one of the large complexes at Değle on the high promontory stretching out north from the Karadağ includes a small church, no. 44, a cruciform structure with a chamber appended in a similar way, which was interpreted as a tomb (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 225). It is likely that these cruciform structures embellished the tombs of notable people and subsequently became the foci of further building and religious activity including pilgrimage (Bell, Diary, 18 May 1907). The tradition of building churches on the highest peaks in southern Anatolian is replicated at Binbirkilise where several of the other hilltops of the Karadağ and its immediate vicinity are topped with churches. Mostly, these were not entirely isolated but discovered with evidence for associated buildings (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 294). Ruins spread across the hilltop at Madendağ, immediately to the west of Madenşehir, include a small church with nave, aisles and an apse (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 259–268), and two churches were reported by Bell, at Tchet Dagh [sic] (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 268). A further church and chapel with associated buildings lay on the peak on the Karadağ called Asamadi to the east of Mahaletch. Here, there was a cistern in the courtyard outside the church and below the ridge on which the buildings were constructed there was a spring (Ramsay and Bell 256–259). Several scholars have criticized Bell and other early travellers for providing monastic interpretations of sites all too liberally (Hill 1994; Kalas 2004). Bell had for example interpreted the less well constructed complex of rooms to the West of the church at Mahaletch as monastic (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 254), but certainly, these buildings would suggest that there were small communities of people living alongside the churches.

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The outlying hills around the Karadağ also often feature churches near their summits. Somewhat confusingly, there are at least three outlying peaks near the Karadağ called Kızıldağ: one located above the village of Dinek to the east of the Karadağ which was fortified; a second lies to the east of Madenşehir, and the third is the hill 12km to the north-west of the Karadağ on which Ramsay and Bell discovered Hieroglyphic Luwian inscriptions (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 279; Hawkins 2000a: 433). It worthy of note that there is a small cruciform chapel on the Kızıldağ, located immediately east of Madenşehir (Ramsay and Bell 1909: 268), but there is no sign of a church on the Kızıldağ with the earlier inscriptions. In the light of all these examples of the siting of churches on hill tops and high places, it is interesting that there is no evidence for a Byzantine church on the Kızıldağ with its obvious pre-classical remains. Rojas and Sergueenkova (2014) have recently discussed the monument at Kızıldağ and its setting as part of their paper on Greek, Roman and Byzantine interaction with Hittite monuments in Anatolia where they show that the throne at Kızıldağ had a complex biography that may have included ritual performance at the time of a Greek-speaking Craterus (2014: 143–147). The themes of performance and the developing biographies of space are relevant too for the monuments on the Karadağ. Thus it is interesting that it seems to be at Karadağ that the earlier inscription was adapted into a later building. In view of the evidence at both the Karadağ and Kızıldağ, the Byzantines seem not to have sought to destroy or remove evidence of the earlier rock-inscriptions. The number of churches, perhaps used as memorial chapels on the highest points in the landscape, demonstrates that the Byzantines did place significance on the high mountains. The evidence from Mahaletch may be taken to suggest that the earlier shrine was incorporated and transformed as part of the wider church complex. Thus although the placement of the churches is clearly a Byzantine phenomenon it would appear that it is not completely without reference to the past. Ramsay was interested in the topographical setting of the monuments, so he saw the choice of mountain top locations of several churches, such as Mahaletch, as the continuity into the Byzantine period of an ancient understanding of place visible in the pre-classical inscriptions of the Karadağ (Ramsay 1909: 19). Ramsay’s colleague D.G. Hogarth with whom Ramsay had travelled when he was preparing his volume The Historical Geography of Asia Minor (Ramsay 1890: 6) had worked in 1900 with Arthur Evans at peak sanctuaries and caves on Crete. Ramsay and Bell’s work at Mahalatch in 1907, therefore, reflects an established interest in peak sanctuaries and caves of the time (Bradley 2000: 18–20; 97–103). We can, however, confidently infer from the multitude of churches (especially those on the peaks) that the whole mountain was regarded with veneration as having a sacred character; and we may also regard it as certain that this awe was an inheritance from ancient Anatolian religious feeling. The Christians considered the Black Mountain as holy, because their forefathers for centuries had thought so. What, then, was the origin and cause of this belief? There seems no room for doubt as to the answer. During many years of study I have relied always on the principle that the pagan religious centres were found in places where the Divine power, which resided specially in the bosom of the earth, the Great Mother of all, was revealed to men by natural phenomena of an impressive kind, such as hot springs, valuable minerals or other mysterious exhibitions of the life and riches of the underworld. The sacredness of the Kara Dagh is derived from the great holes that lead down into the depths of the

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Thus Ramsay likened the craters at the foot of the Karadağ, after which the village at Madenşehir (mine town) was named, to the sinkholes at Cennet ve Cehennem in Cilicia visited in 1905 by Bell. Although the Maden at the Karadaǧ have little real resemblance to the sink holes of the Cilician coast, it is clear from churches such as the Church of Mary, Cennet ve Cehennem, which Bell had visited on her 1905 journey, that the Byzantines did build churches at a range of striking places in the topography which had often captured the attention of earlier communities. Ramsay is very concerned to consider the stories and ideas conjured up in the minds of the ancients that were bound up in these extraordinary places. While we might not agree with all Ramsay’s interpretations, it would seem that the Byzantines were struck by the mountains around them and may have been influenced by long-standing views about the significance of these features in their landscape. The narratives, buildings and places which survived from preChristian times must have been negotiated, appropriated and transformed in the new Christian context, but we cannot assume direct continuation. Bradley has contextualized Arthur Evans’ work on Crete at the turn of the 20th century within a transition point in Aegean archaeology “from a literary and philological pursuit into a discipline whose evidence was collected in the field” (Bradley 2000: 97). Likewise for Ramsay, Topography is the foundation of history. No one who has familiarized himself with Attic history in books and has afterwards ascended Pentelicus and seen that history spread forth before him in the valleys and mountains and sea that have moulded it will ever disbelieve in the value of topography as an aid to history. . . . If we want to understand the Ancients, especially the Greeks, we must breathe the same air as they did and saturate ourselves with the same scenery and the same nature that wrought upon them. For this end correct topography is a necessary though humble servant. (Ramsay 1890: 51).

We see at Mahaletch, Ramsay’s desire to place both the hieroglyphic inscription and the Byzantine ecclesiastical buildings into a long-term topographical and historical context. His appreciation of the depth of time in the landscape context and the interconnected nature of its features is important and a contribution to The Thousand and One Churches that was rather neglected by Byzantine archaeologists of the 20th century who tended to follow Bell’s more typological approach to buildings without affording much interpretation of their context. In discussing the icon stands and outlying churches of Sphakia, Greece, Lucia Nixon, has emphasized the way in which there is intimate knowledge of the landscape demonstrated by the naming of places by rural people. Drawing on the work of Gosden and Lock 1998, she has further shown how the built features in the landscape can be considered a manifestation of social relationships maintained though both physical effort and rhetoric (Nixon 2006: 104–105). The physical effort of maintaining the church buildings on the peaks over at least four building sequences in the Karadağ and perpetuating a presence at these buildings, as well metaphysical work in the form of prayer and church services, would have been an important part of perpetuating social memory and giving narrative to places. The burial of people and the construction of memorial chapels in southern Anatolia may be part of this process as particular people form part of this narrative. The performance of activities in and around the buildings and to and

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from the buildings is an essential part of providing links between the places with their ancient stones and stories and the present (Nixon 2006: 101). Kalas has suggested that in Cappadocia chapels took on a variety of roles not only ceremonial but also as landscape markers that defined settlement space (Kalas 2009: 88). Ousterhout has considered the ways in which churches in Cappadocia as places of burial served a role in the lives of the living through their commemoration of the dead at funerary chapels (Ousterhout 2010). The inscriptions and tombs which survive at Mahaletch help us to see that there was a commemoration of people buried on these mountains. By being associated with the memory of the named, these places would have gathered additional significance through the stories associated with the person. It would seem that initially these churches may have been memorial chapels which would have served to link a visible place in the landscape to the memory of particular people. These isolated churches and chapels are unlikely to have been abandoned for most of the year, for their number over such a large area suggests that they were employed as part of widely held practice. At Maheletch there is evidence for other burials around the church. There is also evidence at other sites, as we have seen at Maheletch, that certain of these churches have several phases showing long periods of use. They are frequently subject to later phases and associated with other buildings that would have been inhabited by a community. There is the strong possibility in view of their visibility that these structures were not simply for ascetic monks, but that these places took on a number of roles for the wider populous, including acting as places of pilgrimage. In addition to the regular cycle of daily and weekly prayers we can assume that there would have been festival days when the buildings would have been visited by those making journeys from local and regional sites. These places would thus have helped to structure time. At festival days we might imagine visitors coming to these sites perhaps in procession. As well as during the day, such events could also have taken place perhaps at night with lights used not only to illuminate the buildings but also pathways through the landscape. The vaulted passageways may be explained in part, as Bell notes (1909: 254), by the presence of snow on the mountain top for up to four months each year, but once created, this internal system of passageways would have created an internal environment which would very much have impacted the experience of anyone at the site. There was the possibility of moving between the various parts of this complex without venturing outside. Such architecture would afford particular experiences of place. The enclosed interior space seems to contrast markedly with the extensive views over the region afforded by the location of the buildings. Space is also defined in other passageways intimately connected to churches at pilgrimage sites, for example at Gemile Ada, an island off the coast of Lycia. There, pilgrims walked in tunnels on their approach to the sacred site (Asano 2010: 27). The architecture of such cryptoportici served to afford a particular experience of place for visitors as they were channelled between particular parts of the site. A similar device is employed at Meryemlik (St. Thecla’s), near Silifke ( Jackson 1999: 77–81). At Mahaletch the experience of the churches may have been defined in part by the monumentalized passage with its gateway, as excavated by Ramsay and Bell, and by the two cryptoportici. If visitors were permitted into these parts of this building complex they would have been entering distinctly unusual settings. High mountains make a very visible impression on the landscape and throughout history they seem to have been the focus of attention as people sought to give narrative to the places

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around them. The monuments built on them often served multiple roles at the same time. It is tempting to think that the small complex of rooms located to the west of the site, was not simply the residence of monks who lived a life on show, but, at the same time isolated, from the surrounding population, but rather that the building was integrated into the lives of others in the settlements elsewhere on the Karadağ by being in part a place of sanctuary at times of need. The significance of monuments on these mountains was in part because of their position isolated from settlements, while they also served as a continual visible reminder communicating to people in the region since they were enduring aspects of daily existence. The Byzantine ideas about the mountains may have had precedents in past pagan ideas, but they developed and were transformed constantly as the various phases of the architecture make clear. Their role as places of burial in the Byzantine period helped to foster collective memory and to locate the mountains into a narrative biography of the landscape by claiming and naming of the peaks. Stories connected people with their landscape and appreciation of its past; they would have been perpetuated by various activities including pilgrimage journeys to the site, where the reality of earlier encounters with the place was monumentalized in stone.

References Asano, K. 2010 The Island of St. Nicholas Excavation and Survey of the gemiler Island Area, Lycia, Turkey. Osaka: Osaka University Press. Bell, G.L. 1906a Notes on a Journey through Cilicia and Lycaonia. Revue Archéologique 7: 1–29. 1906b Notes on a Journey through Cilicia and Lycaonia. Revue Archéologique 7: 385–414. 1906c Notes on a Journey through Cilicia and Lycaonia. Revue Archéologique 8: 7–36. 1906d Notes on a Journey through Cilicia and Lycaonia. Revue Archéologique 8: 225–52. 1906e Notes on a Journey through Cilicia and Lycaonia. Revue Archéologique 8: 390–401. 1907 Notes on a Journey through Cilicia and Lycaonia. Revue Archéologique 9: 18–30. Bouet, P., Otranto, G. and Vauchez, A. 2007 Culte et sanctuaires de saint Michel dans l’Europe medieval. Bari: Edipuglia. Bradley, R. 2000 An Archaeology of Natural Places. London: Routledge. Gough 1962 The Church of the Evangelists at Alahan: A Preliminary Report. Anatolian Studies 12: 173–184. Hawkins, J. D. 1992 The Inscriptions of the Kızıldağ and the karadağ in Light of the Yalburt Inscription. Pp. 255– 275 in Hittite and Other Anatolian and Near Eastern Studies in Honour of Sedat Alp, ed. H. Otten, G. Akurgal, and A. Süel. Ankara: Türk Tarih Kurumu. 2000a Corpus of Hieroglyphic Luwian Inscriptions. Volume I. Inscriptions of the Iron Age. Part 2: Text. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. 2000b Corpus of Hieroglyphic Luwian Inscriptions. Volume I, Part 3: Plates. Inscriptions of the Iron Age. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. Hill, S. 1994 When is a monastery not a monastery? Pp. 137–145 in The Theotokos Evergetis and eleventh-century monasticism, eds. M. Mullett and A. Kirby. Belfast Byzantine Texts and Translations, 6.1. Belfast: Belfast Byzantine Enterprises.

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Jackson, M. 1999 A Pilgrimage Experience at Sacred Sites in Late Antique Anatolia. Pp. 72–85 in TRAC 98: Proceedings of the Eighth Annual Theoretical Roman Archaeology Conference, ed. P. Baker, C. Forcey, S. Jundi, and R. Witcher. Oxford: Oxbow. Kalas, V. 2004 Early Explorations of Cappadocia and the Monastic Myth. Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 28: 101–119. 2009 Sacred Boundaries and Protective Borders: Outlying Chapels of Middle Byzantine Settlements in Cappadocia. Pp. 79–91. in Sacred Landscapes in Anatolia and Neighboring Regions. Ed. C. Gates, J. Morin and T. Zimmermann. Oxford: Archaeopress. Mango, C. 1986 St. Michael and Attis. Deltion ChAE 12. In the centenary of Christian Archaeological Society (1884– 1984), 39–62. 1991 Germia: A Postscript. Jahrbuch des Österreichischen Byzantinistik 41: 297–300. Niewöhner, P., Dikilitaş, G., Erkul, E., Giese, S., et al. 2003 Bronze Age höyüks, Iron Age Hilltop Forts, Roman poleis, and Byzantine Pilgrimage in Germia and Its Vicinity: “Connectivity” and a Lack of Definite “Places” on the Central Anatolian High Plateau. Anatolian Studies 63: 97–136. Nixon, L. 2006 Making an Landscape Sacred. Outlying Churches and Icon Stands in Sphakia, Southwestern Crete. Oxford: Oxbow. Ousterhout, R. 2010 Remembering the dead in Byzantine Cappadocia: the architectural setting for commemoration. Pp. 87–98 in Architecture of Byzantium and Kievan Rus from the 9th to the 12th centuries, ed. D. D. Ëlshin and G. Érmitazh. St. Petersburg: The State Hermitage Publishers. Ramsay, W. M. 1890 The Historical Geography of Asia Minor. London: John Murray. 1905 The Thousand and One Churches in Lycaonia. The Athenaeum 4077, 843–845. 1906 Studies in the History and Art of the Eastern Provinces of the Roman Empire. Aberdeen: University of Aberdeen. 1907 The Church in the Roman Empire Before A.D. 170. London: Hodder and Stoughton. 1908 Luke the Physician and other studies in the history of religion. London: Hodder and Stoughton. Ramsay, W.M. and Bell, G. L. 1909 The Thousand and One Churches. London: Hodder and Stoughton. Ritchie, L, and Jackson, M. 2015 The Gertrude Bell Archive at Newcastle University. Pp. 41–42 in The Extraordinary Gertude Bell, ed. M. Jackson and A. Parkin. Newcastle upon Tyne: Tyne Bridge Publishing. Rojas, F., and Sergueenkova, V. 2014 Traces of Tarhuntas: Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Interaction with Hittite Monuments. Journal of Mediterranean Archaeology 27.2 : 135–160. Rossner, E.P. 1988 Die hethitischen Felsreliefs in der Türkei. Ein archäologischer Reiseführer. München: Selbstverlag.

Archive Sources British Museum, ANE Correspondence 1908, available at http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details.aspx?objectId=1659833&partId=1&searchText=karadag&p age=1

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Newcastle University, Robinson Library, Gertrude Bell Letters Available at http://www.gerty.ncl.ac.uk/ letters.php Newcastle University, Robinson Library, Gertrude Bell Diaries Available at http://www.gerty.ncl.ac.uk/ diaries.php Royal Geographical Society, Bell field notes 1907, Royal Geographical Society, GB 0402 GLB.

Studies in the Lexicon of Neo-Aramaic Geoffrey Khan In this paper I bring together a number of aspects of the lexicon of the North-Eastern Neo-Aramaic (NENA) dialects that I have documented in my fieldwork. Until the beginning of the 20th century the NENA dialects were spoken by Christian and Jewish communities in northern Iraq, south-eastern Turkey and western Iran. In the course of the 20th century many of the NENA-speaking communities underwent upheavals, which resulted in the displacement of all the Jewish and many of the Christian communities from the region. As a result many of the NENA dialects are now highly endangered (Khan 2007). These vernacular dialects are not direct descendants of the attested literary forms of Aramaic but have deep historical roots in the region, which are likely to extend back into antiquity. This is shown, for example, by the survival of a number of Akkadian words in the dialects that are not found in the lexicon of literary Aramaic. The paper is divided into three main sections. In section 1 I discuss the various ways in which the meaning of native Aramaic words has developed. In section 2 I list some words that are of Akkadian origin. In section 3 I examine a number of features relating to loanwords and calques.

1.  The Semantic Development of Lexemes of Aramaic Origin Many lexical items of Aramaic origin in the NENA dialects have a meaning that corresponds directly to the meaning of their cognates in earlier forms of literary Aramaic. Several items, however, have undergone a semantic development from the meaning that was expressed by their literary cognates. It must be borne in mind, as remarked above, that the NENA dialects are not direct descendants of the classical Aramaic dialects and so some of the differences in meaning may have already existed in proto-NENA many centuries ago. It is, nevertheless, of interest to examine the types of semantic differences from the classical forms of the language that are exhibited by some of the lexical items in the dialect. In what follows the majority of examples are taken from the Christian dialects of Qaraqosh and Barwar, which are spoken in northern Iraq. 1 These exhibit a number of differences in their lexicon. Occasional reference will be made to other NENA dialects. Lexical items in the NENA dialects sometimes exhibit a meaning that is more specific than that of their cognates in earlier Aramaic such as Syriac. In such cases, the basic meaning of the dialectal word is subsumed by the more general basic meaning of the Syriac word. This often arises since another lexical item is used in the dialect with a related meaning. The word ʾarxe (Barwar)/ʾarxəl (Qaraqosh), for example, denotes specifically a ‘water-mill’, whereas the cognate in Syriac raḥyā refers to a ‘mill’ in general, including a hand-mill. The 1.  The sources of the examples are Khan (2002) and Khan (2008).

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reason for the narrowing of the meaning range in the dialects is likely to be the existence of another lexical item that denotes specifically a ‘hand-mill’, viz. garosta (Barwar)/garusta (Qaraqosh). The semantic range of the Syriac singular form raḥyā, moreover, includes also the sense of ‘millstone,’ which is a component of the mill, whereas the dialectal words ʾarxe/ʾarxəl refer only to the mill as a whole. A ‘millstone’ in the dialects is expressed differently, viz. by the word pənxa in Barwar and the phrase kipəd ʾarxəl ‘stone of the mill’ in Qaraqosh. The Syriac noun tarʿā denotes a door or gate in general, whereas the cognate tarʾa in Qaraqosh is generally used to refer only to an internal door in a house. The dialect uses a different word to refer to a front door or gate, viz. bəlla, which is likely to be derived ultimately from Akkadian abullu (see below). The noun ʾəspa n.m. (pl. ʾəspe) ‘loan’ in Barwar is related to the Syriac root yzp ‘to borrow’. Whereas the Syriac root is used to refer to borrowing in general, the form ʾəspa is used only to denote borrowing in kind, in most cases consumable items of food, e.g., šqil-li xəṭṭe b-ʾəspa ‘I borrowed wheat’. The act of borrowing money must be expressed by a form of the root dyn, e.g., mudyən-ni zuze ṭla-Gwirgis ‘I caused money to be owed to Gwirgis (= I borrowed money from Gwirgis)’. The cognate of Syriac saʿrā ‘hair’ (in general) is səʾra (Qaraqosh)/seṛa (Barwar), but the dialectal words are restricted in sense to ‘goat’s hair’. Other words are used to refer to hair in general, viz. kosa (Qaraqosh)/kawsa (Barwar), məʾsə (Qaraqosh)/məzze (Barwar). According to the Syriac dictionaries the nouns ʿarbālā and meḥḥalṯā (variant maḥḥoltā) both mean ‘sieve’. The reflexes of these words in Barwar have a more specific meaning, in that they denote sieves with different sizes of hole, viz. ʾərbala ‘sieve with medium sized holes’ and mxilta ‘sieve with small holes (for flour)’. The adjective šammīnā in Syriac has a range of meaning including the senses of ‘physically fat’ and ‘fertile’, e.g., ʿānā šammīnāṯā ‘fat sheep’, ʾarʿā šammīnā ‘fertile land’. In Barwar the word šamina is restricted to the more abstract sense of ‘fertile’, e.g., ʾăra šaminta ‘fertile land’. The narrowing of the semantic range of the adjective in the dialect has arisen due to the existence of another adjective ṭrisa, which is used to express the sense of physically fat, e.g., ʾərwe ṭrise ‘fat sheep’. In Qaraqosh the verb krw has the specific meaning of ‘to plough the first set of furrows in one direction’, in contrast to the ploughing of the second set of furrows in the return direction, which is denoted by the verb tny. The cognate of krw in Classical Syriac krb denotes, by contrast, ‘ploughing’ in general. In Qaraqosh, the generic sense of ‘ploughing’ is expressed by the root rðy. The verb xll II (paʿʿel) ‘to wash’ is more restricted in usage in the dialects than its Syriac cognate ḥallel. The dialectal verb xll II (paʿʿel) is used to express the washing of individual parts of the body (such as hands, feet etc.) and various objects but not clothes. The Syriac verb, by contrast, is used to express also the washing of clothes. In the dialects another verb is used to express specifically the washing of clothes, viz. msy. To wash oneself by covering the body in water, in a bath or a shower, is expressed by other verbs, viz. sxy (Qaraqosh) and xyp (Barwar). Several verbs in Barwar that are restricted in their usage to activities relating to animals had a more general application in Syriac. The Syriac verb ḥsl, for example, was used to express ‘weaning’ both of animals and of humans, whereas the cognate form xsl in Barwar is used only

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to denote the weaning of animals. The weaning of humans is expressed in Barwar by phrases such as qṭʾ mən-mămoṣe ‘to cut off from sucking’ or qṭʾ mən xəlya ‘to cut off from milk’. The Syriac verb yld ‘to give birth’ was used in relation to all living creatures, humans and animals, including the laying of eggs. The reflex of this in Barwar yðl , however, is used only in relation to the birth of animals and the laying of eggs. The birth of humans is expressed by forms of the verb bry. The verb dwṛ in Barwar is used to denote specifically the dwelling of sheep in a rest area during the summer. This appears to be the reflex of the verb dwr in Syriac and other literary Aramaic dialects, which has the generic sense of ‘to dwell’. In other cases, by contrast, a dialect word has a meaning that is wider than that of the Syriac cognate and subsumes it. This has often arisen as a result of additions or losses in related areas of the lexicon. The semantic range of the verb xzy in Barwar and Qaraqosh, for example, includes both the sense of ‘to see’ and ‘to find’, whereas the cognate in Syriac ḥzy denotes only ‘to see’. This has arisen, no doubt, due to the loss of the Syriac verb ʾeškaḥ ‘to find’ in these dialects. The Qaraqosh dialect, moreover, uses the Arabic loanword qšʾ to denote specifically ‘to see’. The basic meaning of the verb ṭʿn in Qaraqosh includes both the sense of ‘to carry’ and ‘to pick up’. The cognate in Syriac, on the other hand, is restricted to the sense of ‘to carry’, whereas the sense of ‘picking up’ is expressed by other lexical items, such as the ʾap̄ʿel of rym, which has been lost in the dialect. The verb dry is used in the Qaraqosh and Barwar as a general word for ‘to put’, whereas the cognate verb dry in Syriac has the sense of ‘to sprinkle, scatter’. It appears that the expression of the transference of location that was a semantic component of the Syriac verb became the dominant feature and the verb came to be used more generally without being associated with a specific manner of action. The specific action of ‘scattering’ is now expressed by other verbs, such as bzq (Qaraqosh/Barwar), bðq (Barwar) or byz (Qaraqosh). The verb sym, the cognate of which in Syriac is a general verb ‘to put’, has come to be restricted in the dialects to the sense of ‘to ordain (a priest)’ in stem I (pəʿal) and to the fixed collocation with the object bāl (Qaraqosh)/bala (Barwar) ‘mind’ with the sense of ‘to pay attention’ in stem III (ʾap̄ʿel). The verb qṭl is used in Qaraqosh not only in the sense of ‘to kill’ but also in the sense of ‘to beat up’ without necessarily killing the victim. This broader semantic range may have arisen due to the fact that a metaphorical usage of the word has come to be included in its basic meaning. The basic meaning of the adjective xriwa in Qaraqosh includes both the sense of physically ‘destroyed’ and also the general sense of ‘corrupt’ or ‘bad.’ The basic meaning of the cognate root in Syriac ḥrb, however, is restricted to the sense of ‘to be desolate, waste, dried up’. In some cases the shift in meaning involves an extension of control by the subject of a verb, i.e., an increase in transitivity. The verb dbq in Syriac, for example, means ‘to stick to, to adhere’ whereas the derivative of this in Barwar dwq denotes the activity of ‘holding’ or ‘keeping’, which typically involves greater control over the object referent. This is reflected by the fact that the dialectal verb dwq ‘to hold, to keep’ takes a direct object, whereas the Syriac verb dbq ‘to adhere’ is connected to its complement by a preposition b- or l-. The verb ṭʿy in Syriac has the sense of ‘to wander, to go astray’, whereas the reflex of this in Barwar ṭy normally has the more purposive sense of ‘to search for’, in which the subject has greater control over the action.

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A further type of semantic change is where the basic meaning of the dialectal word does not directly subsume nor is subsumed by the basic Syriac meaning but rather is associated with some aspect of the contextual usage of the Syriac cognate. This is a broad category that includes various types of development, some examples of which are the following. In Barwar the word ʾumra denotes ‘a church’. This is the reflex of Syriac ʿumrā, which included the semantic range ‘life, way of life, monastic life, monastery’. The sense of ‘church’, i.e. a place of worship, is clearly associated with ‘monastic life’ and ‘monastery’. In the dialect, however, the word ʾumra is no longer used in the sense of ‘monastery’, which is expressed rather by the noun dɛra. The word səmmala in Barwar denotes a ‘small bundle of grass or produce’. It is the reflex of the Syriac word semmālā ‘left, left hand’. The association of ‘small bundle’ with the ‘left hand’ was that during harvesting people typically held a tool such as a sickle (magla) in the right hand and collected the produce in the left. The sense of ‘left hand’ is now expressed in the dialect by the Kurdish loanword čappe. The word xəgga in Barwar and Qaraqosh refers to a type of dance that is associated with a festivity, whereas the Classical Syriac cognate ḥaggā denotes simply ‘festivity or feast.’ The noun šəxda in Barwar has the sense of ‘good news’, whereas its Syriac cognate šuḥdā means ‘bribe’ or ‘gift’. The semantic association is the transitional meaning of ‘gift for the (good) news of arrival’, which is attested in some NENA dialects (Maclean 1901: 303). The noun xusɛra ‘dew’ in Barwar appears to be historically related to the Syriac root ḥsr ‘to decrease, to diminish’. The semantic association evidently is that dew typically diminishes and evaporates. The Syriac root ḥsr has not survived as a verb in the dialect, which uses rather the verb bṣr to express the sense of ‘to diminish’. In Qaraqosh the words ṣapra and ramša, which are the dialectal reflexes of the Classical Syriac words ṣap̄rā and ramšā ‘evening’, are restricted in the dialect to the sense of morning and evening prayer respectively. These activities were originally only contextually associated with the morning and evening, but subsequently became the core meanings of the words. The purely temporal expressions of morning and evening have been replaced in the dialect by other words, viz. m-xuška ‘in the morning’, qadamta ‘in the early morning’, b-ramšə (a doublet of ramša) ‘in the evening’, ʿaṣriyyə ‘evening’. The word ṣalma in Qaraqosh has the sense of ‘face’, whereas its cognate in Syriac means ‘image, figure, form’. Presumably the development here arose from the fact that the face is typically the most conspicuous and characteristic feature of a human figure. One could perhaps compare this to the background of Italian viso ‘face’ (= French/English visage), which is derived from Latin visus ‘appearance’. The adjective ḥaziqa in Qaraqosh means ‘strong’ and the verb ḥzq in stem III (ʾap̄ʿel) has the sense of ‘to strengthen’, whereas the cognate root in Syriac has the sense of ‘girding onto the body.’ The meaning of the root in the dialect appears to have arisen from the fact that the Syriac verb is often used in the context of strengthening oneself by girding oneself with weapons. A parallel semantic development no doubt lies behind the Hebrew cognate ḥāzāq ‘strong’. The adjective xlima in both Qaraqosh and Barwar means ‘(physically) thick’, whereas Syriac ḥlīmā denoted ‘sound, firm, strong’ in both a physical and spiritual sense. The feature of ‘thickness’, which is typically associated with an object that is physically robust, has become the basic meaning of the word.

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The verb ṭwʾ in Qaraqosh denotes ‘to sleep’, whereas the basic meaning of the Syriac cognate ṭbʿ is ‘to sink’. In Syriac the verb is sometimes used in the context of ‘sinking into a deep sleep’, e.g., ṭḇīʿ b-šenṯā ‘sunk in sleep’ (Payne Smith and Payne Smith 1903: 166). The action of ‘sinking’ is expressed in the dialect by another root, viz. ṭmš. As already remarked, the verb rðy in Qaraqosh means ‘to plough’. The basic meaning of the Syriac cognate, however, is ‘to move along, to flow’ or in the causative ʾap̄ʿel ‘to lead.’ The dialectal meaning presumably arose either due to the association of ploughing with the flowing of the plough across the field or, more likely, with the leading of draught animals. The action of leading animals in general is now expressed in the dialect by the verb rxš III (ʾap̄ʿel) and this, no doubt, facilitated the development of the specific meaning of rðy. A variety of roots are used aross the NENA dialects to express the general movement verb ‘to descend’. In all cases these exhibit semantic development. In Barwar ‘to descend’ is expressed by ṣly. This is the reflex of the Syriac verb ṣly, which has the meaning of ‘to incline, to lean towards’. The Syriac meaning is associated with the dialectal meaning in that it constitutes a typical preliminary phase of the act of descending. In Qaraqosh the verb štʾr is used in the sense of ‘to descend’. This is cognate with the earlier literary Aramaic root šgr, which had the sense of ‘running, flowing’; cf. Babylonian Talmudic Aramaic: šaggar ‘to cause to flow’ (Sokoloff 2002: 1109). The feature of fast movement and running, which is typically associated with descending, came to be interpreted as the basic meaning of the word. A similar semantic development has been undergone by the verb špʾ (< *špʿ ), which means ‘to descend’ in several NENA dialects (e.g., the Christian dialects of Bedyal and the Aqra area). The Syriac verb špʿ is typically used in association with liquids in the sense of ‘to overflow, to run over’. The Jewish NENA dialects and a few Christian dialects in north-eastern Iraq, e.g., Christian Sulemaniyya, use the root kwš to express ‘to descend’. In cognate Syriac kbš has the sense of ‘to fall upon, to attack; to subjugate; to tread down’ and in Jewish Babylonian Aramaic ‘to press down, to subdue’. The downward movement that is typically associated with ‘falling upon’, ‘attacking’ and ‘pressing down’ has become the primary meaning of the root. The verb rxš denotes ‘to walk’ in Qaraqosh, whereas the Syriac cognate has the sense of ‘to creep’. The dialectal meaning no doubt developed out of the feature of ‘slow movement’ that is associated with the act of creeping. In several Christian NENA dialects, such as Christian Urmi, the verb has undergone a further shift and now denotes the generic sense of ‘to go’. The verb smx ‘to stand, stop’ in Qaraqosh and several other NENA dialects is cognate with Syriac smk, which has the sense of ‘support, prop up, sustain’ and ‘rest oneself, recline’. The element of immobility that is associated with these meanings in Syriac has apparently developed into the basic meaning of the verb in the dialect. The verb nṣw in Qaraqosh has the sense of ‘to set traps’ and the noun naṣawa means ‘trapper’. The cognate verb in Syriac nṣb means ‘to set, fix’ in general. Clearly the verb was commonly used in the context of setting traps and this specific contextual usage developed into its basic meaning. The Syriac verb pṣḥ has the basic meaning of ‘to rejoice’, whereas its reflex in the Barwar dialect pṣx is generally used to denote the act of ‘smiling’, which is associated with joy. The sense of ‘to rejoice, to become happy’ is generally expressed by the verb xðy. The Syriac verb dʿk has the sense of ‘to be extinguished’ and is used to denote that a fire has been put completely out. The reflex dyx in Barwar, however, denotes the ‘dying down’ of

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a fire, which is a preliminary phase typically associated with the process of being extinguished. The sense of ‘to be extinguished’ is expressed in the dialect by the verb č̣my. The verb jwj ‘to move’ in Barwar is cognate with the Syriac root šwš, which has the sense of ‘disturbing’. Some kind of movement is typically associated with the act of disturbing. In the dialect jwaja is now used to denote ‘moving’ in general, irrespective of whether it involves disturbance or not. An interesting case is the verb tḥy ‘to find, to come across’, which is found in the Jewish Sulemaniyya dialect and the Jewish dialects of western Iran. 2 This is related historically to earlier Aramaic ṭʿy, which has the sense of ‘to wander, to go astray’. As we have seen, in some dialects this verb has developed the purposive sense of ‘to search for’ (e.g., Barwar ṭy). In the Jewish dialects in question, however, it denotes the endpoint that is typically associated with such a search. In some cases the association between the dialectal word and its cognate in earlier Aramaic is metaphorical. The word maqora, meqora in Barwar, for example, denotes a ‘hole dug out of the middle of a dish of stew to hold syrop’. The earlier Syriac form māqōrā denoted a ‘canal’ or ‘cistern’ dug in the ground. The verb qrx in Barwar has the senses of ‘to become white, to make white’ and ‘to knock off (twigs, buds, blossoms)’. Both of these have a metaphorical association with the cognate Syriac root qrḥ ‘to become bald’. In Qaraqosh the word burga means ‘hole’. The cognate in Syriac burgā means ‘tower, turret; pigeon-cote’ (< Greek purgos). The association here seems to be that such structures contained holes through which pigeons entered. The word then came to denote a pigeon-hole, i.e. a part of the original whole. The dialect then came to use another word to denote specifically a pigeon-hole, viz. rozənta, so burga came to be used to refer to a hole in general. In Qaraqosh šahara means ‘blind’. The Syriac cognate denotes somebody who observes a night vigil. Presumably the association of such an activity with darkness led to its acquiring the meaning of anybody enveloped in darkness and then specifically a person who has lost his sight. Qaraqosh uses the word xtira in the sense of ‘beautiful’. The Syriac cognate is defined by Payne-Smith (1903: 164) as ‘haughty, swollen with pride.’ The feature of ‘beauty’ was apparently interpreted as a typical association of pride. The meaning of a word occasionally shifts to the extent that it denotes a completely distinct referent from the one denoted by the earlier Aramaic cognate, though in the same semantic field. This generally arises due to the use of another lexical item to express the meaning of the earlier Aramaic cognate. In Syriac and other earlier Aramaic dialects ḥalḇā means ‘milk’. The dialectal cognate xalwa in Qaraqosh means ‘yoghurt’ and in Barwar it means ‘fatless curds of boiled yoghurt water’, rather than ‘milk’. ‘Milk’ in these dialects is expressed by the word xəlya (< *ḥalyā ‘sweet’). The word dəbbora in Qaraqosh and Barwar means ‘hornet’, whereas its Syriac cognate debburtā normally has the sense of ‘bee’. A ‘bee’ is referred to in the dialect by the term dabaša (literally: ‘honey-maker’). The verb xml in Barwar has the meaning ‘to make merry’ whereas its Syriac cognate ḥml means ‘to withhold, to restrain’. This remarkable difference in meaning appears to have arisen 2.  For descriptions of these dialects see Khan (2004), Khan (2009), Hopkins (1989; 1999).

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by the following semantic shifts. The activity of withholding first developed into senses such as ‘enduring’, ‘waiting’, ‘standing’, which are attested for this verb in some NENA dialects. This then came to mean withholding sleep and waiting up at night. The diverting social interaction of chatting and merriment that was the typical activity associated with such waiting up at night then became the basic meaning. A parallel semantic develop may explain the semantic relationship between Arabic smr ‘to chat at night’ and Hebrew šmr ‘to keep, guard’, which appear to be cognate. Some nouns in particular NENA dialects are derivatives of nouns or verbs that themselves have been lost in the current state of the dialect in question. The noun karaxa ‘irrigation manager’ in Barwar, for example, appears to be derived from a noun *karxa ‘irrigation basin’, which in turn is a development of Syriac karxa ‘enclosure, enclosed area’. The word karxa in this sense is still used in some NENA dialects (e.g., Christian Shiyuz), but not in Barwar, where irrigation basins are denoted by the term məššara. The Barwar noun samxa ‘post supporting a vine’ is in origin an active participle of a verbal root *smx, cognate with Syriac smk ‘to support’. In the current state of the dialect, however, the activity of physically supporting is expressed by the verb snd, which is a loan from Arabic. An interesting semantic development is exhibited by the Barwar adjectival form kosa ‘beardless’. This appears to be derived from the noun kawsa ‘hair’, but is used to denote the lack of hair rather than its presence. A similar development has occurred with the Kurdish word qoç ‘horn’. This has been borrowed in Barwar as an adjectival attribute (koča ̭ ) denoting ‘hornless’, e.g., ʾərwe koče ̭ ‘hornless sheep’. Note also the Barwar adjective lənga ‘crippled in the leg (i.e., legless)’ which in origin is the Kurdish noun ling ‘leg’. With regard to verbal roots, certain phonetic developments reflect the emergence of two separate roots from an original single root. This is seen in distinct developments of the bgdkpt consonants. In the NENA dialects the plosive and fricative alternants fricative of these consonants have become independent phonemes. In principle one particular alternant of these consonants, plosive or fricative, becomes a fixed radical throughout all inflections of a root, e.g., the fricative /θ/ in Barwar kθ  w ‘to write’: kaθ  wa ‘she writes’, kθawa ‘book’, kaθawa ‘writer’. Cases where the reflex of a bgdkpt consonant differs across verbal inflections of an original root should be interpreted as indicating that such inflections have come to be treated as separate roots. This splitting of a root is conditioned by the development of a clear semantic gap between inflections, e.g., Syriac gby ‘to collect’ > Barwar gwy I (pəʿal) ‘to beg’ and gby II (paʿʿel) ‘to elect’; Syriac qby ‘to collect (liquid)’ > Barwar qwy I (pəʿal) ‘to scoop’ and qby II (paʿʿel) ‘to swell’; Syriac brk > Barwar brk I (pəʿal) ‘to kneel’ and brx II (paʿʿel) ‘to bless’; Syriac zbn > Barwar zwn I (  pəʿal) ‘to buy’ and zbn II (paʿʿel) ‘to sell’. Phonetic developments in the dialects can lead to the homophony of two verbal roots or two lexical items, e.g., Barwar prx ‘to crush’ (< *prk) and prx ‘to fly’ (< *prḥ), dəmma ‘blood’ ( Egyptian. 44.  KTU 1.3 iii 14; 1.119:26, 29, 35; see Watson 2007: 101. It also occurs in many personal names. 45.  See Vidal 2011, with discussion. On Ug. mgdl as a metathetic form of Akk. madgaltu see Watson 1999: 40; it was borrowed as Eg. magdāla, “(watch-)tower” (Hoch §224; cf. Schneider 2008: 191). 46.  KTU 1.14 ii 38; 1.16 v 8; 1.23:7, 26; 1.64:23; 1.103+1.145:17; 4.35 ii 12; 4.66:1; 4.68:70; 4.126:4; 4.137:1; 4.163:1; 4.173:1; 4.174:1; 4.179:1; 4.382:5; 4.416:4; 4.485:7; 4.745:3; 4.752:3; in broken context: KTU 4.275:7.

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Wilfred G. E. Watson – CS: RS Akk. lúša-na-nu-ma, “archers” (Huehnergard 1987: 187). It may derive from Sem. ṮN and mean “double or composite bow” 47 or less probably it may be explained by Eth. tasannana, “to contest, strive”. A loanword in Akkadian as šanannu, sanannu, ašannu, “chariot-archer” (CDA, 354), this technical term was also borrowed as Eg. snn(y), normalised as *ṯanānu, “chariot soldier, archer”. 48 It is almost certainly Semitic, but may be a Wanderwort.

2.5  Armour and clothing grbz, “helmet”, 49 only in KTU 4.363:2: ktnt. [ ṯ]lṯ. ʿšr[h ]yt d. bnšm. yd grbzhm [t]hirte[en] tunics . . . of the personnel together with their helmets – Hurr.: kurpiši, “piece of armour”, 50 probably a “helmet”. 51 – CS: RS Akk. gur-BI-ZU, “hauberk” (PRU 6, 132 r.5′); Akk. qurpis(s)u(m), qursi(p)pu(m), q/kurpīsu, “helmet” (CDA, 291b), a loan from Hurrian. 52 – IE: Hitt. kurpiši-, “Teil des Helmes; Vizier, Halsberge oder Helm” (cf. HW, 118b). 53 Possibly borrowed as Greek κυρβασία, “name of a Persian hat with a pointed crown” (EDG 1, 806). 54 The word is Hurrian. ṯryn, “coat of mail” 55 – Hurr. šariyanni, “cuirasse de protection pour hommes, chevaux, chars” (GLH, 215–216). Borrowed as Eg. /s̀iryāna/, “body armour” (Hoch 1994 §546; Schneider 2008: 192– 193) and as Hitt. šarian(n)i, “Panzerhemd” (HW, 324), “a coat of scale armor” (CHD Š/2, 259). 56 – CS: Heb. siryôn, “coat of mail” (HALOT, 769); śiryôn, “scale armour, coat of armour” (HALOT, 1655); Aram. ši/îryôn, “(ringed) coat of mail” ( Jastrow 1903: 1631); Syr.

47.  Proposed by Rainey 1965: 23; 1998: 446–447; accepted by von Dassow 2008: 197 n. 114. 48.  Hoch 1994 §371, with further references; cf. Vita 1995:125–128 and Schneider 2008: 194. 49. See DUL, 306–307; Vita 1995: 79–80; Watson 2007: 127–128, 132. 50.  “Pièce d’armure : selon les uns cotte de mailles, selon d’autres gorgerin” (GLH, 155). 51. Kendall 1982; see also Sanmartín (1992: 97): “un tipo de yelmo”, “casquete”; Huehnergard 1987: 117, 317; etc. Ribichini and Xella (1985: 35) reject any connection with textiles here, but according to Diakonoff and Starostin (1986: 1–19, 59), Hurro-Urart. qurbis- means “cloth worn under the coat of mail, or under the helmet” and Van Soldt (1990: 33 n. 82) suggests “hood”. 52.  However, Durand (1990: 659) states that Akk. qurpîsu is not Hurrian but “attesté en akkadien dès l’OB” and is made of leather. 53.  Further details in Fronzaroli 1956: 36; however, this word is not included in Kloekhorst 2008. 54.  “The very word for “helmet” in the Linear B tablets is ko-ru, which may indeed reflect a relationship with gurpisu” (Kendall 1982: 230–231); see Mycenaean ko-ru-to, “(plates of the) helmet” and Gk κόρυς “helmet” (EDG 1, 757). 55.  KTU 3.13:5; 4.169:5, 6; cf. DUL, 934–935; Vita 1995: 52, 59, 76; Tropper 2012: 112; Watson 2007: 135. In KTU 4.81:5 it refers to a ship (  ṯkt). Note lbš ṯryn (KTU 4.17:15), which may mean “armoured clothing” (Ribichini and Xella 1985: 44, 70; Vita 1995: 78) and cf. Eg. r-bꜢ-šꜢ-y, “(Leder-)Rüstung” (Schneider 2008: 191; Hoch 1994 §274). 56.  Not a form of Hitt. šariyant-, “embroidered”, as noted there.

