Position in chronology
Adad-narari I 18
Written in modern English
The king rebuilt the wall from scratch, pulling out the old and weakened beams, supports, and lashings and replacing them with new ones, running them between the wall and the door. He also built the bakehouse wall from its foundations up to its battlements, restored it, and buried a commemorative inscription inside. He then addressed future rulers directly: if the wall ever falls into disrepair and a later king restores it, he should put the original inscription back in its place, and the god Aššur will hear his prayers. But if any ruler erases the king's name, substitutes his own, or discards the inscription, may Aššur — the exalted god who dwells in Eḫursagkurkurra — the text breaks off here, too damaged to read the curse's conclusion.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — scholar edition
RIAo(1') I built that wall anew. I removed the weak (and) old beams, supports, and lashings (and) installed new beams, supports, and lashings. I made (them) reach between the wall [and] the door. I built the wall of the bakehouse from its foundations to its crenellations. [I] restored it. Moreover, I deposited my monumental inscription (therein). (11') In the future, may a future ruler, when he renovates that wall (when) it becomes dilapidated, return my monumental inscription and my inscribed name to its place. The god Aššur will (then) listen to his prayers. (15') (As for) the one who erases my inscribed name and writes his (own) name or discards my monumental inscription, may the god Aššur, the exalted god, the one who dwells in Eḫursagkurkurra, [...] ...
Royal Inscriptions of Assyria online — scholar edition (ORACC / MOCCI).
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Transliteration
x x x x x x x ⸢i⸣-ga-⸢ra⸣ / šá-a-tu a-na eš₁₅-šu-ut-te ar-ṣi-ip / GIŠ.ÙR.MEŠ ši-ip-šá-te ù nap-de-e / ⸢an⸣-šu-te ù la-be-ru-te ú-né-⸢kir₆⸣ / ⸢GIŠ⸣.ÙR.MEŠ ši-ip-šá-te ù nap-de-e / ⸢GIBIL⸣.MEŠ ú-ki-in ⸢be?⸣-er-te i-ga-ri / [u] KÁ qa-ab-⸢li ú-te⸣-ṣi i-ga-ra / [ša] ⸢É⸣ LÚ.MUḪALDIM.MEŠ iš-tu uš-še-šu / [a-di] ⸢gaba⸣-dib-bi-šu e-pu-uš a-na aš-ri-šu / [ú]-te-er ù na-re-ia aš-ku*-un / [a]-⸢na⸣ ar-kat…
Scholarly note
Royal inscription of an Assyrian king, published in the Royal Inscriptions of Assyria online project (RIAo). Translation reproduced from the ORACC edition. ORACC text Q005755.
Attribution
Image: Based on A. Kirk Grayson, Assyrian Rulers of the Third and Second Millennia BC (to 1115 BC) (RIMA 1), Toronto, 1987. Adapted by Jamie Novotny (2015-16) and lemmatized and updated by Nathan Morello (2016) for the Munich Open-access Cuneiform Corpus Initiative (MOCCI), a corpus-building initiative funded by LMU Munich and the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (through the establishment of the Alexander von Humboldt Chair for Ancient History of the Near and Middle East) and based at the Historisches Seminar - Abteilung Alte Geschichte of Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München. The annotated edition is released under the Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike license 3.0. Please cite this page as http://oracc.org/riao/Q005755/..
Translation excerpted from Royal Inscriptions of Assyria online (RIAo), Munich Open-access Cuneiform Corpus Initiative (MOCCI), Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München; in association with the RINAP Project, University of Pennsylvania. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/riao/Q