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swrny, “lorica” (LS, 808); 57 Akk. siriam, “body armour” (CAD S, 313–315). 58 It is definitely a loan from Hurrian. 2.6  Weapons and Projectiles abn yd, “slingstone”, only in KTU 1.14 iii 14: ḥẓk. al. tšʿl qrth. Do not fire your arrows towards the city, abn. ydk mšdpt. or be hurling 59 (any of) your slingstones. – ES: Syr. bnt ʾydʾ, “slingstones” (SL, 193), is a previously unnoticed equivalent that clinches the meaning here. arkd, “spear”, only in KTU 4.277:9: bdy. ḥrš arkd PN, maker of spear(s) – ES: Akk. ariktu, “(a kind of spear)” (CDA, 23). 60 Even if borrowed from Akkadian, it is Semitic. 61 ḏqt, “arrow”, only in KTU 1.70:39, 62 an Akkadian word in the Ugaritic script. – CS: Akk. ziqtu, “point” of arrow (CDA, 448); see Heb. ziqqîm, “fire-arrows” and Syr. zqwt, “goad” (LS, 205). 63 This word is evidently Semitic. 64 ḥrb, “sword, knife” 65 – CS: Heb. ḥereb, “(flint) knife, dagger, chisel, sword” (HALOT, 349–350); Aram. ḥrb, “sword” (DNWSI, 403); Aram./Syr. ḥrb, “sword” (LS, 254; DJPA, 213); cf. Arab. ḥarbat, “a dart, javelin, a certain weapon resembling a spear” (AEL, 541) and more remotely, Akk. ḫarbu, “plough” (CDA, 108; CAD Ḫ, 97–98). 66

57.  Note also Ebla a-sar-a-nu/núm, Conti and Bonechi 1992. 58.  Note the variant spellings sari(y)am, siri(y)am, siri, še/iryam, sari( y)ānum, sariānu, širʾam, širʾannu and siriyanni (CDA, 318a), indicative of a loanword. 59. A Š active participle from NDP, “to throw”, cognate with Eth. nadafa, “to throw” and Heb. ndp, “to scatter, destroy” (HALOT, 674) which refers to these stones; see Tropper 2012: 606 §74.364; cf. §74.625. The alternative translation “(do not fire) your slingstones at the citadel” (Wyatt 2002: 194, and n. 86), is attractive in terms of parallelism, but the evidence for Ug. mšdpt as meaning “citadel” is very weak. 60.  “There is conflicting evidence whether ariktu denotes “bow” or “spear”” (CAD A/2, 267). See the discussion in Vidal 2007: 6–7. Note that Akk. ariktu probably derives from arāku, “to be long” (CDA, 22a). 61.  Identified by Dietrich and Loretz 1977. 62.  For the reading (instead of yqt) see Hawley, Pardee and Roche-Hawley 2013: 399: “dqt pourrait être la graphie alphabétique du mot ziqātu « flèches »”. 63. See HALOT, 278, with further possible cognates. 64.  In Akk. derived from zaqātu, “to be pointed” (CDA, 445). On Akk. ziqtu see Postgate 2004: 457a. 65.  KTU 1.2 i 32; 1.2 iv 4; 1.3 i 7; 1.4 vi 57; 1.5 iv 15; 1.6 ii 31; 1.6 v 13; 1.15 iv 25; 1.17 vi 4; 1.19 iv 45; 1.96:4. 66.  Hoch (1994: 234) notes the difference between ḥrb and ḥrp (“to sharpen”), although the meaning given in AEL, 541 for Arab. ḥaraba is “he sharpened (a spearhead)”.

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– AA: Borrowed as Eg. *ḥarba, “dagger, short sword” (Hoch 1994 §324; cf. Schneider 2008: 191). The word is Semitic. 67 ḥẓ, ḥḏ, ḫẓ, “arrow” 68 – CS: Other Semitic words for “arrow” also have a range of spellings: Akk. ūṣu, uṣṣu (CAD U/W, 428b), Heb. ḥēṣ (HALOT, 342), Aram. ḥṭ, Ph. ḥṣ (DNWSI, 397), Arab. ḥaẓwat (AEL, 596) and Eth. ḥaṣṣ (CDG, 347), which may indicate that it is a loanword. – IE: Gk ἰός ‘arrow’, from IE *(H)isu, Sanskrit íṣu-, 69 is possibly related. If so, the term may be Indo-European in origin. ksl, “bowstring” (lit. “tendon, sinew”), 70 clear from: mṭm. tgrš šbm. with a club she drove away captives, bksl. qšth. mdnt with her bowstring, the foe. 71 – CS: The only exact isogloss is with Arab. kisl, “sinew on the bow with which cotton is carded” (Renfroe 1992: 124). The word is definitely Semitic. ktp, “axe, mace”, only in KTU 1.6 v 2: the great ones he smote with a mace, rbm. ymḫṣ. b ktp  72 dkym. ymḫṣ. b ṣmd the d. he smote with an axe ṣġrm. ymṣḫ. larṣ the small ones he pulled to the ground. – Hurr. katappu, “weapon” (GLH, 219). – CS: Mari Akk. katappu, “(double) axe, mace”. 73 – AA: Borrowed as Eg. katapa, “sword” (Hoch 1994 §500) possibly via Semitic. 74 mḏrn, “broadsword”, in KTU 4.167:11, 12. – CS: Syll. Ug. urudumam-ṣa-ar (PRU 6, 141:2), the West Semitic form of Akk. namṣāru, “sword” (CDA, 236). 75 – AA: Eg. m-ḏꜢ-r-n-Ꜣ, “weapon”, is a loan from Semitic. 76 mḫṣ, “club”, in KTU 1.2 i 39: [w yuḫ]d. b yd. mšḫṭ and he seized a cleaver with his (left) hand, bm. ymn. mḫṣ. with his right, a club – CS: It occurs in RS Akkadian as [URUDU.MEŠ] me-ḫi-[ṣ]u-ma MEŠ, “(copper) weapons or tools” (PRU 6, 144). The Ug. verb is mḫṣ, “to wound, beat, etc.” (DUL, 540–541) and 67. Gk ἅρπη “sickle” from IE *ser(  p)-, “sickle”, possibly a non-IE word (EDG 1, 138–139) is not related. As Hoch (1994: 235 n. 35) notes, the word for “sword” is semantically remote from the term “sickle” and these words may have had separate origins. Similarly, Rosół 2013: 17 and 62. 68. As ḥẓ: KTU 1.14 iii 12; 1.82:3; 1.90:5; 4.141 iii 19; 4.145:4; 4.169:2; 4.180:1; 4.204:1, 2, 4; 4.630:14; as ḥḏ: KTU 4.609:25; as ḫẓ: KTU 1.172:21. see DUL, 382; Tropper 2012: 115. Also as Ug. ḫḏġl, “fletcher”, in KTU 4.138:2; 4.154:5; 4.188:1; 4.609:16. 69. See EDG 1, 595. This is preferable to the comparison with Greek ὑσσος ‘javelin’, as in EDG 2, 1538. For the equivalence see Takács 1995: 181–182; Dolgopolsky 1977: 7. 70.  KTU 1.3 ii 16; 1.17 vi 11 (see Wyatt 2002: 271 n. 96); also KTU 4.182:9, 26[?]. 71.  KTU 1.3 ii 16–17; translation: Smith and Pitard 2009: 134; cf. 158–159 for discussion. 72.  See Wyatt 2002: 140 n. 103 for possible versions. 73.  Translated as “hache ansée” (Durand 1998: 392) or “masse d’arme” (ARM XXI, 343). 74.  Full discussion in Vita and Watson 2002, 2014. See also Schneider 2008: 192. 75.  See discussion in Vita 1995: 66 n. 9, with further references. 76.  Hoch §241; Schneider 2008: 191; EDE III, 856–857.

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although the verb is Common Semitic, 77 no other Semitic language has a word for “machete” derived from this root. mrḥ, “spear, lance” 78 – CS: Heb. romaḥ, “lance” (HALOT, 1243); Aram./Syr. rwmḥ, “lance, spear” (LS, 734; DJPA, 525); Arab. rumḥ-, “lance” (AEL, 1153); Geʿez ramḥ, “spear” (Leslau 1987: 470). – AA: Eg. mrḥ, “spear, lance”, is borrowed from Semitic and only Ugaritic and Egyptian exhibit metathesis. 79 mšḫṭ, “cleaver, axe” 80 – CS: Cf. Akk. zaḫaṭû(m), “battle-axe” (CDA, 443), and šahāṭu “to flay etc.” (CDA, 347a). – AA: Eg mšḫtjw, “a large metal adze used in wood-working” (Ward 1961: 37), “adze” (Faulkner 1962: 118), seems to share its etymology with Sem. šḫṭ (cf. EDE III, 577– 578). Note also West Chadic ĉəkət-, “to cut, slaughter” (cited in EDE III, 577; cf. HSED §2237). See on Ug. mḥṣ above. mṭ, “club; shaft (of an arrow)” 81 – CS: Akk. miṭṭu(m), mī/ēṭu, “(a divine weapon)” (CDA, 213). 82 – AA: Eg. mdw, “Stab, Stock (auch als Waffe)” (Wb 2, 178); Cushitic (Oromo) muṭuṭé, “Keule, Knüttel, Prügel”. 83 The direction of borrowing remains uncertain. nit, “weapon” 84 – CS: It occurs in RS Akkadian as ni-it, “a weapon” (Ugar. 5, 84:13), 85 possibly derived from Akk. nêtu, “to chop” (CDA, 251). – AA: Eg. nwt, “adze” (Wb 2, 216) 86 or Eg. niw, “spear, javelin” (DLE I, 226). If derived from Akkadian, Ug. nit would be Semitic, but it may be a loan from Egyptian. nṯq, “dart” arbʿm qšt alp ḥẓm w alp nṯq forty bows, one thousand arrows, one thousand darts 87

77.  Note the range of meanings for Akk. maḫāṣu: “to beat, smash, cut etc.” (CDA, 190a), while Akk. māḫiṣu can mean “beater, striker, hunter” and even “archer” (CDA, 190–191). 78.  KTU 1.16 i 47, 51; 1.65:12; 1.92:7, 12; 1.103+1.145:7, 47; 1.140:10; 4.65:3, 4, 6–8, 10, 11; 4.169:9; 4.390:9; 4.624:3, 5, 6, 8, 15, 19, 20, 22; 4.670:5. As Vidal (2007: 6) notes: “the term mrḥ often appears in administrative documents, always in a warlike context: the military recruitment of shepherds . . . (and) weapon lists”. For KTU 4.385:7 see Watson 2002: 924 and Vidal 2007: 6. 79.  See Hoch 1994 §179, Schneider 2008: 191 and EDE III, 437–438, with further discussion and references. It was not borrowed as Gk λόγχη; see Rosół 2013: 188. 80.  KTU 1.2 i 39; 4.167:12, 15. See DUL, 590–591;Vita 1995: 65; Watson 2007: 17. However, cf. Huehnergard 1987: 186. 81.  It occurs in the text cited under ksl: “in this context it may mean “shaft” or perhaps “arrow”” (Smith and Pitard 2009: 158). 82.  The derivation of this word — possibly Akk. naṭû, “to hit” — is very debatable, as is its connection with Heb. maṭṭeh, “stick, etc.”; see EDE III, 778 for an inconclusive discussion. 83. See EDE III, 779, and for full discussion, ibid. 776–780. 84.  KTU 1.65:13; 3.23; 4.625:2, 5, 7; see Watson 2007: 142 §2.3.03 (54) 85.  Cf. Huehnergard 1987: 150; CDA, 256a. 86.  First proposed by Sanmartín 1987: 150. 87.  KTU 4.169:3: as Vidal (2007: 9) argues, the context here clearly indicates a meaning such as “barb”; also in KTU 1.4 vii 39.

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– CS: Heb. nešeq, “equipment, weapons” (HALOT, 731); 88 see Akk. nisku, “(arrow-)shot” (CDA, 255), from Akk. nas/šāku, “to throw (down), to shoot (an arrow)” (CDA, 243). However, the derivation of Ug. nṯq remains uncertain. 89 qṣʿt, “arrow(s)” 90 As it occurs in parallel with “bow”, the meaning seems clear, but the etymology is not. 91 qšt, “bow, archer” 92 – CS: Heb. qešet, “bow, weapon” (HALOT, 1155–1156); Aram. qšt, “bow” (DNWSI, 1040); Pun. qšt, “arch, bow” (DNWSI, 1040; Tomback 1978: 295); Akk. qaštu(m), qaltu, “bow” (CDA, 286); Arab. qaus, “bow” (AEL, 2574–2575); Eth. qast, “bow” (Dillmann 1865: 433–434). – AA: *ḳawas-/*ḳayas- “bow, arrow” (HSED §1560). A Hamito-Semitic term, it seems. srdnn, “projectile, missile”, only as uṯpt srdnnm quiver (full) of/for missiles 93 – CS: It seems to refer to a projectile, 94 corresponding to Aram. zrd, “reed” (cf. Jastrow 1903: 411; DJBA, 412) and Aram. zrdh, “hard reed” (DJBA, 420). This is a new suggestion. For the semantic shift, see Gk σχοῖνος “reed”, used as an arrow or javelin (LSJ, 1747). The word is Semitic. Alternatively, srdnn may be a reference to the material of which it is made, perhaps olive-wood, Akk. sirdu, “olive” (CAD S, 311–312), also in Ugaritian Akkadian. 95 In this case, too, the word would be Semitic. 96 ṣmd, “double axe” 97 – CS: Arab. ṣamada “to defy, resist”; III “to come to blows, fight (with s.o.)” (DMWA, 525). 98 The word is probably Semitic. 99

88.  Cf. Tropper 2008: 92; DUL, 654; it has been compared with Heb. nōšĕqê qešet, “those who wield a bow” (see Smith and Pitard 2009: 679). 89.  See the discussion in EDE III, 584 90.  KTU 1.10 ii 7; 1.17 v 3, 13, 28; 1.17 vi 19, 25; 1.18 iv 13, 41; 1.19 i 15. 91.  For other meanings see DUL, 715–716. Tropper (2012: 166) comments: “Bei dem immer in Parallele zu qšt “Bogen” belegten Subst. qṣʿt handelt sich entweder um eine Bezeichnung für “Pfeile”, “Köcher” oder “Schild” (allerdings ohne überzeugende Etymologien) oder aber um ein anderes Wort für “Bogen””. 92.  KTU 1.3 ii 16; 1.9:13; 1.10 ii 6; 1.12 ii 32; 1.17 v 2, 12, 27, 35; 1.17 vi 13, 18, 24, 39; 1.18 iv 40; 1.19 i 4, 14, 16; 4.53:14; 4.63 passim; 4.141 iii 18; 4.169:1; 4.215:2; 4.624:2, 4, 7, 9; 7.222:4. Cf. DUL, 718–719. It occurs in a polyglot vocabulary as qa-aš-tu4, “bow” (see Huehnergard 1987: 175). 93.  KTU 4.204:3, 5–11; see discussion in Vidal 2007: 8. 94. See DUL, 770. Gordon (1965 §19.1795) translates “a kind of weapon, probably ‘spear’ ”, adding “since the context tells us that s. & arrows are contained in quivers, srdnn is probably ‘spear’ for spearquivers are depicted on ancient representations of Near East chariots”. 95.  As suggested by Vita 1995: 69–70. 96.  Rejected by Vidal 2007: 8 n. 8. 97.  KTU 1.2 iv 11, 15; 1.6 v 3; 1.65:14; 1.82:16; 4.169:4, 6; 4.136:1. Cf. DUL, 785 mng (4). 98.  See Dietrich and Loretz 2009. 99.  Wyatt (2002: 364 n. 11) suggests that as ṢMD means “to bind”, Ug. ṣmd “may mean either an axe or a mace, on which the head is bound to the haft”.

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šurt, “dagger, poniard”, in KTU 4.44:1–17 100 – Hurr.: šauri-, “arme” (GLH, 219). 101 If correctly identified, clearly a loanword. šbr, “club”, 102 in KTU 1.92:13: mrḥh. ti[ḫd bydh] her spear she gra[sped in her hand], her club in her right. šbrh bm ymn – ES: Borrowed from Akk. šibirru, šebirru, šipirru, sibirru, “staff” (CAD Š/2, 377–379); “shepherd’s staff; sceptre” or “staff” carried by shepherds as a weapon (CDA, 370b), which in turn is a Sumerian loanword. It is only remotely a military term. 103 šlḥ, “javelin”, in KTU 1.14 i 20: mšbʿthn. bšlḥ ttpl. A seventh of them fell by the javelin. – CS: Heb. šelaḥ, “weapon” (HALOT, 1516–1517); Arab. silāḥ, “a weapon” (AEL, 1402). 104 – AA: *silaḥ-, “sharp weapon” as West Chadic *sil-, “axe” and Agaw *sil-, “knife” (HSED §2241). 105 The Afro-Asiatic equivalents are rather weak and the word is probably Semitic. šrt, “small arrow, arrowhead” 106 – CS: The meaning is based on Heb. širyāh (HALOT, 1654–1655), here to be understood as a “(set of) arrow(head)s”. – IE: See perhaps Sanskrit śará-, śárya-, śáryā-, śalyá-, “cane, arrow” (EDG 1, 685). If this equivalence is valid, the word would be a loan in Semitic. 2.7  Other Equipment art, “shield” (KTU 4.247:26); also as hrt (KTU 4.390:5). – CS: RS Akk. A.RIT, “shield” (PRU 3, 68–69:6), a pseudo-logogram for Akk. arītum, “Schild, Setztartsche” (AHw, 68–69); “shield” (CAD A/2, 269–270); “shield (of leather, wood, metal” (CDA, 23). 107 Since it is a loanword, these two forms are different representations of the Akk. term. 108 uṯpt, “quiver (for arrows)” 109

100.  In seventeen consecutive lines, almost every time preceded by a number and followed by a name or category of person. 101.  Sanmartín 1992: 99; Watson 2007: 130. 102.  “It is a club in the characteristic form of a shepherd’s staff and therefore identical to Akkad. šibirru” (De Moor 1979: 645); see Vidal (2007: 7) who accepts the meaning “club”. 103.  Salonen (1965: 161): “šibirru ist keine eigentliche Waffe, aber wird als solche gebraucht”. 104.  The underlying verb seems to be šlḥ, “to send, throw”. For surveys see Watson 2007: 5–6 and Wyatt 2002: 182 n. 20. 105. Eg. sꜢḫ, “Messer” (Hannig 1995: 661b) is irrelevant, in spite of the explanation in HSED, 473. 106.  KTU 4.360:12(?); 4.410 passim; 4.769:18, 58; ‘Pfeil, Pfeilspitze’ (Tropper 2008: 123). However, note the alternative meaning “unit or squad of bowmen” (DUL, 846). 107.  Note that it can also mean “knife, dagger” (CDA, 23). 108.  See Dietrich and Loretz 1978; cf. Tropper 2012: 159, 162; Huehnergard (1989: 154 n. 161). 109.  KTU 4.53:15; 4.145:7; 4.204:1–12; 4.624:3, 4, 9, [14], 21, 23; 4.670:2. Cf. DUL, 126; Watson 2007: 79–80, 126–127; Vita 1995: 70–72, 126.

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– CS: Heb. ʾašpāh, “quiver” (HALOT, 96); Akk. išpatu(m), “quiver”, usually of leather for arrows or javelins; also “bow-case” (cf. CDA, 134). 110 – AA: Eg. isp.t (*ʾatpāta, ʾatpōta), “quiver (for arrows)”: “The word is probably not Semitic in origin, but it is, however, quite well attested in Semitic languages” (Hoch 1994 §34). 111 – Hurr. išpa(n)ti, “carquois” (GLH, 127). “The explanation that does least violence to the consonantal morphology is the assumption that a foreign word or culture word of the form *ʾṯpt was the direct ancestor of the NWS forms, and the direct or indirect ancestor of Akkadian išpatu”. 112 mru, “officer” 113 – CS: RS Akk. murʾu, “commander” (Huehnergard 1987: 148–149); Akk. murʾu, “(an official)?” (CDA, 219, only in Nuzi and Ugarit), possibly a WS loan. – AA: Borrowed as Eg. mrj, “groom” (EDE III, 416–417). 114 The origin of this word is unknown. mšmʿt, “(body)guard” 115 – WS: Heb. mišmaʿ at, “bodyguard” (HALOT, 649b), is the only cognate and the word is Semitic. nšg, “scabbard”, in KTU 1.19 iv 45: tšt ḫ[ ] 116 bnšgh she placed . . . in her sheath, ḥrb. tšt btʿr[th] a sword she placed in [her] scab[bard] – CS: Aram. nsg, “to weave” (DJPA, 352); Arab. nasaġa, “he wove, plaited” (AEL, 2788). 117 Evidently Semitic. qlʿ, “shield” 118 – CS: As Vita (1995: 64–65) has shown, there is no connection with Heb./Aram. qlʿ, “sling”. 119 Instead, Akk. kušgubābu, “shield”, occurs in the totals in KTU 4.63, indicating that Ug. qlʿ has the same meaning. – AA: Eg. qrʿw, “shield”, Dem. glʿ, “shield” (Hoch 1994, §432); 120 Chad *kwar-, “shield” (HSED §1594). The etymology remains uncertain. 110.  See also AHw, 397; CAD I/J, 257–58. 111.  See Schneider 2008: 187–188. 112.  Mankowski 2000: 45; see also Tropper 2012: 111, 170. 113.  KTU 4.36:3; 4.47:2, 3; 4.68:63, 64, 69; 4.69 iii 11; 4.69 v 6, 17; 4.99:12, 13; 4.105:1; 4.126:2, 23, 24; 4.137:7; 4.163:3; 4.173:6; 4.174:3; 4.179:6; 4.195:1; 4.382+:30; 4.416:2; 4.745:1; 4.752:2, 7; 4.837:6′, 7′; 4.838:13′, 14′; 6.66:4–5. See Vita 1995: 145–147; Arnaud (1999: 301) argues that they are “gardes du corps”. However, cf. Smith and Pitard 2009: 693. 114.  See also Hoch 1994 §173, glossed as “a military position involving horses”, possibly a groom or squire; also Schneider 2008: 193. 115.  KTU 2.72:11, 14. The root is šmʿ, “to obey”. 116.  “In 1.19:IV:44 ist gegen KTU2 nicht ḫ[lpn] zu ergänzen. . . . Es ist ein Lexem mit der ungefähren Bed. >Dolch, Messer< (// ḥrb) zu ergänzen.” (Tropper 2008: 50). 117.  De Moor and Spronk 1987: 156. 118.  Or “shield-bearer”: KTU 1.162:2; 4.63 passim; 4.167:10; 4.169:3; 4.624:3, 5, 6, 8, [9], 11, 12, 13, 17. 119.  Instead, see Aram. qlʿ, ‘to plait’ (DJPA, 495a) and Eichler 1983; 1990. 120.  See also Hoch 1994 §§ 433–434 and Schneider 2008: 192.

Ugaritic Military Terms in the Light of Comparative Linguistics

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sbrdn, “lancer” 121 The word can be analysed as sbr, “spear” + the ending -dn, which is the Hurrian affix -tennu, denoting a profession (Wilhelm 1970) and means “lancer, spear-bearer”. 122 – CS: Syr. zbrnʾ, “spears” (LS, 188). The etymology proposed here is new. 123 2.8 Various asr, “prisoner-of-war” 124 – CS: Akk. asīru(m), “captive; prisoner of war” (CDA, 26); Syr. ʾsyr, “captive” (LS, 37); ʾāsîr, “prisoner” ( Jastrow 1903: 93b); Heb. ʾāsîr, ʾassîr, “prisoner” (HALOT, 73). Cf. Palm. ʾsr, “to imprison” (DNWSI, 91). – AA: *ʾacir-, “to bind, tie”, e.g., East Cushitic *ʾusur-, “to tie” (HSED §12). The verb from which the noun is derived is Hamito-Semitic, but the specific meaning “(war) captive” seems to be Semitic. Borrowed as Eg. *ʾas̀īra, “captive” (Hoch 1994 §40; Schneider 2008: 196). ib, “enemy” 125 – CS: Heb.ʾôyēb, “enemy” (HALOT, 38–39); Akk. ayyābu(m), yābu, “enemy” (CDA, 32a). ibt, “enmity”, in KTU 2:27: watm. ydʿt. lb aḫtk k mrṣ. hm ibt and you know your sister’s mind, which is ill if there is hostility – CS: Heb. ʾêbāh, “enmity” (HALOT, 39); cf. OSA tʾby, “disputation, contention” (DOSA, 2). 126 The word is Semitic. ḫzr, “(military) auxiliary” 127 – CS: Akk. ḫāziru, “Helfer” (AHw, 339); “helper” (CAD Ḫ, 166), 128 probably a loan from West Semitic. ṣrt, “enemy” (lit., “enmity”) 129 – CS: Heb. ṣārāh, “enmity; enemy” (HALOT, 1054); Akk. ṣerru, “enmity; enemy” (AHw, 1093; CAD Ṣ, 137–138; CDA, 336); OSA ṣrr, “to advance (on), launch an attack” (DOSA, 431). – AA: *ĉ̣ar-, “enemy” (HSED §583); cf. West Chadic ĉ̣Vr-, “ostracizing” (HSED §587); Eg. ḏꜢj < *ĉ̣rj, “to oppose” and Eg. ḏꜢj.tj.w, “opponents” (EDE I, 259, with references). šby, “captive”, in KTU 1.2 iv 29–30: k šbyn. zb[l. ym.] For our captive is Pri[nce Yam], 121.  KTU 4.337:1; 4.352:6; possibly in KTU 6.26:1. 122.  As shown by Vidal 2007: 10. 123.  Full details in Watson 2013b. 124.  KTU 1.2 i 37; 1.39:11; 2.31:24; 4.382:6; see Watson 2007: 79. 125.  KTU 1.2 iv 8, 9, 39; 1.3 iii 37; 1.3 iv 4, 5; 1.4 vii 35, 38; 1.10 ii 24; 1.19 iv 59; 1.103+ passim; 1.140:6; 2.33:10, 11, 17, 27, 29; 2.39:31; 2.72:44; see DUL, 4; as ebu in a polyglot vocabulary (Huehnergard 1987: 106). 126. Eth. taʾabaya, “to contend with one another”, cited in DOSA, 2. 127.  KTU 4.141 iii 4, 7, 9; 4.216:6; 4.609:51, 52; 4.630:2. 128.  Dietrich and Loretz 1966a: 188–191; Sanmartín 1989: 347 n. 93; also Tropper 2012: 106. 129.  KTU 1.2 iv 9; 1.3 iii 37.

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[k] šbyn. tpṭ. nhr. [for] our captive is Ruler Nahar. – CS: Heb. š ebî, “booty, captive” (HALOT, 1390–1391); Aram. šby, “captives, prisoners” (DNWSI, 1101); Aram. šbyh, “captive (f.)” (DJBA, 1103); Syr. šebyā, “captivity” (LS, 750) and Arab. sabīy, “captive” (AEL, 1303). Definitely a Semitic word. šnu, “enemy”, in KTU 1.4 vii 36: ib. bʿl. tiḫd yʿrm. The enemies of Baal took refuge in the forest, šnu. hd. gpt ġr. those hating Hadd (in) the cavities of the mountain. – CS: Heb. śōnēʾ, “enemy (lit., ‘one who hates’)” (HALOT, 1339); Arab. šāniʾ, “hating, a hater, enemy” (AEL, 1603–1604) and Aram./Syr. śnʾ, “enemy” (DJPA, 571; LS, 483). The word is Common Semitic. 2.9 Uncertain ġrm, “men-at-arms, troops”, in KTU 1.16 vi 44: k ġz. ġzm. tdbr Like a warrior can you command warriors w ġrm. ttwy and give orders to the troops? – CS: Syr. ʿrmw, “force” (LS, 548); Arab. ʿaramat-, “hard, strong, vehement; numerous (army)” (AEL, 2025); see also Heb. ʿarēmāh, “heap” (HALOT, 887). The word is Semitic. ġz, “warrior, raider”, in KTU 1.16 vi 43 (see previous entry). – CS: Arab. ġzw, “to raid, fight against, invade, plunder” (AEL, 2257); ESA ġzw, “raid”. 130 The term is Semitic. ktr, “guard”, in KTU 4.126:29 – CS: Alalakh Akk. kutturu, possibly “guard”, with the nominal pattern /kutturu/ according to Arnaud (1998: 169) or Akk. kitru, “Hilfstruppe” (AHw, 494); “help, reinforcements” (CDA, 163a). 131 šrr, “enemy” 132 – WS: Heb. šôrēr, “(personal) enemy” (HALOT, 1454); Arab. šarra, “he was/became evil, a wrongdoer, etc.” (AEL, 1524–1525). Cf. EA Akk. šāru, “hostile, enemy” (CDA, 362a), 133 as a West Semitic loanword. tšyt, “victory”, in KTU 1.3 ii 27: kbd. ʿnt tšyt. Anath’s liver (was filled) with victory – WS: Heb. tu/ûšiyyāh, “success, good result” (HALOT, 1713–1715). 134

130.  See Renfroe 1992: 40. Full discussion in Wyatt 2002: 240 nn. 292, 293; see Watson 2007: 61. 131.  Dietrich and Loretz 1967: 541. For other explanations cf. DUL, 470; Watson 2007: 91, 141. 132.  KTU 1.2 iv 33, 35, 37; 1.16 vi 7; 1.19 ii 36. 133. See AHw, 1193; CAD Š/2, 132–33. 134.  See perhaps Aram. swy, “be joyful” (DJBA, 792). Very uncertain items have not been included here, e.g., dṯn, “weapon”, grgr, “spear”, ktġḏ, “spear”, minš, “camp”, mgn, “shield”, npṣ, “armament”, qbl, “battle” and qdm, “axe”.

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3. Table The information collected above (in simplified form) can be set out in a table: 135 Ug. word

Semitic Cognates/Loans gloss

(RS) Akk.

Arab.

non-Semitic Equivalent

Other

Egypt.

abn yd arkd

sling-stone – spear ariktu bow √arāku

art hrt

shield

asr

prisoner

ib

enemy

ibt

enmity

ul

army

uṯpt bdl

quiver deputy

dmt

tower

ḏmr [ḏqt]

soldier arrow

grbz

helmet

qurpissu RS gurbizu

–

ġrm

troops

–

ʿaramat

S ʿrmw H ʿrmh

ġz ġzr

raider warrior

– –

ġzw –

– – H ʿzr ʿḏꜢ E ʿazara

ḥl

fortress

bīt ḫilāni

–

ḥyl

IE

Hurr.

AA

– –

S bnt ydʾ – – –

– –

– –

– –

arītum RS aritu

–

–

–

–

–

–

asīru RS asíru (ay)yābu RS ebu EA ʾibu –

ʾasara

ʾs(y)r

ʾas̀īra

–

–

ʾacir

–

H ʾwyb

–

–

–

–

OSA tʾby

H ʾybh

–

–

–

–

ʾawwal

H ʾyl Pm ʾl H ʾšbh Eb bidalu A bdl –

Ꜣ.t

ἴλη *wel– –

–

–

išpanti –

– –

–

dim

– –

– –

alīlu(m) elīlu išpatu bidaluma bidaluna dimtu RS dimtu – ziqtu

– badala

– ḏimr –

– S zqt H zq –

isp.t –

dmi ḏimri –

δόμος *dōm– –

–

Hitt kurpiši kurpiši κυρβασία Myc koru

–

–

–

–

–

– –

– –

– –

Hitt ḫīla

–

–

–

É

135.  Abbreviations for table: A = Aramaic; AA = Afro-Asiatic; Ch = Chadic; Cu = Cushitic; Dem = Demotic; E = Ethiopic; Eb = Eblaite; H = Hebrew; Hitt = Hittite; IE = Indo-European; Myc = Mycenaean; OSA = Old South Arabic; P = Phoenician; Pm = Palmyrene; Pu = Punic; RS = Ras Shamra; S = Syriac; Sb = Sabaean; Skt = Sanskrit.

714

Ug. word ḥrb

Wilfred G. E. Watson

Semitic Cognates/Loans gloss

(RS) Akk.

Arab.

non-Semitic Equivalent

Other

sword knife fighter

ḫarbu

ḥarbat

ḫiʾālu

ḥayl

ḥẓ, ḥḏ, ḫẓ, [ḫḏġl] ḫb/pṯ

arrow

ūṣu uṣṣu

–

ḫupšu

–

ḫrd

mercenary guard

A ḥrb H ḥrb P ḥl H ḥyl A br ḥyl H, P ḥṣ A ḥṭ E ḥaṣṣ –

–

ḫzr ksl ktp

ḫurādu ḫar  (ā)du auxiliary ḫāziru bow-string – axe katappu

ktr

guard

mḏrn

sword

mhr

warrior

mḫṣ MḪṢ mlḥmt LḤM mru

weapon

Egypt.

IE

Hurr.

AA

ḥrp ḥarba –

*ser(p)-

–

–

–

–

–

–

ἰός *(H )isu

–

–

–

–

–

–

H,P ḥrd

–

ḫurādu

–

– kislkatīf

– – –

– – katpa

Hitt ḫurati – – –

– – katappu

– – –

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

maḏarana

–

–

–

māhir

mh(y)r

mhr

–

–

mahor

RS meḫiṣuma –

–

–

–

–

–

–

lḥmh

–

–

–

–

leader squire

murʾu

–

H, A mlḥmh –

mrj

–

–

–

mrḥ

spear

rumʾu

rumḥ

rwmḥ

mrḥ

ῥομφαία

–

–

mryn

warrior

maryannu

–

–

maryana

Skt márya

mariyani

–

mṣd

fortress

–

–

H mṣd A mṣdtʾ

–

–

–

–

mšḫṭ ŠḪṬ

weapon

zaḫaṭû šahāṭu

–

–

mšḫtjw

–

–

Ch ĉəkət

mšmʿt mṭ

guard shaft arrow axe spear sheath

– miṭṭum mī/ēṭu nētu RS niʾtu –

– –

H mšmʿt – H mṭh mdw

– –

– –

–

–

–

–

– Cu muṭuṭé –

nasağa

–

–

–

–

ḥyly

nit nšg

war

kutturu kitru namṣāru RS mamṣāru maḫāru

nwt niw –

Ugaritic Military Terms in the Light of Comparative Linguistics

Ug. word nṯq

Semitic Cognates/Loans gloss

(RS) Akk.

missile dart shieldbearer

nas/šāku nisku –

qrd

warrior

qrš

camp

qarrādu qurādu karašu karšu – qaštu RS qaštu bēl madgalti

qlʿ

qṣʿt qšt

dart bow archer rb mgdlm chief of towers sbrdn lancer

Arab.

715

non-Semitic Equivalent

Other

Egypt.

IE

Hurr.

AA

–

H nšq

–

–

–

–

–

–

ḳrḥ Dem glʿ

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

– qaus

– qšt

– –

– –

– –

– ḳawas

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

–

S zbrnʾ

–

–

-tennu

–

srdnn

dart

serdu

–

A zrdh

–

–

–

–

ṣbu

army

OSA ḍbʾt

ṣbʾ

ḏꜢbꜢiw2

–

–

ĉ̣abaʾ (šab)

ṣmd ṢMD

axe

ṣâbum ṣabbu RS ṣābu –

ḍamada –

–

–

–

–

ṣrt šurt šbr šby šlḥ

enemy poniard club captive javelin sword

ṣerru – šibirru – –

OSA ṣrr – – sabīy silāḥ

H ṣrh – – šby H šlḥ

ḏꜢj – – – –

– – – – –

– šauri – – –

ĉ̣ar – – – silaḥ

šnu šrr šrt

enemy enemy (set of) arrowheads battle fight

– EA šāru –

šāniʾ šarra sirwa sariyya

śnʾ H šrr H šryh

– – –

– – Skt śárya σάρῑσα

– – –

– – –

ḫaṣābu tamḫuṣu

– –

H ḥṣb –

ḫbḏ –

– –

– –

– –

tšyt ṯnn ṮN

victory chariotarcher

– –

H tšyh –

– snn(y)

– –

– –

– –

ṯryn

armour

– š/sanannu ašannu RS šananuma siriam Eb asarnu

–

H sryn A šryn S swrny

siryāna

Hitt šariyani

šariyanni

–

tḫtṣb tmtḫṣ MḪṢ

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4. Conclusions The conclusions relate to the proportion of inherited words to loans and to the distribution according to literary genre. 4.1 Loanwords Whereas Egyptian has a high number of loanwords relating to the military, particularly from Semitic, 136 most Ugaritic terms in this category are inherited. Out of the 63 terms discussed, there are 13 loanwords:

• from Akkadian: arkd, art, nit, qrd, qrš, šbr (6 = 9%) • from Hurrian: grbz, ḫrd, ktp, šurt, ṯryn (5 = 7%) • from Indo-European: ḥẓ, mryn (2 = 3%) This means that approximately 10% of Ugaritic military terms are non-Semitic, although some may have been transmitted by another Semitic language. 4.2 Genre In terms of the type of document in which they occur, the distribution is:

• mythological texts: abn yd, ul, ḏmr, ḏqt, ġrm, ġz, ḥl, ḥrb, ḥyly, ksl, ktp, mḫṣ, mṣd, mṭ, nšg, qrd, qṣʿt, ṣrt, šbr, šby, šlḥ, šnu, šrr, tḫtṣb, tmtḫṣ, tšyt (26 = 41%) • economic texts: arkd, art, utpt, grbz, ḫzr, ktr, mdrn, mru, mryn, ntq, rb mgdlm, sbrdn, srdnn, šurt, šrt (15 = 23%) • letters: ibt, dmt, mlḥmt, mšmʿt (4 = 6%)

• mythological and economic texts: asr, ġzr, ḥẓ, ḫpṯ, ḫrd, mhr, mšḫṭ, qlʿ, qšt, ṣbu, ṣmd, ṯnn (12 = 19%) • legal and economic texts: ṯryn (1 = 1·6%) • religious, legal and economic texts: nit (1 = 1·6%) Therefore, most of our information on termss in this category comes from the mythological and economic texts, which is only to be expected since they form the largest corpora. 136.  Hoch 1994: 462 and Table 4. See now Schneider 2008.

Abbreviations AEL E. W. Lane, An Arabic-English Lexicon, vols. 1–8. London: Williams and Norgate 1863–1893. ARM XXI J.-M. Durand, Textes administratifs des salles 134 et 160 du palais de Mari. Archives Royales de Mari XXI. Paris: P. Geuthner 1983. CDG W. Leslau, Comparative Dictionary of Geʿez. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 1987. DJBA M. Sokoloff, A Dictionary of Jewish Babylonian Aramaic. Ramat Gan: Bar Ilan University Press: / Baltimore MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press 2002. DJPA M. Sokoloff, Dictionary of the Jewish Palestinian Aramaic of the Byzantine Period. Ramat Gan: Bar Ilan University Press / Baltimore MD: The Johns Hopkins University Press 1990. DLE L. H. Lesko, A Dictionary of Late Egyptian, 2 vols. Providence: B. C. Scribe Publications 2002.

Ugaritic Military Terms in the Light of Comparative Linguistics DMWA DNWSI DOSA DUL EDE EDG GLH HALOT HSED KAI LS LSJ PRU 3 PRU 6 Ugar. 5 Wb

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H. Wehr and A. Cowan, A Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 1971. J. Hoftijzer and K. Jongeling, Dictionary of the North-West Semitic Inscriptions, 2 vols. Leiden: Brill 1995. J. C. Biella, A Dictionary of Old South Arabic. Sabaean Dialect. Harvard Semitic Studies 25. Chico CA: Scholars Press 1982. G. del Olmo Lete and J. Sanmartín, A Dictionary of the Ugaritic Language in the Alphabetic Tradition (English Version Edited and Translated by W. G. E. Watson), 2 vols. Leiden: Brill 2004. G. Takács, Etymological Dictionary of Egyptian, vols I, III. Leiden: Brill 1999, 2008. R. Beekes, Etymological Dictionary of Greek, 2 vols. Leiden: Brill 2010. E. Laroche, Glossaire de la langue hourrite. Paris: Librairie C. Klincksieck 1980. L. Koehler and W. Baumgartner, The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament (translated and edited under the supervision of M. E. J. Richardson), vols. I-V, Leiden: Brill 1994–2000. V. E. Orel and O. V. Stolbova, Hamito-Semitic Etymological Dictionary. Materials for a Reconstruction. Leiden: Brill 1995. H. Donner and W. Röllig, Kanaanäische und Aramäische Inschriften, 3 vols. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz 1962–1964. C. Brockelmann, Lexicon Syriacum. Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark / Berlin: Reuther & Richard 1895. H. G. Liddell, R. Scott and H. S. Jones, A Greek-English Lexicon. Oxford: Oxford University Press 1996. J. Nougayrol, Palais Royal d’Ugarit III. Textes accadiens et hourrites des archives est, ouest et centrales. MRS 6. Paris: Librairie C. Klincksieck 1955. J. Nougayrol, Palais Royal d’Ugarit VI. Textes en cunéiformes babyloniennes des archives du grand palais et du palais sud d’Ugarit. MRS 12. Paris: Librairie C. Klincksieck 1970. J. Nougayrol et al., Ugaritica V. Nouveaux textes accadiens, hourrites et ugaritiques des archives et bibliothèques privés d` Ugarit. Commentaire des textes (première partie). BAH 80; MRS 16. Paris: Librairie Orientaliste Paul Geuthner 1968. A. Erman and H. Grapow, Wörterbuch der ägyptischen Sprache, vols. 1–13. Berlin and Leipzig: Berliner Akademie 1926–1963.

References Arnaud, D. 1998 Le dialecte d’Alalah: un examen préliminaire. AuOr 16: 143–186. 1999 Review of Vita 1995. Syria 76: 299–302. Bordreuil, P., Pardee, D., and Hawley, R. 2012 Une bibliothèque au sud de la ville***. Textes 1994–2002 en cunéiforme alphabétique de la Maison d’Ourtenou. Ras Shamra-Ougarit XVIII. Lyons: Maison de l’orient et de la méditerranée. Conti, G. and Bonechi, M. 1992 ’saryānum éblaïte, šariyanni ḫurrite. NABU 1992 Nr. 10. pp. 7–8 Dassow, E. von 2008 State and Society in the Late Bronze Age. Alalaḫ under the Mittani Empire. Studies on the Civilization and Culture of Nuzi and the Hurrians 17. Bethesda MD: CDL Press. de Moor J. C. 1985 ʿAthtartu the Huntress (KTU 1.92). UF 17: 225–230. de Moor J. C., and Spronk, K. 1987 A Cuneiform anthology of religious texts from Ugarit. Autographed texts and glossaries. Semitic Study Series 6. Leiden: Brill. Diakonoff, I. M. and Starostin, S. A. 1986 Hurro-Urartian as an Eastern Caucasian Language. Münchener Studien zur Sprachwissenschaft, Beiheft 18. Munich: R. Kitzinger.

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Dietrich, M. and Loretz, O. 1966a Die soziale Struktur von Alalaḫ und Ugarit. I. Die Berufszeichnungen mit der hurritischen Endung -ḫuli. WO 3: 188–205. 1966b Zur ugaritischen Lexikographie (I). BO 23: 127–132. 1971 Zur ugaritischen Lexikographie (IV). ušpt. UF 3: 372. 1977 Das ug. ‘Sumerogramm’ für die Hersteller von Bronzespeeren. UF 9: 335. 1978 Ug. kld “Bogen” und arkd “Wurfholz, Lanze(?)” in KTU 4.277. UF 10: 429. 2008 Die sozialen Gruppen der bidalūma und mhrm in Ugarit. Pp. 287–315 in Orbis Ugariticus, ed. M. Die­trich and O. Loretz. AOAT 343. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. 2009 ṣmd I “Paar” und ṣmd II “Axt, Doppelaxt” nach KTU 4.169; 4.363; 4.136; 1.65. UF 41: 165–179. Dietrich, M., Loretz, O. and Sanmartín, J. 1974 Zur ugaritischen Lexikographie (XI). Lexikographische Einzelbemerkungen. UF 6: 19–38. 2013 Die keilalphabetischen Texte aus Ugarit, Ras Ibn Hani und anderen Orten. Dritte, erweiterte Auflage / The Cuneiform Alphabetic Texts from Ugarit, Ras Ibn Hani and Other Places. Third, Enlarged Edition. KTU  3. AOAT 360/1. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. Dijkstra, M. and de Moor, J. C. 1975 Problematical Passages in the Legend of Aqhâtu. UF 7: 171–215. Dillmann, C. F. 1865 Lexicon Linguae Aethiopicae. Leipzig: T. O. Weigel. Dolgopolsky, A. B. 1977 Emphatic Consonants in Semitic. IOS 7: 1–13. Durand, J.-M. 1998 Les documents épistolaires du Palais de Mari, Tome II. LAPO 17. Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf. 1990 Review of Ribichini and Xella 1985. MARI 6: 659–664. Eichler, B. L. 1983 Of Slings and Shields, Throw-Sticks and Javelins. JAOS 103: 95–102. 1990 On weaving etymological and semantic threads: The Semitic root QLʿ. Pp.  163–169 in Lingering Over Words, Studies in Ancient Near Eastern Literature in Honor of William L. Moran, ed. T. Abusch. HSS 37. Atlanta GA: Scholars Press. Faulkner, R. O. 1962 A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian. Oxford: Griffith Institute. Fronzaroli, P. 1956 Rapporti lessicali dell’ittita con le lingue semitiche. Archivio Glottologico Italiano 41: 32–47. Gordon, C. H. 1965 Ugaritic Textbook. AnOr 38. Rome: Pontificum Institutum Biblicum. Hannig, R. 1995 Großes Handwörterbuch Ägyptisch-Deutsch: die Sprache der Pharaonen (2800–950 v.Chr.). Kultur­ geschichte der antiken Welt 64. Mainz: Philipp von Zabern. Hawley, R., Pardee, D. and Roche-Hawley C. 2013 À propos des textes akkadiennes alphabétiques conservés au Musée d’Alep: Notes épigraphiques. Pp. 395–401 in Études ougaritiques III, ed. V. Matoïan and M. Al-Maqdissi. RSO XXI. Leuven — Paris — Walpole MA: Peeters. Hoch, J. E. 1994 Semitic Words in Egyptian Texts of the New Kingdom and Third Intermediate Period. Princeton NJ: Princeton University Press. Huehnergard, J. 1987 Ugaritic Vocabulary in Syllabic Transcription. HSS 32. Atlanta GA: Scholars Press. Jastrow, M. 1903 Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yerushalmi and the Midrashic Literature. London and New York: Luzac. Kassian, A. et al. 2010 The Swadesh wordlist: An attempt at semantic specification. Journal of Language Relationship 4: 46–89.

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Kendall, T. 1982 Gurpisu ša awēli: The Helmets of the Warriors at Nuzi. Pp. 210–231 in In Honor of Ernest R. Lacheman on His Seventy-fifth Birthday, April 29, 1981, ed. M. A. Morrison and D. I. Owen. SCCNH 1. Winona Lake IN: Eisenbrauns. Kloekhorst, A. 2008 Etymological Dictionary of the Hittite Inherited Lexicon. Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 5. Leiden: Brill. Kogan, L. 2006 Lexical Evidence and the Genealogical Position of Ugaritic (I). Babel und Bibel 3: 429–488. Lackenbacher, S. 2002 Les textes akkadiens d’Ugarit. LAPO 20. Paris: Les Éditions du Cerf. Liverani, M. 1969 Il corpo di guardia del palazzo di Ugarit. RSO 44: 191–198. Mankowski, P. V. 2000 Akkadian Loanwords in Biblical Hebrew. HSS 47. Winona Lake IN: Eisenbrauns. Olmo Lete, G. del 2003 Glosas ugaríticas III. Reyes, difuntos y armas. AuOr 21: 144–148. Postgate, N., 2004 Pfeil und Bogen. A. Nach schriftlichen Quellen. In Mesopotamien. Pp. 456–458 in RlA 10. Rabin, C. 1963 Hittite Words in Hebrew. Or 32: 113–139. Rainey, A. F. 1965 The Military Personnel of Ugarit. JNES 24: 17–27. 1981 Institutions: Family, Civil, and Military, Pp. 69–107 in Ras Shamra Parallels. The Texts from Ugarit and the Hebrew Bible, Vol. II, ed. L. R. Fisher. AnOr 50. Rome: Pontificium Institutum Biblicum. Renfroe, F. 1992 Arabic-Ugaritic Lexical Studies. ALASP 5. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. Ribichini, S., and Xella, P. 1985 La terminologia dei tessili nei testi di Ugarit. Collezione di Studi Fenici 20. Rome: Consiglio Na­ zionale delle Ricerche. Rosół, R. 2013 Frühe semitische Lehnwörter im Griechischen. Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang. Salonen, A. 1965 Die Waffen der alten Mesopotamier. Eine lexikalische und kulturgeschichtliche Untersuchung. Studia Orientalia 33. Helsinki: Societas Orientalis Finnica. Sanmartín, J. 1987 Herramientas agrícolas y burocracia en Ugarit. AuOr 5: 149–152. 1989 Glossen zum ugaritischen Lexikon (VI). UF 21: 335–348. 1992 Tejidos y ropas en ugarítico: apuntes lexicográficos. AuOr 10: 95–104. 1995 Das Handwerk in Ugarit: eine lexikalische Studie. SEL 12: 169–190. Schmitz, P. C. 2011 The Large Neo-Punic Inscription from Hr Maktar. A Narrative of Military Service. SEL 28: 67–93. 2012 The Phoenician Diaspora. Epigraphic and Historical Studies. Winona Lake IN: Eisenbrauns. Schneider, T. 2008 Fremdwörter in der ägyptischen Militärsprache des Neuen Reiches und ein Bravourstück des Elitesoldaten (Papyrus Anastasi I 23, 2–7). JSSEA 35: 181–205. Schrakamp, I. 2009a Schild. Pp. 176–179 in RlA 12. 2009b Schleuder. A. Philologisch. Pp. 222–225 in RlA 12. 2009c Schwert. Pp. 333–338 in RlA 12. 2010 Speer und Lanze. Pp. 630–633 in RlA 12.

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Schwemer, D. 2005–2006  Lehnbeziehungen zwischen dem Hethitischen und dem Akkadischen. AfO 51: 220–234. Smith, M. S. and Pitard, W. T. 2009 The Ugaritic Baal Cycle. Volume II. Introduction with Text, Translation and Commentary of KTU/CAT 1.3–1.4. VTS 114. Leiden — Boston: Brill. Stieglitz, R. R. 1981 Ugaritic ḫrd ‘Warrior’: A Hurrian Loanword. JAOS 101: 371–372. Swadesh, M. 1971 The origin and diversification of language. Chicago IL: Aldine, Atherton. Takács, G. 1995 Egyptian sbꜢ “star”, sbꜢ “to teach”, their origin and related questions. Folia Orientalia 31: 177–188. Tomback, R. 1978 A Comparative Lexicon of the Phoenician and Punic Languages. Missoula MT: Scholars Press. Tropper, J. 2008 Kleines Wörterbuch des Ugaritischen. Elementa Linguarum Orientis 4. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. 2012 Ugaritische Grammatik. AOAT 273. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. van Soldt, W. H. 1990 Fabrics and Dyes at Ugarit. UF 22: 321–57. Vidal, J. 2005 Ugarit at War (1): The Size and Geographical Origin of the ḫrd-militia. UF 37: 653–672. 2007 Lances and Javelins in Administrative Texts. Gladius 27: 5–14. 2011 Las funciones del rb mgdlm en Ugarit. Pp. 293–300 in Esta Toledo, aquella Babilonia. Convivencia e interacción en las sociedades del Oriente y del Mediterráneo Antiguos, ed. J. A. Belmonte and J. Oliva. Cuenca: Ediciones de la Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha. Vita, J. P. 1995 El ejército de Ugarit, Banco de Datos Filógicos Semíticos Noroccidentales Monografías 1. Madrid: Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas. Vita, J. P. and Watson, W. G. E. 2002 Are the Akk. terms katappu (Ug. ktp) and katinnu Hurrian in origin? AoF 29: 146–149. 2014 Akk. katappu and katinnu revisited. NABU 2014 Nr. 24. p. 35. Von Dassow, E. 2008 State and Society in the Late Bronze Age. Alalaḫ under the Mittani Empire. SCCNH 17. Bethesda MD: CDL Press. Ward, W. A. 1962 Some Egypto-Semitic Roots. Or 31: 397–412. Watson, W. G. E. 2002 Tools of the Trade. (KTU 4.127 and 4.385). UF 34: 921–930. 2007 Lexical Studies in Ugaritic. Aula Orientalis Supplementa 19 Sabadell: Editorial Ausa. 2009 The Ugaritic bdlm: A Reappraisal. SEL 26: 23–27. 2011 Semitic and Non-Semitic Terms for Horse-Trappings in Ugaritic. AuOr 29: 155–176. 2013a Terms Related to the Family in Ugaritic. Historiae 10: 17–50. 2013b Getting to the point. NABU 2013 Nr. 30. pp. 52–53 Wilhelm, G. 1970 ta/erdennu, ta/urtannu, ta/urtānu. UF 2: 277–282. Xella, P. 1973 Sul ruolo dei ġzrm nella società ugaritica. La Parola del Passato 150: 194–202. 2002 *ġzr in ugaritico. Analisi contestuale e ricerca etimologica. Pp. 857–869 in Ex Mesopotamia et Syria Lux. Festschrift für Manfried Dietrich zu seinem 65. Geburtstag, ed. O. Loretz, K. A. Metzler and H.-P. Schaudig. AOAT 281. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. Zorn, J. 1991 lú.pa-ma-ha-a in EA 162:74 and the role of the mhr in Egypt and Ugarit. JNES 50: 129–138.

Tabal and the Limits of Assyrian Imperialism Mark Weeden The thesis of this short contribution is that Neo-Assyrian foreign policy in Tabal, the name given by Neo-Assyrians to the area roughly corresponding to modern Kappadokya in Central Turkey (Cappadocia in classical Anatolia), was thoroughly destabilized by the removal of the local king Wasusarma, known in Assyrian sources as Uassurme, towards the end of the reign of Tiglath-Pileser III (745–727 BC). This intervention occasioned a period of instability in the region lasting at least for the rest of the 8th century BC, after which mentions of Tabal are rare in Assyrian sources. 1 Associated with this period are the events surrounding the death of Sargon II (721–705 BC). This perspective differs from the “divide and rule” interpretation of Assyrian strategy during this period favoured by S. Melville in a recent article, although the historical analysis is in many other respects in agreement with hers. 2 Melville’s hypothesis that the area of Tabal functioned as a “contested periphery”, which experienced economic growth and political consolidation due to the conflicting attentions of neighbouring powers (Assyria, Phrygia, Urartu) during the 8th century BC, remains highly illuminating. Also of great interest are the ramifications of a recent article by Zs. Simon (2013) which suggests that parts of southern Tabal may have been paying tribute to or have been otherwise administered by “Great Kings” in the north of the area. The modification to both of these views proposed here throws an interesting light on the Assyrian relationship with client states, indicating that a fragmented local hierarchy was — in this case at least — not conducive to effective indirect governance. The precise details of the situation largely elude us, of course, not least due to our still poor understanding of the historical geography.

The Name “Tabal” To be clear: Tabal was the name given by the Neo-Assyrians to this area. The attestations of the name are documented by d’Alfonso (2013). Tabal was indeed a relatively common placename, there being at least one Tabal in southern Syria, and one or more places called D/Tabal referred to in Old Akkadian documents (third millennium BC). 3 These are unlikely to be identical with the Neo-Assyrian Tabal in Anatolia and are merely a further indication that this was a 1.  Aro 2012: 389–90. 2.  Melville 2010: 100. 3.  d’Alfonso 2013: 178 fn. 10; see now Luukko 2012: 6 Text 3 rev. 3. Edzard, Farber, and Sollberger 1977: 29.

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reasonably common place-name. 4 Tabal is not attested at all as a place-name in Old or Middle Assyrian documents, and is thus unlikely to have been an external name for this specific area prior to the Neo-Assyrian period. The south of the area was referred to as Tuwana by the native inscriptions, which is identical with the toponym Tuhana in Assyrian sources, and is normally associated with classical Tyana. It is unclear what the local name for the northern part of the same area was. Recently the name Sura has been advanced as a candidate, based on the otherwise allegedly unexplained occurrence of the name as a reference to the inhabitants of an important place of that name, spelled su-ra/i-za-ha(URBS), in an inscription of Yariri, regent at Karkamish in the early 8th century BC, which lists the places where his name was heard, as well as on the fact that classical sources refer to Cappadocians as “White Syrians”. 5 The hypothesis is also supposed to explain the reference to a (land of) Sura, this time spelled sú-ra/i-(REGIO), in the earliest inscriptions from Karkamish (early 10th century BC), where it is assumed that this cannot be a reference to Assyria, owing to that country’s presumed weakness at the time and the lack of aphaeresis of initial /a/ in texts from this period. 6

Nevertheless, there is only one clear piece of evidence for the identity of a land of Sura(ya) in hieroglyphic, namely the Phoenician equivalent to the same in the bilingual inscription of ÇİNEKÖY from the second half of the 8th century BC. 7 This form (ʾšr) continues to point to Assyria being the default interpretation of Sura(yya), even if Sura in the inscriptions of Yariri cannot refer to it. Until this name is attested in the local hieroglyphic inscriptions from Tabal, the suggestion that the indigenous population referred to the area as Sura cannot be verified. It is also unclear where such a name would have originated, as it is not attested in connection with the area in the Late Bronze Age. The best, although still tentative, suggestion for a referent of this term in Yariri’s KARKAMIŠ A6 §6 remains in my view Urartu, the inhabitants of which were called KUR Biainele, but also possibly KURŠurele in their own inscriptions, although the signification of the latter term is disputed and its status as a specific toponym in Urartian inscriptions is beginning to look unlikely. 8 Urartu remains the most suitable geo-political 4.  For consideration of suggested etymologies (Akkadian tābalu “dry land” or, less likely, Hurrian taballi “smith(-land)”) see d’Alfonso 2013: 187–191. As an ad hoc suggestion one might also consider Akkadian tabālu “to take away”, as in “export(-land)”, but it is unclear how this could be verified. 5.  Simon 2012: 173–177. KARKAMIŠ A6 §6 (Hawkins 2000: 124). 6.  Simon 2012: 173. KARKAMIŠ A4b §2 (Hawkins 2000: 80); KH 11.O.400, 2 (Peker 2016: 14, Cat 2, 2). It is debatable whether Assyria really was so weak as not to be able to have reached Karkamiš at the time of Karkamiš A4b (Weeden 2013a: 10). 7.  su-ra/i-wa/i-za-ha(URBS) | DOMUS-na-za = bt ʾšr ÇİNEKÖY §5, su-ra/i-ia-sa-ha(URBS) = wʾšrym ibid. 6; Tekoğlu 2000: 968. It is not necessary to assume that strict sound laws can always be used to explain the writings of place names or that a similar writing needed to be used at all periods in all places. sú-ra/i-(REGIO) at Karkamish in the 10th century does not need to be the same as su-ra/i-(URBS) at the same place in the early 8th century BC, while it can be the same as su-ra/i-(ia)(URBS) in a Cilician inscription from later that century. Semantic, graphic, psycho- and socio-linguistic factors, among others, all play roles in determining the shapes taken by place-names and their spellings over time, not just phonology, but they are harder for us to access. 8.  Sura in KARKAMIŠ A6 §6 is tentatively associated with Urartu by Hawkins (2000: 126) on the basis of the possible toponym *KURŠura/i/u- which occurs in the possibly gentilic forms nom. pl. KURšúre-(e)-le/le12, gen. pl. KURšú-ra-(a)-ú-e, dat. pl. KURšú-ra-ú-e, abl. pl. KURšú-ra-a-ni (forms in Wilhelm 1993: 136;

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player of sufficient status to be named alongside Egypt, Babylon, Phrygia and Lydia (?) in the list of places where Yariri’s fame was known. 9 If Assyria is not named in that list, it is because Urartu was.

Power Relations in Northern Tabal We are thus left with the Assyrian name for the area. To use d’Alfonso (2013)’s terminology, it is an “out-group” designation, which does not necessarily correspond to any local politically defined territory. How far the Assyrians thought Tabal extended is one issue. How far the local territorial units that may or may not be expressed by such elements of material culture as settlement type, pottery or the use of hieroglyphic writing were matched by borders and divisions of political units, is quite another issue. The Kızıl Irmak, the main river encircling the central Hittite area of the Late Bronze Age, appears not to have functioned as a cultural or political border in the Iron Age, with the possible exception of the border towards the Phrygian heartland to the west. 10 The distribution of so-called Alişar IV pottery to the south of the Kızıl Irmak as well as to the north, and the find of a hieroglyphic lead strip from the 8th century BC north of the Kızıl Irmak, possibly belonging to the same political context as Wasusarma and his father Tuwati, now indicate how little significance this waterway seems to have had as a marker of geo-political or cultural boundaries on its southern bend. 11 Salvini 2008/II: 202, 204, not listed under toponyms) which appear to have a similar extension to forms of the name KURBiainele “Urartians” (Wilhelm 1993: 139). The main argument against interpreting this as a toponym is the alleged “translation” provided by the Kelišin bilingual, where Belck (1904: 73) restored [ŠÚ (kiššati)], “universe” in the Assyrian version (Salvini 2008: 141; A 3–11 obv. 3), and has since been followed by numerous scholars in equating this with gen. pl. KURšú-ra-a-ú-e (recently Mayer 2013: 26). This does not have to be a direct translation. Nor is it necessary that that a place-name *KURŠura/i/u- have anything to do with the weapon GIŠšuri- known from Urartian texts. It should be noted, however, that the base-form *KURŠura/i/u- does not occur in any Urartian text, nor for that matter does the form *KURBia(Wilhelm 1993: 139). Furthermore, the logographic writing KÚR KUR.KURMEŠ (Gövelek stele, Salvini 2008/I: 622; A 14–1, 12) appears as partially phonetic bur-ga-la-ni KUR.KURMEŠ in an almost identical passage on the stele from Čelebibağ (Salvini 2008/I: 535–6; A 11–1 obv. 21–22), which is written fully phonetically as bur-ga-la-ni KURšú-ri-l [i] in the duplicate text on a stele from Hagi (Salvini 2008/I: 538; A11–2, 30). If the translation “enemy lands” suggested by Salvini for all three attestations is correct then KURŠuricannot be a designation of Urartu, nor is it likely to be a toponym. It is indeed difficult to understand the context otherwise, but the passage is very unclear. See Salvini 2002: 128. 9.  Simon’s further point, following Starke (1997: 386), but in fact going back to Forrer (1931: 30), is that the place-name usually interpreted as Babylon in the same passage from KARKAMIŠ A6 (*475-la Hawkins 2000: 126) may in fact refer to Urartu, given that Babylon is usually spelled *292-la (= ROTA-la), as allegedly attested on a Late Bronze Age glass mould from Boğazköy (Baykal-Seeher and Seeher 2003) and on Imperial seal-impressions indicating a Babylonian princess (e.g., SBo 1.34, Güterbock 1940: 64). This would indeed exclude Sura being a writing of Urartu. However, the consistent internal cross-hatching in these signs for “Babylon”, as opposed to the consistent Empire period drawing of *292 (ROTA) as having a single cross-bar, indicates that they are most likely separate signs. The writings of Babylon from the Empire period are therefore also best interpreted as *475-la. 10.  Summers 2013. 11.  Summers 1994; Summers 2009: 660; d’Alfonso 2012: 392. Summers 2013: 45. Akdoğan and Hawkins 2009. Iid. 2010. Giusfredi 2010: 236–239. For likely confirmation of the find-spot of the new lead strip see Weeden 2013b.

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The distribution of Wasusarma’s inscriptions, particularly the SUVASA-TOPADAGÖSTESİN group, which all share idiosyncratic features of script and orthography, may indicate a consolidation of power in north-west Cappadocia moving from a base either in the north-east of the area around Kululu and Sultanhan, where inscriptions mentioning servants of his father Tuwati are concentrated, or from the area north of the Kızıl Irmak, where the lead strip mentioning a “Lord Tuwati” was found. 12 Crucial here is the location of the land of Parzuta, which formed an alliance of 8 kings against Wasusarma, who was himself only left with the support of the kings Kiyaki, possibly the same as Kikki of Šinuḫtu (= Aksaray?) known from Assyrian sources, Warpalawa (of Tuwana, classical Tyanitis near Niğde), known in Assyrian documents as Urballaʾa of Tuhana, and the otherwise unknown Ruwata. 13 Parzuta, which one reaches by crossing a river, if it is identical with the land of the city of Ta-x which is also mentioned in the context, could be the area of north-western Cappadocia where the inscriptions are found, in which case Wasusarma was crossing the Kızıl Irmak from the north to reach it. Alternatively it could be the area further west in the Konya plain, in which case he was crossing the Melendiz Çay between the Salt-Lake and the Melendiz mountains. 14 In TOPADA Wasusarma refers both to himself and to his father Tuwati as “Great King”, reviving a Hittite title last seen in 10th century Karkamish, and using an arrangement of the signs expressing it into a royal aedicula not seen since the Late Bronze Age. 15 His removal by TiglathPileser III, who sent one of his eunuchs to dislodge him after he stopped paying tribute, might be seen as a move to curtail what appeared to be overweening ambition on the part of the client king. 16 Wasusarma himself tells us how he had been collecting tribute from his defeated enemy in Parzuta. 17 By doing this he had been behaving like Assyria, which expected tribute from him and apparently did not receive any. However, the Assyrian tactic of not annexing the newly kingless territory into the Assyrian provincial system and instead installing on the throne one Hulli, “the son of a nobody”, does not appear to have led to a resolution of the situation. Hulli may or may not be identical with Huli the nephew of Ruwa, a servant of Tuwati, who erected the stele KULULU 4 in honour of his uncle. 18 He would thus be of the same generation as Wasusarma, but presumably not of the royal line. It is unclear whether he is better described as a competitor or a subaltern. 19 12.  Weeden 2010: 43–46. 13.  TOPADA §§3–4. Hawkins 2000: 451–461; Weeden 2010: 48–52. The location of the town the Assyrians called Šinuḫtu at Aksaray is made likely by the find of a stele there belonging to one “Kiyakiya, the ruler, the king” (AKSARAY 5 §9, Hawkins 2000: 475–478). 14.  Weeden 2010: 55–59. 15.  TOPADA §1 (Hawkins 2000: 452). In SUVASA B and C (Hawkins 2000: 462) Wasusarma also refers to himself as “Great King”. Note that d’Alfonso and Payne (2016: 122) now date TOPADA to the eleventh to tenth centuries BC due to the archaic palaeography of one frequent sign. There are, however, other late sign-forms and spelling phenomena in the inscription: lack of initial a-final, possibly form of FRONS. 16.  Tiglath-Pileser III 47, 14′–15′ (Tadmor and Yamada 2011: 123); 49, 27–29 (ibid. 133). 17.  TOPADA §§15, 25 (Hawkins 2000: 453). 18.  Dillo 2003: 319; Melville 2010: 97. 19.  Translated “commoner” at Tadmor and Yamada 2011: 123, 133. Dillo 2003 and Melville 2010 argue for Hulli being of elite status. Anyone not of the royal line might be a “commoner”, no matter how elite they might be.

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Whoever he was, Hulli would appear to have been removed by Shalmaneser V (727–722 BC), because Sargon II restored him to power over Tabal, or Bīt-Purutaš as the northern part of the area is called in Sargon’s inscriptions, some time at the beginning of his reign, although he only tells us this in the narrative concerning the treachery of Hulli’s son Ambaris in 713 BC. 20 Sargon says that Hulli was removed to Assyria, where he was treated “[like] the common people” (ṣāb ḫupši), before Sargon restored him. 21 It is theoretically possible that Hulli was on Sargon’s side in the almost certainly hostile power-manoeuvres that resulted in his taking over the throne from his brother, or that he was preferred by Sargon for not being Shalmaneser’s agent in Tabal. 22 Hulli’s re-instatement may also be indirectly connected in some way with the — presumably later — events of 718 BC surrounding the removal from power of Kikki of Šinuḫtu, which may have been the Assyrian name for Aksaray or somewhere in the area. 23 This Kikki was possibly the same Kiyaki who allied himself with Wasusarma in the fight against the Parzutean enemy back in the late 730s BC. Whatever had intervened during the short reign of Shalmaneser V, Sargon gave Kikki’s holdings to Kurti, king of Atuna. We thus obtain a fairly clear, although extremely hypothetical, map of the loyalties in northern Tabal from the end of Tiglath-Pileser III through to the treachery of Ambaris. Assyrian relations with Tabalian kings: F = friend; E = Enemy Tiglath-Pileser III (744–727 BC) Shalmaneser V (727–722 BC) Sargon II (722–705 BC)

Uassurme E

Hulli/Ambaris F E F>E

Kikki E F? E

Kurti F? E? F

What becomes clear from this simplifying although hypothetical table is that the relationship entertained by the Assyrian and local kings to the line of Tuwati and his son Wasusarma and those rulers or kings who had allegiances with them are the central fulcra determining the Assyrian strategy. The hypothesis that Assyrian patronage for some reason shifted away from Hulli during the reign of Shalmaneser V, and back to Hulli during the events associated with the change from Shalmaneser V to Sargon II, may be a key to understanding the processes at work. Whatever claim Wasusarma had to calling himself and his father “Great King”, it seems that they at least temporarily represented something that local elites could either identify with or reject. Hulli is anti-Wasusarma, thus likely anti-Kikki. Kurti also appears to have interests opposed to Kikki’s and partially overlapping with Hulli’s. If Shalmaneser V (727–722 BC) removed Hulli, whom did he replace him with? This is not mentioned by Sargon, who just says that he “restored” Hulli. A tribute list from Nineveh published by J.D. Hawkins and J.N. Postgate (1988) mentions a Tuatti along with 8 other “Tabalian” kings, including two known from elsewhere (Ašhitu, Urballaʾa). Hawkins and Postgate date this document to Uassurme’s father, Tuwati, due to the fact that the succession of rulers after 20.  Annals 195–6 (Fuchs 1994: 123–124); Fuchs 1998: 42, 71 Text VIc.10. 21.  Fuchs 1998: 42, 71 Text VIc, 10–11. 22.  For Sargon’s excuse that he assumed power due to his brother’s sacrilegious behaviour with regard to taxing the people of Assur, see Chamaza 1992. 23.  Annals 68 (Fuchs 1994: 62); Hawkins and Postgate 1988: 39.

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Uassurme (Hulli-Ambaris) is known, while considering but rejecting the possibility that this Tuatti be Uassurme’s son. 24 S. Aro, in her unpublished dissertation on Tabal, has cogently argued that the document dates later, to the reign of Sargon, due to the likely archival context (Nineveh, North Palace, rather than Nimrud, where Tiglath-Pileser III’s administrative documents were found) as well as the historical consideration that one would not expect tribute from Tabal in the eighth century before 738 BC, when Tiglath-Pileser III actually went there, by which time Uassurme was on the throne. 25 This would mean that there would be someone using the dynastic name Tuatti ruling part of Tabal, indeed mentioned first in the list, at the same time as Hulli and Ambaris are attested as having been in power over at least some of Uassurme’s territory during the reign of Sargon. I would suggest the possibility that the Tuatti from this list, possibly a son of Uassurme, was precisely the person installed in Tabal by Shalmaneser V after he had for whatever reason removed Hulli. The document should thus be dated to his reign. We do not hear of his removal by Sargon, just as we hear very little about his brother’s reign from him. As part of his re-instatement of Hulli in Bit-Purutaš Sargon married his own daughter, Ahat-abiša, to Hulli’s son Ambaris and gave him the region of Hilakku as a dowry. 26 The donation of a daughter is a mark of the Assyrian king’s interest in the area. It is a mystery why Hilakku, essentially rough Cilicia according to most interpretations, should be given to Ambaris as a dowry, when it lay in an area separated from northern Tabal by the Melendiz mountains, part of the Konya plain, the Tabalian kingdom of Tuwana and the Assyrian province of Que. 27 Melville proposes that this dislocation of Ambaris was an attempt to control Tabal through a “divide and rule” strategy by not allowing him to gain too much territorial integrity. 28 I would propose as an alternative explanation that Sargon at this time simply did not have the power over the area of northern Tabal to give Ambaris any land there. In short, once he had dispensed Šinuḫtu (= Aksaray?) to Kurti of Atuna, there was no land for him to give. This does not suggest that Hulli and his son Ambaris are directly inheriting the area previously ruled by Wasusarma, which must have included the area of north-western Cappadocia, where the TOPADA, SUVASA and GÖSTESIN inscriptions are found. In fact it looks as though events connected with the removal of Hulli during the reign of Shalmaneser V allowed another local power to arise, Atuna, of which Sargon has to take account when re-distributing land and power to his new favourites.

North vs. South in Tabal The precise location and extent of Atuna have been heatedly debated. A detailed contribution on this subject was recently made by Zs. Simon (2013), to which the reader is referred 24.  Hawkins and Postgate 1988: 39. 25.  Aro 1998: 85–87. I am grateful to S. Aro for sending me these pages and discussing the matter with me. Further arguments for a dating later than early Tiglath-Pileser III are found in d’Alfonso 2013: 181. The archival argument is of course made more complex by various confusions relating to Nimrud and Nineveh by Layard and in the British Museum collections, but this document belongs to the DT collection, excavated by George Smith, which does not necessarily exhibit so many difficulties of precisely this type. See Reade 1996: 214. 26.  Annals 198 (Fuchs 1994: 124). 27.  Postgate 1973: 31. The view presented here is in contrast to that of Bryce (2012: 279–280), who sees the gift of Hilakku as extending Ambaris’ dominion continuously from northern Tabal all the way to rough Cilicia. 28.  Melville 2010: 100.

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for a thorough collection of the evidence and exposition of the history of research. To briefly recapitulate: The spellings of this place name occur in Assyrian inscriptions both with and without the initial /a/, which may or may not reflect a form of aphaeresis either in the local Luwian language or in Assyrian; 29 the local inscription of BOHÇA mentions a king Kurti, who may or may not be identical with the Kurti mentioned by Sargon; 30 it has further been proposed with serious reservations that this Kurti’s father As(a)hwisi may have been identical with the Ašhitti/ Ušhitti mentioned by Tiglath-Pileser III as a king of Atuna, and the two of them would thus represent an established local dynasty; 31 an inscription by a servant of one Kurti was also found at Hısarcık on the north-east face of Ericyes Dağ; 32 a place-name Tuna, as well as an Upper and Lower Tuna, is mentioned in the lead-strips from Kululu, among other place-names, and has been assumed by some to be the name of the settlement at Kululu, although this is unlikely; 33 the classical place-name Tynna has been located at Zeyve Höyük/Porsuk, thus in the region of Tuwana; this may or may not be identical with the region of the “silver-mountain” Tunni and the “alabaster-mountain” Muli which are mentioned together with Hubušna (classical Kybistra near Ereğli?) in Shalmaneser III’s itinerary from Melid though Tabal in 836 BC. 34 Simon separates Kurti’s Tuna/Atuna, of which he argues Atuna would have to be the older form of the name, from (Upper and Lower) Tuna mentioned in the Kululu lead-strips as well as from Tynna (Zeyve Höyük). 35 These latter two he posits to be identical, which means that the people who had power where the Kululu lead strips were written would also have had control over regions of Tuwana, where Tynna would have been located, at the time of their writing. Simon argues that this identification means that Tynna (and Tuwana) must have been subject to the “Great Kings” of Tabal. 36 However, the function of the lists in the Kululu documents is sufficiently unclear that the relationship could also have been the other way round. Furthermore, Tuwati is not referred to as a “Great King” on the inscriptions of his “servants” in north-eastern Cappadocia. It is only his son Wasusarma who refers to him as “Great King”. Should Tuna of the Kululu lead strips and classical Tynna/Zeyve Höyük thus be the same place, the Kululu lead strips would probably date to the time of Wasusarma. Assuming that the deliveries in the Kululu lead strips relate to tribute, which is unclear, this would also mean that Warpalawa of Tuwana would have been a vassal of Wasusarma at the time of the TOPADA inscription, when 29.  For attestations and spellings see Bagg 2007: 35–36. 30.  Hawkins 2000: 478–80. 31.  Hawkins 2000: 479; literature at Simon 2013: 283. Also mentioned in ADD 908+ obv. 6′, rev. 5 (Hawkins and Postgate 1988: 32). 32.  Hawkins 2000: 483–85. 33.  Hawkins 2000: 506–11; see literature at Simon 2013: 284 fn. 17. Simon (2013: 284) points out that it is rather unlikely that Tuna (Upper and/or Lower) refers to the mound at Kululu, given that some individuals are not referred to with a town-name in the Kululu lead strips, which probably means they came from Kululu. Tuna, therefore, would not be at Kululu. 34.  Most completely Nimrud Statue, Grayson 1995: 79, A.0.102.16, 164′–181′: Hatti (i.e. northern Syria) — Mount [. . .]inzini — Melid (Malatya-Arslantepe) — Mount Timur — cities of Tabal including Artulu (Kululu?) — Mount Tunni (silver mountain, Bolkar dağlar) — Hubušna (Ereğli) – Mount Muli (alabaster mountain, Bolkar dağlar). It was also written on the throne base of Shalmaneser III (Grayson 1995: 140, A.0.102.60) that the stone for it had come from Mount tu-nu, and the stone is called NA4 pa-ru-te, a type of alabaster (CAD P 211). Yamada 2000: 211–214. 35.  Simon 2013: 284. 36.  Simon 2013: 285.

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he joined him in the fight against the 8 kings and the Parzutean enemy. 37 When, acccording to this hypothesis, Tiglath-Pileser III removed Uassurme, he would thus have been removing the primary king of Tabal, both North and South. This view, which mainly derives from the identification of Tuna at Kululu with Tynna/ Zeyve Höyük, in combination with a particular understanding of the relationship between the kings allied to Wasusarma in the TOPADA narrative, is certainly to be entertained, but is difficult to accept without reservations on the basis of the present evidence. Kululu in the extreme north-east of Tabal does not make a very natural location from which to rule over both north-western and southern Tabal (= Tuwana). Tiglath-Pileser III certainly made no distinction between the status of the kings of Tabal in his tribute lists from the time before the removal of Uassurme. The king of Tuhana (= Tuwana), Urballa’a (= Warpalawa) is mentioned in these as if he is quite separate. The order is on both occasions: Uassurme the Tabalian, Ušhitti the (A)tunaean, Urballa’a the Tuhanaean, Tuha(m)me the Ištundaean, Urimm(e)i the Hubišnean. 38 Nevertheless, it remains true that Uassurme is given the ethnic adjective “Tabalian”, which is also the denomination of the whole area. Whether this is relevant is another question. 39 Nevertheless, it is likely that Uassurme (Wasusarma) was the foremost North Tabalian king at the time of his removal, although this is disputed by some. 40 The interpretation of the inscriptional evidence followed here, notably the distribution of the North Tabalian inscriptions and the TOPADA narrative, suggests that it was the westward or southward expansion by Wasusarma into the area of north-western Cappadocia either from Kululu or somewhere north of the Kızıl Irmak, and his subsequent levying of tribute, that would have occasioned his removal in the first place, rather than his having occupied a longer term position of “Great Kingship” superordinate to the other kings. 41 The view taken here inclines to the understanding that Wasusarma or maybe his father had revived or usurped the title “Great King” quite recently. The argument for keeping the Tuna of the Kululu lead-strips separate from the Atuna/ Tuna mentioned in the Annals of Sargon is mainly linguistic, based on the position of H.C. Melchert that aphaeresis of initial /a/ did not happen in Luwian. 42 Under Simon’s application of this theory, which attempts to explain away apparent counter-examples in late Luwian texts as purely graphic phenomena with no linguistic validity, it would have been impossible for an older form Atuna to have developed into the form Tuna in the Kululu lead strips. 43 As much 37.  Simon 2013: 285. 38.  Tiglath-Pileser III 15, 1–2; 27, 5–6 (Tadmor and Yamada 2011: 48, 70). Although Simon (2013: 281) correctly rejects a geographical tendency for the order of the tribute lists in these documents more generally on the macro-level, it is quite possible that the order is geographical within the smaller units, such as Tabal. 39.  See d’Alfonso 2013: 179, who does not think it is relevant. 40.  E.g., d’Alfonso 2013: 179. 41.  Weeden 2010. For an opposing view which does not see the need to explain the use of the title “Great King” in TOPADA and SUVASA according to the development envisaged here see d’Alfonso loc. cit. 42.  Melchert 2010. 43.  Simon 2013: 281–282. The choice would thus remain between whether one accepts a Luwian alternation Atuna/Tuna, which is reproduced in Neo-Assyrian, or a Neo-Assyrian aphaeresis of an original Atuna with Hieroglyphic Tuna being separate, as preferred by Simon. It is also not impossible that Assyrian scribes confused Tuna and Atuna, whether these were alternate pronunciations of the same

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of this theory is based on assumptions concerning the position of the accent in Luwian, about which I know very little, not to mention the accent found in place-names, it is difficult to feel convinced of its certainty. In my view it therefore remains entirely possible, although impossible to prove, that Atuna/Tuna from the Annals of Sargon and Tuna from the Kululu lead-strips are the same place. If this were the case then the occurrence of Tuna in the lead strips would rather indicate an economic connection of some kind between Atuna/Tuna and whatever authority at Kululu was producing the lead strips. This is geographically not surprising, if Atuna/Tuna is in the area of Bohça in the region of Avanos. 44

If Atuna/Tuna from the Annals of Sargon can be connected with the king Kurti of the BOHÇA inscription, and that remains a significant “if”, one might assume that the king of Atuna was among the kings who allegedly conspired against Wasusarma. His territory, if it is partially to be associated with the area between Bohça and Hısarcık, even if it had such an extent only after the benefaction he had received from Sargon, would have been directly affected by any push westwards from the Kululu area. If Hulli represented in some sense an anti-Wasusarma faction in the Kululu area itself, then the king of Atuna would have been a similar entity in the neighbouring zone. Thus Sargon’s reward of both Kurti and of Hulli would have represented an attempt to placate two sides. The lion’s share of the reward would have gone to Hulli’s side, in that his son was married to Sargon’s daughter, but it was not possible for the Assyrian king to give him a dowry that was in any way territorially meaningful. As narrated by Sargon, Ambaris was removed from power for conspiring with the Phrygian and Urartian enemies in 713 BC and deported to Assyria with his family. 45 BitPurutaš and Hilakku were annexed as an Assyrian province, with a eunuch being sent to take over the administration, deportees from conquered areas being settled in the area and fortifications being built. 46 It is just possible that an extensive “Cappadocian” wall noted by A. Müller-Karpe along the tops of the Kulmaç hills was built in connection with these efforts. 47 Another wall of a similar construction on an east–west axis over a hill to the north-west of Topada has been documented by Y. Şenyurt, although place or whether they were separate places. If one is convinced by Melchert’s abolition of all apparent cases of aphaeresis in Luwian and accepts that this also applies to place-names and this place-name in particular, then Atuna in Sargon’s annals and Tuna in the Kululu lead strips cannot be identical, and Simon’s reconstruction of the relationship between north and south Tabal becomes the best way to explain the evidence. 44.  Perhaps nearby Camiihöyük, subject of a recent rescue excavation by Y. Şenyurt from Gazi University, a medium-sized mound (Erol and Şenyurt 2011). The need still remains, however, to explain what the difference is between Upper and Lower Tuna, whether these are different parts of the same place or different places (Giusfredi 2010: 197; Simon 2013: 284). Lower Tuna has more personal names associated with it than Upper Tuna (eg. KULULU lead strip 1: Upper Tuna 8 individuals, Lower Tuna 13, Hawkins 2000: 506–8). 45.  Annals 200–201 (Fuchs 1994: 124–125). 46.  Annals 202–203 (Fuchs 1994: 125). The fortifications are referred to with the words kir-he ú-šep[i]-šá “I had walls made”, where the plural of the noun kirhu “citadel” (CAD K 405) appears to have the meaning “walls”. 47.  Müller-Karpe 2009. Yamada 2006: 231 fn. 39, although Yamada is careful to point out that the wall is too far North to have been part of the defences (10 fortresses) around Kammanu (plain of Elbistan) built during 711 BC (Annals 204b-208a, Fuchs 1994: 125–127).

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it is difficult to see precisely what it might have been a defence against: possibly even against Atuna, although it would have to be little more than a symbolic defence. 48 Kurti had also allegedly been conspiring with Mita of Muški, i.e. the Phrygians, but was apparently pardoned by Sargon after sending an envoy to meet him in Media. 49 The contrast in treatment with that of Ambaris is striking, and again makes one suspect that the Assyrians did not have a great deal of control over north-west Cappadocia. Sargon’s annexation and defensive building measures do not seem to have worked terribly well either, because by 710–9 BC he was already hearing in a letter from his governor in Que, as we read in a draught of Sargon’s reply preserved at Nimrud, that Urballa’a of Tuhana was losing cities in Bit-Paruta to the Atunaeans and Ištuandaeans. 50 After S. Parpola’s suggested identification of Bit-Paruta in this letter with the term BitPurutaš known from Sargon’s royal inscriptions, i.e. a name that sometimes refers to the area of northern Tabal, this fits very well with the location of Atuna in the area around Bohça. 51 It is possible that the Ištuandeans also had access to northern Tabal, but it is unclear where from. 52 What also appears to be implied by the governor’s report is that Urballa’a has at some time been made responsible for Bit-Purutaš, or at least assumed some sort of responsibility under unclear circumstances, for example a failure of the governor to keep order in the area. Sargon does not tell us anything in his royal inscriptions about arrangements that may have led to this situation, nor would one expect him to. A. Fuchs subtly infers from Sargon’s fortification of the area around Kammanu and Tilgarimmu in 711 BC as a bastion against Urartu, Mušku and (restored) [Kasku] that he had by this point effectively lost control over northern Tabal, which was from then on largely under Phrygian influence, if not quite Phrygian territory. 53 48.  Şenyurt 2010: 263, 268 resim (picture) 9. 49.  Fuchs 1994: 411; Fuchs 1998: 44, 72, Text VIIa ii 5–12. 50.  Parpola 1987: 6 Text 1, 43–45. 51.  D’Alfonso (2013: 182) tentatively interprets Bit-Purutaš as referring to part of southern Tabal, north-east of Tuwana, on the basis that it is mentioned between Tabal and Hilakku on Sargon’s Bull Colossus (Fuchs 1994: 63, 21f.). The term is here understood to refer to the northern areas of Tabal where Wasusarma’s inscriptions are located (Postgate 1973: 31; Hawkins 1979: 165), but also as a term that could be used to refer to the area more generally, like “Tabal” itself. 52.  The location of Ištu(a)nda is no closer to being securely established (Postgate 1973: 30 “north or north-east of Ereğli”). If the tribute-lists of Tiglath-Pileser III are geographically meaningful on the micro-level, then it should be located somewhere to the west of Tuwana. See Bagg 2007: 119. The LBA Hittite place-name Wistawanta (Del Monte and Tischler 1978: 485) is an unlikely comparandum, as this must be in northern Anatolia due to its involvement in the narrative of Hattusili III’s campaign against the Pishuruwean enemy (Apology ii 44; Otten 1984: 12). Hittite Wasutuwanda has also been suggested (Gurney apud Hawkins 1979: 167), which is mentioned after the Hittite Lower Land (i.e. the Konya plain and Cappadocia) and before Innuwita (also BT iii 51, Otten 1988: 23), Alazhana (hapax) and Hanhana (Çankırı in the northern Kızıl Irmak?) in the long list of gods in KUB 6.45 ii 41 = KUB 6.46 iii 9 (Del Monte and Tischler 1978: 480). It is possible that the order of this part of the list is built on non-geographical criteria (Singer 1996: 173), but the insertion between entries concerning the Lower Land and somewhere associated with LBA Tarhuntassa may indicate again the area to the west of Tuwana, but still north-east of Hilakku (Rough Cilicia). 53.  Fuchs 1994: 462–3. Bagg 2011: 240. The suggested location of Tilgarimmu at modern Gürün is rather unlikely given that there are no Iron Age remains there, apart from the Hieroglyphic inscription

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The extraordinary news from his governor in Que that Mita of Muški had intercepted a delegation sent by Urik of Que to Urartu and was prepared to make peace must therefore have come as a panacea to the failing Assyrian area strategy. 54 The very fact that the Phrygians were able to intercept an embassy travelling from Que to Urartu should also demonstrate how thickly Phrygian political presence in Tabal must have been spread at this time. Mita himself was most likely much troubled by Cimmerian groups at this stage, and unable to sustain a warlike footing against the Assyrians. King Midas (Mita) in fact died fighting the Cimmerians in 695 BC.

The Consequences Within 5 years of the entente with Midas, Sargon died in battle (705 BC). The eponym chronicle from Assyria tells us that he fell in battle against one Gurdi the Kulummaean. 55 A fragmentary Babylonian chronicle tablet informs us that Sargon was campaigning in Tabal, probably in that year. 56 His body was not retrieved from the battlefield, a fact which may have had a profound influence on Assyrian foreign policy in the north-west over the next thirty years. 57 This character Gurdi is sometimes controversially understood as a Cimmerian, Assyrian gimmirayya, with a metathesis of /r/ and /m/ besides a confusion between the liquid consonants /l/ and /r/ and rounding of the vowels /i/ to /u/. 58 However, the possibility should also not be forgotten that Gurdi may be the same as Kurti, whom Sargon had failed to punish for siding with Mita/Midas only 8 years before. 59 Such a proposal would have to assume that the use of the epithet “Kulummaean” referred to another location in northern Tabal, the alternation with “Atunaean” being thus comparable to the terms Bit-Purutaš and Tabal. 60 Of course this cannot currently be verified, and the first conclusion from the available data should be that figures with different ethnic epithets are in fact separate individuals. The story of Assyrian involvement in Tabal during the 8th century BC is characterised by an inability on the part of the Assyrians to find the right local partners. It is possible that of that name (literature in Bagg 2007: 256). Tilgarimmu, also written Tagarimmu, is more likely to be associated with the Tegarama known from Hittite texts, which is probably to be located somewhere on the plain of Elbistan (discussion in Yamada 2006; Barjamovic 2011: 122–133). 54.  Parpola 1987: 4 Text 1. 55.  Millard 1994: 48 Text B6 rev. 9 Glassner 2004: 174–5. The fragmentary note for 704 BC mentions other events before going on to say that “the magnates [went?] against the Kulummaean” as read by Frahm 1998, with the inference that this was an unsuccessful action in revenge for the king’s death, as it is not reported in any royal inscription. Cf. Finkel and Reade 1998: 252 GALMEŠ ina UGU DUMU É.GALlum qer?-x “the magnates against the palace servant”. Parpola 1987: 70f. with fn. 7 has the action happening at Kuluman in Iran. One might speculatively assume a confusion of Kuluman for either gimmirayya or for another ethnonym. See the confusion of kurhubuškayya (near Mannaea in Iran) for uruhubušnayya (in Tabal) on the Nimrud statue of Shalmaneser III, Grayson 1996: 79 (A.0.102.16, 176′). Hawkins 1995: 99 fn. 147; Weeden 2010: 39 fnn. 4–5. Such a suggestion is only to be entertained as a last resort, of course. 56.  Grayson 1975: 76, Chronicle 1(B) ii 6′; Glassner 2004: 204–205, no. 17 ii 20′. 57.  Frahm 1999; 2005. 58.  Hawkins 2000: 428, with reservations in fn. 50. 59.  See Fuchs 1994: 412. Kept separate as individuals at Aro 1999: 431, although the name Gurdi/ Kurti is supposed by her to be Anatolian. Also Hawkins 2000: 428 fn. 50. 60.  Aro 1999: 431.

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an important point in the development was reached when Sargon was forced by the circumstances of his own rise to power to support Hulli after his removal by Shalmaneser V. Without knowing the details of Hulli’s removal from power speculation is idle, however intriguing the possibility. On the other hand, it seems fairly clear that the original decision by Tiglath-Pileser III to intervene and remove Uassurme from power had serious consequences, as one of the most influential kings of Tabal was thus removed causing a power vacuum. With Melville, I view Wasusarma’s regional power and influence as a relatively recent phenomenon, developing from the renewed interest in the area that had accrued due to the competition of the great powers around it. Once removed, the institution of “Great Kingship” did not re-emerge in any of the post-Wasusarma local inscriptions. The Assyrians had to walk a tight-rope between not allowing client kings to become too powerful and preventing a chaos where other powers could gain influence or where they simply had no one to deal with. Despite intense interest, as evidenced by a dynastic marriage and possibly by extensive fortification programmes, they were unable to establish any lasting order in what was a chaotic and fast-changing local political situation.

Map by Z. Homan, showing central Turkey and main places mentioned in this essay.

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References Akdoğan, R. and Hawkins, J. D. 2008–9 (pub. 2009) Kırşehir-Yassıhöyük’ten ele geçen luvi hiyeroglif yazılı kurşun levha. Anadolu Mediniyetleri Müzesi’nin Yıllığı, Ankara, 7–14. 2010 The Kirşehir Letter: a New Hieroglyphic Luwian Text on a Lead Strip. pp. 1–16 in Proceedings of the 7th International Congress of Hittitology, Çorum 25–31 August 2008, ed. A. Süel. Ankara. Aro, S. 1998 Tabal. Zur Geschichte und materiellen Kultur des zentralanatoliscen Hochplateaus con 1200 bis 600 v. Chr. PhD Thesis. University of Helsinki. 1999 Gurdî. P. in The Prosopography of the Neo-Assyrian Empire. Volume 1. Part I: A, ed. Radner,  K. Helsinki. 2012 “Tabal”. Pp. 388–391 in Reallexikon der Assyriologie Bd. 13, ed. M. P. Streck. Bagg, A. M. 2007 Die Orts-und Gewässernamen der neuassyrischen Zeit. Teil 1: Die Levante. RGTC 7/1. Wiesbaden. 2011 Die Assyrer und das Westland : Studien zur historischen Geographie und Herrschaftspraxis in der Levante im 1. Jt. v. u. Z. Leuven. Barjamovic, G. 2011 A Historical Geography of Anatolia in the Old Assyrian Colony Period. CNI Publications 38. Copenhagen. Baykal-Seeher, A. and Seeher, J. 2003 Götter-Bilder aus Babylonstein? Eine hethitische Gußform aus Boğazköy-Ḫattuša. Istanbuler Mitteilungen 53: 99–111. Belck, W. 1904 Die Kelischin-Stele und ihre chaldisch-assyrischen Keilinschriften. Anatole Zeitschrift für Orientforschung 1. Leipzig. Bryce, T. 2012 The World of the Neo-Hittite Kingdoms. A Political and Military History. Oxford. d’Alfonso, L. 2012 Excavations at Kınık Höyük: A Preliminary Report on the First Camping (sic!). Pp. 387–398 in 34. Kazı sonuçları toplantısı 1. Cılt. 28 Mayıs — 1 Hazıran 2012, Çorum, ed. H. Dönmez. Ankara. 2013 Tabal: An Out-group Definition in the First Millennium BC. Pp. 173–193 in Leggo! Studies Presented to Mario Fales on the Occasion of his 65th Birthday, ed. Lanfranchi, G. B., Bonacossi, D. M., Pappi, C, and Ponchia, S. Wiesbaden. d’Alfonso, L., and Payne, A. 2016 The Palaeography of Anatolian Hieroglyphic Stone Inscriptions. Journal of Cuneiform Studies 68, 107–127. del Monte, G. and Tischler, J. 1978 Die Orts- und Gewässernamen der hethitischen Texte. Répertoire Géographique des Textes Cunéiformes 6. Wiesbaden. Dillo, M. 2003 De Neo-Hetitische Rotsinscriptie van Grootkoning Wasusarmas van Tabal, ca. 735 v.  Chr. Pp. 311–21 in Zij Schreven Geschiedenis: Historische Documenten Uit Het Oude Nabije Oosten (2500– 100 v. Chr.), ed. R. J. Demaree and K. R. Veenhof. Leuven. Edzard, D. Farber, G. and Sollberger, E. 1977 Die Orts- und Gewässernamen der präsargonischen und sargonischen Zeit. Wiesbaden. Erol, A. and Şenyurt, S.Y. 2011 A Terracotta Mask of Mithras Found at Camihöyük-Avanos, Cappadocia Providing New Evidence on the Mithraic Cult and Ritual Practices in Anatolia. TÜBA-AR 14: 87–100.

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Finkel, I.L. and Reade, J.E. 1995 Lots of Eponyms. Iraq 57: 167–72. Forrer, E. 1931 Die Hethitische Bilderschrift I. Chicago. Frahm, E. 1998 704 v. Chr. Nouvelles Assyriologiques Brèves et Utilitaires no. 116 (p. 106). 1999 Nabû-zuqup-kēnu, das Gilgameš-Epos und der Tod Sargons II. Journal of Cuneiform Studies 51: 73–90. 2005 Nabû-zuqup-kēnu, Gilgamesh XII and the Rites of Du’uzu. Nouvelles Assyriologiques Brèves et Utilitaires no. 5 (pp. 4–5). Fuchs, A. 1994 Die Inschriften Sargons II. aus Khorsabad. Göttingen. 1998 Die Annalen des Jahres 711 v. Chr. nach Prismenfragmenten aus Ninive und Assur. State Archives of Assyria Studies VIII. Helsinki. Giusfredi, F. 2010 Sources for a Socio-Economic History of the Neo-Hittite States. Texte der Hethiter 28. Heidelberg. Grayson, A. K. 1975 Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles. TCS 5. New York: Augustin. 1996 Assyrian Rulers of the Early First Millennium BC II (858–745 BC). Royal Inscriptions of Mesopotamia Assyrian Periods Vol. 3. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Güterbock, H. G. 1940 Siegel aus Boğazköy. Erster Teil. Die Königssiegel der Grabungen bis 1938. Archiv für Orientforschung Beiheft 5. Berlin. Hawkins, J. D. 1979 Some Historical Problems of the Hieroglyphic Luwian Inscriptions. Anatolian Studies 29: 153–167. 1995 The Political Geography of North Syria and South-East Anatolia in the Neo-Assyrian Period. Pp. 87–101 in Neo-Assyrian Geography, ed. M. Liverani. Quaderni die Geografia Storica 5. Rome: University of Rome “La Sapienza”. 2000 Corpus of Hieroglyphic Luwian Inscriptions Vol. I.1–3. Berlin–New York. Hawkins, J. D. and Postgate, J. N. 1988 Tribute from Tabal. State Archives of Assyria Bulletin 2/1: 31–40. Luukko, M. 2012 The Correspondence of Tiglath-pileser III and Sargon II from Calah/Nimrud. State Archives of Assyria 19. Helsinki. Mayer, W. 2013 Assyrien und Urarṭu II. Die assyrisch-urartäischen Bilinguen. Münster. Melville, S. C. 2010 Kings of Tabal: Politics, Competition and Conflict in a Contested Periphery. Pp. 87–109 in Rebellions and Peripheries in the Cuneiform World, ed. S. Richardson. American Oriental Series 91. New Haven. Millard, A. R. 1994 The Eponyms of the Assyrian Empire, 910–612 B.C. SAAS 2. Helsinki. Otten, H. 1984 Die Apologie Hattusilis III. Das Bild der Überlieferung. Studien zu den Boğazköy-Texten 24. Wiesbaden. 1988 Die Bronzetafel aus Boğazköy. Ein Staatsvertrag Tutḫalijas IV. Studien zu den Boğazköy-Texten Beiheft 1. Wiesbaden. Müller-Karpe, A. 2009 Auf dem Rücken der Berge: die kappadokische Mauer in Anatolien. Antike Welt 40/4: 17–21.

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Parpola, S. 1987 The Correspondence of Sargon II, Part I. State Archives of Assyria 1. Helsinki. Peker, H. 2016 Texts from Karkemish I, Luwian Hieroglyphic Inscriptions from the 2011–2015 Excavations. Bologna Postgate, J. N. 1973 Assyrian Texts and Fragments. Iraq 35: 13–36. Reade, J. 1986 Archaeology and the Kuyunjik Archives. Pp. 213–222 in Cuneiform Archives and Libraries. Papers Read at the 30th Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, Leiden, 4–8 July 1983, ed. K. R. Veenhof. Istanbul. Salvini, M. 2002 Una Stele di Rusa III Erimenaḫi dalla zona di Van. Studi micenei ed-egeo-anatolici 44: 115–143. 2008 Corpus dei testi urartei Vol. I–III. Istituto di studi sulle civiltà dell’egeo e del vicino oriente. Rome. Şenyurt, S. Y. 2010 Ovaören-Göstesin Geç Hitit/Luwi Hiyeroglif Yazıtı. Pp.  261–268 in DUB.SAR É.DUB.BA.A. Studies Presented in Honour of Veysel Donbaz, ed. Ş. Dönmez. Istanbul. Simon, Zs. 2012 Where is the Land of Sura of the Hieroglyphic Luwian Inscription KARKAMIŠ A4b and Why Were Cappadocians Called Syrians by Greeks? Altorientalische Forschungen 39/1: 167–180. 2013 Überlegungen zu Masaurhisas, einem König von Tabal, und der Herrscherliste von Tuwana. Anatolica 39: 277–296. Singer, I. 1996 Muwatalli’s Prayer to the Assembly of Gods Through the Storm-God of Lightning (CTH 381). Atlanta. Starke, F. 1997 Sprachen und Schriften in Karkamis. Pp. 381–395 in Ana šadî Labnāni lū allik. Beiträge zu alt­ orientalischen und mittelmeerischen Kulturen. Festschrift für Wolfgang Röllig, ed. B. Pongratz-Leisten et al. Alter Orient und Altes Testament 247. Kevelaer-Neukirchen-Vluyn. Summers, G. D. 1994 Grey Ware and the Eastern Limits of Phrygia. Pp. 241–252 in Anatolian Iron Ages 3. Van 6–12 August 1990, ed. A. Çilingiroğlu and D. H. French. Oxford. 2009 Between Urartu and Phrygia. The North-Central Anatolian Plateau in the Iron Age. Pp. 657– 671 in Studies in Honor of Altan Çilingiroğlu: A Life Dedicated to Urartu on the Shores of the Upper Sea, ed. H. Sağlamtimur et al. Istanbul. 2013 East of the Halys: thoughts on settlement patterns and historical geography in the late second millennium and first half of the first millennium B.C. Pp. 41–51 in L’Anatolie des peuples, des cités et des cultures (IIe millenaire av. J.-C. — Ve siècle ap. J.-C.). Colloque internationale de Besancon 26–27 Novembre 2010, ed. H. Bru and G. Labarre. Franche-Comté. Tadmor, H. and Yamada, Sh. 2011 The Royal Inscriptions of Tiglath-Pileser III (744–727 BC) and Shalmaneser V (726–722 BC), Kings of Assyria. RINAP 1. Winona Lake. Tekoğlu, R. 2000 Texte hiérogyphique. Pp. 968–990 in La bilingue royale louvito-phénicienne de Çineköy, ed. İ. İpek, A. Kazım Tosun, A. Lemaire, R. Tekoğlu. Comptes-rendus des séances de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, 144e année, N. 3. Weeden, M. 2010 Tuwati and Wasusarma: Imitating the behaviour of Assyria. Iraq 72: 39–61. 2013a After the Hittites: the Kingdoms of Karkamish and Palistin in Northern Syria. Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies 56/2: 1–20. 2013b A probable join to the “Kırşehir Letter”. Anatolian Archaeological Studies 18: 15–17.

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Wilhelm, G. 1993 Sura/i in Kargamiš und das urartäische Gentiliz Šurele. Studi micenei ed egeo-anatolici 31: 135–141. Yamada, Sh. 2000 The Construction of the Assyrian Empire. A Historical Study of the Inscriptions of Shalmaneser III (859–824 BC) Relating to His Campaigns to the West. Culture and History of the Ancient Near East. Leiden and Boston. 2006 The City of Togarma in Neo-Assyrian Sources. Altorientalische Forschungen 33: 223–236.

Ein dritter Backstein mit der großen Inschrift des Königs Takil-ilissu von Malgûm und der Tonnagel des Ipiq-Ištar Claus Wilcke Nicholas Postgate erblickte, wenn ich mich recht erinnere, als erster Assyriologe nach den Grabungsteilnehmern im Frühjahr 1977 den in Isin ausgegrabenen, gebrannten Inschriftziegel des Takil-ilissu (Exemplar A: IB 1014), und wir unternahmen gemeinsam erste Lesungsversuche an der dreikolumnigen Inschrift auf der Oberfläche, die auf zwei Schmalseiten des Ziegels verteilt wiederholt wird. Ihm sei diese Studie zu dem mittlerweile dritten Exemplar in alter Freundschaft und in der Erinnerung an gute gemeinsame Zeiten in München und im Iraq gewidmet. Ein anderes Bruchstück eines weiteren Backsteins unbekannter Provenienz mit gleichlautender und gleich angeordneter Inschrift (Exemplar B: YBC 2185) war schon 1915 in die Yale Babylonian Collection gelangt, wo ihn 1977 ­­­­ — neu gebrannt und gereinigt — Raphael Kutscher studierte. D.O. Edzard wusste um die Pläne Kutschers und Wilckes, die Inschriften zu verröffentlichen, und regte die gemeinsame Publikation 1 an. D. Frayne 1990: 672–74 nahm die Inschrift — an Photos kollationiert — als „Takil-ilissu 2“ 2 in das Corpus der altbabylonischen Königsinschriften (RIME 4) auf. 30 Jahre nach der Erstveröffentlichung hat nun Daniel Arnaud 2007: 37–40 unter der Überschrift „Une inscription du roi Muttakkil-ilišu de Malgum“ 3 einen dritten, wesentlich Author’s note:  Herzlich danke ich F. van Koppen für seinen freundlich zugesandten Aufssatz „De kleispijker van Ipiq-Ištar voor het voetlicht“. Seine Beobachtung inhaltlicher Nähe der Tonnagelinschrift zu literarischen Themen ergänzen die hier vermutete Nähe zur Syntax der Literatursprache in schöner Weise. W. Sallaberger und seinen Mitarbeitern danke ich herzlich für Hilfe bei der Literaturbeschaffung. 1.  Kutscher/Wilcke 1978 (s. auch Kutscher 1988: 301; 304). 2. Kutscher/Wilcke 1978 hatten sie als die längere Inschrift als „Takil-iliśśu 1“ bezeichnet. Die dort S. 127–28 (nach Scheil 1912 und Speleers 1925 und mit neuer Kopie Jacobsen 1937/39) neu edierte wesentlich kürzere, andere Ziegelinschrift nannten wir Takil-iliśśu 2; diese Zählung gebraucht auch Kutscher 1988. Frayne 1990, 671–74 bezeichnet nun die früher veröffentlichte kürzere Inschrift als Nr. 1 und die spätere, längere als Nr. 2. Um den Wirrwarr so gering wie möglich zu halten, übernehme ich hier Frayne’s Zählung, behalte aber die Quellensigla unserer Originalpublikation (A, AS, B, BS und jetzt C, CS) bei. 3. Arnaud 2007: 37 Anm. 103 erklärt: „J‘écris «Malgum» et non «Malgûm». Aucune reférence babylonienne (Hervorhebung D.A.) ne suppose une crase finale, à ma connaissance du moins. Les transcriptions en sumérien qu‘on pourrait invoquer sont secondaires, artificiels et de fantaisie.“ Dem könnte man vielleicht zustimmen, gäbe es eine altbab. Akkusativschreibung *Ma-al-ga-am. Die bezeugten Schreibungen Ma-al-gu-umki (Nominativ und Genitiv) und Ma-al-gi-imki (Genitiv) können ebenso für *Malgum, *Malgim, wie für Malgûm, Malgîm stehen und sind für die Frage nach dem vokalisch oder konsonantisch endenden Wortsamm irrelevant. Aber die sumerographischen Schreibungen Ĝá-al-gi/gi4(-a) und

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besser erhaltenen, offenbar ebenfalls gebrannten Ziegel mit dieser Inschrift (Exemplar C) in Übersetzung und eklektisch transliteriert und kommentiert samt minimierten 4 Photos bekannt gegeben. 5 Alle drei Exemplare verteilen den Text in identischer Weise auf die drei Kolumnen der Oberseite 6 und wiederholen ihn auf der rechten und der unteren Schmalseite des Ziegels. Der Fundort dieses Ziegelsteins ist wie der des Exemplars von Yale unbekannt; auch sein moderner Aufbewahrungsort bleibt ungenannt. Dasselbe gilt für seine Maße. Die Photos zeigen den Ziegel recht gut erhalten; nur die rechte obere Ecke ist abgebrochen. Die fast quadratische Oberfläche verjüngt sich geringfügig zur rechten Unterkante hin. Das Verhältnis von Länge zu Höhe seiner unteren Schmalseite entspricht mit 4,7 :: 1 fast dem bei dem Ziegel aus Isin (4,8 :: 1). Ich vermute darum, dass er ebenfalls ca. 38,5 × 38,5 × 8,00 cm (oder 8,5 cm) maß. Kutscher/Wilcke 1978, denen auch Frayne 1990 folgte, hatten den Anfang der Inschrift falsch rekonstruiert. Denn der König beruft sich hier nicht — wie in seiner anderen, kürzeren Inschrift (Takil-ilissu 1) und wie in altbabylonischer Zeit weithin üblich — auf eine göttliche Berufung; er geht vielmehr medias in res und berichtet die Erneuerung des É-maš-Tempels für die Göttin Anunītum 7 und die eines auf diesem errichteten Altars oder Kultsockels (parakkum) 8 für den Himmelsgott. Ein auf dem Dache — anders ist das ša ina muḫḫi-šu ramû kaum zu verstehen — des Tempels einer Gottheit dauerhaft errichteter Altar einer anderen Gottheit ist m.W. neu. Kapellen oder Altäre anderer Götter innerhalb eines Tempels sind aber wohlbekannt, und der auf dem Dach eines die umliegenden Gebäude überragenden Tempels unter freiem Himmel dem Himmel nahe Altar des Himmelsgottes leuchtet sofort als sinnvoll ein. Ĝá-al-gu7-a (RGTC 3: 156–57; -nag-a und -ka-a sind Schreib- oder Lesefehler für -gu7-a) sind keineswegs irrelevant. Auch wenn ihnen vielleicht Volksetymologien zugrunde liegen, sind sie doch keine aus der Luft gegriffenen Phantasieprodukte; denn die sie gebrauchenden Schreiber müssen ja einen Grund für das Spiel mit vokalisch endenden sumerischen Verben gehabt haben. War der Wortstamm vielleicht *Malkī-? War „Malgûm“ die „Königliche (Stadt)“ und die Schreibung mit G ein Archaismus in aB Zeiten? — Exemplar Ci 3 schreibt Ma-al-gu-umki auch im Genitiv.  4.  Mittels eines Xeroxgerätes eher schlecht als recht, aber noch lesbar zu vergrößern. Die Schriftzeichen auf den Schmalseiten lassen sich allerdings oft nur in Kenntnis des Textes der Oberfläche annäherungsweise identifizieren. 5.  Arnaud 2007: 37–40; Photos auf S. 76 (pl. viii). 6.  Exemplar A zeigt im Photo schwache Spuren radierter Zeilen an den Enden der Kolumnen i-ii. In Exemplar C ist am Ende von Kol. i ebenfalls eine Zeile radiert. Den Schreibern war die Länge der Kolumnen (i : 33, ii : 33, iii : 32 Zeilen) also vorgegeben. Die am wenigsten sorgfältig geschriebene Quelle ist Exemplar A (aus Isin), bei dem das Photo die Kolumnentrenner über das untere Ende der Inschrift hinaus bis an den Ziegelrand durchgezogen zeigt. Unten am Ziegelrand sind dann Reste eines abschließenden Querstriches sichtbar. 7.  Das É-maš war bislang nur als Tempel der Ulmašītum bekannt; s. George 1993: no. 740 mit Verweis auf seine Erwähnung in Z. „26“ (jetzt 27) dieser Takil-ilissu-Inschrift. Er sucht es in Malgûm, doch scheint mir nach wie vor die Möglichkeit nicht ganz auszuschließen, dass es als Doppeltempel der beiden Göttinnen in Isin stand; siehe unten. 8.  Weniger wahrscheinlich: eine Kapelle. Ein überdachter Raum könnte die auf dem Dach mögliche Wahrnehmung der Nähe zum Himmel ausblenden.

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Auch an einigen anderen Stellen erlaubt es die neue Quelle, fehlerhafte Lesungen unsicherer Zeichenspuren unserer Erstedition zu verbessern. Arnaud liest den Namen des Königs in Kol. i 1 als „Mu-ut-ta-ki-il–ì-lí-šu“, „Muttakil-ilišu“ (S. 37; 38; 40), „Muttakkil-“ (S. 37 Anm. 104), 9 wenngleich auch dieses Exemplar in Z. 66 (Cii 32 d Ta-ki-il–ì-lí-su = CSb 17 dTa-ki-il-. . .) den aus der Inschrift Takil-ilissu 1 wohlbekannten, auch sonst als Personennamen bezeugten Namen des Königs verwendet und mit Gottesdeterminativ schreibt. 10 Das überrascht und erstaunt. Arnauds Lesung in i 1 (ohne Gottesdeterminativ!) 11 läßt sich jedoch am (vergrößerten) Photo der Oberfläche nicht verifizieren.   Vor dem deutlichen -ta- ist in i 1 innerhalb des Kolumnenrahmens 12 nur Platz für ein Zeichen. Die erhaltenen Zeichenspuren passen zu an (Gottesdeterminativ wie in ii 32). Dieses ⸢an⸣ wäre nur unwesentlich größer als das an in ii 32; dort müssen aber in der ein wenig schmäleren Zeile außer dem Königsnamen auch die beiden zusätzlichen, großen Zeichen šum und lugal Platz finden. Das ⸢an⸣ wäre ebensogroß wie das an in iii 6 und das mu am Anfang von i 10. Der zum ersten Zeichen von i 1 gehörige, im Photo erkennbare Kopf eines senkrechten Keiles nach dem eines schrägen — das ist wohl das „-ut-“ Arnauds — passt zu an und schließt ein ⸢mu⸣ vor dem -ta- und damit auch einen Beginn mit *[M]u-ta- aus. Das letzte Zeichen der Zeile ist ebenso wie in ii 32 -su, nicht -šu. Auch an einigen anderen Stellen lese ich anders als in den Transliterationen des Herausgebers (S. 38–39) notiert: Z. 6: pa-le-e-ia; Z. 7: bi-ta-am; Z. 8: ḫi-du-ti-ša; Z. 10: ú-ṣú-ra-at; Z. 12: É-maš 13 ra-mu-ú; Z. 13: ú-ud-di-iš-su-ma; (Z. 16–33 nicht transliteriert); Z. 43 (Cii 10 = CSa 20‘): dDa-an-é dRašu-ub-é (kein „ù“ zwischen den beiden Götternamen 14); Z. 47: ma-aṣ-ḫa-at ni-ši ma-da-tim (Cii 14; CSa 24′ ma-aṣ-ḫa-at ni-ši ⸢ma⸣-d[a-tim]); Z. 50 (Cii 17 uš-ta-as-sí-iq-{Ras.}-ma; kein *nisaĝ); Z. 52: kuul-ma-ša-am (Cii 19 = CSb 3 ⸢ku-ul⸣-. . .): Zeile in Translit. versehentlich ausgelassen; Z. 55 (lies: 56): ša a-na zi-mi i-lu-ti-ša (Cii 23; CSb 7: ša a-na zi-. . .); Z. 58 (lies: 59): te-em-me-ni (Cii 26; CSb 10 te-. . .); (Z. 60–63; 68–72 nicht translit.); Z. 73 Ciii 7 Ende): [x x x (x)]: Platz für šar-ru(-ut)-sú; CSb 24 Ende nicht lesbar; Z. 74 CSb 25 li-sú-úḫ; (Z. 77–78; 80–84; 93–96 nicht translit.); Z. 97: ⸢e⸣-gi-ir-ri-šu 15 šu-nu (Ciii 31; CSb 48 ⸢e⸣-[gi-ir-ri]-šu ⸢šu-nu⸣; (Z. 98 nicht translit.).

Unsere Inschrift erweist sich nun als Bauinschrift für einen Emaš genannten Tempel der Anunītum, der als Ištar-Anunītum „kriegerische Ištar“ verehrten „Göttin der Könige von Akkad,“ 16 der einen besonderen Altar des Himmelsgottes Anum auf dem Dach besaß. In diesem 9.  Gt-, D-, Dtn- und N-Stamm von takālum sind bezeugt; die Partizipien sind bildbar, und die differenzierenden semantischen Nuancen der verschiedenen Stammformen des Verbums sind in Namen bezeugt oder vorstellbar. 10.  Arnaud 2007: 37 Anm. 104 bemerkt dazu: „L‘alternance entre Muttakkil- et Takkil- m’intrigue. Les deux noms sont dérivés de *tkl «fair confiance» etc. et il est impossible de ne pas voir dans le second une abbréviation du premier.” 11.  Alle derzeit bekannten altbabylonischen Könige von Malgûm, also auch Šū-Kakka, Nabi-Enlil, Šū-Amurrum und Imgur-Sîn, führen das Gottesdeterminativ, das sie jedoch bei den Namen ihrer Väter ebensowenig notieren, wie sie diese als Könige bezeichnen; s. de Boer 2013a: 20 (auf der Grundlage von Mayr 2012); 2013b: 122. 12.  Die Beschädigung der Oberfläche geht über den Kolumnenrahmen hinaus. 13.  Das von Arnaud -bar- („É-bar-ra-mu-zu“) gelesene Zeichen gleicht dem maš von É-maš in i 7; 27. 14.  Das Zeichen ⸢ù⸣ erscheint also nur in AS20. 15.  Exemplar A schreibt i-gi-ir-ri und lässt das Possessivsuffix aus. 16.  Sallaberger 1999: 259; Westenholz 1999: 31.

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Tempel wurden auch Ilabrat, der „Großwesir“ des Anum, 17 und die der Anunītum „zwillingshaft verbundene Ulmašītum, die Göttin ihres Tempels É-ul-maš von Akkad“ 18 verehrt, die im Emaš verhüllt oder verschleiert — d.h. vermutlich verheiratet — wohnt. Hatte Ulmašītum hier eine der Anunītum nachgeordnete Stellung, und sah man Ilabrat und Ulmašītum hier als Ehepaar an? 19 Ilabrat ist m.W. die einzige dieser Gottheiten deren Verehrung auch sonst für das altbabylonische Isin und/oder für Malgûm bezeugt ist. 20 Takil-ilissu hat den Tempel erneuert; er bestand also schon vorher. Die Erneuerung erfolgte von Grund auf; die Fundamente wurden in eine eigens angelegte Aufschüttung gesetzt. Und er besaß einen Festhof für die Bevölkerung, in dem Ilabrat und Ulmašītum fröhlich feiern sollten — von Anunītum und Anum ist in diesem Zusammenhang nicht mehr die Rede, sie erscheinen erst wieder in den abschließenden Flüchen. Obendrein hatte Takil-ilissu den Hof des Tempels zu Ehren (wörtl. als „Zierde“) der Ulmašītum mit aus Backsteinen errichteten Pfeilern gegliedert, die vielleicht ein Vordach trugen und so einen Iwān bildeten. Von diesen Pfeilern stammen zweifellos die uns vorliegenden Exemplare, die diese Bauinschrift tragen. Dort hüteten die beiden Löwenfiguren Dān-bītum „Mächtig ist das Haus“ und Rašub-bītum „Ehrfurcht gebietend ist das Haus“ 21 Opferstätten, an denen Könige Trankopfer und das Volk Feinmehl spenden sollten und wo zwei Pauken, das noch unbekannte kulmāšum und ein geeignetes Bierfass standen. Dān-bītum und Rašub-bītum bewachten dort auch den von einem Vorhang verhüllten Eingang zur Zella der Göttin Ulmašītum, in der wir wohl eine Statue der Göttin vermuten dürfen. [Korr.-Zusatz 11.12.2015: Es ist gewiss sinnvoller anzunehmen, dass die Backsteine von rechteckigen Pfeilerbasen stammen, auf denen Rundpfeiler standen. Waren jeweils vier oder mehr der Backsteine im Geviert vermauert und die Ecksteine jeweils um 90° gedreht, konnte die jeweils auf der rechten und der unteren Schmalseite des Ziegels geschriebene Seiten­ inschrift an jeder Ecke fortlaufend gelesen werden. Waren je Kannte der Basis mehr als zwei Ziegel vermauert, war sicher auch die Inschrift auf der Oberseite der Ziegel lesbar. Man kann sich des Eindrucks nicht erwehren, dass es sich um eine — trotz großer Worte — bescheidene Tempelanlage handelte.]

*  *  *

17.  Zur komplexen Geschichte dieser Gottheit, die dem Himmelsgott An und der Göttin Inana/ Ištar als Wesir diente und zeitweise diesen Funktionen gemäß männlich oder weiblich vorgestellt wurde, in akkadischen Texten aber stets männlich, s. Wiggermann 2001. 18.  Sallaberger 1999: 259. 19.  Dass Ilabrat gemäß seiner Doppelrolle als Wesir von An und Ištar hier als Wesir der Ulmašītum erscheine (Kutscher 1988 fragend „her female vizier“) ist mir unwahrscheinlich; denn die die Inschrift abschließenden Flüche nennen Ilabrat unmittelbar nach Ulmašītum als Wesir Ans. 20.  Siehe Wiggermann 2001; Richter 1999: 147–229. 21.  So lasen Kutscher/Wilcke 1978 und Kutscher 1988: 301, die aber auch eine Genitivverbindung für möglich hielten; letztere setzten Frayne 1999: 673, 42; 674, 92 und Arnaud 2007: 40 an. Da Rašub-é auch als aB Personenname bezeugt ist, ist mit CAD R s.v. rašbu (adj.) b (S. 192) der Auffassung von rašub als Prädikat eines Nominalsatzes der Vorzug zu geben.

Ein dritter Backstein mit der großen Inschrift des Königs Takil-ilissu von Malgûm

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Takil-ilissu Ziegel, Exemplar C (D. Arnaud AuOr 25 (2007) 37–40 mit pl. viii). (C = Text auf der Oberfläche, CSa–b = Text auf den Schmalseiten) Transliteration, Transkription und Übersetzung 01 Takil-ilissu d  ⸣Ta-ki-il-ì-lí-su Ci 1 ⸢ 

19 Ci 19

02 ⸢šarrum dannum⸣ Ci 2 ⸢lugal dan?-nu?-um⸣

20 isiq šukkalmāḫūtišu Ci 20 i-si-iq sukkal.maḫ-ti-šu

03 Ci 3

[ša]r Malgûm [lug]al ⸢Ma-al⸣-gu-umki

21 Ci 21

04 Ci 4

mār Ištaran-asû anāku ⸢dumu⸣ dIštaran-a-su a-na-ku

05 Ci 5

ana Anunītum a-na An-nu-ni-tum

22 Anum rāʾimišu Ci 22 An-num ra-i-mi-šu CSa 1′ A[n-n]u[m . . .]

06 Ci 6

rāʾimat palêya ra-i-ma-at pa-le-e-ia

07 Ci 7

bītam Emaš ellam bi-ta-am É-maš el-lam

08 Ci 8

šubat ḫidûtiša-ma šu-ba-at ḫi-du-ti-ša-ma

09 Ci 9

ana Anum šar ilī a-na An-num šar ì-lí

10 Ci 10

mukīn uṣurāt mu-ki-in ú-ṣú-ra-at

11 šarrūtiya parakkašu ellam Ci 11 šar-ru-ti-ia bára-šu el-lam 12 Ci 12

ša ina muḫḫi Emaš ramû ⸢ša i-na mu⸣-ḫi é-maš ⸢ra-mu-ú⸣

13 Ci 13

aḫīṭ-ma uddissu a-ḫi-iṭ-ma ud-di-iš-su

14 Ci 14

naptan Anūtišu na-ap-ta-an A-nu-ti-šu

15 Ci 15

akalšu ellam a-ka-al-šu el-lam

16 Ci 16

mêšu naʾdūtim me-šu na-aḫ-du-tim

17 Ci 17

warḫam u šapattam ud.sákar ù u4-15-kam

18 aštakkanšum-ma Ci 18 aš-ta-ak-ka-an-šum-ma

u ana dIlabrat ù a-na dIlabrat(dNin.šubura)

ina naptan i-na na-ap-ta-an

23 lā ušparkû Ci 23 la uš-pa-ar-ku-ú CSa 2′ ⸢la uš⸣-[. . .] 24 lū ušaškinšum Ci 24 lu ú-ša-aš-ki-in-šum CSa 3′ ⸢lu ú⸣-[. . .] 25 ana Ulmašītum Ci 25 ⸢a⸣-na dUl-maš-ši-tum CSa 4′ a-na dUl-⸢maš-ši⸣-t[um] 26 nābiʾat šumiya Ci 26 na-bi-a-at šu-mi-ia CSa 5′ na-bi-a-at ⸢šu-mi⸣-i[a] 27 Emaš šubat pussummiša Ci 27 É-maš šu-ba-at pu-sú!-um-mi-ša CSa 6′ É-maš šu-ba-at ⸢pu?⸣-s[u]/-⸢um?- mi-ša⸣ 28 kisallam rabiʾam Ci 28 kisal ra-bi-a-am CSa 7′ kisal ra-bi-a-⸢am⸣ 29 šubat nišī mādâtim Ci 29 ⸢šu-ba⸣-at ni-ši ma-da-tim CSa 8′ šu-ba-at ni-ši ma-da-t[im] 30 bīt rīšātim kisal ḫidûtiša Ci 30 ⸢é⸣ ri-ša-a-tim kisal ḫi-du-ti-ša CSa 9′ é ri-ša-a-tim kisal ḫi-du-ti-[ša] 31 ša šī u dIlabrat Ci 31 ša ši-i ù dIlabrat(dNin.šubura) CSa10′ ša ši-i ⸢ù⸣ dIlabrat(dNin.šubura)

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32 ḫidût ḫegallim Ci 32 ḫi-du-ut ḫé.ĝál-im CSa11′ ḫi-du-ut ḫé.ĝál-im

46 ašar maqqīt šarrī Cii 13 a-šar ma-aq-qí-it šar-ri CSa25′ a-šar ma-aq-qí-it šar-r[i]

33 isin ḫudu libbim Ci 33 [i]-si-in ḫu-du li-ib-bi-im CSa12′ i-si-in ḫu-du li-ib-⸢bi⸣-i[m]

47 maṣḫat nišī mādātim Cii 14 ma-aṣ-ḫa-at ni-ši ma-da-tim CSa26′ ma-aṣ-ḫa-at ni-ši m[a-x x]

34 ina libbim Cii 1 i-na li-⸢ib-bi-im⸣ CSa13′ i-na li-ib-bi-im

48 lū ušēšibšunūti  22 Cii 15 lu ú-še-ši-ib-šu-nu-ti CSa27′ lu ú-še-ši-ib-šu-nu-⸢ti⸣

35 īteneppešu Cii 2 i-te-né-ep-pe-šu CSa14′ i-te-né-ep-pe-šu

49 bābam aḫīṭ alaktašu Cii 16 ká? a-ḫi-iṭ a-la-ak-ta-šu CSa28′ ká? a-ḫi-iṭ a-la-ak-⸢ta-šu⸣

ina tamlîm rabîm 36 Cii 3 i-na ta-am-li-im ra-bi-im CSa15′ i-na ta-am-li-im ra-⸢bi⸣-i[m]

uštassiq-ma 50 Cii 17 uš-ta-as-sí-iq-{Ras.}-ma CSb 1 uš-. . .

37 išdīšu ina erṣetim Cii 4 iš-di-šu i-na er-ṣe-tim CSa16′ iš-di-šu i-na er-⸢ṣe-tim⸣

51 saskâm ellam 23 Cii 18 sà-ás-ka-a-am el-lam CSb 2 sà-. . .

38 ukīn-ma Cii 5 ú-ki-in-ma CSa17′ ú-⸢ki⸣-in-⸢ma⸣

52 kulmāšam Cii 19 ku-ul-ma-ša-am CSb 3 ⸢ku-ul⸣-. . .

39 makâtim ša agurrim Cii 6 ma!-ka-a-tim ša sig4.al.ùr.ra CSa18′ ma-ka-a-tim ša? sig4.al.ùr.[ra]

53 šina mazzê tigiʾātim Cii 20 ⸢2?⸣ me.zé ti-gi-a-tim CSb 4 ⸢2⸣ . . ..

40 māniʾat kisallim Cii 7 ma-ni-a-at kisal CSa19′ ma-ni-a-at kisal

54 šitram rabiʾam Cii 21 ši-it-ra-am ra-bi-a-am CSb 5 ši-it-ra-. . .

41 simat ilūtiša Cii 8 sí-ma-at i-lu-ti-ša CSa20′ sí-ma-at i-lu-ti-⸢ša⸣

55 ḫubūram wasmam Cii 22 ḫu-bu-ra-am wa-ás-ma-am CSb 6 ḫu-bu-. . .

42 ana balāṭiya ēpuš-ma Cii 9 a-na ba-la-ṭí-ia e-pu-uš-ma CSa21′ a-na ba-la-ṭí-ia e-pu-uš-m[a]

56 ša ana zīmī ilūtiša Cii 23 ša a-na zi-mi i-lu-ti-ša CSb 7 ša a-na zi-⸢mi⸣ . . .

43 Dān-bītum Rašub-bītum Cii 10 dDa-an-é d{x}Ra-šu-ub-é CSa22′ dDa-an-é Ra-šu-ub-é

57 rabîš šūluku Cii 24 ra!-bi-iš šu-lu-{Ras.}-ku CSb 8 ra-bi-⸢iš⸣ . . .

44 nēšī našparīša Cii 11 ne-ši na-aš-pa-ri-ša CSa23′ ⸢ne-ši⸣ na-aš-pa-ri-ša 45 ālikū idīša Cii 12 a-li-ku i-di-ša CSa24′ a-li-ku i-di-ša

22.  Text in Aii 3 korrupt. 23.  Lesung von Aii 6 in Kutscher/Wilcke 1978 an Kopie und Photo nicht zu verifizieren.

Ein dritter Backstein mit der großen Inschrift des Königs Takil-ilissu von Malgûm 58 ina bītim šâti lū armi Cii 25 i-na é ša-a-ti lu ar-mi CSb 9 i-na é ⸢ša⸣-. . .

70 lū ša ina awīlūtim Ciii 4 lu ša i-na a-w[i-lu-tim] CSb 21 lu ša ⸢i-na a⸣-wi-lu-⸢tim⸣

59 ša temmennī ukkašu Cii 26 ša te-em-⸢me⸣-ni ú-uk-ka-šu CSb 10 ša te-em-. . ..

71 šumam nabû Ciii 5 šu-ma-am na-b[u-ú] CSb 22 šu-ma-am na-bu-ú

60 šumī šaṭram Cii 27 šu-mi ša-aṭ!-ra-am CSb 11 šu-⸢x⸣ ša-. . .

72 Anum šarrum ša ilī r[abûtim] Ciii 6 an šar-rum ša ì-lí r[a-bu-tim] CSb 23 An-num šar-rum ša . . .

61 udapparu-ma Cii 28 ú-da-ap-pa-ru-ma CSb 12 ú-da-ap-pa-ru-. . .

73 likkelmi-ma šar[rūssu] 27 Ciii 7 li-ik-ke-el-mi-m[a šar-ru-sú] CSb 24 li-ik-ke-el-mi-ma šar ?-. . .

šumšu išaṭṭaru 62 Cii 29 šum-šu i-ša-aṭ-ṭa-ru CSb 13 šum-šu i-ša-aṭ-. . .

74 išittašu lissuḫ Ciii 8 i-ši-it-ta-šu li-s[ú-úḫ] CSb 25 i-ši-it-ta-šu li-sú-úḫ

63 bītam liḫīt Cii 30 é li-ḫi-iṭ CSb 14 é li-ḫi-. . .

75 šarrūssu ina tānīḫim Ciii 9 šar-ru-ut-su i-na ta-ni-ḫi-i[m] CSb 26 šar-ru-ut-su i-na ta-ni-ḫi-⸢im⸣

64 makâtim liddiš 24 Cii 31 ma-ka-a-tim li-id-di-iš CSb 15 ma-ka-a-tim li-. . .

76 liqtatti Ciii 10 li-iq-ta-at-⸢ti⸣ CSb 27 li-iq-ta-at-ti

65 tamliʾam limalli-ma 25 Cii 32 ta-am-li-a-am li-ma-al-li-ma CSb 16 ⸢ta-am-li-a-am li⸣-. . .

77 Anunītum Ciii 11 An-nu-ni-⸢tum⸣ CSb 28 An-nu-ni-tum

66 šum dTakil-ilissu šarrim Cii 33 šum dTa-ki-il–ì-lí-su lugal CSb 17 šum d⸢Ta-ki-il⸣-. . .

78 rāʾimat palêya-ma Ciii 12 ra-i-ma-at pa-le-i[a]:ma CSb 29 ra-⸢i-ma⸣-at pa-le-ia-ma

67 ana ašrišu lā u[tarru] Ciii 1 a-na aš-ri-š[u la ú-ta-ar-ru] CSb 18 a-na aš-ri-šu +la +ú-+ta-+ar-+ru 26

79 lībussu-ma Ciii 13 li-bu-ús-sú-m[a] CSb 30 li-bu-ús-sú-ma

68 awīlum šū lū šarrum Ciii 2 a-wi-lum šu-ú [lu lugal] CSb 19 a-wi-lum šu-ú lu ⸢lugal?⸣

80 maruštam rabītam Ciii 14 ma-ru-uš-tam ra-bi-t[am] CSb 31 ma-ru-uš-tam ra-bi-tam

69 lū šakkanakkum lū pašīšum Ciii 3 lu šagina l[u gudu4] CSb 20 lu šagina lu ⸢gudu4⸣

81 liškun ina zumri[šu] Ciii 15 li-iš-ku-un i-na zu-um-ri-[šu] CSb 32 li-iš-ku-un i-na zu-um-ri-. . .

24.  Nach Photo auch Aii 19‘: ma-ka-a-tim. 25. Aii 20‘ sicher auch -[m]a; in BS(b) 2‘ -⟨ma⟩. 26. + = nach der Transliteration Arnauds (p. 39); im Photo nur partiell und sehr unsicher zu erkennen.

743

82 arnam ša lā ibšû Ciii 16 ar-nam ša la ib-šu-ú CSb 33 ar-nam ša la? ib ?-šu-ú 27. N.b.: Exemplar B schreibt likkelmīšu-ma und lässt šarrūssu aus.

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83 ina nišī matīma Ciii 17 i-na ni-ši ma-ti-ma CSb 34 i-na ni-ši ma-ti-ma

91 limḫaṣ-ma Ciii 25 li-im-ḫa-aṣ-ma CSb 42 li-im-ḫa-aṣ-ma

84 Ulmašītum d Ciii 18 Ul-maš-ši-tum CSb 35 dUl-maš-ši-tum

92 ṭēmšu lišanni Ciii 26 ṭe4!-em-šu li-ša-an-ni CSb 43 ṭe4-em-šu li-ša-an-ni

85 nābiʾat šumiya Ciii 19 na-bi-a-at šu-mi-ia ? ⸣-a-at šu-⸢mi⸣-. . . CSb 36 na-⸢bi 

93 Dān-bītum Rašub-bītum Ciii 27 dDa-an-é dRa-šu-ub-é CSb 44 ⸢dDa-an⸣-é Ra-šu-ub-é

86 milik ḫalāqišu Ciii 20 mi-li-ik ḫa-la-qí-šu CSb 37 mi-li-ik ḫa-la-qí-. . .

94 itti Anunītum Ciii 28 it-ti An-nu-ni-tum CSb 45 it-ti An-nu-ni-tum

purussê lā balāṭišu 87 Ciii 21 pu-ru-sé la ba-la-ṭì-šu CSb 38 pu-ru-sé la ba?-la-ṭì-. . .

u Ulmašītum 95 Ciii 29 ù dUl-maš-ši-tum CSb 46 ⸢ù dUl⸣-maš-ši-⸢tum⸣

88 ana dār liqbi Ciii 22 a-na da-a-ar li-iq-bi CSb 39 a-na da-a-ar li-iq-. . .

96 lū mulemmin Ciii 30 lu mu-le-em-mi-in CSb 47 lu mu-le-⸢em-mi⸣-in

d 89 Ilabrat šukkal Anum Ciii 23 dIlabrat(dNin.šubura) sukkal an.na CSb 40 dIlabrat(dNin.šubura) sukkal an.na

97 egerrîšu šunu Ciii 31 ⸢e⸣-ge-er-ri-šu šu-nu 28 CSb 48 ⸢e⸣-[. . .]-šu ⸢šu-nu⸣

90 muḫḫašu Ciii 24 mu-úḫ-ḫa-šu CSb 41 mu-úḫ-. . .

98 ana dāriʾātim Ciii 32 a-na da-ri-a-tim CSb 49 a-na [d]a-[r]i-a-tim

Ich, Takil-ilissu, der mächtige König, König von Malgûm, 29 Kind des Ištaran-asû,13 überprüfte und erneuerte – 5 für Anunītum, die meine Regierungszeit liebt, das reine Haus Emaš, eben den Wohnsitz, der ihr Freude bereitet – 9 für Anum, den Götterkönig, der meine königlichen Pläne wahr werden lässt, seinen reinen Altar, der oben auf das Emaš gesetzt ist. 14 Seine ihm als Anum gebührenden Mahlzeiten, seine reine Speise, sein klares Wasser setzte ich ihm zu jedem Monatsersten und zu jeder Monatsmitte vor. 19 Auch habe ich für Ilabrat seinen Anteil als Großwesir an den Mahlzeiten des ihn liebenden Anum ohne Unterlass hinstellen lassen;  28

28.  A iii 14‘ i-⸢gi-ir⸣-ri šu-nu; ASb 74‘ i-gi-⸢ir-ri⸣ š[u-nu]; in Biii 31 ist das beschädigte erste Zeichen im Photo undeutlich; R. Kutscher kopierte ein ⸢i⸣-[. 29.  Wegen der in Königsinschriften regelhaften Genitivverbindungen „König von ON“ ist Malgûm nicht als adjektivisches Attribut („malgûitischer König“) zu verstehen und darum als Name nicht dekliniert. Vgl. die Genitive der ebenfalls nicht deklinierten Götternamen An-nu-ni-tum (Z. 5, 94) und Ul-mašši-tum (Z. 25, 95); deshalb ist auch graphisch ambivalentes An-nim in Z. 9 und 22 (und an.na in Z. 89) als indeklinables Anum zu lesen.

Ein dritter Backstein mit der großen Inschrift des Königs Takil-ilissu von Malgûm

745

– 25 und für Ulmašītum, die mich mit Namen genannt hat, das Emaš, wo sie verschleiert wohnt,28 einen großen Hof, einen Wohnsitz für das zahlreiche Volk,30 ein Haus der Freuden, einen Hof, in dem sie fröhlich ist, wo sie und Ilabrat froh über den Überfluss immer wieder fröhlichen Herzens Feste feiern. 36 Dessen Fundamente gründete ich auf einer großen Aufschüttung auf dem Erdboden und errichtete dann für mein Leben den Hof gliedernde Backsteinpfeiler als Zierde für sie als Göttin. 43 Und dann ließ ich Dān-bītum und Rašub-bītum, ihre Boten in Löwengestalt — sie sind es, die ihr zur Seite schreiten 30 — sich an der Stätte der königlichen Trankopfer und der Mehlstreuopfer des zahlreichen Volkes niedersetzen. 49 Das Tor überprüfte ich, brachte den Weg dorthin in Ordnung und installierte in diesem Hause eine Feinmehl(opferstätte), ein kulmāšum, zwei Pauken für Paukenspielerinnen, einen großen Vorhang und ein zünftiges Bierfass, die ihrer göttlichen Erscheinung großartig zukommen. 59 Wer meine Gründungsfiguren vertreibt, meinen niedergeschriebenen Namen verschwinden lässt, seinen Namen hinschreibt — mag er auch das Haus überprüfen, die Pfeiler erneuern und die Aufschüttung (wieder) aufschütten — wer den Namen von König Takil-ilissu nicht wiederherstellt — sei dieser Mensch ein König oder ein Statthalter oder ein (gesalbter) Priester oder, wer (auch immer, der) unter den Menschen mit Namen genannt ist – 72 Anum, der König der großen Götter, soll ihn zornig anschauen, soll seine Königsherrschaft, seine Lebensgrundlage herausreißen, sodass seine Königsherrschaft in Jammern zuende gebracht wird; – 77 Anunītum, eben die, die meine Regierungszeit liebt, soll ihn zugrunde richten, und zwar soll sie ein großes Übel in seinen Körper legen als eine Strafe, die es noch nie unter den Menschen gegeben hat; – 84 Ulmašītum, die mich mit Namen genannt hat, soll den Ratschluss über seine Vernichtung, die Entscheidung, dass er nicht leben solle, auf ewig aussprechen; – 89 Ilabrat, der Wesir von Anum, soll ihn aufs Haupt schlagen und so seinen Verstand verwirren; – 93 Dān-bītum und Rašub-bītum sollen zusammen mit Anunītum und Ulmašītum diejenigen sein, die die Vorzeichen für ihn schlimm gestalten — in alle Ewigkeit.

*  *  * Die Frage, wo dieser Tempel stand, lässt sich auch heute noch nicht mit Sicherheit beantworten. Der Tonnagel unbekannter Herkunft des Ipiq-Ištar von Malgûm (Ipiq-Ištar 1), eines Zeitgenossen Hammu-rapi’s von Babylon 31, und die ebenfalls aus dem Antikenhandel stammende Ziegelinschrift Takil-ilissu 1 (mit der fragwürdigen Herkunftsangabe „from Ahymer, that is Kiš“ 32) kommen wahrscheinlich aus dem noch nicht lokalisierten, nahe dem Tigris und nahe ˇ amdat Naṣr 33 zu suchenden Malgûm selbst. 34 Beide berichMaškan-šarrum und auch unweit G ten die Berufung des jeweiligen Herrschers durch das Götterpaar Eʾa und Damkina. 30.  Eingeschobener Satz mit Prädikat im Stativ. 31.  Charpin 2004: 318 mit Anm. 1651; 330 mit Anm. 1722. 32.  Frayne 1990: 675; s. auch Anm. 33. 33.  De Boer 2013: 121. 34.  Van Koppen 2005: 179 schlägt den noch nicht lokalisierten, nahe Babylon und Kiš zu suchenden Ort Pī-kasî vor, von dem bei frühen Raubgrabungen gefundene Inschriften stammen.

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Für unsere Backstein-Inschrift Takil-ilissu 2 wird die Annahme der Herkunft aus Malgûm aber dadurch erschwert, dass der einzig gesicherte Fundort Isin ist und sich ein Motiv, einen oder gar mehrere schwere, unhandliche Ziegelsteine vom Tigris über eine Entfernung von mehr als 100km Luftlinie nach Isin zu transportieren, schwer vorstellen lässt. Andererseits bleiben die Bedenken von Kutscher/Wilcke 1978: 101f. bestehen; denn die Einnahme der traditionsreichen Königsstadt Isin, ein Erfolg, den Rīm-Sîn I. dreißig Jahre lang in seinen Jahresdaten gefeiert hatte, hätte in der Inschrift doch wohl genannt sein sollen, hätte Takil-ilissu Isin erobert und den Tempel dort erneuert. Die Frage der Herkunft ist auch mit der nach der Datierung verknüpft, denn um die Möglichkeit zu überprüfen, dass der in Isin gefundene Ziegel von Takil-ilissu dort verbaut wurde, gilt es ein Zeitfenster finden, in dem seine Herrschaft über die Stadt vorstellbar ist. Kutscher/ Wilcke 1978: 97–102 erörterten dies 35 und fassten dabei vor allem (S. 100–101) zwei mögliche Zeiten ins Auge, in denen Takil-ilissu Isin regiert haben könnte: a) nach dem Jahr Si (=Samsu-iluna) 26, nach dem kein weiteres Samsuiluna-Datum in Isin bezeugt war, oder b) die Zeiten der Revolten des Südens gegen Samsuiluna, d.h., b1) der des Rīm-Sîn II. von Ur und Larsa (Si 8–10) oder b2) der von Ilī-ma-an von Iri-kù, die Charpin 2004: 360 jetzt nach Si 30 datiert, was dann cum grano salis der erwogenen Möglichkeit (a) entspräche. Für den Fall solcher Spätdatierungen des Takil-ilissu nahmen sie an, „daß vielleicht Ipiq-Ištar vor Takil-ilissu anzusetzen sei.“ Diese Bedingtheit der vorgeschlagenen relativen Datierung dieser beiden Herrscher von Malgûm geht in den Ausssagen Frayne’s (1990) und Charpins (2004) dazu verloren. 36 Das wahr35.  Kutscher/Wilcke 1978: 97 hielten eine Herrschaft von Malgûm über Isin während der Regierungszeit von Rīm-Sîn I. nicht für möglich. Takil-ilissu von Malgûm könnte aber als Verbündeter Babylons in der Endphase des Krieges von Hammurapi von Babylon gegen Rīm-Sîn I. von Larsa Isin in seinen Besitz gebracht haben und dann für kurze Zeit — das Datum H (= Hammurapi) 31 i 13 ist durch IB 1510 in Isin bezeugt — gehalten haben. Ipiq-Ištar hätte dann anders, als Charpin 2004: 330 Anm. 1723 annimmt, zu dieser Zeit nicht mehr regiert und Takil-ilissu wäre nach ihm anzusetzen. — Aber angesichts der Beobachtung von de Boer 2013a-b (s.o., Anm. 11), dass die sich in ihren Inschriften selbst stets mit Gottesdeterminativ als göttlich präsentierenden Könige von Malgûm den Königstitel und das Gottesdeterminativ bei den Namen ihrer als Könige nachweisbaren Väter weglassen, ist aber auch sehr wahrscheinlich, dass auch Apil-ilišu, der Vater des Ipiq-Ištar, und Ištaran-asû, der Vater des Takil-ilissu, den Thron von Malgûm inne hatten, dass also Ipiq-Ištar und Takil-ilissu — gleich welcher der frühere und welcher der spätere ist — nicht ummittelbar auf einander gefolgt sein können und zwischen ihnen mindestens ein weiterer König von Malgûm anzusetzen wäre. Eine solche dicht gedrängte Abfolge von Herrschern von Malgûm in den letzten Jahren Hammurapis wäre auch höchst unwahrscheinlich. 36.  Frayne (1990: 668): „Edzard“ (1957) „suggested that the Ipiq-Eštar inscription is to be dated after the Takil-ilissu inscription. C. Wilcke and R. Kutscher, however have argued for a date before this, a scheme followed here”; Charpin (2004: 330 Anm. 1723) “il me semble en tout cas que Takil-ilissu fils de Ištaran-asu occupa le thrône de Malgium avant Ipiq-Eštar (pour un avis contraire, voir R. Kutscher & C. Wilcke. . . . ZA 68 [1978], 95–12). . . .“ Zuvor hatte Edzard 1957: 160 mit Anm. 854 sprachliche Gründe (fehlende Mimation und Schreibfehler in der Ipiq-Ištar-Inschrift) für die Annahme eines höheren Alters der Takil-ilissu-Inschrift angeführt (bei Kutscher 1988: 302 § 3.2.1 missverstanden) und sich 1976: 151 für eine Datierung des Ipiq-Ištar in die Hammurapi-Zeit ausgesprochen (was Charpin 2004: 330 dann bestätigte). — Später hatte Kutscher 1988 dann für einen Ansatz des Takil-ilissu in die 2. Hälfte des 19. Jhd. v.Chr. plädiert: “The inner evidence of Takil-ilissu’s inscriptions points to a date in the second half of the 19th cent. B.C., and no later than the beginning of Hammurapi’s reign.” Für Ipiq-Ištar schlug er aber keine neuere Datierung vor.

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scheinlichste Szenario bleibt darum, dass Exemplar A von Malgûm nach Isin verschleppt wurde — ob auf direktem Wege oder mit einer Zwischenstation in Pī-kasî oder anderswo, wird sich wohl kaum noch feststellen lassen.

*  *  * Die Tonnagelinschrift des Ipiq-Ištar Die Texte der beiden Könige von Malgûm unterscheiden sich von anderen altbabylonischen Tempelbau-Inschriften dadurch, dass sie mit dem Namen des Herrschers beginnen und nicht dem der Gottheit(en), für die er das Heiligtum errichtete. Diese Form kenne ich sonst nur noch von der Ziegelinschrift Samsuiluna 6 (Frayne 1990: 283–84). Und während beide Inschriften des Takil-ilissu die übliche altbabylonische Syntax mit der S–O–V-Folge 37 der Satzglieder gebrauchen, besticht die vielgeschmähte des Ipiq-Adad 38 durch ihren an die Literatursprache angelehnten Satzbau. 39 Edzard 2004: 487 billigt den „sog. Königsinschriften, d.h. in der Hauptsache monumentale[n] Verlautbarungen altbabylonischer Herrscher über ihre Bautätigkeit (Bauinschriften) und Weihungen (Weihinschriften)“ zu, dass sie „«in schöner Sprache» formulierte Exkurse enthalten“ können, „die manchmal nicht mehr unmittelbar etwas mit dem primären Zweck der jeweiligen Inschrift zu tun haben müssen;“ auf S. 549 stellt er fest, dass sie durch den Hinweis auf „gelegentlich[e] . . . stilistische Eleganz . . . nicht voll gewürdigt“ seien, und beobachtet in der Steleninschrift des Daduša von Ešnuna als „bewusst eingesetztes Stilmittel, das die ganze Inschrift durchzieht . . . iš-Adverbien, die in 22 Fällen einer Verbalform vorangehen.“ Zweckfreie Literatur ist Ipiq-Ištars Tonnagelinschrift gewiß nicht. Aber wir sehen als her­ ausstechendes Stilmittel den Gebrauch syntaktischer Formen, die für die babylonische Poesie typisch sind. So die vor allem in Chiasmen häufigen V–S-, V–O- oder V–S–O-Folgen (einfach unterstrichen) und auch — aber nach dem Subjekt unterbrochen durch einen Nebensatz — S–V–O statt der üblichen S–O–V-Abfolgen (doppelt unterstrichen). Ein weiteres typisches Stilmittel sind die asyndetischen Reihungen in Z. 2; 15–16; 24; 28; 30. Zusätzlich können wir auf die modifizierte Wiederholung der Vorstellung des Herrschers von Z. 1–4 in Z. 25–27 hinweisen. Zwischen diesen beiden, im parallelismus membrorum auf einander bezogenen Reihungen des Namens mit Epitheta im Nominativ, d.h., dem Subjekt zum in Z. 30 fortgeführten Hauptsatz, sind mit Z. 5–24 ein vergangenheitsbezogener Temporalsatz mit Nachsatz und eine weitere Rückblende in die Vorvergangenheit eingefügt. Auf das in Z. 25–27 wieder aufgegriffene Subjekt folgt mit Z. 28–29 ein abermals eingeschobener Temporalsatz, bevor in Z. 30–38 die Taten des Herrschers mit finiten Verben und ihren Objekten zur Sprache kommen. 37.  Adv. = Adverb; O = Objekt; Oi = indirektes Objekt (Dativ); S = Subjekt; V = Verbum; c = Konjunktion; s = Subjunktion. 38.  Der Text des Verfassers und seine Niederschrift durch einen nachlässigen Schreiber sind getrennnt zu betrachten. 39.  Van Koppen 2005: 175–177 hebt die für eine Bauinschrift höchst ungewöhnliche Unheilsschilderung in Z. 18–24 hervor und findet literarische Motive in der mythologischen Passage Z. 10–17.

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In Z. 25 erweitert Ipiq-Ištar mit šarrum naʾdum das einfache šarrum von Z. 1, und er variiert mit binīt qātīšu ša Eʾa anāku in Z. 27–28 lexikalisch wie grammatisch das šikin Eʾa Damkina von Z. 2 mit Hilfe der altbabylonisch sehr seltenen, determinierenden und zurückverweisenden Auflösung der Annexion vermittels eines an das Regens angefügten Possessivsuffixes und des Genitivexponenten ša (GAG3 §138j); der für das fromme Handeln zugunsten der Göttin unwesentliche Titel šar Malgîm und die Filiation finden kein Gegenstück in der Wiederholung. In den Inschriften Takil-ilissu 1–2 lassen sich derartige poetische Stilmittel nicht finden; in Takil-ilissu 2 fällt allerdings ein gewisses Bemühen um eine verschiedene, Chiasmen bildende Reihung der göttlichen Benefiziare der Baumaßnahmen und der im Fluch genannten Wächter über Werk und Inschrift auf: Z. 5 ana Anunītum, Z. 9 ana Anum, Z. 19 u ana Ilabrat und dann nachklappend Z. 25 ana Ulmašītum und schließlich in Z. 43 Dān-bītum Rašub-bītum Z. 72 Anum; Z. 77 Anunītum; Z. 84 Ulmašītum; Z. 89 Ilabrat; Z. 93–95 Dān-bītum Rašub-bītum itti Anunītum u Ulmašītum. In der ersten Reihe fehlt aber beim ersten Glied das einschlägige Verbum, sodass das Verbenpaar aḫīt-ma uddissu von Z. 13 anders als bei Ilabrat, Ulmašītum und dem Löwenpaar für die beiden ersten Gottheiten der Reihe gemeinsam gelten muss. Das lässt doch etwas an der Eleganz der Formulierungskunst zweifeln. In der zweiten Reihe resultiert die Inversion von Anunītum und Anum sowie von Ulmašītum und Ilabrat in zwei mit Anunītum und Ulmašītum endenden Dreiergruppen, zwischen denen Ilabrat als Zwischenglied steht — ebenso wie in der ersten Reihe — was aber auch nicht signifikant zu sein erscheint. Tonnagelinschrift des Ipiq-Ištar VA 3359 (Kopie VS 1, 32; Photo [J. Marzahn] bei van Koppen 2005: 174) Letzte Edition Frayne 1990 (RIME 4) 669–70; Übersetzung: van Koppen 2005: 175 Ipiq-Ištar šarrum 2 šikin Eʾa Damkina 3 šar Malgîm 4 mār Apil-ilišu 5 inu Anum Illilum Diĝirmaḫ 6 u Eʾa šarrī 7 milik mātim imlikū 8 wāšib apsîm40 bēl pirištim 9 ūtaddi ana ḫīrtišu 10 elletim Damkina 11 «arḫiš-mi muḫrī ḫīta⟨m⟩ 12 šūtiqī maruštam    13 ana warkīātim 14 lū kīnā išdāšu      15 Malgûm āl-ki 16 šarrūtum palûm [l]īik        17 ayyipparku ina Enamtila» 18 inūmīšu urdam mātum 19 innapḫari kalûšu    20 iškun ḫabarattam rabītam 21 u maruštam īpuš      22 ušalpit kiṣṣam 23 šubat Diĝirmaḫ rabītim        24 u ṣillam rašbam kirâša ikkis 1

  

40.  Zeichen wohl engur!.

S1+S2+S3+S4+S5–Ø (s S1+S2+S3 c S4–V) S1+S2–V–Oi1+Oi2 Adv–V–O; V–O Adv–V–S S1+S2+S3+S4–V1   +V2–Adv Adv–V–S1–Adv–S2 V1–O1 c O2–V2 V–O1+O2 c O1+O2–V

Ein dritter Backstein mit der großen Inschrift des Königs Takil-ilissu von Malgûm

Ipiq-Ištar šarrum naʾdu 26 binīt qātīšu 27 ša Eʾa anāku 28 ina šurri Eʾa Damkina 29 ana wardūtišunu iršûninni 30 ēpuš abni bītam 31 ana Diĝirmaḫ ummiya    32 azqupšim kirâm ellam 33 simat ilūtiša      34 ušaškin sattuk inbim 35 ana dār ina! 41 maḫriša 36 abbi šum bītim É-ki-tuš-ĝešĝeštu    37 utēršim parakka pānīam 38 u šubassa armi 39 ša temmennī udapparu 40 Diĝimaḫ erretam rabītam 41 līruršu 25

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S1+S2+S3+S4– (s S1+S2 Adv V V1+V2– O–Oi V1–O1+O2 V1–O–Adv1–Adv2 V–O1+O2 V1–O1 c O2–V2 s O–V; S–O–V

Ipiq-Ištar, König, Schöpfung 41 von Eʾa und Damkina, König von Malgûm, Sohn des Apil-ilišu — 5 Als Anum, Illilum, Diĝirmaḫ und mein Herr Eʾa über das Land Rat gehalten hatten, 8 da tat der, der im Apsûm sitzt, der Herr über das Geheime, seiner Ehefrau, der reinen Damkina kund: 11 «Eilends tritt entgegen dem Vergehen! Wende ab das Übel!    13 In alle Zukunft sei fest ihre Gründung!       15 Deine Stadt Malgûm, das Königtum, die Regierungszeit währe lange!         17 Nicht höre es auf im E-namtila („Haus des Lebens“)!» 18 Damals war herabgekommen das Land insgesamt, das ganze,    20 hatte großes Getöse veranstaltet und hatte Übles getan       22 hatte das Heiligtum vernichtet, die Wohnung der Diĝirmaḫ,         24 und hatte den ehrfurchtgebietenden Schattenspender, ihren Baumgarten          kahlgeschlagen. 25 Ich, Ipiq-Ištar, der fromme König, eben dieses Geschöpf Eʾa’s — 28 sobald Eʾa und Damkina mich in ihren Dienst nahmen, 30 errichtete und erbaute ich das Haus für meine Mutter Diĝirmaḫ,    32 pflanzte einen reinen Baumgarten für sie, der ihr als Göttin zukommt,       34 ließ ihr für ewige Zeiten regelmäßige Frucht-Opfer vorsetzen. 36 Ich benannte das Haus mit dem Namen E-kituš-ĝeštu („Haus, Wohnung der Weisheit“),    37 gab ihr ihren früheren Altar zurück und legte ihren Wohnsitz an. 39 Den, der meine Gründungsfiguren verschwinden lässt, soll Diĝirmaḫ mit einem großen Fluch   verfluchen! 1

 40

41. Frayne’s Lesung (1990: 670) „a-na da-a-ar-i-tam“ ergibt eine grammatisch falsche Form. Die Korrektur des UD zu NA ist minimal und wird jetzt durch das Photo in van Koppen 2005: 174 bestätigt. 42.  šiknum verstehe ich hier wie šikin napišti „Geschöpf“. CAD Š/2 438 šiknu A 2 “emplacement, setting, arragement, establishing, appointing, issuing (as nominalization of constructions with šakānu)” zitiert unsere Zeile unter “f) other nominalizations 1′ appointing, establishing” (und übersetzt “appointed by Eʾa”) zusammen mit zwei Vorkommen von šikin qātēya (übersetzt als “appointed by me”). Diesem šikin qātê entspricht in unserem Text das zu dem šiknum parallele binīt qātīšu ša von Z. 26. binītum und šiknum sind darum weitgehend synonym. Das mag etwas wie der Streit um des Kaisers Bart erscheinen, weil ein von den Göttern eingesetzter König ihr Werk und Geschöpf ist. Es geht mir lediglich darum, die inhaltliche Parallelität von šikin Eʾa Damkina und binīt qātīšu ša Eʾa aufzuzeigen.

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Abkürzungen AfO AuOr CAD GAG3 NABU OBO RGTC 3 RIME 4 RlA VS ZA

Archiv für Orientforschung Aula Orientalis The Chicago Assyrian Dictionary = von Soden 1995 Notes Assyriologiques Brèves et Utilitaires Orbis Biblicus et Orientalis = Groneberg 1980 = Frayne 1990 Reallexikon der Assyriologie und der Vorderasiatischen Archäologie Vorderasiatische Schriftdenkmäler Zeitschrift für Assyriologie und Vorderasiatische Archäologie

Literatur Arnaud, D. 2007 Documents à contenu «historique» de l’époque présargonique au VIe siècle. AuOr 25: 5–84. De Boer, R. 2013a An Early Old Babylonian Archive from the Kingdom of Malgium? Journal Asiatique 301/1: 19–25. 2013b Another New King of Malgium: Imgur-Sîn, son of Ili-abi. NABU 2013: 121–23 no. 73. Charpin, D. 2004 Histoire Politique du Proche-Orient Amorrite (2002–1595). S. 23–480 in Mesopotamien. Die altbabylonische Zeit, hrsg. von D. Charpin, D. O. Edzard, M. Stol. Annäherungen 4, hrsg. von P. Attinger et al. OBO 160/4. Fribourg: Academic Press. Edzard, D. O. 1957 Die zweite Zwischenzeit Babyloniens. Wiesbaden: Otto Harrassowitz. 1976 Ipiq-Ištar. S. 151 in RlA 5/1–2. 2004 Altbabylonische Religion und Literatur. S. 481–640 in Mesopotamien. Die altbabylonische Zeit, hrsg. von D. Charpin, D. O. Edzard, M. Stol. Annäherungen 4, hrsg. von P. Attinger et al. OBO 160/4. Fribourg: Academic Press. Frayne, D. R. 1990 Old Babylonian Period. The Royal Inscriptions of Mesopotamia. Early Periods 4. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. George, A.R. 1993 House Most High. The Temples of Ancient Mesopotamia. Mesopotamian Civilizations 5. Winona Lake (Ind.): Eisenbrauns. Groneberg, B. 1980 Die Orts- und Gewässernamen der altbabylonischen Zeit. Répertoire Géographique des Textes Cunéiformes Bd. 3. Wiesbaden: Dr. Ludwig Reichert. Jacobsen, Th. 1937/39  The Inscription of Takil-ili-su of Malgium. AfO 12: 363–66. van Koppen, F. 2005 De kleispijker van Ipiq-Ištar voor het voetlicht. Phoenix 51/3: 173–80. Kutscher, R. 1988 Malgium. S. 300–4 in RlA 7/3–4.

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Kutscher, R. und C. Wilcke 1978 Eine Ziegel-Inschift des Königs Takil-iliśśu von Malgium, gefunden in Isin und Yale. ZA 68: 95–128. Mayr, R. H. 2012 Seal impressions on Administrative Tags from the Reign of Šu-Amurru. S. 409–23 in The Ancient Near East: A Life! Fs. Karel Van Lerberghe, hrsg. von T. Boiy et al. Orientalia Lovanensia Antiqua 220. Louvain: Peeters. Richter, Th. 1999 Untersuchungen zu den lokalen Panthea Süd- und Mittelbabyloniens in altbabylonischer Zeit. Alter Orient und Altes Testament 257. Münster: Ugarit Verlag. Sallaberger, W. 1999 Ur III-Zeit. S. 119–390 in Mesopotamien. Akkade-Zeit und Ur III-Zeit, hrsg. von W. Sallaberger, Aa. Westenholz. Annäherungen 3, hrsg. von P. Attinger und M. Wäfler. OBO 160/3. Fribourg: Academic Press. Scheil, V. 1912 Site roi et dieux de Malgî. Recueil de Travaux 34: 104–5. Soden, W. von 1995 Grundriss der Akkadischen Grammatik. 3., ergänzte Auflage unter Mitarbeit von Werner R. Mayer. Analecta Orientalia 33. Roma: Editrice Pontificio Istituto Biblico. Speleers, L. 1925 Recueil des inscriptions de l‘Asie Antérieure des Musées Royaux du Cinquantenaire à Bruxelles. Bruxelles: Musées royaux du Cinquantenaire. Westenholz, Aa. 1999 The Old Akkadian Period. History and Culture. S. 15–117 in Mesopotamien. Akkade-Zeit und Ur III-Zeit, hrsg. von W. Sallaberger und Aa. Westenholz. Annäherungen 3, hrsg. von P. Attinger und M. Wäfler. OBO 160/3. Fribourg: Academic Press. Wiggermann, F. 2001 Nin-šubur. S. 490–500 in RlA 9/7–8.

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Assur among the Gods of Urartu Paul Zimansky Introduction The god Assur is so intimately bound to the land and yoke of Assyrian imperialism that the discovery of a text showing a respectful, if less than awed, dedication to him in a foreign language in a place outside the control of the Assyrian monarchy is quite unexpected. Yet his name has now been revealed, in unmistakable clarity, midway through a list of gods for whom the Urartian king, Rusa son of Erimena, ordained regular sacrifices in connection with a dam supplying water to the area of the Urartian capital. Here, in the land of his enemies, Assur appears as the periodic recipient of two sheep. Overshadowed by Haldi and other gods of the Urartian state cult, he is in the company of, and apparently on equal footing with, such obscure deities as Nalaini, Ura, Quera, and Aniquni. What on earth is he doing here? Very little scholarly attention has been paid to this question, and what has been published, by myself in particular (Zimansky 2012: 106) is problematic, if not simply wrong. I welcome the opportunity to take a deeper look at the context in which this inscription was written as an offering to the man who has done so much in revealing the inner workings of the Assyrian imperium. The circumstances in which the titular god of the Near East’s largest empire of the time became involved in a local irrigation project of the second largest deserve exploration, even if they cannot be entirely explained. One conceivable solution to the problem is to argue that this particular Assur has nothing to do with the Assur of Assyria. Given the large number of minor and presumably local deities in Urartu, he could be an Urartian god whose name sounded a little like Assur to a scribe who was brought to this mountainous backwater to draft Rusa’s inscription. But this is improbable. Urartian scribes were hardly ignorant of the Assyrian Assur, writing his name in the same signs as when they referred to him as an element in a personal name or mentioned the land of Assyria in other inscriptions. Would someone really make this substitution without elaboration? It is more likely, and certainly more intriguing, that this actually is the same god as the one in whose name Assyrian kings campaigned.

The Keşiş Göl Inscriptions and Chronology We owe the rediscovery of the text in question to Mirjo Salvini’s indefatigable efforts in tracking down Urartian inscriptions as he prepared the entire body of Urartian texts for publication in his comprehensive Copus dei Testi Urartei (Salvini 2008). 1 Its full reconstruction 1.  This collection is now the most complete and authoritative in print, and Urartian texts will be cited by the numbers it uses. Following the abbreviation CTU texts are designated by material category, assumed ordinal position of the king or kings in whose name the inscriptions were written, and a number

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came about through several separate discoveries, which I will address below in connection with chronology and context, but let us first consider the passage in which Assur was discovered. It was found in 2002 on the well-preserved upper portion of a stele in the wall of a modern house in Gövelek, a small village in the highlands east of Van. Along with a smaller joining fragment from the middle of the stele, it was initially treated as a unique monument (Salvini 2002: 115–16). I follow Salvini’s transliteration (ATU 14–1, lines rev. 2–18) with my English rendering of his Italian translation. . . . mru-sa-še a-li gu-ni (3) ṭè-el-zu-še te-ru-bi a-še Ameš (4) ṣu-i-ni-ni ni-ki-du-li uduMÁŠ.TUR (5) Dhal-di-e ni-ip-si-du-li-ni GU4 5 UDU (6) Dhal-di-e ŠUM UDU ŠE UDU DIM UDU ŠE U[DU] (7) DUTU UDU ŠE UDU Dᵓa-ru-ba-n[i-e] (8) UDU ŠE UDU DINGIRMEŠ UDU ŠE UDU D⸢NIN⸣ (9) GU4 mru-sa-i-nie DGI (10) GU4.ÁB mru-sa-i-ni-e DNIN (11) GU4.ÁB Da-ni-qu-gi 3 UDU DINGIRMEŠ (12) ṣu-i-ni-ni UDU ŠE UDU Daš-šur UDU ŠE UDU (13) Dna-la-i-ni-e UDU ŠE UDU Dqu-e-r[a] (14) GU4 UDU D ú-ra ⸢3⸣ UDU KURba-ba-na-ú-e (15) at-qa-na-na-ú-e i-ni-ni ŠUM-ṣi (16) a-še Ameš ni-ik-du-li a-še Ameš (17) e-ši-a-ṣi-ú-li UDU ŠE UDU Dhal-di-e (18) UDU DIM UDU DUTU UDU Dᵓa-ru-ba-ni-e . . . Rusa speaks: I (3) established a regular offering. When the waters (4) of the lake nikdu they will sacrifice a goat (5) to Haldi. One cow and five sheep (6) will be sacrificed to Haldi, a sheep and a fattened sheep to the Storm God, a sheep and fattened sheep (7) to the Sun God, a sheep and a fattened sheep to ᵓArubani (8) a sheep and a fattened sheep to the gods, a sheep and a fattened sheep to the goddess(es) (9) an ox to the divine “reed” of Rusa (10) a cow to the divine lady of Rusa (11) a cow to Aniqugi, three sheep to the gods of (12) the lake, a sheep and a fattened sheep to Assur, a sheep and a fattened sheep (13) to Nalaini, a sheep and a fattened sheep to Quera (14) an ox and a sheep to Ura, 3 sheep for the consecrated (15) mountains — these they sacrifice (16) when the waters of the lake nikdu. When the waters (17) ešiaṣu, a sheep and a fattened sheep to Haldi (18) a sheep to the Storm God, a sheep to the Sun God, a sheep to ᵓArubani. . .[the list of gods repeats, with slightly different quantities of animals]

This is thus one of a small number of Urartian texts in which sacrifices are ordained for various gods at fixed occasions, in this case when the waters of a lake do one thing (nikdu) and when they do another (ešiaṣu). One assumes these are annual events, but the interval is as not important for evaluating Assur’s role as his position and associations on the list. As do almost all 2 inscriptions mentioning more than one god in Urartu, the list of offerings begins with Haldi. The order immediately thereafter is also not unexpected: Storm God, Sun God, and Haldi’s consort, ᵓArubani. Then the innovations begin, with sacrifices to poorly understood concepts before returning to named deities. Aniqugi is followed by the unspecified gods of the lake, then comes Assur, Nalaini, Quera, Ura, and finally the gods of the mountains. Assur is hardly highlighted here, but not treated disrespectfully by any means. For Mirjo Salvini, in his first publication of the key text (Salvini 2002), Assur’s appearance in this context was a curiosity. He remarked that foreign gods were sometimes introduced by ancient Near Eastern powers in the wake of a conquest. But he found it difficult to posit such specific to the text. Thus the Meher Kapısı inscription, discussed extensively below, is CTU A [monumental stone] 3 [Išpuini + Minua] — 1 [first text of these authors treated in the collection]. 2.  CTU A10–6, in which Rusa son of Sarduri offers sacrifices to Šebitu and Arṭu’arasau without mentioning Haldi appears to be an exception, but the beginning of the inscription is missing, so his absence is not absolutely certain.

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a conquest in the time of Rusa son of Erimena, whom he believed came near the end of the known line of Urartian kings and was hardly distinguished for military prominence. He also noted that the Urartians had not added Assur to their pantheon decades earlier, when Sarduri II reported a victory over Aššurnirari V. His concluding statement about the reference to Assur is “Potrebbe essere un indizio delle buone relazioni che intercorrevano con l’Assiria negli ultimi tempi della storia urartea” (Salvini 2002: 138–39). Even this vague comment was soon undermined by Salvini’s subsequent discoveries and their implications for the context and chronological position of the text. In 2006 he found a substantial, but less well-preserved duplicate in the village of Savacık, 5.5 km south of Keşiş Göl (Salvini 2006: 210–12). This in turn, enabled him to recognize that the Gövelek piece joined a stele base fragment which Lehmann-Haupt had removed the nearby artificial lake Keşiş Göl in 1898 (Lehman-Haupt 1926: 187–90) and is now in the Vorderasiatische Museum in Berlin. This is the lake to which the inscriptions refer, and the stelae were thus erected nearby as part of its creation and dedication. The complete whole text, as it is presently known, is thus established by four fragments: three belonging to the original stele found by Lehmann-Haupt and the duplicate found at Savacık. In Salvini’s corpus and publications these duplicates, CTU A 14–1 and CTU A14–2 respectively, are now designated “le due stele del Keşiş Göl” (Salvini 2006; 2008: 621–28; 2010). Since we are in essence dealing with a single composition, and the variants are inconsequential for my arguments, I will refer to them at the Keşiş Göl texts henceforth. From the time of Lehmann-Haupt, when only the bottom portion of one stele was known, it was recognized that this was an important document because it contained a statement that its author, Rusa, founded Rusahinili. For a long time only one site was known to have this name: Toprakkale, on the edge of modern Van. It was the first place at which archaeological excavations, of a sort, were conducted and since the waters from Keşiş Göl flowed in that direction, just as the inscription suggested, there has never been any doubt that Toprakkale was Rusahinili. The lack of a patronymic for the king in the fragment found and exported by Lehmann-Haupt prompted speculation over the years as to whether the Rusa in question was the son of Saruri, who ruled in the late 8th century, or the son of Argišti, who ruled in the second quarter of the 7th century. Salvini’s joins, which did contain the patronymic, resolved this issue in a completely unexpected way: it was the work of neither, but rather the obscure Rusa, son of Erimena. This fact, alone, did not resolve the chronological issues because it simultaneously challenged the traditional placement of Rusa son of Erimena himself. A debate has erupted over the date of Keşiş Göl inscriptions, specifically where to place Rusa son of Erimena in the sequence of Urartian kings, and has all but eclipsed consideration of anything else in the text itself. It is, however, an asymmetrical debate, with almost all scholars who have discussed the issues in any detail favoring a late 8th century date for him, and one very important exception holding to the traditional mid- to late 7th century date. Were that exception not Salvini, whose authority on Urartian texts is unimpeachable, there would probably be no controversy at all. Since chronology is not irrelevant to interpreting the context in which Assur is mentioned, we must discuss the issues here. Urartian chronology is established through the Urartian practice of including patronymics with royal names, which produces a coherent line of succession: Sarduri son of Lutipri, Išpuini son of Sarduri, Minua son of Išpuini, Argišti son of Minua, Sarduri son of Argišti, Rusa son of

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Sarduri, Argišti son of Rusa, and Rusa son of Argišti. Despite the frequent repetition of names, no kings have both the same name and patronymic. Synchronisms with Assyrian records, which never give the patronymic, anchor this line in absolute chronology at a few points: e.g., Sarduri is a contemporary of Shalmaneser III; Išpuini of Shamshi-Adad V; Tiglath-Pileser III of Sarduri; Sargon of one of the Rusas and one of the Argištis; and Esarhaddon of another Rusa, universally agreed to be Rusa son of Argišti. Since Rusa, son of Erimena does not fit into this sequence, traditional chronologies put him in the historically obscure period after Rusa son of Argišti. 3 Even before Salvini recognized that the Keşiş Göl inscription was written in the name of Rusa son of Erimena, there were suggestions that this king belonged to an earlier period. Seidl (2004: 124) had remarked that the style of bronzes inscribed in his name seemed to be much closer to that of 8th century kings than it was to those of the 7th century. In recent decades excavations at the most important 7th century citadels, such as Bastam, Ayanis, Karmir Blur and Anzaf invariably found major destruction levels in which there were artifacts of Rusa, son of Argišti, but never of Rusa, son of Erimena. 4 That would be most peculiar if the latter were the ruling king closer to the time the citadels were sacked. So the ground was well prepared for moving him to an earlier period. The author of the Keşiş Göl text makes explicit statement: mru-sa-š[e] a-li i-ú mru-sa-hi-i-nil[i] [š]i-du-ú-li (CTU A14–2, obv. 41–43) “Rusa speaks: ‘when I built Rusahinili. . .’.” This king, now discovered to be Rusa son of Erimena, conventionally called Rusa III, could not possibly be at the end of the Urartian line, since Toprakkale was also occupied by the energetic Rusa son of Argišti, who could not have been there before its foundation. When Salvini presented evidence of the joins at a conference on Urartu in Munich in October, 2007, many of the participants immediately recognized this fact. Salvini himself, however, was not ready at that time to reconfigure the order of the Rusas. In the interval between when the conference took place and when its proceedings were published (Kroll et al. 2012) many of the participants had the opportunity to add materials and reinforce their arguments. Kroll (2012) argued that scholars working with texts had neglected the obvious archaeological evidence that Rusa, son of Argišti was the last active king of Urartu. Seidl (2007, 2012) elaborated on the art historical and textual evidence that Rusa Erimena belonged to the 8th century and had to be the founder of Toprakkale. Roaf (2012) made a strong case that Sargon’s opponent in his campaign of 714 BC, portrayed in Assryian records as a usurper, was indeed Rusa son of Erimena. Fuchs (2012) concluded that Rusa son of Erimena’s reign must have immediately preceded that of Rusa son of Argišti. I will not reiterate all their arguments here, but simply note one puzzle that the new scheme happily resolved. Rusa son of Argišti, who was a contemporary of Esarhaddon, built many of the great Urartian fortresses of the seventh century. In the 1990s, inscriptions found at Ayanis made it clear that this site, which he founded, was also called Rusahinili. Since there were then two similarly named sites, his records always distinguish Rusahinili Qilbanikai (“before Mt. 3.  For a discussion of how this placement was originally made at the dawn of Urartian historiography, see Roaf 2010: 66–73. 4.  The distribution of non-monumental inscriptions bearing the name Erimena and the patronymic Erimenahi is very limited. The metal objects all come from Toprakkale (Salvini 2012: 101–102) and the impressions on clay from Karmir Blur (Salvini 2012: 161).

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Qilbani”) i.e.Toprakkale, from Rusahinili Eidurukai (“before Mt. Eiduru”), i.e. Ayanis. Rusa son of Erimena never does this, although he does mention that Keşiş Göl is near Mt. Qilbani in the inscription we are discussing. Moreover, Rusa son of Argišti, also founded another site that he named after himself, Rusai-URU.TUR at Bastam, Iran. As the largest of the Urartian fortresses, it is a little hard to see why he would call it the “small city of Rusa” unless he was loath to name another place Rusahinili. Why would one man stop at two Rusahinilis rather than three? It is more reasonable to believe that he only founded only Rusahinili Eidurukai and Toprakkale was the only Rusahinili and thus in no need of a geographical qualifier when Rusa, son of Erimena, built it. Salvini has been impervious to these arguments and has retained the traditional enumeration of Rusa I (son of Sarduri), Rusa II (son of Argišti), and Rusa III (son of Erimena) (Salvini 2007b) on the grounds that the new findings do not conclusively rule it out (Salvini 2007a; 2010). He has identified fragments of a display inscription of Rusa son of Argišti among fragments that Russian excavators had taken from the Van area in 1912 (Salvini 2007a: 149). Bullae sealed with the same king’s seal have long been known from the site, and an inscribed bulla from Bastam specifically states that Rusa son of Argišti set up a throne in Rusahinili Qilbaniki (Salvini 2007a: 153–54). He also argues for a restoration of the legend on an official’s seal, attested in a very defective form on a tablet from Karmir Blur, gives the name of an Erimena as a son of Argišti. The individual might therefore be a younger brother of Rusa, son of Argišti. Since all other known clay tablets date to Rusa son of Argišti, it is unlikely that this one would come from a much earlier reign (Salvini 2007a: 154). One shield from Ayanis, he finds a lion that looks like the earlier style that Seidl used to date the Erimena shield to the 8th century (Salvini 2007a: 154–56). He also finds it improbable that Rusa son of Argišti, whom we know was ruling by 673 BC could be the same king as the Rusa mentioned by Assurbanipal in 652 BC (Salvini 2007a: 157–59: 2010: 1021–22). Individually, each of these arguments is very thin. Part of an Erimena’s name, which may yet be an element of a patronymic, on an official’s seal gives no solid grounds for assuming that this man was the father of king Rusa son of Erimena, for example. The fragments of a “founding document” mention neither the founding of the city nor Rusa son of Argišti, and setting up a throne probably means just that, not making Rusahinili Qilbanikai a new capital. Collectively the arguments are not enough to overrule the explicit foundation statement of provided by Keşiş Göl or justify the assumption that the site was founded twice. In short, there is very little to recommend the idea that this reference to Assur at Keşiş Göl comes in the dying days of the Urartian imperium, and a great deal of evidence against it. Redating of the inscription to the 8th century moves it into an era of dramatic hostility between Assyria and Urartu. We must look for something other than cordiality between them to explain Assur’s appearance here.

Assur’s Urartian Colleagues: Greater and Lesser Gods in Urartu I long entertained the idea that Assur came to the area with an immigrant population of Assyrians who had, for one reason or another settled, or been settled, in the Van area. I somewhat rashly published a brief statement on this theme (Zimansky 2012: 106) claiming that most

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of the lower ranking gods in Urartu had very limited territorial spheres of influence, and the company in which Assur found himself at Keşiş Göl would suggest he was nothing much more than the god of a local village. I have come to recognize that the dramatis personae of the Urartian pantheon actually had much more varied roles, and that new gods in fact appeared only rarely in royal inscriptions. What can we say about the associations of Assur and his place in the Urartian pantheon? In the corpus of Urartian inscriptions as it currently exists, Assur is named in only the Keşiş Göl texts. This fact does not, by itself, distinguish him from other gods and goddesses in Urartu, the vast majority of whose names are mentioned only once. Only Haldi, the Storm God, and Sun God, and Haldi’s consort ªArubani enjoy a wide distribution in time and space. Haldi is of course ubiquitous, and appears from the earliest through the latest inscriptions in the Urartian language. In many ways, he seems to play the same role as god of empire that Assur plays for Assyria, albeit without the Urartian king explicitly serving as vicegerent or the head of his cult. In any hierarchical listing of deities, he comes first, and references to Haldi in Urartian texts outnumber references to all the other gods combined, by a good margin. Next in pan-Urartian importance are the storm god, Teišeba, and the sun god, Šiuini. They are clearly depicted bearing the relevant symbols of lightning and winged disc following Haldi into battle on the unique shield of Anzaf (Belli 1999: 37–47; Seidl 2004: 85). The numbers of references to these gods is elevated by their inclusion in curse formulae. Thanks to the latter, they may also be seen as gods who are called upon to act, like Haldi, rather than simply being the recipients of royal beneficence, like all of the other gods and goddesses in Urartian texts. Of the approximately fifty other gods and goddesses in Urartu known by name, thirty-two are only mentioned in a single inscription: the Meher Kapısı niche carved on a cliff outside of Van (Salvini CTU A3–1). This unique monument, carved in the name of Išpuini and Minua around the end of the 9th century, has long been seen as the key text for understanding the Urartian pantheon. Because of its length, early date, and position near the capital, it has generally been regarded as complete and canonical for the time at which it was composed (Salvini 1994). It established sacrifices for gods and such abstractions as “the weapons of Haldi” in what appears to be a ranked order, with the types and quantities of animals offered decreasing as the list goes on. Haldi and the more important male gods dominate the beginning of the list, of course, and the names of lesser gods follow. Goddesses are taken up at the end, in an apparently separate listing. The whole text list is repeated a second time, without significant variation. Oktay Belli was sufficiently convinced that Meher Kapısı listed the gods in a standard hierarchy that he gave names to each of the eleven gods following Haldi the procession of gods from Anzaf alluded to above, claiming “the gods represented on shield the visually animate the Meher Kapısı inscription” (Belli 1999: 37). The idea that this is a standard and complete list, at least for the time in which it was composed, is not without merit. The number of gods known to have received Urartian royal dedications but not mentioned at Meher Kapısı is indeed quite small. Besides Assur, the additions include Aniqugi, Iubša, Eiduru, Anita (if not a misspelling of Aniqugi), Elipuri (if not a variant of Elipri) and Ṭušpuni (probably the same as Ṭušpuea at Meher Kapısı). Why were these parvenus introduced? For the last three, evidence for independent existence is too weak for any useful discussion. Aniqugi appears to be linked to hydraulic management and may have arrived

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with new technologies of irrigation. We will take up his case below, with regard to the Keşiş Göl inscriptions specifically. There is an obvious explanation why Iubša, perhaps to be read Iarša, 5 would not appear at Meher Kapısı. He is known from two inscriptions in the Erevan area, one a dedication of a temple at Erebuni (CTU A8–21), and another on a fragment of Rusa, son of Argišti’s dedicatory inscription found at Karmir Blur (CTU A12–2viii). These are from territory that was not part of Urartu until the reign of Minua’s successor, Argišti I and their findspots support the idea that he was a local deity. The most interesting omission from the Meher Kapısı list is the god Eiduru, who was only discovered as a deity when the Ayanis temple inscription (CTU A12–1 II line 1) came to light in 1997. He is indisputably tied to a place, and indeed the location of Ayanis itself — Rusahinili Eidurukai (Rusahili before Mt. Eiduru) — is distinguished from Toprakkale — Rusahinili Qilbanikai (Rusahinili before Mt. Qilbani) — by this mountain. If the god Qilbani appears at Meher Kapısı, why doesn’t Eiduru? One cannot argue that he was too remote, because Ayanis is actually very close to the Urartian capital. From the heights nearby, one can actually see the citadel rock of Van, although Toprakkale is hidden by the ridge on which Meher Kapısı itself is carved. This is a striking omission, particularly if one accepts the identification of Eiduru with Süphan Daǧ, the mountain that dominates the horizon as one looks out from Ayanis (Çilingiroğlu and Salvini 2001: 19, note 27.). In any case, the gods not mentioned in Meher Kapısı inscription are so few, despite the numerous reigns expanded territory in which royal dedications were made, that one must see it as a fairly comprehensive list. If Assur were there at the time, he would have been mentioned, so his entry into Urartu probably came after that text was composed. He is, however, found in territory that would have been controlled by Urartian kings from the outset, so we can not associate his arrival with the addition of new territory to the kingdom. To what extent were the lesser deities were tied to specific locations in the territory controlled by the Urartian kings? In a brief article composed before many of the new texted discussed here had been discovered, Salvini argued that many of them were (Salvini 1994). Correlations were not possible for the gods and goddesses mentioned only at Meher Kapısı, of course, but for others the findspots of inscriptions were suggestive. For example, Salvini tied the lands of Ura, and Ua to the northeast shore of Lake Van (Salvini 1994: 206) on the basis of inscriptions found at Karahan; Šebitu with the western shore of Lake Urmia because of a text in a secondary context at Mahumdabad (CTU A10–6); and Irmušini with the Gürpınar valley in view of a dedicatory inscription to him on the facade of a susi temple at Çavuştepe (CTU A9–17). This article is also one of the first to recognize that mountain gods existed in Urartu, most obviously Qilbani. This had been made obvious shortly before by recognition that Qilbanikai “before Mt. Qilbani” described the location of Rusahinili, and was confirmed two years after Salvini published this article by the discovery of Rusahinili Eidurukai, noted above. Thus at least some of these minor gods were tied to specific geographical locations. 5.  The reading was Iarša is made possible by reading the second sign of the name as ár rather than the much more commonly attested ub. Melikišvili and others preferred this reading in arguing that this represented the name of a Luwian deity. The history of the discussion has been reviewed by Tiratsyan 2008, without sensitivity that this reading is far from assured.

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Not all members of the lower strata of the pantheon, however, may be regarded as local deities, associated with individual mountains or specific alluvial areas in which Urartian kings were active. The god Šielardi, for example, alternates with the logographic writing for the name of the Mesopotamian moon god, Sin, in the two lists at Meher Kapısı, and it seems unlikely that an appreciation of the moon god would be geographically confined. Besides ªArubani and Hutuni, a few of the gods and goddesses are mentioned in inscriptions found at widely scattered sites, which would suggest they were they were more widely revered. What are the associations of the other gods on the Keşiş Göl stelae? Quera is one of the more frequently mentioned of the lesser gods, also appearing at Meher Kapısı, Zivistan (CTU A2–3), Astvadzašin (CTU A5–83), and Surb Saak/Van (CTU A8–7). Nalaini also has a respectable number of invocations, appearing at Meher Kapısı and on an unprovenienced text in the Historical Museum of Armenia (CTU A5–31). Ua is also at Meher Kapısı, on two different occasions at Karahan (CTU A2–9 and CTU A5–30), and in an inscription probably from Patnos (CTU A3–12). In his study of the Meher Kapısı inscriptions, Salvini associates him with the area of the northeast shore of Lake Van on the basis of the two Karahan references (Salvini 1994: 206). Aniqugi is the most interesting case, since this deity is only mentioned once elsewhere, but it is in a context connected with irrigation, in a text that parallels Keşiş Göl in many respects but concerns the waters of a canal rather than a lake (CTU 12–8). (17) . . . a-še pi-li ni-ki-du-li (18) uduMÁŠ.TUR dhal-di-e (19) ni-ip-si-du-li-ni UDU dhal-di-e (20) ŠUM UDU dIM-a UDU dUTU-ni-⸢e⸣ (21) še-ha-di da-ni-qu-gi- ⸢e⸣ (22) ⸢a⸣-še Ameš e-ši-a-ṣi-ú-li (23) [M] ÁŠ.TUR dhal-di-e ni-ip-si-du-li (24) UDU dhal-di-e ŠUM UDU dIM-⸢a⸣ (25) ⸢UD⸣U dUTU-ni-e še-ha-di d a-ni-ta When the canal flows a goat must be sacrificed to Haldi, a sheep must be sacrificed to Haldi, a sheep to the Storm God, a sheep to the Sun God, šehadi to the god Aniqugi. When the water goes down(?), a goat must be sacrificed to Haldi, a sheep must be sacrificed to Haldi, a sheep to the Storm God, a sheep to the Sun God, šehadi to the god Anita 6

Interestingly, none of lesser deities of Keşiş Göl inscriptions is mentioned on the facade of the Ayanis temple, where the second longest list of offerings to gods is found. Otherwise, Assur is in good company. Aniqugi is the only other parvenu, while Nalaini, Quera, Ura are moderately high ranking and cannot really be assigned a territory, given the distribution of their inscriptions and their absence at Ayanis, which is close enough to Karahan that one would at least expect to hear about one of them. This gives no support to the idea that Assur is only here to represent a village east of Van.

Assyrians in Urartu? Is there any validity to the idea that Assur might be here as a representative of a transported population who might have had an inclination to worship him from their Assyrian heritage? One issue, of course, is whether Assur was ever revered by individuals who were not 6.  In collating the text Salvini affirms that the expected repetition of Aniqugi does not appear here, commenting “Il risultato è incomprensible, ma epigraficamente obbiettivo”. (Salvini 2008, Vol. 1, p. 580.)

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connected to the city of Aššur or subjects of the Assyrian state. Some support to the idea that he was is provided by Neo-Babylonian references to the existence of a cult of Assur in Uruk. He continued to command respect there after the fall of the primary temples, cities, monarchy, and empire over which he ruled. Beaulieu (2003: 331–32) attributes this to the settlement of Assyrians in the south and a putative melding of Assur with other deities there. Although the Urartian reference obviously contains no suggestion of a formal cult, the same principle might well apply in the vicinity of Keşiṣ Göl. That Urartu might harbor Assyrian dissidents of various stripes is of course well known from the Biblical accounts of the flight of Sennacherib’s assassins. Resident populations of Assyrians in Urartu are hinted at by several sources, although none of them conclusive or contemporary with the Keşiş Göl text. Perhaps the most explicit comes from facade of the Ayanis temple inscription. There, a passage indicates that this Rusa conquered enemy lands, listed in the following order: Assur, Targuni, Etiuni, Tabal, Qainaru, Hate (Hatti), Muški and Ṣiluquni. (ATU 12–1 sec. VI. ll. 10–11).The next passage is somewhat unclear, but suggests that captives from these were settled in the vicinity as part of the construction of the fortress complex (ATU 12–1 sec. VII ll. 1–3). This would be in keeping with long-standing Urartian practices, where deportations of conquered populations are a key theme in 8th century annals, and, in the case of the founding of Erebuni, settlement of people from Hatti and Ṣupani is made explicit (ATU 8–1 Vo. ll 20–22). More specifically related to Assyrian settlement is the appearance of an assemblage of common Assyrian pottery in one of the houses in the outer town at Ayanis. The wares of which it is composed with in a whitish buff color, stand out from the more reddish color of the standard Urartian pottery, which was also found in this house, and neutron activation analysis indicates that it is not composed of the same clay. No one would argue that a deported population would bring its tableware along when it was resettled, but the Ayanis outer town discovery does at least suggest that there were people in residence there, several generations after the Keşiş Göl inscription was composed, who had Assyrian tastes. These might well have included a residual respect for the god Assur.

Conclusions Assur’s presence in the heart of Urartu is likely to remain mysterious unless future discoveries bring more textual and archaeological evidence to bear on the problem. This inquiry, however, has sought to establish a frame within which the answers may be sought. 1) The Meher Kapısı inscription does indeed appear to have been a canonical list of deities for the kingdom of Biainili/Urartu at the time it was written. It shows that Assur was not among the numerous things that the Urartians borrowed from Assyria as they formed their state culture in the last quarter of the 9th century. 2) The Keşiş Göl inscriptions show that Assur was there by the reign of Rusa son of Erimena, who is now dated to the last decades of 8th century. 3) Royal dedications and offerings to gods who are not mentioned at Meher Kapısı are rare, and seem to have been made for different reasons at different times and places. Besides Assur, there are only three unambiguous cases: Aniqugi, Eiduru, and Iubša. The first may have

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been needed because of hydraulic innovations, the second was a mountain elevated to divine status because of its proximity Rusa son of Argišti’s new citadel at Ayanis, and the third was associated with the founding a center in a newly conquered area, whether for local associations or as a gesture to a foreign population group settled there. None of these fits the circumstances of Assur at Keşiş Göl, but the case of Iubša, if indeed related to a local foreign population, is perhaps the closest. 4) People whom the Urartians regarded as Assyrians, in some sense, lived in the heart to of Urartu in the second quarter of the 7th century, if not earlier. Neo-Babylonian references indicate that Assur was worshiped after the fall of the Assyrian Empire, so it is not out of the question that exiled Assyrians in other periods might have had some personal allegiance to him. There is nothing conclusive about any of this, but the possibility remains open that the Keşiş Göl texts see Assur as local god, at home in the mountains west of Van because of the erstwhile presence of a small group of resettled Assyrians. It cannot be ruled out that the Urartian Assur has nothing to do with the Assyrian one–that is to say he is another god of the same name–but the case is hardly compelling. His unique status in a land that was clearly part of Urartu when the pantheon of Meher Kapısı was set in stone would still call for explanation. In any case, two sheep at regular intervals to keep the capital’s irrigation waters flowing, is a bargain price, particularly if we are dealing with a god of empire.

Bibliography Beaulieu, P.-A. 2003 The Pantheon of Uruk during the Neo-Babylonian Period. Cuneiform Monographs 23. Leiden/ Boston: Brill/Styx. Belli, O. 1999 The Anzaf Fortress and the Gods of Urartu. Trans. G. D. Summers and A. Üzel. İstanbul: Arkeoloji ve Sanat Yayınları. Çilingiroğlu, A. and M. Salvini 2001 Ayanis I: Ten Years’ Excavations at Rusahinili Eiduru-kai 1989–1998. Documenta Asiana 6. Rome: Istituto di studi sulle civilità dell’egeo e del vicino oriente. Fuchs, A. 2012 “Urartu in der Zeit.” Pp. 135–61 in Biainili-Urartu. Proceedings of the Symposium held in Munich 12–14 October 2007, S. Kroll, C. Gruber, U. Hellwag, M. Roaf and P. Zimansky. Acta Iranica 51. Leuvan: Peeters. Kroll, S. 2012 “Rusa Erimena in archäologischem Kontext.” Pp. 183–86 in Biainili-Urartu. Proceedings of the Symposium held in Munich 12–14 October 2007, S. Kroll, C. Gruber, U. Hellwag, M. Roaf and P. Zimansky. Acta Iranica 51. Leuvan: Peeters. Kroll, S., C. Gruber, U. Hellwag, M. Roaf and P. Zimansky. 2012 Biainili-Urartu. Proceedings of the Symposium held in Munich 12–14 October 2007. Acta Iranica 51. Leuvan: Peeters. Lehmann-Haupt, C. F. 1926 Armenien Einst und Jetzt. Zweiter Band, Erste Häfte. Berlin and Leipzig: B. Behrs/Friedrich Feddersen.

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Roaf, M. 2010 Thureau-Dangin, Lehmann-Haupt, Rusa Sardurihi and Rusa Erimenahi. ARAMAZD: Armenian Journal of Near-Eastern Studies 5/1: 66–82. 2012 “Could Rusa son of Erimena have been king of Urartu during Sargon’s Eighth Campaign?” Pp. 187–216 in Biainili-Urartu. Proceedings of the Symposium held in Munich 12–14 October 2007, S. Kroll, C. Gruber, U. Hellwag, M. Roaf, and P. Zimansky. Acta Iranica 51. Leuvan: Peeters. Salvini, M. 1994 “The Historical Background of the Urartian Monument of Meher Kapısı.” Pp.  205–210 in Anatolian Iron Ages 3, ed. A. Çilingiroǧlu and D. H. French. British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara Monograph 16. London: British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara. 2002 Una stele di Rusa III Erimenahi dalla zona di Van. SMEA 44/1: 115–43. 2006 Le due stele di Rusa Erimenahi dal Keşiş Göl. SMEA 48: 209–72. 2007a Argišti, Rusa, Erimena, Rusa und die Lövenschwänze: eine urartäishe Palastgeschichte des VII. Jh. v. Chr. ARAMAZD: Armenian Journal of Near-Eastern Studies 2: 146–62. 2007b Rusa I. II. III. Reallexikon der Assyriologie 11/5–6: 264–66. 2008 Corpus dei testi urartei. Vols 1–3. Documenta Asiana 8. Rome: Istituto di studi sulle civilità dell’egeo e del vicino oriente. 2010 “Les deux stèles de Rusa III, fils d’Erimena, provenant du Keşiş Göl.” Pp. 1015–49 in Language in the Ancient Near East: Proceedings of the 53 e Rencontre Assyirologique Internationale, Vol. I, Part 1, ed. L. Kogan, N. Koslova, S. Loesov, and S. Tishchenko. Orientalia et Classica 30/1. Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns (for the Russian State University for the Humanities). 2012 Corpus dei testi urartei. Vol. 4. Documenta Asiana 8. Rome: Istituto di studi sulle civilità dell’egeo e del vicino oriente. Seidl, U. 2004 Bronzekunst Urartus. Mainz: Philipp von Zabern. 2007 Wer gründete Rusahinili/Toprakkale? ARAMAZD: Armenian Journal of Near-Eastern Studies 2: 137–45. 2012 “Rusa son of Erimena, Rusa son of Argišti and Rusahinili/Toprakkale.” Pp. 177–81 in BiainiliUrartu. Proceedings of the Symposium held in Munich 12–14 October 2007, S. Kroll, C. Gruber, U. Hellwag, M. Roaf, and P. Zimansky. Acta Iranica 51. Leuvan: Peeters. Tiratsyan, N. 2008 Luwian Gods in Urartu? ARAMAZD: Armenian Journal of Near-Eastern Studies 3/1: 79–86. Zimansky, P. 2012 “Urartu as Empire: Cultural Integration in the Kingdom of Van.” Pp. 101–10 in Biainili-Urartu. Proceedings of the Symposium held in Munich 12–14 October 2007, S. Kroll, C. Gruber, U. Hellwag, M. Roaf and P. Zimansky. Acta Iranica 51. Leuvan: Peeters.

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Some Bronze Stamp Seals of Achaemenid Date Dominique Collon and John Curtis Introduction The starting-point for this study is a very unusual stamp seal made of red, mottled limestone found in the excavations of the British School of Archaeology in Iraq at Nimrud in 1953 (fig. 18). It shows a stick-like figure with long arms seated on a chair with a spiked back (Parker 1955: 107, pl. 18/4; Mallowan 1966: I, 160–61, 210, fig. 95, n. 35 on p. 36; Curtis 2005: 180, fig. 2). He holds a branch in one hand and raises the other, and in front of the chair is a small deer with antlers. There is a crescent-shaped symbol above the figure’s head and what looks like a caduceus, possibly the symbol of the moon-god of Harran, above the deer. At the bottom of the seal is a ladder pattern design, and there are line borders on the other three sides. On the back is a broad, raised lug with a small hole through it. This seal was found in Room 47 of the Burnt Palace. On the south side of the same room there were traces of kilns together with red glass ingots and slag. Mallowan originally dated these kilns to the early 6th century B.C. (1954: 77, 82–83) but he later redated them to c. 200 B.C. (1966/I: 209–10). Barag has dated this glassmakers’ workshop to the Achaemenid period and points to the discovery of opaque red glass at Persepolis (Barag 1985: 108–9). This date is within the range suggested by radiocarbon analysis (Curtis 2005: 180). Mallowan dated this seal to the 7th century B.C. (1966: I, caption on p. 161), but the context seems to point to a date in the Achaemenid period. This is consistent with the fact that this seal can be compared with a large group of bronze stamp seals, mostly unprovenanced, that are generally dated to the Achaemenid period. The opportunity is taken here to present a group of such seals in the British Museum. This study is respectfully offered to Nicholas Postgate who has been an inspired teacher and colleague and who has contributed so much to the study of Ancient Mesopotamia and surrounding regions, and not least added substantially to our knowledge of Assyrian Nimrud (Postgate 1973; Dalley and Postgate 1984).

Characteristics The seventeen seals described here were all acquired between 1991 and 1996; eleven were purchased from Julia Schottlander, five were donated by her, and one was donated by Neil F. Philips. They are all plaques or tablets of bronze, more or less flat on both surfaces, and square or rectangular in shape. They vary in size from 1.1 × 1.3 cm to 2.8 × 3.3 cm, and in thickness from 0.25 cm to 0.5 cm. It seems that all except two of them had wire holders that were fitted into holes at opposite sides or ends of the plaques. The holes are deep, giving the impression 765

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that these plaques were pierced through the centre horizontally or vertically, but because of corrosion it is not certain that the holes go all the way through the plaques. In only one case (no. 13) is the wire holder intact, and it is omega-shaped. In three more instances (nos. 6, 8, 11) parts of the holders survive, and they all seem to have been originally omega-shaped. In 11 cases the holders do not survive at all, or only as stubs of metal in the holes, but it is likely that they were all omega-shaped. In two cases, both of them small seals, the wire holders were of a different type. In these seals (nos. 3, 7) there are diagonal holes on either side of the plaque. In both cases there are remains of wire in these holes, but it is not possible to speculate about the shape or form of the holders. All the seals have designs in intaglio on the upper surface, sometimes in quite deep relief. Although first impressions seemed to suggest that the seals were cast, either in piece-moulds or by the lost wax process, Susan La Niece of the Department of Conservation and Scientific Research in the British Museum has kindly looked at the seals and believes they were made by engraving and drilling, using a variety of metalworking tools. 1 In this case each seal would have been unique, and no duplicates would have existed such as might have been the case if they had been cast. More than half of the seals have one distinctive feature in common, which is a ‘ladder-pattern’ border all around the decorated face of the seal. In its finest expression, this ladder-pattern consists of an incised line a short distance from the edge of the decorated face of the seal with beyond it short lines at right-angles, thus producing the appearance of a one-sided ladder. Sometimes this “ladder-pattern” is highly stylized, but nevertheless the genesis of the design can still be identified. Of the 17 seals listed here, nine have a ‘ladderpattern’ border all around the face of the seal (nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 11, 14) and one (no. 12) has ‘ladder-pattern’ designs at the top and bottom of the seal. Two of the seals have linear borders (straight lines) all around the decorated face of the seal (nos. 5, 17), while another has linear borders at top and bottom (no. 13). Four of the seals (nos. 9–10, 15–16) have no borders at all.

Catalogue (1) BM 1995,0619.1 (Fig.1) Bronze stamp seal in form of a rectangular plaque pierced vertically. There are no remains of the wire holder. The intaglio design shows three stylized musician figures wearing hats. The first holds a tambourine with both hands, the second plays double pipes, and the third plays a stringed instrument. It is interesting that we have percussion, wind and strings represented on this one scene, as the occurrence of all three together is very unusual in the art of the Ancient Near East. There is a frieze of five segmented rings above the scene, and a frieze of crescent shapes below it. There is a ladder pattern border all around the seal. Height 3.3 cm, Width 2.8 cm, Thickness 0.44 cm. Donated by Neil F. Philips in 1995.

1.  Pers. comm. 2nd July 2014. She also ruled out the possibility that the seals had been die struck in the manner of ancient coins.

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Fig. 1.  Seal no. 1.

(2) BM 1991,1005.9 (Fig.2) Bronze stamp seal in form of a rectangular plaque pierced horizontally. The intaglio design shows a stylized stick-like figure with one curved arm raised and the other curved arm lowered. He faces two trees or plants. Two short lines above the figure’s raised arm may represent a bird or flying insect, and short lines on his head may be a headdress. There is a ladder pattern border all around the edge of the seal. Height 1.53 cm, Width 1.7 cm, Thickness 0.4 cm. Purchased from Julia Schottlander in 1991.

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Fig. 2.  Seal no. 2.

Fig. 3.  Seal no. 3.

(3) BM 1991,1005.8 (Fig. 3) Bronze stamp seal in form of a square plaque that is pierced with diagonal holes at the top and bottom with remains of wire in both holes. The intaglio design shows a striding figure with one arm raised and one arm lowered. There is a highly stylized ladder pattern border all around the edge of the seal. Height 1.34 cm, Width 1.44 cm, Thickness 0.4 cm. Purchased from Julia Schottlander in 1991. (4) BM 1992,1109.3 (Fig. 4) Bronze stamp seal in form of a rectangular plaque pierced vertically. There are no remains of the wire holder. The intaglio design shows a stylized human figure with an incised circle behind his head. There is a stylized ladder pattern border all around the edge of the seal. Height 1.8 cm, Width 1.33 cm, Thickness 0.32 cm. Donated by Julia Schottlander in 1992.

Some Bronze Stamp Seals of Achaemenid Date

Fig. 4.  Seal no. 4.

Fig. 5.  Seal no. 5.

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Fig. 6.  Seal no. 6.

(5) BM 1995,0123.1 (Fig. 5) Bronze stamp seal in form of a square plaque pierced vertically. There are no remains of the wire holder. The intaglio design shows five armless stick-like figures. Above the heads of the figures are crescent shapes, possibly the remains of incised circles. There is a linear border on all sides of the seal. Height 2.5 cm, Width 2.6 cm, Thickness 0.4 cm. Donated by Julia Schottlander in 1995. (6) BM 1992,0127.1 (Fig. 6) Bronze stamp seal in form of a rectangular plaque pierced top and bottom with remains of an omega-shaped wire holder still in position. The intaglio design shows three standing archers wearing long dresses that are possibly Assyrian in style. These archers should be compared with the archers represented on seal no. 8. There is a ladder pattern border on all sides of the seal. Height 2.1 cm, Width 2.6 cm, Thickness 0.38 cm. Purchased from Julia Schottlander in 1992. (7) BM 1991,1005.6 (Fig. 7) Bronze stamp seal in form of a rectangular plaque that is pierced with diagonal holes at the top and bottom, with remains of wire in both holes. The intaglio design is obscure but seems to show a row of three standing human figures, each with at least one arm upraised. There is a highly stylized ladder pattern border consisting in part of dots. Height 1.3 cm, Width 1.55 cm, Thickness 0.33 cm. Purchased from Julia Schottlander in 1991. (8) BM 1991,1005.3 (Fig. 8) Bronze stamp seal in form of a square plaque with remains of a bronze wire fastener on the back, probably originally omega-shaped. The wire fastener is fitted into holes on either

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Fig. 7.  Seal no. 7.

Fig. 8.  Seal no. 8.

side of the seal. In the upper part of the intaglio design are three standing archers wearing belted robes that may be compared with the costumes on seal no. 6. The archers are bareheaded but they wear head bands. In the lower half of the intaglio design are two Greek hoplites wearing crested Corinthian helmets. They are kneeling and hold their shields on their left arms. There is a ladder pattern all around the edge of the design. Height 2.6 cm, Width 2.65 cm, Thickness 0.4 cm. Purchased from Julia Schottlander in 1991.

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Fig. 9.  Seal no. 9.

Fig. 10.  Seal no. 10.

(9) BM 1996,0930.1 (Fig. 9) Bronze stamp seal in form of a square plaque pierced vertically. There are no remains of the wire holder. In the upper part of the intaglio design are two bearded figures wearing short tunics and probably trousers. The first figure wears what appears to be a crown, while the second figure is bareheaded. They hold up unidentified animals (probably lions) by their hind legs. In the lower part of the design are three hoplites wearing crested Corinthian helmets. They are kneeling and hold their shields on their left arms. The seal has no borders. Height 2.44 cm, Width 2.16 cm, Thickness 0.4 cm. Donated by Julia Schottlander in 1996. (10) BM 1993,0125.2 (Fig. 10) Bronze stamp seal in form of a rectangular plaque pierced vertically, with remains of wire at both ends. The intaglio design shows a hoplite wearing a crested Corinthian helmet. He is kneeling and has a shield mounted on his left arm. The seal design has no border. Height 1.43 cm, Width 1.15 cm, Thickness 0.27 cm. Donated by Julia Schottlander in 1993.

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Fig. 11.  Seal no. 11.

Fig. 12.  Seal no. 12.

(11) BM 1991,1005.1 (Fig. 11) Bronze stamp seal in form of a rectangular plaque with corroded remains of an omegashaped (?) wire fastener on the back. This fastener apparently fitted into holes in the centre of the long sides. The seal has a highly stylized design in intaglio possibly showing either a figure seated on a throne or a standing figure with extended arm holding an unidentified object. There is a stylized ladder pattern border all around the edge of the seal. Height 2.0 cm, Width. 1.65 cm, Thickness 0.5 cm. Purchased from Julia Schottlander in 1991. (12) BM 1991,1005.7 (Fig. 12) Bronze stamp seal in form of a rectangular plaque with holes at either side in which are remains of a wire holder. The intaglio design shows a figure on horseback wearing trousers. There is a criss-cross design on the lower part of the trousers, possibly representing leggings. The rider sits on a fringed saddlecloth and the horse has a knotted tail. There is a vertical row of three impressed circles on either side of the horse and rider, but in most cases the impressions are incomplete and have the appearance of crescent shapes. There are ladder pattern borders at top and bottom of the seal.

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Fig. 13.  Seal no. 13.

Fig. 14.  Seal no. 14.

Height 1.32 cm, Width 1.45 cm, Thickness 0.5 cm. Purchased from Julia Schottlander in 1991. (13) BM 1991,1005.5 (Fig. 13) Bronze stamp seal in form of a rectangular plaque with intact omega-shaped wire holder that is fitted into holes on either side of the seal. The intaglio design shows a figure on horseback, seated on a fringed saddlecloth and wearing horizontally-grooved trousers. There are narrow, deeply cut linear borders at top and bottom of the design. Height 1.3 cm, Width 1.1 cm, Thickness 0.3 cm. Purchased from Julia Schottlander in 1991. (14) BM 1991,1005.4 (Fig. 14) Bronze stamp seal in form of a rectangular plaque pierced lengthways with a fragment of wire still in position at one side. The intaglio design shows a figure in a long pleated robe holding a lion by the tuft of hair on top of its head with the left hand and holding a dagger in his right hand. There is a highly stylized ladder pattern border around the edge of the seal. The design may well have been based on a Persepolis relief showing the royal hero fighting a lion (e.g. Ghirshman 1964: 203, ill. 252). Height 1.35 cm, Width. 1.13 cm, Thickness 0.32 cm. Purchased from Julia Schottlander in 1991.

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Fig. 15.  Seal no. 15.

Fig. 16.  Seal no. 16.

(15) BM 1991,1005.2 (Fig. 15) Bronze stamp seal in form of a rectangular plaque that is pierced lengthways through the centre. The intaglio design shows a striding lion with tail raised. There is no border around the edge of the seal. Height 1.3 cm, Width 1.5 cm, Thickness 0.3 cm. Purchased from Julia Schottlander in 1991. (16) BM 1991,1005.10 (Fig. 16) Bronze stamp seal in the form of a square plaque pierced horizontally with remains of wire at one side. The intaglio design shows a striding lion. There is no border around the edge of the seal. Height 1.3 cm, Width 1.4 cm, Thickness 0.36 cm. Purchased from Julia Schottlander in 1991 (17) BM 1996,0427.1 (Fig. 17) Bronze stamp seal in form of a rectangular plaque pierced horizontally. There are no remains of the wire holder. The intaglio design shows a stylized animal figure, probably a stag with antlers (or possibly a goat: see discussion below). There is a linear border all around the edge of the seal. Height 1.3 cm, Width 1.55 cm, Thickness 0.25 cm. Donated by Julia Schottlander in 1996.

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Fig. 17.  Seal no. 17.

Comparanda Unfortunately, parallels to our collection of bronze seals from excavated contexts are few and far between. However, in addition to the parallel from Nimrud referred to at the beginning of this article, there is an interesting silver ring (KL 64:116h) excavated in the Iron Age cemetery at Kāmid el-Loz, a site strategically located in the Bekaa Plain near the gaps in the Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon mountains that still link Beirut and Damascus (Kühne and Salje 1996: 121–22, no. 67, Tafel 16, Abb. 20, Karte 10–11 body no. 7). It is made of silver and was found in situ in Grave 7, the grave of a “mature” woman, on a finger of her left hand. The bezel is a flat, rectangular silver plaque (1.4 × 1.2 × 0.15 cm) soldered onto the open ends of the ring, and the two attachment points are each decorated with a volute. There is a sort of ladder pattern all around the edge of the seal, and it is divided into two registers again by a ladder pattern. The upper register shows two stars, and the lower register a row of four standing human figures, rendered in a very schematic way. The parallels cited are not particularly helpful, but they do point to a date in the “5th to 4th centuries B.C.” (Kühne and Salje 1966: 122). The only other ring-seal from Kāmid el-Loz is a bone ring (KL 66:555) from a tertiary context that contains sherds that have been dated somewhere between the Late Bronze and Early Iron Age (Kühne and Salje 1996: 120, no. 66, Tafel 16, Abb. 19, Karte 13 north of the Temple). It is in the form of a finger ring, made from a bovine metatarsal with the marrow removed, the back cut to form the narrow ring-band, and the front sealing surface shaped as a square that is incised with a linear standing figure and two animals, but the design is unclear. Again the parallels are unconvincing, but it is evidently the ‘poor man’s version’ of the lady’s seal discussed above. In contrast to the excavated parallels, there are many examples of similar bronze seals that are unprovenanced. For example, there is a bronze seal that is close to the British Museum examples in the Royal Albert Memorial Museum in Exeter, catalogued by Sheila Hoey Middleton (1998: 29–33, no. 28) who describes the type as “tabloid stamp seals.” It is very close to our no. 17, with a goat also walking towards the left, and it came from the collection of Lt. Colonel Leopold Agar Denys Montague (1861–1940) (Middleton 1998: introduction, p. ix). The animal is shown within a linear border, with one hind leg raised, three ribs, and a “humanoid head” with a similar “beard.” Apart from damage to its ear, the goat is, in fact, so similar that one might wonder whether the “stag” shown on our no. 17 could have been a goat. Nor is the Exeter seal the only close parallel to this particular seal: Middleton publishes a bronze seal in the Shubin Collection

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(Middleton 1998: 30; fig. 28x) that is said to have been acquired near Tiberias in northern Israel and has a completely-preserved omega-shaped holder. Analysis of the Exeter seal concluded that the intaglio was struck rather than cast or engraved (Northover n.d.), but Middleton suggests “that the rectangular frame round the motif was chiselled out after the striking” (Middleton 1998: 30) If the Exeter seal was indeed struck, this is at odds with Susan La Nieces’s observation that the British Museum seals were probably engraved (see above). Middleton suggest that the Exeter seal and the Shubin seal were struck from the same die, with the differences between the two seals being accounted for by the suggestion that the die was modified or repaired between the two strikings. However, although very similar the two seals are apparently not exFig. 18.  Limestone seal from Nimrud. actly the same, so even if they were struck from a die it is From Parker 1955: pl. 18/4. not likely to have been the same one. There are also very close similarities between the Exeter seal and our no. 17, but again they are not sufficiently close to indicate they were made from the same die. Middleton illustrates two further bronze seals of this type (Middleton 1998: 30, figs. 28 y–z), one in possession of the Malter Galleries and the other in the possession of A. L. Wolfe (see below). The first shows two robed figures facing left on the seal, the foremost an archer while the figure behind him seems to be grasping his hair and is about to stab him. The other seal shows a heavily built lion facing left between two horizontal lines (cf. our nos. 15–16). In 2000 we were informed by Mr Lenny Alexander Wolfe, a dealer in Middle Eastern antiquities based in Jerusalem, that he had about 40 bronze seals of this type in his possession. Photographs and impressions of some of them kindly shown to us by Mr Wolfe confirmed that they were of the same type as ours; apart from being the same shape, a number of these seals have ladder pattern or linear borders, one has an omega-shaped wire holder, and the designs and motifs are very similar. There are also examples of bronze seals of this kind in the Jonathan Rosen collection, 2 and from time to time they appear in antiquities auctions. 3There are also unprovenanced parallels to our seals in materials other than bronze. Thus there is a stamp seal in the British Museum of similar tabloid shape to our bronze seals but made of steatite (BM 104863). It has designs on both surfaces, showing a crude human figure and a winged ibex respectively, and both designs are framed by a ladder pattern border (figs. 19–20). It was acquired by Sir Leonard Woolley in the Carchemish region of Syria (allegedly from Merj Khamis) and sent to the British Museum in 1912. Then, two close parallels in Berlin (VA 759 and 763), both of comparable size, made of steatite and showing figures within ladder-pattern borders, were acquired from dealers in Damascus and Marash respectively ( Jacob-Rost 1975: 26; pl. 6, nos. 81–82, classified as Syrian and dated to the 2nd to 1st millennia B.C.). 2.  Pers. comm. Sidney Babcock, the Curator of the Jonathan Rosen Collection. 3.  E.g. Christie’s New York, 2nd June 1995, no. 249.

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Figs. 19–20.  Steatite seal British Museum 104863.

Before drawing this brief discussion to a close, it may be instructive to point to a mouldmade Achaemenid cylinder seal published in 1999 by Baruch Brandl. It was excavated at Bethsaida in Israel on the north coast of the Sea of Galilee/Lake Tiberias (Brandl 1999: 230ff.). This is just south of Kāmid el-Loz where the excellent provenanced parallel referred to above was excavated. It is also “close to Lake Tiberias in Israel” where Middleton’s seal 28x from the Shubin Collection is said to have originated (Middleton 1998: 29–32). The Bethsaida seal (no. 96-2227, Ht. 2.15 × Diam. 1.1 cm) is made of “ceramic(?) sintered quartz(?)” and was manufactured in a bi-valve mould. The design is set at right-angles on the seal and consists of “a walking winged bull” and “a bearded fish-man wearing a double plumed helmet, with his right hand in a blessing pose and his left hand holding a treelike staff”. Both face right between double vertical lines said to be “the result of the bi-valve mold” for which a reconstruction is proposed (Brandl 1999: 232–34; figs 4–6). The two designs are also separated by a horizontal line, so that each design has in effect a linear border like some of our stamp seals. An extremely detailed and well-referenced discussion of the iconography leads Brandl (1999: 235) to conclude that the seal belongs to “a small group” of the “Achaemenian” court style seals “characterised by the existence of two separated but equal motifs on them” originally derived from the production technique–“molding in a bivalve mold.” As an example, Brandl cites a chalcedony seal in the British Museum (Merrillees 2005: no. 30). Brandl also refers to a seal in the ex-Moore Collection (Eisen 1940: no. 103) as “the only other mold-made cylinder seal known to me”. This seal, which depicts Median and Greek warriors, is now in the British Museum (Merrillees 2005: 69, no. 63 (BM, ME 141641)). In her analysis of the seal, Margaret Sax also concluded that “the cylinder was made in a two-piece mould as indicated by the flash-lines on either side of the seal between the figures”.

Conclusions It is immediately evident that although our seals are all of the same material and shape, there is a range of different styles and motifs. Some of the seals are very stylised, and the designs are so schematic that it is sometimes difficult to determine what is being depicted (nos. 1–5, 7, 11). Amongst the seals that are more naturalistic, three show animals in a fairly straightforward manner (nos. 15–17). Two seals show figures wearing trousers and riding on horseback (nos. 12–13), while another shows the so-called Persian royal hero, wearing a pleated dress, grappling with a lion (no. 14). On one seal (no. 6) there is a row of three archers apparently wearing an

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archaic style of dress, and similar archers also appear on one of the three seals featuring Greek hoplites (nos. 8–10) 4. They are shown kneeling, wearing crested Corinthian helmets, and holding their shields on their left arms. These seals are presumably examples of what is sometimes called Graeco-Persian glyptic. The parallels to our bronze seals, although scanty and mostly unprovenanced, seem to point to a date in the Achaemenid period, probably 5th–4th century B.C., and an origin in the western part of the Achaemenid empire. We may cite the silver ring from Kāmid el-Loz in the Lebanon probably to be dated to the 5th–4th centuries B.C., the cylinder seal from Bethsaida in Israel of similar date, the bronze seal that is said to have been acquired near Lake Tiberias, and the fact that bronze seals of this type were available on the antiquities market in Israel. The seals in other materials that are broadly comparable allegedly come from Syria, apart from the example from Nimrud. A western provenance for the bronze seals is supported by the fact that such seals or impressions from them seem to be absent in the eastern part of the Achaemenid Empire. Thus, amongst the stamp seal impressions on the Persepolis Fortification Tablets showing “images of heroic encounter” (Garrison and Root 2001), there are none that could have been made with seals of this type and style, and nor is there anything similar amongst the published seals from Sardis (Dusinberre 2003: 264–83). Amongst the many Achaemenid period clay tablets in the British Museum from Mesopotamian sites such as Babylon, Borsippa, Sippar, Kutha, Warka and Ur there are none that carry impressions of this kind (Mitchell and Searight 2008: nos. 340–595), a conclusion that was kindly confirmed by C.B.F. Walker. 5 We may tentatively conclude, therefore, that the bronze seals in the British Museum and probably others of the same kind date from the Achaemenid period (5th–4th centuries B.C.) and come from Syria-Palestine. They were probably all produced in one cultural area, although not necessarily in one workshop. 4.  For a representation of a hoplite on an Achaemenid seal allegedly from Syria see, for example, Boardman 2000: 169, fig. 5.34. 5.  Pers. Comm. See also Graziani 1989.

Bibliography Barag, D.P 1985 Catalogue of Western Asiatic Glass in the British Museum I. London. Boardman, J. 2000 Persia and the West: An Archaeological Investigation of the Genesis of Achaemenid Art. London. Brandl, B. 1999 “Two first-millennium cylinder seals from Bethsaida.” Pp.  225–44 in Bethsaida, A City by the North Shore of the Sea of Galilee (vol. 2), ed. R. Arav and R. A. Freund,. Kirksville, Missouri. Curtis, J. E. 2005 “The Achaemenid Period in Northern Iraq.” Pp. 175–95 in L’archéologie de l’empire achéménide: nouvelles recherches, ed. P. Briant and R. Boucharlat, Persika 6. Paris. Dalley, S., and Postgate, J.N. 1984 The Tablets from Fort Shalmaneser. CTN III. London. Dusinberre, E.R.M. 2003 Aspects of Empire in Achaemenid Sardis. Cambridge.

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Eisen, G.A. 1940 Ancient Oriental and other Seals with a Description of the Collection of Mrs.William H. Moore. OIP 47. Chicago. Garrison, M.B., and Root, M.C. 2001 Seals on the Persepolis Fortification Tablets (vol. 1): Images of Heroic Encounter. OIP 117. Chicago. Ghirshman, R. 1964 Persia: from the Origins to Alexander the Great. London. Graziani, S. 1989 Le impronte di sigilli delle tavolette mesopotamiche del British Museum, pubblicate da J. N. Strassmaier, datate a Ciro, Cambise, Dario e Sarse. Annali dell’Istituto Universitario Orientale di Napoli 49: 161–200. Jakob-Rost, L. 1975 Die Stempelsiegel im Vorderasiatischen Museum Berlin, Berlin (reprinted in 1997 by Philipp von Zabern, Mainz). Kühne, H. and Salje, B. 1996 Kāmid el-Lōz 15. Die Glyptik. Saarbrücker Beiträge zur Altertumskunde 56. Bonn. Mallowan, M.E.L. 1954 The excavations at Nimrud (Kalḫu), 1953. Iraq 16: 59–163. 1966 Nimrud and its Remains. (Vols. I–II). London. Merrillees, P. H. 2005 Catalogue of the Western Asiatic Seals in the British Museum, Cylinder Seals VI: Pre-Achaemenid and Achaemenid Periods. London. Middleton, S.H. 1998 Seals, Finger Rings, Engraved Gems and Amulets in the Royal Albert Memorial Museum, Exeter, from the Collections of Lt. Colonel L.A.D. Montague and Dr N.L. Corkill. Exeter. Mitchell, T.C., and Searight, A. 2008 Catalogue of the Western Asiatic Seals in The British Museum. Stamp Seals III. Impressions of Stamp Seals on Cuneiform Tablets, Clay Bullae, and Jar Handles, Leiden. Northover, J. P. n.d. R1171. Analysis and Metallography of a Stamp Seal, Analytical Report, Department of Materials, University of Oxford (in Middleton 1998: 29). Parker, B. 1955 Excavations at Nimrud, 1949–1953: Seals and Seal Impressions. Iraq 17: 93–125. Postgate, J. N. 1973 The Governor’s Palace Archive. CTN II. London.

Assyrians after the Fall: Evidence from the Ebabbara of Sippar John MacGinnis In recent years there has been a steady interest in what happened to Assyria at the end of the empire. A number of scholars have reviewed the archaeological and historical evidence. 1 Two literary texts purport to document an exchange of letters between Sin-šar-iškun and Nabopolassar, 2 and the site of Ziyaret Tepe in southeastern Turkey has yielded a dramatic letter which can only have been written as the empire was in the very process of collapse. 3 Looking to the emergence of the Neo-Babylonian empire, light has been cast on the origins of Nabopolassar, 4 and an administrative text from Sippar indicates that the city of Assur was the seat of a Neo-Babylonian governor. 5 This is a topic also touched upon by Prof. Postgate in his study of the documents from the post-Assyrian occupation of Tell Sheikh Hamad dated according to Nebuchadnezzar. 6 We hope therefore that the following remarks will be of interest to a scholar who has been such an exceptional investigator and inveterate teacher of the Assyrian world. To the above listed evidence it is possible to add a further note from the archives of the Neo-Babylonian temple of Šamaš in Sippar. The starting point for this contribution is a series of ration lists from the Ebabbara. These texts take the form of multi-columned ledgers enumerating personnel in the employment of the temple; the columns are divided by lines and the sections are divided by rulings so that the effect is a boxed grid. 7 Each box lists the members of a group of workmen, specified in the first entry and repeated in the group total in the last line. The majority of the groups are professional, either artisans (blacksmiths, carpenters, different classes of weavers and so on) or menials (of the ox house, of the sheep stalls etc), but there are exceptions. The first of these is the Egyptians, a group who must have originally come to Sippar as prisoners of war. Many, perhaps all, of the ledgers date to the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, in the light of which it would not seem improbable that these Egyptians were captured in the battle of Carcemish in 605 BC and/or the campaign of 601 BC. Egyptians do however also ap1.  Oates 1991; Dalley 1993; Kuhrt 1995; Dandamayev 1997; Zawadzki 1988; Kühne 2002; Curtis 2003; Kreppner 2008a; 2008b. I would like to thank Michael Jursa, Laurie Pearce, Caroline Waerzeggers, Cornelia Wunsch, Ran Zadok and Stefan Zawadzki for reading drafts of this article and suggesting numerous changes and improvements. 2.  Gerardi 1986; Lambert 2005. 3.  Parpola 2008: 86–95, No. 22; MacGinnis & Matney 2009: 39–40. 4.  Jursa 2007. 5.  MacGinnis 2000: 335, BM 63283. 6.  Postgate 1993. 7.  For a discussion of these boxed ledgers see Bongenaar 1997: 297–8 and Da Riva 2002: 25. Unfortunately not one of these ledgers is complete, a situation which is probably not accidental.

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pear in a ration list from Nabopolassar year 13 (613 BC), BM 73261: 8 the total of Egyptians in the Ebabbara at that time is given as 46, and the way in which they are listed, as an add on to the main body of the širāku, makes it clear that they are a recent addition to the temple’s rolls. It may therefore be the case that batches of Egyptian prisoners were presented to the Ebabbara on multiple occasions. In BM 73261 the Egyptians are listed simply according to the count of adults and children but in many of the boxed ledgers they are listed by name, and the names are indeed genuinely Egyptian, and of no little interest for that. 9 The Egyptians are the best documented foreign group in Sippar but they are not the only ones. These ledgers offer a tantalising clue that there was also a body of Assyrians in the workforce of the Ebabbara. It is in this context that we offer the following texts. No. 1   BM 49998 5.0 × 8.3+ cm   no date preserved Piece of a single columned tablet, damaged at both ends, reverse effaced. Side A effaced Side B [Kī-Šamaš], [section leader]   1′ [mKi-i-dUTU] ⸢lú⸣[GAL 10-tú]   2′ [x x x]-an-ni [(0)] [. . .]-anni [. . .]-uṣur   3′ [md x x]-ŠEŠ [Šamaš-ana]-bītišu   4′ [mdUTU-ana]-⸢É⸣-šú md [Nabû-šu]zibanni   5′ [ NÀ-šu]-zib-an-ni [Šamaš]-ana-bītišu, second (of this name)   6′ [mdUTU]-ana-⸢É⸣-šú 2-ú m d   7′ [ x- ]UTU [. . .]-Šamaš  8′ m ⸢GIŠ⸣.MI-É.BABBAR.RA (Ina)-ṣil-Ebabbara Total of 10, Kī-Šamaš  9′ mdNÀ-DI.KUD!-DÙ-uš PAP 10 mKi-i-dUTU Nabû-dīn-ēpuš Bunene-budiya 246 l. 10′ mdBu-ne-ne-bu-di-iá 1 GUR 1 (PI) 5-BÁN —————————————————————————— ———————————————————— lú Sēbi, section leader 11′ mSe-e-bi GAL 10-tú m Kinūnāya 12′ KI.NE.-na-a-a Gaṣuṣu 13′ mGa-ṣu-ṣu m m [Paṭ]uesiri Total of 5, Sēbi 14′ [ Pa-ṭ]u-e-si-ri PAP 5 Se-e-bi [Paṭ]uesi 15′ [mPa-ṭu]- ⸢e-si⸣ —————————————————————————— ———————————————————— [Arad]-Nabû son of Aššurāya 16′ [mÌR]-⸢dNÀ⸣ A mAš-šur-a-a md [Šamaš-ana-bīti]šu 17′ [ UTU-ana-É]-šú 18′ [x x x x] 4 PI [. . .. . .] 4 pānu 8.  MacGinnis 2004. 9.  Wiseman 1966; Bongenaar & Haring 1994; Spar, Logan & Allen 2006. Further Egyptian names may be found in the corpus of texts dealing with Carians from Egypt settled in Borsippa in the reign of Cambyses, see Waerzeggers 2006: 5.

Assyrians after the Fall: Evidence from the Ebabbara of Sippar 19′ [mIt-ti-dNÀ-I]GI-iá [Itti-Nabû-in]īya [. . . . .] 20′ [mx x x (x)] PAP 5 [mÌR-dNÀ]

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Total of 5, [Arad-Nabû]

left edge col.i ′   1 [. . . ŠE]Š   2 [. . .]x-ŠEŠ

[. . .]-uṣur [. . .]-uṣur

col.ii  ′   1 3-BÁN mdUTU-[. . .] 18 l. Šamaš-[. . .] Notes l.5′

For the restoration cf. Bongenaar 1995: 379–80. l.12′ Note the compacted logographicphonetic spelling with mKI.NE.NEna-a-a > mKI.NE-na-a-a; that this is not just a scribal omission is suggested by the recurrence of this spelling in BM 50647 below. l.16′ The restoration of the name as Arad-Nabû comes from BM 50090 Side B (?) line 8, where the box following the Egyptian section opens with mÌR-dPA A m[Aš-šur-a-a], the circumstances surely justifying the restoration. Unfortunately nothing other than the name of Arad-Nabû is preserved, but this does at least give us the identity of the section leader. l.19′ For the restoration see BM 60647 side B l.13′.

Fig. 1 (above).  No.1 BM 49998 Side B. Fig. 2 (left).  No.1 BM 49998 left edge.

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No. 2   BM 50647 5.2+ × 11.2 cm   date: 29/6/A strip down the middle of a tablet preserving the full height, listing rab eširti’s and their teams. Side A [Ah-uṣur], section leader   1′ [mŠEŠ-ŠEŠ] lúGAL 10-tú m   2′ [ DN-DÙ].A.BI-DA [. . .-kul]lat-ile’’i [. . .]-Nabû   3′ [X X X]-⸢dNÀ⸣ m [Il]e’’i-Iltammeš   4′ [ D]A-ìl-tam-meš   5′ [mKi]-i-dUTU [K]ī-Šamaš   6′ [mPa-h]a-at-re-e [Pah]atrē [Gaṣu]ṣu, second (of this name)   7′ [mGa-ṣu]-ṣu 2!-ú m   8′ [ x]-zi-ki-iá [. . ..]-zikiya [. . .]-Nabû, second (of this name)   9′ [x x dN]À 2-ú m [. . .]-uṣur 10′ [ x x]-ŠEŠ [Har]umasi Total of 11, Ah-[uṣur] 11′ [mHar]-⸢ú⸣-ma-si! PAP 11 mŠEŠ-[ŠEŠ] m lú [Ah]-uṣur, section leader 12′ [ ŠEŠ-ŠE]Š GAL 10-tú —————————————————————————— ———————————————————— 13′ [NÀ-ŠE]Š [Nabû-uṣ]ur 14′ [x x (x)] [. . .] 15′ [x x (x)] [. . .] 16′ [x x (x)]-u [. . .]-u 17′ [x x x]-ṣa [. . .]-ṣa/za 18′ [x x (x)] [. . .] m [Ebabbara-l]umur 19′ [ É.BABBAR.RA-l]u-mur 20′ [x x (x)]-PAP [. . .]-uṣur 21′ [x x (x)] [. . .] [. . .] Total of 10, Nabû-uṣ[ur] 22′ [mx x (x) PA]P mdNÀ-ú-ṣ[ur] —————————————————————————— ———————————————————— [. . .]-si, section leader 23′ [x x (x)]-x-si lúGAL 10-tú 24′ [x x (x)]-re [. . .]-re 25′ [x x (x)]⸢x⸣ [. . .] 26′ [x x (x)]-PAP [. . .]-uṣur 27′ [x x (x)]⸢x⸣ [. . .] 28′ [x x (x)]⸢x x⸣ [. . .] Side B   1′ [mGIŠ.MI-É.BABBAR.R]A [(Ina)-ṣil-Ebabbar]a   2′ [mdNÀ-DI.KUD.DÙ]-uš [Nabû-dīn-ēp]uš   3′ [mBu-ne-n]e-bu-di-iá PAP [x m]⸢ Ki⸣-[i-dUTU] [Bunen]e-budiya; total of [. . .], Kī-[Šamaš] —————————————————————————— ———————————————————— [Sē]bi, section leader   4′ [mSe-e]-bi lúGAL 10-tú m [Kinū]nāya   5′ [ KI.N]E-na-a-a [Gaṣ]uṣu   6′ [mGa-ṣ]u-ṣu

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Fig. 3 (far left).  No. 2 BM 50647 Side A. Fig. 4 (immediate left). No.2 BM 50647 Side B.

  7′ [mA-mi-ni-s]i [Aminis]i   8′ [mPa-ṭu]-⸢e⸣-si-ri [Paṭue]siri [Paṭu]esi total of 6, Sēbi   9′ [mPa-ṭu]-e-si PAP 6 m⸢Se⸣-[e-bi] —————————————————————————— ———————————————————— [Arad]-Nabû son of Aššurāya 10′ [mÌR-d]PA A mAš-šur-a-a [Šamaš-ana]-bītišu 11′ [mdUTU-ana]-É-šú m d 12′ [ x- ]UTU [. . .]-Šamaš

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13′ [mdUTU]-⸢tak⸣-lak [Šamaš]-taklāk m d m d [It]ti-Nabû-inīya total of 5, [Arad-Nabû] 14′ [ It-t]i- NÀ-IGI-iá PAP 5 [ÌR- PA] —————————————————————————— ———————————————————— 15′ [mdUTU-d]a-a-a-nu [Šamaš-d]ayyānu 16′ [mx x]-šìr-dEN [. . .]-šir-Bēl 17′ [mdN]À-TIN-an-ni PAP 3 [mdUTU-da-a-a-nu] [Na]bû-bulliṭanni total of 3, [Šamaš-dayyānu] —————————————————————————— ———————————————————— 18′ [x x x] [. . .] 19′ [x x x] [. . .] [it]i ? Month of Ululu, day 9 [year x?] 20′ KIN UD 9 KÁM [(MU x KÁM )] upper edge   1 [. . . Š]UK.HI.A.MEŠ ] ⸢lú⸣[. . .]   2 [TA U]D 21 KÁM x [. . .]   3 [a-di U]D 29 KÁM šá? [. . .]

[. . .] rations of the [. . .] [from] day 21 [. . .] [until] day 29 of [. . .]

Notes Side A 2′ Although an individual with such a name is not so far attested in the Ebabbara, this would appear to be the only type of name which gives a plausible reading. Side A 11′ For the restoration see Bongenaar & Haring 1994: 67–8. Side B 7′ This name can be written either mA-ni-si (BM 50090.11′) or mA-mi-ni-si (BM 67107.6′, cf. Bongenaar & Haring 1994: 60 li.24). Side B 10′ See the note to BM 49998 line 16′ above. Side B 17′ The reading of this name is not certain. A Nabû-bulliṭanni is attested in the reign of Nabopolassar paying in agricultural dues, Moldenke M II 7.4 (Nabopolassar 8); cf. also Nbk 21.4 where a Nabû-bulliṭanni borrows silver (attribution to Nebuchadnezzar 2 not certain). However a restoration of Šamaš-bulliṭanni is not excluded. Neither BM 49998 nor BM 50647 have their date preserved but an estimation can be given. As mentioned, these ledgers date to the time of Nebuchadnezzar; more specifically, two of the ledgers with Egyptian names published previously are dated to Nebuchadnezzar year 15. 10 From the close similarity of all these texts it may be assumed that the present texts also date to the same timeframe. 11 Both texts preserve sections listing individuals of Egyptian descent. Those listed–Sēbi, Kinūnāya, Gaṣuṣu, Aminisi, Paṭuesiri, Paṭuesi–all feature in other texts from Sippar enumerating Egyptians published to date. 12 The Egyptians are however not the principal subject of interest here. Of rather more interest in this case are the sections starting with the entry for Arad-Nabû son of Aššurāya. The name Aššurāya means “the Assyrian” and surely indicates that Arad-Nabû’s father was an Assyrian brought to the Ebabbara in a circumstance where his 10.  Bongenaar & Haring 1994: 64. 11.  Another text which may belong here is BM 51907, a part of a boxed ledger with a section labelled lúA-x-[. . .]: possibly this is to be restored lúA-š[ur-a-a], although this would be a somewhat unorthodox spelling. 12.  Cf. Bongenaar & Haring 1994: 64. Note though that while Kinūnāya is clearly one of the Egyptian group his name is actually Babylonian; very likely he was born in Babylonia.

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name given at birth was not used. An alternative would be that the formulation apal Aššurāya is actually meant to convey the designation “of Assyrian descent”. 13 As discussed above, these ledgers list the workers in distinct groups, whether professional or ethnic. In either case therefore the likelihood is that the section headed by Arad-Nabû refers to a group of Assyrians. 14 The implications are striking: as with the Egyptians, the only context in which a group of Assyrians can have been employed as širāku in the Ebabbara is as prisoners of war. Let us turn to the onomasticon of these individuals. The names listed are Arad-Nabû, Šamaš-ana-bītišu, [. . .]-Šamaš, [Šamaš]-taklāk and Itti-Nabû-īnīya. These name are all from the standard Akkadian repertoire. They are, however, either common to both Assyrian and Babylonian (Šamaš-taklāk) or specifically Babylonian (Itti-Nabû-īnīya, Šamaš-ana-bītišu); 15 none is specifically Assyrian. The name Šamaš-ana-bītišu is very specific, well documented in the onomasticon of the širāku of the Ebabbara and perhaps in fact restricted to that set. 16 The fact that none of these names are Assyrian, and that at least two are Babylonian, of which one is specific to the Ebabbara, suggests that these are names given to individuals born into the Ebabbara, the implication being that their bearers are offspring of deportees rather than the original deportees themselves; given the date of the texts, it is likely they were the second (rather than any further) generation. 17 This also fits exactly with the fact that Arad-Nabû himself clearly belongs to the second generation. With this in mind, it is interesting to revisit other attestations of Assyrians in Sippar. Among the published material two texts in particular stand out, CT 56 638 and CT 56 758. 18 These texts are notes of rations for workers in the Ebabbara. In the case of CT 56 638 the rubric and date are missing, but the information that they are carpenters given in CT 56 758 and the dating to the reign of Nabonidus probably also apply to CT 56 638. CT 56 638 BM 55972 m [x] l. Zērūtu 1′ [x] qa NUMUN-tu md 2′ [x] qa NÀ-DU-NUMUN [x] l. Nabû-mukīn-zēri 2 l. Tabnēa 3′ 2 qa mTab-ni-e-a m 1 1/2 l. Marduka 4′ 1 1/2 qa Mar-duk-a 1 1/2 l. the water carrier 5′ 1 1/2 qa lúna-di A.MEŠ lú 7 Assyrians 6′ 7 Aš-šur-a-a 13.  For the use of the gentilic preceded by the Personenkeil, rather than the determinative lú, as a family label, cf. names of the type PN1 A-šú šá PN2 A mMiṣirāya (Cam. 49.9–10, CT 55 79.11–12, Nbn. 20.14–15, 505.12–13, 506.11–12, Pinches Peek 11.15–16) and PN1 A-šú šá PN2 A mSuhāya (ABC 34.14, CT 4 43a 26–27, VS 5 95.29); there are doubtless other examples. 14. The eširtu of Arad-Nabû also occurs in CT 56 87.ii.14f: many of the names there are damaged but Šamaš-ana-bītišu is among those preserved. 15.  Arad-Nabû is almost certainly Babylonian as there is no indication (or likelihood) that the writing mÌR-dNÀ encodes the Assyrian form Urad-Nabû. 16.  Bongenaar 1997: 534. 17.  In the same way it appears that the Carians transported to Borsippa in the reign of Cambyses gave Babylonian names to the second generation (Waerzeggers 2006: 5). 18.  CT 56 758 is also discussed by Bongenaar 1997: 396.

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John MacGinnis 7′ 3 lúBi-KA-ta-a-a 8′ 1 lúGu-bu-lu-a-a 9′ ⸢2⸣ lúši-ir-ki 10 [x] ⸢lúx x x⸣ [(x)]

l.6

3 Biriteans 1 Byblite 2 širāku [x] . . .. . ...

As noted by Zadok (RGTC 8, p.74) lúBi-KA-ta-a-a here is an error for lúBi-ri-ta-a-a as in CT 56 758.

CT 56 758     BM 55731 1 [UDU?].HI.A ŠUK.HI.A lúNAGAR.MEŠ [sheep (?)] rations of the carpenters. Month of Abu, day 8, 2 itiNE UD 8 KÁM md year 5 of Nabonidus 3 MU 5 KÁM NÀ-I king of Babylon. 4 LUGAL Eki 9 Assyrians 5 9 lúAš-šur-a-a 7 Biriteans 6 7 lúBi-ri-ta-a-a lú 2 širāku 7 2 ši-rik 1 . . . 8 1 ⸢lúx x⸣ [x x] Together the preserved parts of these texts list 7 or 9 Assyrians, 3 or 7 “Biriteans”, 1 Byblite and 2 širāku working for the Ebabbara. Once again the question arises who these people were and once again the most likely explanation is prisoners of war or their descendants. The fact that prisoners of war were donated to the temple by the Neo-Babylonian kings is not only to be assumed but is directly attested. 19 In addition to the data on the Egyptians cited above, the most explicit confirmation comes in an inscription of Nabonidus in which the king records giving 2,850 prisoners to Bel, Nabû and Nergal (ie. the Esagila temple in Babylon, the Ezida temple in Borsippa and the Emeslam temple in Cutha); the Cilicians who are found receiving rations from the Ebabbara from the reign of Nabonidus are also almost certainly deportees and possibly part of the same deportation. 20 In the case of Nabopolassar, while the king does indeed boast in his royal inscriptions of his conquest of Assyria–“I overthrew Subaru and turned its land into tells and desolate places”, 21 he does not in fact explicitly mention prisoners of war. This omission is however made up for by entries in the Babylonian Chronicle, not least in the entry for Nabopolassar year fourteen (612 BC), which specifically records that captives and deportees from Ruṣapu (as well as, probably, elsewhere) were brought to the king at Nineveh. 22 If the phrase hu-bu-ut-su-nu is indeed to be understood as referring to captives rather than booty, then further references to the taking of prisoners occur in Babylonian Chronicle entries for both the accession and the tenth year of Nabopolassar. 23 Captives (lúhúb-tú, note the determina19.  Wunsch 2013; MacGinnis 2013: 45f. 20.  MacGinnis 2013: 46. 21.  su-ba-ru-um a-na-ru KUR-su ú-te-er-ru a-na DU6 ù ka-ar-mi (Langdon 1912: 61 No.1 i.29–31); for an elaboration on the theme see ibid. p.68 No.1 i.17–21: see now Da Riva 2013, 81. 22.  hu-ub-ti u ga-lu-tu ka-[. . .. . .] u KUR Ru-ṣa-pu ana šàr Akkadî ana Ninuaki ú-bil-lu-ni (Grayson 1975: 94 l.48). 23.  Glassner 2004: 216f, Chronicle 21 line 13 (accession year) and Chronicle 22 lines 5 and 14 (year 10); in Chronicle 22 line 5, for example, Glassner translates ŠI.ŠI KUR Aš-šur ma-a-diš GAR-an hu-bu-ut-su-

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tive) from both Elam and Cilicia are however directly recorded at the court of Nebuchadnezzar in the celebrated tablets listing oil rations found in the south palace of Babylon. 24 With regard to CT 56 638 and CT 56 758, a possible time for a Byblite captive to have arrived would be in the context of Nebuchadnezzar’s siege of Tyre. 25 This being the case, the suggestion can be made that a plausible candidate for the location of Birītu, not previously identified, may be Beirut. In Neo-Assyrian texts the city is attested as Biʾrû, however the final /t/ is amply documented from the second millennium onwards and there is no obstacle to this being indicated in a Neo-Babylonian text; finding deportees from Beirut in the same context as ones from Byblos would of course pose no problem. It is, incidentally, possible that the Assyrians listed as a block in CT 56 638 and CT 56 758 may be either identical with the individuals named in BM 49998 and BM 50647, or at least their descendants. Whether the Šamaš-taklāk of the Assyrian section of BM 50647 is the same as the Šamaš-taklāk known as a carpenter active in the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, 26 and also one of the carpenters of CT 56 638 and CT 56 758, is difficult to judge. An interesting question arises as to why the majority of the entries in these two texts are listed by geographical designation in contrast to those who are simply listed as širāku, suggesting that the former had a different status. Without being able to give a definitive answer, one possibility is that they belonged to one of the other dependent status groups, such as šušānû– see further below. The deportees given to the temples by the Neo-Babylonian king were, as a rule, settled on the land. The system worked well as it simultaneously brought waste land under cultivation, yielding income for the temples and taxes or service for the state. 27 In the case of the Egyptian deportees in Sippar, they must certainly have been settled in the village Bīt-Miṣirāya, attested from Nabonidus year 15 until Darius year 27 as a place of routine agricultural activity (date cultivation and brickmaking). 28 The fact that a field in Bīt-Miṣirāya was part of the ‘’property of Šamaš’’ would fit well with the suggestion that it was founded with Egyptians settled on temple land; they would then in all probability have paid a tithe to the temple and been subject to state service. 29 Another group of deportees settled on land around Sippar was the colony of Gezerites attested in a dialogue contract in which the temple authorities investigate the level of tithes payable by that community. 30 To these groups from Sippar may be added a settlement of Tyrians in the vicinity of Nippur in the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, 31 a settlement of Arabs in the vicinity of Nippur in the early Achaemenid period, 32 the Carians settled in Borsippa in the nu ma-a-diš ih-tab-tu as “He inflicted a crushing defeat on Assyria. He took many prisoners among them”. Grayson by contrast (1975: 91) translates “He inflicted a major defeat on Assyria (and) plundered them extensively”. 24.  Weidner 1939 Plate II lines 5–8, cf. Plate I line 5. 25.  Zawadzki 2003; 2008; MacGinnis 2013: 44. 26.  Bongenaar 1997: 407, to which add MacGinnis 2013: No. 14 (BM 79705.3), dating to a year Nebuchadnezzar (x)­+19. 27.  MacGinnis 2012: 23–30; Wunsch 2013. 28.  Jursa 1995: 219–220. 29.  Jursa 1995: 219–220; MacGinnis 2013: 45–6. 30.  Jursa 1998: 25–27 (text No.1); cf. Jursa 2010: 329; MacGinnis 2013: 47. 31.  Beaulieu 2013: 49; cf. Zawadzki 2003. 32.  Beaulieu 2013; 48, Zadok 1981 p.71.

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reign of Cambyses mentioned above, and last but not least the Jews deported from Babylonia by Nebuchadnezzar, 33 for which the most recent evidence is the texts referring to the settlement of Judeans attested at Al-Iāhūdu (probably in southeastern Babylonia, between Nippur and the Tigris) from Nebuchadnezzar 33 to early in the reign of Xerxes. 34 Other localities whose names suggest they may be locations of forced settlements are Alu-ša-Amurru (Nebuchadnezzar 10), Alu-ša-Nērebāya (Nabonidus 16), Alu-ša-Qurabatūa (Nebuchadnezzar 40) and Alu-ša-Šasiʾūa (Amel-Marduk 1). 35 It may be noted in passing that the foreign haṭru’s found in the vicinity of Nippur in the late fifth century, whose names betray a multitude of geographical origins– Phrygia, Sardis, Miletus and others, 36 may similarly have had their roots in deported/transported labour. In any case, the fields cultivated by the deportees in Neo-Babylonian Sippar were very likely bow fiefs (bīt qašti), a status which did not stop them being included in the concessionary land (bīt sūti) granted to the rent farmers (rab sūti, ša muhhi sūti) in the schemes instituted by Nabonidus; the dependent cultivators still liable to be called up for military service. 37 As is now well understood, both bīt qašti and bīt sūti could be covered by the more generalised term bīt ritti. 38 With this in mind, a further piece germane to the present discussion is BM 99825: No. 3 BM 99825 5.3+ x 3.6+ x 1.4 cm no date preserved Fragment of the lower left hand corner of a tablet. obverse  1′ ina ŠÀ-bi [. . . from which [. . .   2′ É KIŠIB šá ⸢x⸣-[x x x] bīt ritti of [. . .] m Balassu, from which [. . .  3′ TIN-su ina ŠÀ-bi x x [  4′ ina ŠÀ-bi 1 (PI) 4-BÁN ŠE.NUMUN šá mKI-[. . . from which 60 l. seed of Kī-[. . .] bīt ritti of the Assyrians, from which [. . .   5′ É KIŠIB šá lúAš-šur-a-a ina Š[À-bi . . . Nabû-kaṣir  6′ mdNÀ-ka-ṣir  7′ ina ŠÀ-bi 2 (PI) 3-BÁN ŠE.NUMUN hal-qa [. . . from which 90 l. seed is missing [. . . reverse   8′ É KIŠIB šá mdUTU-A-⸢MU?⸣ [. . .

bīt ritti of Šamaš-apal-iddin [. . .

33. 2 Kings 24.8f; 2 Chronicles 36.20; Josephus Jewish Antiquities x.97–98, 149–150, 181–183, xx.231; Contra Apionem i.131. 34.  Wunsch 2013; Pearce 2006 and forthcoming; Wunsch & Pearce 2015; cf. Waerzeggers 2006: 8. The presence of Jehoiachin at the court of Nebuchadnezzar is documented in the tablets listing oil rations, and these lists attest to a multitude of other foreign nationals (Philistines, Phoenicians, Elamites, Egyptians) at the court. One from Media and one from Lydia are labelled as refugees (maqtu) but on the whole it is difficult to know whether specific individuals were deported and in a servile status or free. See Weidner 1939; Wiseman 1985: 81–84; Jursa 2010: 73. The similar text YBCT 9657 (quoted Jursa 2010: ibid.) lists 187 and 175 women and children assigned to the lúma-áš-a’ (according to Jursa, personal communication, this may be a writing of mašennu) and designated as captives (hubtu). 35.  For references see RGTC 8 p.8, 18, 20. 36.  Stolper 1985: 72–79. 37.  Jursa 1995: 103; MacGinnis 1997: 95–97; 1998; 2012: 5–6. 38.  van Driel 2002: 305f; MacGinnis 2012: 25–6.

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 9′ mdNÀ-ka-ṣir Nabû-kaṣir 10′ 4 GUR ŠE.NUMUN É KIŠIB [šá . . . 4 kur seed, bīt ritti [of . . . 11′ 1-en 22 ina ŠÀ-bi ⸢4⸣ (PI) [. . . one “22”, from which 144 l. [. . . Notes l. 11′ The sequence 1-en 22 is unusual and not fully understood. BM 99825 is just a small fragment but the information it preserves is of extraordinary importance. It is the only reference we have so far to a bīt ritti of the Assyrians. This can hardly be anything but land cultivated by Assyrian deportees, or their descendants, in the vicinity of Sippar. It is unfortunate that no date is preserved as this might have given an insight into the creation and longevity of this landholding,  39 though there can be little doubt that these Assyrians will have arrived in Sippar in the late seventh century. We can however make some remarks on the prosopographic front. If the Assyrians listed individually in the ration lists are indeed the same as, or perhaps rather a subset of, the body of Assyrians settled on temple land, we might expect to find some corroboration of this in other areas of the temple’s docuFig. 5.  No. 3 BM 99825. mentation. In this context we can note that there are bit ritti’s known of both Arad-Nabû and Šamaš-ana-bītišu. 40 There are in addition to the above a few other references to Assyrians in Sippar. To start with, there are individuals whose family name identifies them as of Assyrian descent (apil lú lú Aššurāya), for example Zēr-Bābili/Ina-tēšî-ēṭer/ Aššur who appears as a witness in both the sworn statement Nbn. 113.13 (Nabonidus year 3) and the real estate contract BM 62585 (no 39.  A Nabû-kaṣir is found in agricultural ledgers from the reigns of both Nebuchadnezzar (Nbk. 36.12: Nebuchadnezzar 3) and Nabonidus (Nbn. 583.21: Nabonidus 11) but the data is insufficient to be sure of identity with the Nabû-kaṣir of BM 99825. 40.  bīt ritti of Arad-Nabû (son of Nabû-zēr-ibni): CTMMA 2, 46 (Nabonidus 3) [cf Jursa 1998: 14 n.52] and BM 62820.4′ (Nabonidus 8); cf also the bīt ritti of Bēl-ušallim ina pān Arad-Nabû BM 77949.11 (Nebuchadnezzar 20+); bīt ritti of Šamaš-ana-bītišu: BM 61818.2′. If the suggestion is correct that the term šušānû designated a dependent labourer tied to enfeoffed land in the same manner in which ikkarū were tied to temple land (MacGinnis 2012: 11; after van Driel 1990: 233), note also that a šušānû by the name of Arad-Nabû is attested in BM 63271.4 (Nebuchadnezzar 43) and CT 56 668.rev.i.7′, CT 56 764.10 and BM 68203.3′ and BM 101536.8′ (all undated).

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date preserved). The case of the Ina-ṭêšî-ēṭir, who features in the list of ērib bīti BM 77834, 41 cannot be used as evidence as there is an ambiguity in that his patronymic could be read either m Aš-šur or mDILI-SUR (=Edu-ēṭer); were he indeed of Assyrian descent he might likely be the father of the Zēr-Bābili above; whether or not being of Assyrian descent would preclude the possibility of him being a prebendary (ērib bīti for the month of Tašrîtu) we cannot certainly say. lú We may add the fragmentary attestation to an individual [. . ..]-x-DA A Aš-šur-a-a mentioned in BM 53559.7′. Examples of names which are themselves Assyrian are quite rare. 42 The most telling are names compounded in Aššur, but the problem here is that in Neo-Babylonian the combination dŠÁR is certainly used as a writing of Ištar and there is at the very least ambiguity on whether there are cases where it should in fact be read as Aššur. 43 One case where this problem does not arise is with Aššur-ah-uṣur, who in Nbn. 573.12 appears as a witness to a guarantee concerning the mandattu (remuneration) of a slave (Nabonidus year 11), written mdAš-šur-ŠEŠPAP. In VS 6 288.10 mAš-šur-SU is presumably to be read Aššur-erība, though note the absence of a divine determinative. Names compounded in Arbail 44, fractionally more common, are also unambiguous in pointing to an Assyrian orientation and perhaps origin. There is also at least one personal name compounded in Libbali, a name for the city of Assur, 45 Libbali-lūmur in Nbn. 1030.4 (Nabonidus 17). In addition to this, citizens of Libbali are mentioned in UCP 9/2 No.57 (Lutz 1927; cf. Beaulieu 1997: 59 and 2003: 331–332). This rather interesting text, which enumerates various prebendaries of the cult of Aššur/Anšar, is unfortunately quite damaged: the reference to the citizens of Libbali (lúŠÀ-bi-URU-lumeš) comes towards the end (as preserved), along with merchants, and while the exact import is not clear it does attest to the presence of natives of Assur at the Eanna temple. The text dates to the reign of Nebuchadnezzar, 46 and so constitutes additional evidence for relations between Assyria and Babylonia in the Neo-Babylonian period further to the presence of a Neo-Babylonian governor in Assur, mentioned above, and the possible Neo-Babylonian temples at the site. 47 Last but not least, it is interesting to draw attention to the existence of a village of Aššurītu in the vicinity of Uruk, attested from the first year of Nebuchadnezzar to the seventh year of Cambyses, as well as a Nar-Aššurītu and a Bab-Aššurītu attested over the same time span. It can be suggested that the Nar-Aššurītu was a canal dug by Assyrian deportees and that the village of Aššurītu is where they were settled. 48 It should be noted that an alternative explanation of these names has been proposed by Beaulieu: following on from his elucidation that there was a cult of AN.ŠÁR/Aššur in Uruk in the sixth century BC, he hypothesises that either Aššurītu 41.  Bongenaar 1995: 153–4, PL.IV, cf. van Driel 2002: 144. 42. For previous studies of Assyrian names in Neo-Babylonian and Achaemenid Babylonia see Zadok 1984, 1998, 2002. 43.  Bongenaar 1995: 109. 44.  Zadok 1984: 8–9. 45.  The statement of Unger that Libbali was also the name of a quarter of Babylon (Unger 1931: 78–79, Zadok RGTC 8: 212) should be disregarded. Note that Zadok’s reading uruŠÀ(!)-a-la11 in Dar. 346.13 has been superseded by Jursa’s reading uruIG!.GUR!.ki ( Jursa 1998: 105 n.335). 46.  Jursa personal communication. 47.  Andrae 1938: 164–166; Haller & Andrae 1955: 81. 48.  For references see RGTC 8: 35–6, 38 & 365, cf. Cocquerillat 1968: 17b and Zadok 1984: 3.

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may have been an epithet of Aššur’s consort Šerua (who is mentioned once in the archives from Uruk) or that there may have been a cult of the goddess as Aššurītu. 49 However the absence of a divine determinative in the writing of the names of the village and canal of Aššurītu makes it unlikely that this is the right explanation here. A “Crossing point of the Assyrian” (uruNé-bé-ri šá lú Aš-šurki) is the place of writing of TuM 2/3 22 (Cyrus year 6). In conclusion, a sifting of the data preserved in the archives of the Neo-Babylonian Ebabbara demonstrates that midway through the reign of Nebuchadnezzar there was a group of Assyrians located in Sippar and under the jurisdiction of the temple. In addition to this we now know, from a reference to a bīt ritti ša Aššurāya, that there was a tract of temple land worked by Assyrians. The fact that there should only be a single reference to such a landholding in the Sippar material is surprising. The reason for this could be that these holdings are in fact referred to elsewhere but by the names of their tenants. It is also possible that the numbers in question were small: there is, a priori, no reason to exclude the possibility that the Assyrians of the ration lists are one and the same with both the Assyrians working the land and the Assyrians recorded as carpenters; the highest number we get from all these sources is nine. 50 In any case, it is overwhelmingly likely that all these individuals were prisoners either captured during the hostilities which led to the expulsion of the Assyrians from Babylonia or deported in the aftermath of the overthrow of the empire. These results nevertheless leave many questions unanswered. When precisely did these Assyrians come under the control of the Ebabbara? Did their tenure of temple land require them to perform military service? Did they at some stage become sufficiently integrated into the community that they were no longer regarded and referred to as Assyrians? We may hope that these questions will be illuminated by future research and it can be expected that in the fullness of time further evidence for the settling of deported Assyrians in Babylonia will emerge from other institutional archives of the period. For now, it is once again an honour to celebrate the quite exceptional contribution which Prof. Postgate has made to Assyriology and Mesopotamian archaeology in Cambridge and beyond. 49.  Beaulieu 1997: 63, 2003: 311–312, 332. The texts recording this cult for which a date can be reconstructed can be assigned to the reign of Nabonidus or the period covered by the reigns of Cyrus and Cambyses (Beaulieu 1997: 58). 50. Although it might seem surprising that only a small number were allocated to Sippar, this does seem to be exactly what happened with the distribution of Cilician prisoners of war in the reign of Nabonidus, when the Ebabbara appears to have received only six (see MacGinnis 2012: 46).

References Andrae, W. 1938 Wiedererstandene Assur. Leipzig: Deutsche Orientgesellschaft. Beaulieu, P.-A. 1997 The Cult of AN.ŠAR/Aššur in Babylonia after the fall of the Assyrian empire. SAAB 11: 55–73. 2003 The Pantheon of Uruk during the Neo-Babylonian Period. Leiden: Brill.

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Kreppner, F. J. 2008a The Continuity of Ceramic Production after the Fall of the Neo-Assyrian Empire. New Data from the Red House of Tell Sheikh Hamad. Pp. 167–178 in Proceedings of the 4th International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East, 29 March – 3 April 2004, Berlin, Germany, vol. 2, Social and Cultural Transformation: The Archaeology of Transitional Periods and Dark Ages, Archaeological Field Reports (Excavations, Surveys, Conservation), edd. H. Kühne, R. Czichon and F.J. Kreppner. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. 2008b The Collapse of the Assyrian Empire and the Continuity of Ceramic Culture: The Case of the Red House at Tell Sheikh Hamad. Pp. 147–165 in A Re-Assessment of Iron Ages Chronology in Anatolia and Neighbouring Regions. Proceedings of a Symposium held at Ege University, Izmir, Turkey, 25 – 27 May 2005, ed. A. Sagona. Ancient Near Eastern Studies 45. Izmir: Ege University Press. Kühne, H. 1994 The Urbanization of the Assyrian Provinces. Pp.  55–84 in Nuove fondazioni nel vicino oriente Antico: Realtà e ideologia, ed. S. Mazzoni. Pisa: Giardini. 2002 Thoughts about Assyria after 612 BC. Pp. 171–175 in Of Pots and Plans: Papers on the Archaeology and History of Mesopotamia Presented to David Oates in Honour of his 75th Birthday, edd. L. al-Gailani-Werr, J. Curtis, H. Martin, A. McMahon, J. Oates and J. Reade. London: NABU. Kuhrt, A. 1995 The Assyrian Heartland in the Achaemenid period. Pallas 43: 239–254. Lambert, W. G. 2005 Letter of Sin-šarra-iškun to Nabopolassar. Pp. 203–210 in Literary and Scholastic Texts of the First Millennium BC, edd. I. Spar & W. G. Lambert. CTMMA 2. New York: Brepols. Langdon, S. 1912 Die neubabylonische Königsinschriften. Leipzig. Lutz H F 1927 Neo-Babylonian Administrative Documents from Erech. Parts I and II. Berkeley. MacGinnis, J. D. A. 1995 Letter Orders from Sippar and the Administration of the Ebabbara in the Late Babylonian Period. Poznan: Bonami. 1998 BM 64707 and rikis qabli in the Ebabbara. WZKM 88: 177–183. 2000 Review of Jursa Der Tempelzehnt in Babylonien vom 7 bis zum 3 Jhdt v Chr. Orientalia 69: 32–336. 2004 Servants of the Sun God: Numbering the dependents of the Neo-Babylonian Ebabbara. Baghdader Mitteilungen 35: 27–38. 2007 Fields of endeavour: leasing and releasing the lands of Šamaš. JEOL 40: 91–101. 2010 Mobilisation and Militarisation in the Neo-Babylonian Empire. Pp. 153–164 in Studies on Warfare in the Ancient Near East, ed. J Vidal. AOAT 372. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. 2012 Arrows of the Sun: Armed Forces of the Neo-Babylonian Ebabbara. Dresden: ISLET. MacGinnis, J. D. A. & Matney, T. 2009 Ziyaret Tepe: Digging the Frontier of the Assyrian Empire. Current World Archaeology 37: 30–40. Oates, J. 1991 The Fall of Assyria, in The Cambridge Ancient History (second edition) volume III Part 2 (Chapter 25). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 162–193. Pearce, L. E. 2006 New Evidence for Judeans in Babylonia. Pp. 399–411 in Judah and the Judeans in the Persian Period, edd. O. Lipschits & M. Oeming. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns. Pearce, L.E. and Wunsch, C. forthcoming  Into the Midst of Many Peoples: Judeans and Other Exiles in Babylonian Texts. CUSAS. Bethesda, Md.: CDL Press. Parpola, S. 2008 Cuneiform Texts from Ziyaret Tepe (Tušhan), 2002–2003. SAAB 17: 1–137.

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Postgate, J. N. 1993 The Four Neo-Assyrian Tablets from Šēh Hamad. SAAB 7: 109–124. Spar, I., Logan, T. J. & Allen, J. P. 2006 Two Neo-Babylonian Texts of Foreign Workmen. Pp. 443–461 in If a Man builds a House: Assyriological Studies in Honor of Erle Verdun Leichty, ed. A. K. Guinan et al. Leiden: Brill. Stolper, M. W. 1985 Entrepreneurs and Empire. PIHANS 54. Leiden: Brill. Unger E 1931 Babylon. Die Heilige Stadt nach der Beschreibung der Babylonier. Berlin: de Gruyter. Waerzeggers, C. 2006 The Carians of Borsippa. Iraq 68: 1–22. Weidner, E. 1939 Jojachin, Königs von Juda, in babylonischen Keilschrifttexten. Pp. 923–35 in Mélanges syriens offerts à Monsieur René Dussaud par ses amis et ses élèves. Paris: Geuthner. Wiseman, D. J. 1966 Some Egyptians in Babylonia. Iraq 28: 154–8. 1985 Nebuchadrezzar and Babylon. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Wunsch, C. 2013 Glimpses on the Lives of Deportees in Rural Babylonia. Pp. 247–260 in Arameans, Chaldeans and Arabs in the First Millennium BC, edd. A. Berlejung & M. P. Streck. Leipziger Altorientalische Studien 3. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. 2015 Judeans by the Waters of Babylon: New Historical Evidence in Sources from Rural Babylonia. Texts from the Schøyen Collection. Babylonische Archive 6. Dresden: Islet. Zadok, R. 1981 Arabians in Mesopotamia during the Late Assyrian, Chaldean, Achaemenian and Hellenistic Periods chiefly according to Cuneiform Sources. ZDMG 131: 42–84. 1984 Assyrians in Chaldean and Achaemenid Babylonia. Assur 4/3. 1998 More Assyrians in Babylonian Sources. NABU 1998/2 No.55. 2002 Contributions to Babylonian Geography, Prosopography and Documentation. Pp. 890–891 in Ex Mesopotamia et Syria Lux–Festschrift Manfred Dietrich, edd. O. Loretz, K. A. Metzler & H. Schaudig. AOAT 281. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. Zawadzki, S. 1988 The fall of Assyria and Median-Babylonia relations in light of the Nabopolassar Chronicle. Poznan: Adam Mickiewicz University Press. 2003 Nebuchadnezzar and Tyre in the Light of New Texts from the Ebabbar Archives in Sippar. Eretz Israel 27: 276*-281*. 2008 Nebuchadnezzar’s campaign in the 30th year (575 B.C.): a conflict with Tyre? Pp. 331–336 in Travelling on Camels’ Humps: Historical and Literary Studies from the Ancient Near East Presented to Israel Ephʾal, edd. M. Cogan & D. Kahn. Jerusalem: Hebrew University Press.

Prayer and Praise in the City of Assur Frances Reynolds Who, what, and where, by what helpe, and by whose: Why, how, and when, doe many things disclose.       Thomas Wilson, Arte of Rhetorique Book 1;       ed. Mair (1909: 17)

Nicholas’ many fields of academic enquiry include Assyrian urban life and bureaucracy, as well as Turkish archaeology. I hope all these aspects are reflected by this study of a composition relating to the cult of the city of Assur known from two tablets excavated at Ḫuzirina.

Manuscript Sources A composition of prayer and praise stemming from the cult of the city of Assur, deified as the god Aššur, is partially preserved on two tablets from Ḫuzirina, corresponding to modern Sultantepe in Turkey. 1 The Assur composition is incompletely preserved on two damaged tablets that are partial duplicates, both in the collections of the Archaeological Museum in Ankara. The tablet pieces were excavated in 1951 and 1952 at Ḫuzirina and were published in hand copy, S.U. 51/124 + 52/154 as STT 87, here designated MS A, and S.U. 51/26 + 51/54A + 51/188 as STT 371, here designated MS B (Gurney and Finkelstein 1957: iv–v, 7, 13, CIX; Gurney and Hulin 1964: iii–iv, 19, 24, 31, CCLIV). 2 The original excavation photographs, formerly held by O. R. Gurney, are unpublished. The Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative catalogues STT 87 as P338404 and STT 371 as P338686 with summary information and reproductions of the hand copies but no photographs (; ; accessed 11/06/2014). 3 Deller (1965: 461–64, 476) did ground-breaking work on both manuscripts and recorded additional collations made by Gurney in the Archaeological Museum in July 1965. Livingstone (1989: no. 10; XXV–VI, 24–26, 178, microfiche) published a composite edition with two collations from excavation photographs and a microfiche score of the duplicate lines. The composition is listed by Foster (2007: 2.13.9 ‘In Praise of Assur’) but, without reference to Livingstone’s edition, it is described as ‘too broken for comprehension’. As part of The Corpus 1.  The convention is followed here of rendering the city as Assur but the god as Aššur, but this distinction in spelling is only one of modern convenience. 2.  The fragment S.U. 52/43 = STT 87A may be an indirect join to STT 87 (Gurney and Finkelstein 1957: 7, 13, CIX). Deller (1965: 461) suggested that S.U. 52/336 = STT 375 may be another such fragment. For the former see also Van Buylaere (2011b) and for the latter (accessed 11/06/2014). 3.  STT 87 has the correct excavation number but SU 51/026 + SU 51/124 is listed as an accession number.

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of Ancient Mesopotamian Scholarship (CAMS), Van Buylaere (2011a; 2011c) published individual online editions of both manuscripts and also had access to the excavation photographs. The tablets are part of a well-known scholarly library that included a number of hymns and prayers. Capraro (2001) and Robson (2013: 48–50) give overviews of the library, and the CAMS textual database, with introductory material by Clancier (2012), is a useful resource. The datable tablets span the period 718–616 BCE (Lambert 1959: 122; Capraro 2001: 207) and Ḫuzirina was probably destroyed in 610/609 BCE, when nearby Ḫarrān fell to the Babylonians and their allies (Glassner 2004: 222–25; Postgate 1975: 124; Radner 2012: 287). The references to Qurdī-Nergal in five colophons, two of them datable to 701 BCE, probably concern the same man, and he has become particularly associated with the library (Baker 2002: 1024–25). The orthography of tablets from this library in Ḫuzirina can have a distinctive character, and scribal errors are not uncommon (Lambert 1959: 124–26; Capraro 2001: 208–9; see also George 2003: 369–71). STT 87 (MS A) is a tablet of portrait format with a preserved length of 130 mm and a full width of 68 mm. The full length is unknown, because the bottom of the obverse and corresponding top of the reverse are lost. This slim one-column tablet contained the Assur composition, partially preserving 34 lines on the obverse and 14 lines on the reverse, and a four-line colophon. A vertical, central double ruling bisects the whole obverse and reverse, as preserved. After a double horizontal ruling, the lines of the colophon are evenly and generously spaced to occupy the remainder of the reverse. The vertical double ruling is related to the composition’s poetic structure. The script is Neo-Assyrian and the dialect is literary Neo-Assyrian, which includes some Babylonian features (Deller 1965: 463). STT 371 (MS B) is an extract tablet with a chunkier portrait format, and its full size is 96 mm long by 75 mm wide. This one-column tablet contained ruled-off extracts and can be considered as a school tablet related to Type 2a (Gesche 2001: 50). The first extract provides a duplicate, with substantial variation, to part of the Assur composition: STT 87 17–27 // STT 371 1–9. The continuous passage chosen as an excerpt begins with the prayers for particular staples, namely oil, wool, bread and beer, and ends with the beginning of the harvest prayer. The excerpt otherwise consists of statements about cultic observance in Assur, specifically fixed offerings to Aššur and Ellil, as the way to secure divine favour and happiness, followed by a prayer for divine protection. Thus, the excerpt is coherent and encapsulates the main message of the composition. After a ruling, a three-line extract from a prayer for the king (STT 371 10–12) is followed by another ruling and seven lines of commentary involving aspects of power and deities, probably including Aššur and Mullissu as the father and mother of the Assyrian king (STT 371 13–19). On the badly damaged reverse, ten lines are followed by a ruling and blank space (Van Buylaere 2011c). Thus, as preserved, Assyrian royal cult can be seen as a unifying theme. The script and dialect are Neo-Assyrian (Deller 1965: 463–64). In two instances, two lines in MS A are written as one line in MS B without any marker of line division between them: A 23–24 // B 7 and A 26–27 // B 9. The elegant literary tablet MS A is narrower and, although it is the product of a junior apprentice scribe, it pays careful attention to the composition’s poetic structure. In MS A the tablet line division follows the poetic line division and a double vertical ruling corresponds to the boundaries between poetic feet. MS B, however, is a relatively short extract in a school excerpt text and has inferior lineation.

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Both manuscripts have errors in keeping with their nature as scribal training tablets (e.g., A 12: lil2!(E2); A 18: la!(ŠA); A 22: possibly ⸢ka2!?⸣(I ⸢ŠA2⸣); B 5: ina!(U2); B 8 possibly ti!?(UD U)). It is noticeable that there are considerable divergences in phrasing, particularly with verbal forms (e.g., A 17–20 // B 1–4; A 22 // B 6). In terms of the work’s date of composition Esarhaddon (680–669 BCE) is named in a prayer in STT 87 14 (see edition below). The two manuscripts cannot be dated precisely but, as noted above, the latest datable tablet from this library is from 616 BCE and Ḫuzirina was probably destroyed in 610/609 BCE. The undated colophon of STT 87 (MS A) reads as follows: A 15′ [kīma(gin7)] labiri(⸢libir⸣.ra)-šu2 šaṭir (sar) ⸢bari(e3)⸣ šāṭiru(sar) m.⸢mu⸣mutaqqin(lal)in     —aš-šur šam-lu3-u daq-qu A 16′ [mār (a) m.d]E2.A—nuḫšī(he2.nu.gu10)—uṣur (uru3) ⸢lu2⸣tup-šar-ru iriaššur (bal.til)⸢ki⸣ A 17′ [mār (a) m].⸢dša3⸣-maš2—šu-⸢mu2⸣—i3-⸢di⸣-na šam-lu3-u šu-bul-⸢tin⸣-bi A 18′ [mār (a)] ⸢m⸣.dna5-bu4-u—ka-ab-tu4—aḫḫē(šeš)meš-šu2 lu2tupšar (a.ba) irikutî(⸢gu2⸣.[du8.a])[ki]                 STT 87 rev. 15′–18′ (A); see Hunger 1968: 371 A 15′ Written (and) checked [according to] its original. Writer: Mutaqqin-Aššur, junior     apprentice scribe, A 16′ [son of] Ea-nuḫšī-uṣur, scribe of the city of Assur, A 17′ [son of] Šamaš-šumu-iddina, young apprentice scribe, A 18′ [son of] Nabû-kabtu-aḫḫēšu, scribe of Cutha. As noted by Hunger (1968: 371), this colophon includes cryptographic writings. This indicates a high degree of self-conscious scholarship that is in keeping with the scribe’s elaborate professional pedigree, as well as with the tablet’s shape, rulings and line spacing. This colophon gives us a snapshot of members of a scribal family at different locations and various stages of professional development. The family moved progressively northwards, with an ancestor in Cutha in northern Babylonia, a father in the city of Assur and his son, the current junior apprentice scribe, in Ḫuzirina. This trajectory suggests forced movement of professional personnel as part of Assyrian imperial policy, rather than some kind of ‘minor private school’ (cf. Robson 2011: 564–65; Robson 2013: 50, 55). The current junior apprentice scribe has an Assyrian name containing the theophoric element –aš-šur and his father is a scribe of the city of Assur, written with the literary name iriaššur (bal.til)⸢ki⸣ (see George 1992: 459). This suggests an Assyrian influence on the family’s name-giving practices. The information given in the colopohon about the scribe and his family is in keeping with the decision to copy a scholarly composition celebrating the city of Assur and its cult.

Edition of STT 87 11–30, rev. 2′–14′ (A); STT 371 1–9 (B) The better preserved passages are presented in a score edition. This includes new readings and interpretations, and also highlights the poetic structure and manuscript variants. In each couplet the two lines are grouped together, with the second line indented in translation. When there are duplicate versions of a couplet, often with significant variation, these are arranged consecutively to aid comparison. The vertical double ruling on the tablet STT 87 is marked by || in the transliteration. As manuscript sigla, A = STT 87 and B = STT 371.

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Transliteration of STT 87 11–30 (A) // STT 371 1–9 (B) Obverse A 11 [x x] ⸢mul⸣-la-a || mul-la-a pan-di-šu-un A 12 [daš-šur] ⸢d⸣ellil(en.lil2!(tablet E2)) || ku-ur-ba ⸢iri⸣libbi(ša3)—āli(iri) A 13 [x x] ⸢mul⸣-li || a-na ki-ša2-di-šu2-nu A 14 [x x x] ⸢ik⸣-rib ḫegalli(he2!(coll.).gal2) || maš-šur—aḫa(pap)—iddina(aš) balāṭa(ti.la)   ⸢lu⸣-tir A 15 ⸢lib3⸣-bu || ḫa-du-u liš-ša2-kin A 16 x x [le]-⸢ru⸣-bu || ḫa-du-u ka-a-a-nu A 17 ⸢šamnu(i3)⸣nu || ina gul-gul-le-e tab-bi-⸢ka⸣ A 18 šīpāti(sig2)meš || a-na la!(tablet ŠA) ⸢ma⸣-ne2-e šu-⸢pi2⸣-[ša] B   1 šamnū(i3)meš ⸢ina gul?-gu⸣-le?-⸢e lu tab⸣-[ku] B   2 ⸢šīpāti(sig2)⸣me ḫi-iṣ-be ti-pa-a-aš2-⸢a⸣ A 19 akalī(ninda)meš ru-⸢ba⸣-a || šikarī(kaš)meš ṭu-ḫi-da A 20 i-na lib3-bi-⸢šu⸣-nu || i-šar-tu2 eš-ra-a-ni B   3 ⸢a⸣-kal pi ⸢ka⸣-[mir?] ⸢šikarū(kaš)⸣meš ṭuḫ-⸢du⸣ B   4 [ina] lib3-bi-šu-nu ⸢i?- ša10-ar2?-tu2?⸣ sa-⸢di⸣-[ra] A 21 mātātu(kur.kur)meš i-⸢riš⸣-ša2 || i-na irilibbi(ša3)—āli(iri) A 22 ⸢u3⸣ iri⸢libbi(ša3)⸣—āli(iri) || ⸢bābu(ka2)!?⸣(copy I ⸢ŠA2⸣) gax(KAK)-⸢am?⸣-mi3-il3 B   5 mātātu([kur].⸢kur⸣)me ⸢i⸣-ri-ša2 ina!(tablet U2) iri⸢libbi(ša3)⸣—āli(iri) B   6 ⸢u2⸣ iri⸢libbi(ša3)⸣— āli(iri) bābu(ka2) ga-ma-lu A 23 daš-šur dellil(BAD) || gi-nu-u A 24 gi-⸢nu⸣-u2 || sa-li-ma-⸢ku-nu⸣ B   7 aš-šur d[ellil(BAD)] ⸢gi⸣-nu-u ⸢MIN⸣ (= gi-nu-u) ⸢sa-li?-mu?-ku⸣-nu A 25 qa-at ⸢ra⸣-[ga?]-⸢ti⸣ || paṭ-ṭi-ra A 26 in-šu x x || i-na ⸢šār (tu15)⸣ ilānī(dingir)meš B   8 qāt(šu) ⸢ra⸣-[ag?]-⸢ga2?⸣-ti!?(copy UD U) pa-ṭi2-⸢ir?-a?⸣ B   9a en-⸢šu⸣ [lu? ša]-ad-da a-na šār  (tu15) ilānī(dingir)meš A 27 ebūru(buru14) ⸢ša⸣ [māti(kur)] || lu-u damiq(sig5)iq A 28 an-tu4 [x x || lu-u] ⸢kab?⸣-ba-ra B   9b ⸢ebūru(buru14)⸣ [ša2] ⸢māti(kur)?⸣ x B Horizontal ruling A 29 x x [x x || x] ⸢i⸣-kab-bir A 30 [x x x x || x] x-e il-la-ka

Prayer and Praise in the City of Assur Translation of STT 87 11–30 (A) // STT 371 1–9 (B) Obverse A 11 Fill, fill their chests [with joy]! A 12   [O Aššur] (and) Ellil, bless the Inner City (= Assur)! A 13 Fill to their necks [with . . .]! A 14   [. . .] prayer for plenty, may Esarhaddon restore life. A 15 May a joyful heart be established, A 16   may . . . (and) constant joy enter. A 17 Pour oil into skull-shaped pots! A 18   Have countless amounts of wool produced! B   1 May oil be poured into skull-shaped pots. B   2   You shall produce wool as yield. A 19 Make great the bread, supply beer copiously! A 20   Go straight for prosperity among them! B   3 The bread of the mouth is heaped up, the beer is copious. B   4   Direct prosperity among them! A 21 The lands rejoice in the Inner City (= Assur) A 22   and, as for the Inner City (= Assur), the gate is merciful. B 5 The lands rejoice in the Inner City (= Assur) B 6   and, as for the Inner City (= Assur), the gate is mercy. A 23 O Aššur (and) Ellil, fixed offerings, A 24   fixed offerings are concord with you. B 7 O Aššur (and) [Ellil], fixed offerings,   ditto (= fixed offerings) are concord with you. A 25 Remove the hand of malice, A 26   the weak man . . . into the breath of the gods; B   8 Remove the hand of malice, B   9a   may the weak man be drawn to the breath of the gods. A 27 May the harvest of [the land] be good, A 28   [may] the ear of barley (and) [. . .] be very plump. B   9b The harvest [of ] the land . . . B   Horizontal ruling A 29 . . . [. . .] it shall become plump, A 30   [. . .] . . . it shall come.

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Transliteration of STT 87 rev. 2′–14′ (A) Reverse A   2′ [a-na x x] xmeš-⸢šu2⸣ [|| i-kar-ra-bu] A   3′ [a-na] mātāti([kur].kur) meš-⸢šu2⸣ [|| i-kar-ra-bu] A   4′ [a-na . . .]- ⸢ME⸣ni-⸢šu2⸣ [||] ⸢i-kar-ra⸣-[bu] A   5′ [a-na] ⸢pirʾī(nunuz)⸣me-⸢šu2⸣ [||] ⸢i⸣-kar-ra-bu A   6′ [a-na] ⸢mār (dumu)⸣ um-[man] || i-kar-ra-bu A   7′ a-⸢na lu2⸣ab.ba ⸢āli(iri)⸣ || i-kar-ra-bu A   8′ u4-mu ⸢li-is⸣-mu || ša dnabû(na3) A   9′ ⸢u4⸣-mu [ša2] itiayyari( gu4) || urḫi(iti) ⸢ṭābi(du10.ga)⸣ A 10′ ⸢im-nu⸣-[ku-nu] šumēlu(gub3)-ku-nu || sūq(sila) āli(iri)-šu2 a-na e-te-qi A 11′ purussê(eš.bar) ⸢āli(iri)⸣ [a]-⸢na⸣ parāsi(ku5)si || ⸢bēt(e2)⸣ ni-⸢ru⸣-bu nuḫuš(he2.nun)   kuzub(ḫi.li) A 12′ sūq(sila) ⸢ni⸣-ti-qu || i-ri-ia-aš2 ālu(iri) A 13′ is-⸢qu⸣ nindabê(nidba)meš || rabbûti(nun.na) lis-⸢ri⸣-qu A 14′ x ⸢tuppu(im)?⸣ || MA ⸢MA?⸣ U Double ruling Translation of STT 87 rev. 2′–14′ (A) Reverse A   2′ [They invoke blessings upon] his (= Esarhaddon’s) [. . .] . . .s, A   3′   [they invoke blessings upon] his lands. A   4′ They invoke blessings [upon] his [. . .] . . .s, A   5′   they invoke blessings [upon] his descendants. A   6′ They invoke blessings [upon] the scholars, A   7′   they invoke blessings upon the city elders: A   8′ ‘The day is the run of Nabû, A   9′   a day [of] Ayyaru, a favourable month. A 10′ On [your] right (and) on your left, for going along the street of his    (= Nabû’s?) city, A 11′   for deciding the decisions of the city, wherever we enter, there is abundance   (and) attractiveness. A 12′ The city rejoices at the street that we go along, A 13′   may they scatter shares (and) very big food offerings.’ A 14′ . . . tablet . . . Double ruling

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Selected Notes on Edition A 11. A reading pan-di-šu-un, ‘their chests’, is preferred given A 13: ki-ša2-di-šu2-nu, ‘their necks’. The two lines open successive couplets and probably have a degree of parallelism (cf. Livingstone 1989: 24–25; Van Buylaere 2011a). The possessive suffix is understood as referring to the people of the city of Assur. A 18 // B 2.  The traces in B 2 favour ḫi-iṣ-be ti-, ‘yield, you . . .’, rather than ⸢ḫi⸣-is-⸢sa⸣-ti, ‘understanding’, which is also difficult in terms of sense (cf. Livingstone 1989: 25). The variant verbal forms at the end of A 18 // B 2 are difficult but are probably cognates. They can tentatively be read as forms of epēšu, with A 18: šu-⸢pi2⸣-[ša], ‘have produced’, Š imperative plural, and B 2: ti-pa-a-aš2-⸢a⸣, ‘you produce’, an irregularly written Assyrian G durative 2nd plural. Broken syllabification may also occur in B 8: pa-ṭi2-⸢ir?-a?⸣ and for a comparable Assyrian form see STT 87 33: te-pa-ša2. Livingstone (1989: 25) and Van Buylaere (2011a) propose A 18: šu-⸢bi⸣-[ša], ‘gather’, D imperative plural of šabāšu, but do not propose any meaning for the end of B 2. A 19 // B 3.  The variant in B 3 is difficult. Livingstone (1989: 25) and Van Buylaere (2011c) propose reading B 3: ⸢a⸣-kal pi-⸢ka⸣ [x (x)], ‘the bread of your mouth [. . .]’, but a 2nd singular possessive suffix is awkward in this context and a verbal form is more likely. However, the suggested reading B 3: ⸢a⸣-kal pi ⸢ka⸣-[mir?], ‘bread of the mouth [is heaped up]’, is a speculative one. A 22 // B 6.  The suggested reading A 22: ⸢bābu(ka2)!?⸣(copy I ⸢ŠA2⸣) gax(KAK)-⸢am?⸣-mi3-il3, ‘the gate is merciful’, with the adjective gammilu used predicatively, reflects the duplicate B 6: bābu(ka2) ga-ma-lu, ‘the gate is mercy’. However, the proposed reading in A 22 is very uncertain, involving emendation and a speculative sign value. A 25 // B 8.  The proposed reading A 25: qa-at ⸢ra⸣-[ga?]-⸢ti⸣ // B 8: qāt(šu) ⸢ra⸣-[ag?]-⸢ga2?⸣ti!?(copy UD U), ‘the hand of malice’, fits the traces and the context, although uncertainty remains. The couplet would work well if the first line is a request to the gods to remove a malign force (A 25 // B 8) and the second line is a celebration of divine protection (A 26 // B 9a). On šār (tu15) ilānī(dingir)meš, ‘the breath of the gods’, as a benevolent force see e.g., CAD Š 17/2 138–39. A rev. 4′–12′.  These lines have been usefully discussed by Stadhouders (2013: 319). A rev. 7′.  The Neo-Assyrian equivalent to lu2ab.ba in the phrase ⸢lu2⸣ab.ba ⸢āli(iri)⸣, ‘elders of the city’, is uncertain but Van Buylaere (2011a) proposes paršumūt. A rev. 14′.  This line is difficult. Despite the lack of a preceding ruling, might this be a rubric or even a line of commentary in the style of the latter part of STT 371 (B 13–19)? If the signs were tentatively read A rev. 14′: ⸢mu?-ši?⸣ || ma-⸢šu?⸣­-u, then B 15: mu-ši, ‘night’, might be relevant or A rev. 14′ might contain two forms of the root m š ʾ, ‘to forget’, although this has no obvious relevance.

Setting, Protagonists and Voice This composition of prayer and praise focuses on the city of Assur. Assur, Assyria’s first political capital, retained a unique high status as a religious centre at the core of the Assyrian

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Empire until its fall and the deified city, rendered here as Aššur, was the national god of Assyria, the land of Aššur (e.g., Holloway 2002: 65–68). In this composition the city of Assur is given the title irilibbi(ša3)-āli(iri), ‘the Inner City’ (A 12; A 21–22 // B 5–6; Postgate 1985: 98; George 1993: 443). There are intermittent references to topographical features, bābu, ‘gate’, libittu, ‘brickwork’, and sūqu, ‘street’ (A 22 // B 6; A 31; A rev. 10′; A rev. 12′). As preserved, there is no direct reference to Ešarra, the principal temple complex of the city and god Aššur and of Assyria, but the offerings to Aššur and Ellil would have been made there. The Nabû procession involves going along the street but, as preserved, no Nabû temple is mentioned. Prayers and statements are addressed directly to the pair of gods Aššur and Ellil, who occur twice in the vocative and are referred to by second-person plural forms, usually imperatives (A 11–12; A 17–20 // B 2, 4; A 23–25 // B 7–8; A 33). Although the god Aššur, as head of the Assyrian pantheon, could be syncretised with Ellil, these plural forms suggest that in this composition Aššur and Ellil are treated as paired but distinct deities (George 1993: 185–86). Esarhaddon, whose theophoric name credits the king’s birth to Aššur, is referred to in the third person: he is named as the subject of a third masculine singular precative verb in a prayer (A 14) and is the referent of the possessive suffix -šu2 (A rev. 2′–5′). He is probably also once addressed directly using a second masculine singular imperative (A 13). This composition is mostly a third-person narrative. Third feminine plural forms refer to mātātu, ‘the lands’ (A 4–6; A 21; A 30?) and third masculine plural forms to unspecified people in the city of Assur (A 11; A 13; A 20 // B 4; A rev. 13′), sometimes as participants in the procession celebrating the hunting run of Nabû (A rev. 2′–7′). As suggested by Stadhouders (2013: 319), six lines near the end of the composition are probably a direct quotation of the words spoken by participants in this ritual to the experts and city elders upon whom they are invoking blessings, although the experts should probably be understood as scholars rather than craftsmen (A rev. 8′–12′). The speakers are in first-person plural and their hearers are in second masculine plural (A rev. 10′–12′).

Synopsis and Exegesis As noted by Livingstone (1989: XXV–VI), the Assur composition focuses on the city and activities within it, emphasising prosperity and contentedness. As well as celebrating Assur’s current well-being, there are repeated prayers for its continuance through blessings for the people in the city. A pervasive theme is abundance, particularly in the form of cult offerings to Aššur and Enlil to secure divine favour and happiness. As well as plentiful offerings, proper cultic observance in the city involved a procession dedicated to Nabû in Ayyaru. As expected, human communication with the divine was a combination of speech and action, involving prayer and praise on the one hand and offerings and a procession on the other. Because of the unique status of Assur, this cultic activity and rejoicing had a reach far beyond the current city and extended to future generations and the whole Assyrian Empire. In the Middle and NeoAssyrian periods the provisions for the fixed offerings (gināʾū, ginû) for the Aššur temple in the city of Assur were supplied by high officials and by the Assyrian provinces according to a rota and this included grain and sesame, which could be processed to produce bread and beer on the one hand and oil on the other: the provision of these offerings was a fundamental na-

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tional enterprise (Holloway 2002: 67–68, 100–108; Leichty 2011: no. 60 15′–16′; Postgate 2014: 89–146, including 108 ff. on foodstuffs and processing). The first ten badly damaged lines of the composition are not edited here. They include two instances of riʾāšu, ‘to rejoice’, with the lands (mātātu) understood as the subject (A 4: ⸢i⸣riš-ša2; A 5: [i]-⸢riš⸣-ša2). Forms of ri’āšu for rejoicing by the city and the lands also occur in A 21 // B 5 and A rev. 12′. Isolated references to wealth (A 8: meš-⸢re⸣-[e]) and playing, possibly signifying battle (A 10: me-lu-lu), and possibly to overcoming the negative in the form of enemies’ recalcitrance (A 9: šip-ṣa-⸢ti?⸣) may relate to the city’s current state or to requested blessings. 4 The lines edited here begin with a pair of complementary couplets. The second couplet contains a prayer to the king Esarhaddon that he provide fullness for the people (mulli) and that through a prayer for plenty (ikrib ḫegalli) he might restore life (balāṭa lutīr) (A 13–14). As preserved, all the other prayers in the composition with an identifiable addressee are directed to the paired gods Aššur and Ellil. The couplet about Esarhaddon is preceded by a related couplet about Aššur and Ellil (A 11–12; on the relationship see under poetic structure below). In A 11–12 Aššur and Ellil are directly petitioned for fullness (mullâ mullâ) and the blessing of the Inner City (kurbā libbi-āli). The prayers to Aššur and Ellil are for prosperity and bountiful cult offerings, including plentiful supplies of staple commodities, and for the joy that the resulting divine favour brings. A prayer for a joyful heart (libbu ḫadû) and constant joy (ḫadû kayyānu) form another couplet (A 15–16). This is followed by two couplets of prayers for abundant supplies of four specific staples, namely oil (šamnū), wool (šīpāti), bread (akalī // akal pi) and beer (šikārī // šikārū), concluded by a prayer for general prosperity (išartu) for the people (A 17–20 // B 1–4). The abundance of these four staples is expressed in a variety of ways. Although plural forms of all four nouns are not unexpected, of the eight writings, six are specifically marked as plural with meš or me, and the other two could stand for plural (A 17: ⸢šamnu(i3)⸣nu; B 3: ⸢a⸣-kal pi). The plentifulness of the oil is indicated by the use of a rare word for a type of pot, since the oil is to be poured into gulgullē, ‘skull-shaped pots’ (A 17 // B 1). The word gulgullu or gulgullatu, ‘skull’, is rarely used for pots but it could signify a relatively large copper or bronze pot suitable for cooking. A booty list in the letter account of the eighth campaign of Sargon II includes ‘copper skull-shaped pots’ (TCL 3 392: gul-gul-lat erî(urudu)) and a work contract from the reign of Nebuchadnezzar II mentions ‘one bronze kettle weighing three minas, a skull-shaped pot’ (Nbk. 426 1–2: 1en siparru(zabar) mu-šaḫ-ḫi-nu ša2 ⸢3? manā(ma.na)⸣ / gul-gul-lu). A mušaḫḫinu-kettle was used for the preparation of fixed offerings (ginû) in Uruk in the Late Babylonian period (Beaulieu 2003: 290). The abundance of wool is indicated in one manuscript by ana lā manê, ‘for not counting’ (A 18) and in the duplicate by ḫiṣbe, ‘(abundant) yield’ (B 2). The plentiful amounts of bread and beer and signified by the choice of verbs. One manuscript has the D imperatives rubbâ, ‘make great’, and ṭuḫḫidā, ‘supply copiously’ (A 19) and the duplicate has the G stative forms ⸢kamir?⸣, ‘it is heaped up’, if restored correctly, and ṭuḫdū, ‘they are copious’ (B 3). 4.  For examples of battle as play, see CAD M/2 15–17. Assurbanipal’s hymn to Ištar of Nineveh and Ištar of Arbela celebrates his conquest of the recalcitrant (Livingstone 1989: no. 3, 21: [x] ⸢mātāte(kur)⸣ meš šip-ṣa-a-te, ‘[. . .] recalcitrant lands’; rev. 12: šip-ṣu-u-te, ‘the recalcitrant’).

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The next two couplets concern rejoicing through the divine mercy and concord granted to those who enter the Inner City and make fixed offerings to Aššur and Ellil. The lands rejoice in the Inner City (A 21 // B 5: mātātu iriššā ina libbi-āli; ri’āšu also occurs in A 4–5 and A rev. 12′) and the gate of the Inner City is said to be merciful (A 22 // B 6: u libbi-āli bābu gammil?//gamālu). In the second couplet fixed offerings, food and drink that was offered daily, are said to be concord with Aššur and Ellil (A 23–24 // B 7: aššur ellil ginû / ginû salīmākunu//salīmūkunu). The provinces supplied provisions for the fixed offerings for this temple according to a rota (Holloway 2002: 67–68, 100–108; Postgate 2014: 93–107). The title Inner City, a name for Assur, and the term ginû are stressed through carefully positioned repetition and this signals that these two couplets are of key importance for the composition as a whole. Overcoming the negative and achieving the positive in the form of divine protection are sought in the following couplet (A 25–26 // B 8–9a). This is probably a prayer to Aššur and Ellil that they remove ‘the hand of malice’ (A 25 // B 8: qāt ⸢raggāti?⸣ paṭṭirā) and that as a result the formerly vulnerable weak man come under the protection of the gods (A 26 // B 9a: šār ilānī, literally ‘the breath of the gods’). The theme of abundance is resumed by a harvest (ebūru) prayer which relates to these specific staples (A 27–29 // B 9b). Bread and beer usually depended upon barley, the most important crop, and the main source of vegetable oil was sesame, which was also harvested. This prayer probably has a couplet structure (see poetic structure below). The focus moves out from the city to the agricultural land that supported it and MS A preserves a prayer for a good harvest (A 27: lū damiq) and probably the swelling of the grain with two forms of k b r (A 28: antu [. . . lū] ⸢kabbarā⸣; A 29: ikabbir). After a lacuna, the composition ends with a particularly propitious ritual performed in Assur on a specific day of the second month Ayyaru, namely the cultic procession celebrating the run by the god Nabû. According to a Neo-Assyrian letter, the consummation of the ‘sacred marriage’ of Nabû and Nanāya/Tašmētu earlier in Ayyaru was followed by Nabû’s bull-hunting run on the eleventh day (Cole and Machinist 1998: 62, 221 = SAA 13 70):   1 [ud] 11.kam2 dnabû(na3) uṣ-ṣa-a   2 šēp(gir3)-šu2 i-pa-aš2!-šar   3 a-na am-ba-as-si il-lak   4 ri-ma-a-ni i-du-ak   5 el-li ina šub-ti-šu2 uš-šab   6 a-na ⸢šarri(lugal)⸣ [bēli(en)]-⸢ia!⸣   7 u3 ⸢bēti(e2)!-šu2­! i!-kar!-rab!⸣           SAA 13 70, rev. 1–7  1  2  3  4  5 6–7

On the eleventh [day] Nabû will come out. He will release his foot, He will go to the game-park. He will kill wild bulls. He will ascend and sit in his seat. He will bless the king, my [lord], and his house.

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The ritual expression of Nabû’s post-coital hunt took the form of a procession by Nabû’s statue and, after the statue had been reinstalled, the ‘sacred marriage’ festival concluded with Nabû blessing the king. In a sequence of three damaged couplets, all the lines probably share the same structure and concern the participants in the procession invoking blessings upon various recipients (A rev. 2′–7′). 55) These include blessings for the king’s lands (A rev. 3′: ⸢mātātīšu⸣) and descendants (A rev. 5′: ⸢pirʾīšu⸣), so the ritual’s geographical and temporal reach extends far beyond the contemporary city to encompass the Assyrian empire and generations of potential future kings. In the third couplet the focus returns to the actual city with the invocation of blessings upon ⸢mār ummân⸣, ‘experts’, probably signifying ‘scholars’ rather than ‘craftsmen’, and ⸢ lu2ab.ba āli⸣, ‘city elders’ (A rev. 6′–7′). Two elite urban cadres are singled out and the scholar who composed this work puts the experts in the leading position. The words spoken by the ritual participants are then quoted in direct speech in the final three couplets (A rev. 8′–13′). The speakers identify the current day in Ayyaru as the annual date in Assur’s ritual calendar for the procession celebrating Nabû’s run and characterize Ayyaru as urḫi ⸢ṭābi⸣, ‘a favourable month’ (A rev. 8′–9′). To the hearers’ right and left, for going along the city streets or making decisions for the city, the speakers say that there is abundance (nuḫšu) and attractiveness (kuzbu) wherever they enter (A rev. 10′–11′). Going along the city streets and making decisions for the city are appropriate activities for the scholars and city elders who are the last named addressees (A rev. 6′–7′). As the celebration of a successful post-coital hunt, the procession gives rise to qualities with an erotic aspect along its route, namely abundance and attractiveness. In the final couplet the city rejoices at the street taken by the speakers in procession (A rev. 12′: irīʾaš ālu; on riʾāšu in A 4–5 and A 21 // B 5 see above) and there is a prayer that shares and lavish food offerings may be scattered for the gods (A rev. 13′: isqū nindabê rabbûti lisriqū:). This latter line may end the direct speech or the composition may have reverted to third person narrative. This key procession in the city’s cultic year makes a fitting conclusion for the Assur composition and is important for the composition as a whole. For further bibliography on the run of Nabû and on Ayyaru in cult and as a favourable month and time of rejoicing see Stadhouders (2013). It is noteworthy that the composition ends with a description of a specific cultic event and a final petition that the appropriate offerings are made.

Poetic Structure The better preserved passages of the composition can be analysed as poetic lines grouped into couplets (A 11–28 // B 1–9b; A rev. 2′–13′). Before a ruling the excerpt in MS B ends with a line that spills over onto the side of the tablet and contains two poetic lines (A 26–27 // B 9a–b). The final poetic line is the first line of a harvest prayer (A 27 // B 9b). The end point of the excerpt and the use of two forms of k b r in the next two lines of the composition (A 28–29) might suggest that A 27 // B 9b is a monostich. However, given the prevalence of couplets in the rest of the composition and the fact that MS B is an excerpt on a less regularly written school tablet,

5.  It is less likely that A rev. 2′–5′ should be understood as blessings by Aššur and Ellil.

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it is more likely that A 27 // B 9b is the first line of a couplet. For another instance of MS B having two poetic lines on one line of tablet see A 23–24 // B 7 and the discussion on sources above. A striking feature of MS A is the double vertical ruling down the centre of the tablet on both obverse and reverse. This double ruling is related to the poetic structure. In a four-foot poetic line the text is written so that the double ruling corresponds to the mid-line caesura, shown most clearly in A 19, rev. 10′. In a three-foot poetic line the double ruling corresponds either to the boundary between the first and second feet (e.g., A 15, 17–18, 20) or to the boundary between the second and third feet (e.g., A 23, 25, 27, rev. 8′). There is also one highly emphatic poetic line that consists of just two simple feet and encapsulates the essential message of the poem (A 24). It is noticeable that, adjacent to the double ruling, some sequences of lines have one or more signs vertically aligned. This is most common after the double ruling (A 8–10: ša; A 9–10: ša ME; A 15–16: ḫa-du-u; A 20–22: i (possible dittography in A 22); A rev. 4′–8′: i-kar-ra-bu), but can also precede it (A 4–5 i-riš-ša2 (if correctly restored; imprecise alignment); A 15–16: bu). As an example of the composition’s poetic complexity a couplet of prayer to Aššur and Ellil (A 11–12) and the following couplet of prayer to Esarhaddon are elaborately interrelated (A 13–14). This involves the use of imperative forms of mullû (A 11: mullâ || mullâ = feet 2/4 and 3/4; A 13: mulli || = foot 2/3); a degree of parallelism between body-parts (A 11: pandīšun (accusative) = foot 4/4; A 13: || ana kišādīšunu = foot 3/3); related but contrasting divine and royal names (A 12: [aššur] ellil || = feet 1/4 and 2/4; A 14: || aššur—aḫa—iddina = foot 3/4); and cognate forms of the root k r b (A 12: || kurbā = foot 3/4; A 14: ikrib ḫegalli || = foot 2/4). The recipients of the blessings are specified in A 12 and the nature of the blessings in A 14.

Literary and Historical Contexts The Assur composition was edited by Livingstone together with a celebration of the city of Arbela and a celebration of the city of Uruk (Livingstone 1989: nos. 8–10). Among the examples of Neo-Assyrian poetry these three compositions were grouped together as ‘hymns to cities’, with the proviso that the term ‘hymn’ was one of convenience and ‘elements of prayer’ were also involved (Livingstone1989: XXI, XXV–VI). Livingstone also noted a related example of Babylonian poetry, a composition on a Kouyunjik tablet relating to the cult of the city of Babylon (Livingstone 1989: XXV, XXXIV; Foster 2005: 876–77). For discussion of the problems of imposing modern genres on ancient compositions, and on hymns as a specific variety of prayer see Lenzi (2011: 1–23, 57). While each of these four works has a distinct character, nevertheless they are all compositions of prayer and praise that focus on a particular city. It has been noted by scholars including Livingstone (1989: XXV–VI) and George (1987: 37–39) that these compositions can be related to earlier compositions from southern Mesopotamia celebrating temples and cities but that they lack any close Babylonian parallels. These compositions probably constitute an Assyrian innovation, albeit one that draws on material from southern Mesopotamia. The composition celebrating Assur contains a prayer addressed to Esarhaddon (A 14) and can thus be dated to the reign of this king. The composition is an expression of Neo-Assyrian ideology and theology centred on the provision of offerings to Aššur and Ellil in the city of Assur as a national enterprise that was necessary to secure divine favour. This is very much in keeping with Esarhaddon’s reign. His inscriptions describe a ma-

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jor renovation of Ešarra, Aššur’s temple in Assur (Leichty 2011: nos. 57 [two copies dated to 679 BC], 58, 59, 76). His renovating of Ešarra and his rebuilding of Esagil, Marduk’s temple in Babylon, were regularly paired as highlights of royal achievement and this reflects the status of these two temple complexes as the epicentres of Assyrian and Babylonian national cult (Leichty 2011: nos. 10 3, 17 6′–7′, 43 8–9, 48 36, 60 17′–50′, 74 4–5, and passim). Esarhaddon’s chronic ill health and desire to make amends for the sack of Babylon by his father Sennacherib all contributed to a particularly anxious desire to please the gods and he also faced the challenge of welding his empire together, including Babylonia (Porter 1993: 119–53; Holloway 2002: 358–72; Leichty 2011: 1–3). It is quite possible that all the four compositions mentioned above date to the reign of Esarhaddon. 6 The Assur composition was copied in toto onto one tablet and a duplicate passage, with significant variants, was copied as an excerpt onto another. Both surviving manuscripts were written as part of scribal training and were found in a scholarly library in Ḫuzirina. Manuscript A (STT 87), containing the composition and a colophon, was written by a junior apprentice scribe whose Assyrian name celebrates Aššur and whose father was a scribe of the city of Assur. Manuscript B is an excerpt tablet (STT 371), which has an overall theme of Assyrian royal cult. Thus, a composition of prayer and praise celebrating the traditional capital city Assur as the unifying, religious centre of the Assyrian Empire has partially survived on two scribal education tablets from the imperial periphery. 6.  As I will argue in a separate article in preparation.

References Baker, H. D. 2002 The Prosopography of the Neo-Assyrian Empire 3/I. Helsinki: The Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project. Beaulieu, P.-A. 2003 The Pantheon of Uruk during the Neo-Babylonian Period. Leiden: Brill, Styx. Capraro, M. 2001 La biblioteca di Sultantepe. Unpublished Ph.D. thesis. Napoli: Istituto Universitario Orientale di Napoli. Clancier, P. 2012 Qurdi-Nergal’s house in Huzirina. in The Geography of Knowledge in Assyria and Babylonia: A Diachronic Analysis of Four Scholarly Libraries, directed by E. Robson and S. Tinney. Accessed 11/06/2014. Cole, S. W., and Machinist, P. 1998 Letters from Priests to the Kings Esarhaddon and Assurbanipal. State Archives of Assyria XIII. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. Deller, K. 1965 Neuassyrisches aus Sultantepe. Or 34: 457–77. Foster, B. R. 2005 Before the Muses: An Anthology of Akkadian Literature. 3rd edition. Bethesda. MD: CDL Press. 2007 Akkadian Literature of the Late Period. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. George, A. R. 1987 A Neo-Assyrian Literary Text. SAAB 1: 31–41. 1993 Babylonian Topographical Texts. Leuven: Peeters Press.

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2003 The Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic: Introduction, Critical Edition and Cuneiform Texts I–II. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Gesche, P. D. 2001 Schulunterricht in Babylonien im ersten Jahrtausend v. Chr. Münster: Ugarit-Verlag. Glassner, J.-J. 2004 Mesopotamian Chronicles. Atlanta, GA: Society of Biblical Literature. Gurney, O. R., and Finkelstein, J. J. 1957 The Sultantepe Tablets I. London: British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara. Gurney, O. R., and Hulin, P. 1964 The Sultantepe Tablets II. London: British Institute of Archaeology at Ankara. Holloway, S. W. 2002 Aššur is King! Aššur is King! Religion in the Exercise of Power in the Neo-Assyrian Empire. Leiden: Brill. Hunger, H. 1968 Babylonische und assyrische Kolophone. Kevelaer: Butzon & Bercker. Lambert, W. G. 1959 The Sultantepe Tablets: A Review Article. RA 53: 119–38. Leichty, E. 2011 The Royal Inscriptions of Esarhaddon, King of Assyria (680–669 BC). RINAP 4. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns. Lenzi, A. 2011 Reading Akkadian Prayers and Hymns: An Introduction. Atlanta, GA: Society of Biblical Literature. Livingstone, A. 1989 Court Poetry and Literary Miscellanea. State Archives of Assyria III. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. Mair, G. H. 1909 Wilson’s Arte of Rhetorique, 1560. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Porter, B. N. 1993 Images, Power, and Politics: Figurative Aspects of Esarhaddon’s Babylonian Policy. Philadelphia, PA: American Philosophical Society. Postgate, J. N. 1975 Ḫarrān. Pp. 122–25 in Reallexikon der Assyriologie und Vorderasiatischen Archäologie 4, ed. D. O. Edzard. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. 1985 rev.  K. Nashef, Die Orts- und Gewässernamen der mittelbabylonischen und mittelassyrischen Zeit. Répertoire Géographique des Textes Cunéiformes 5. AfO 32: 95–101. 2014 Bronze Age Bureaucracy: Writing and the Practice of Government in Assyria. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Radner, K. 2012 Sultantepe. Pp.  287–88 in Reallexikon der Assyriologie und Vorderasiatischen Archäologie 13, ed. M. P. Streck. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. Robson, E. 2011 The Production and Dissemination of Scholarly Knowledge. Pp. 557–76 in The Oxford Handbook of Cuneiform Culture, ed. K. Radner and E. Robson. Oxford: Oxford University Press. 2013 Reading the Libraries of Assyria and Babylonia. Pp. 38–56 in Ancient Libraries, ed. J. König, K. Oikonomopoulou, and G. Woolf. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Stadhouders, H. 2013 A Time to Rejoice: The Egalkura Rituals and the Mirth of Iyyar. Pp. 301–324 in Time and History in the Ancient Near East, ed. L. Feliu, J. Llop, A. Millet Albà, and J. Sanmartín. Proceedings of the 56th Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale at Barcelona 26–30 July 2010. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns.

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Van Buylaere, G. 2011a STT 1, 087. in The Corpus of Ancient Mesopotamian Scholarship: The Geography of Knowledge in Assyria and Babylonia: A Diachronic Analysis of Four Scholarly Libraries, directed by E. Robson and S. Tinney. Accessed 11/06/2014. 2011b STT 1, 087a. in The Corpus of Ancient Mesopotamian Scholarship: The Geography of Knowledge in Assyria and Babylonia: A Diachronic Analysis of Four Scholarly Libraries, directed by E. Robson and S. Tinney. Accessed 11/06/2014. 2011c STT 2, 371. in The Corpus of Ancient Mesopotamian Scholarship: The Geography of Knowledge in Assyria and Babylonia: A Diachronic Analysis of Four Scholarly Libraries, directed by E. Robson and S. Tinney. Accessed 11/06/2014.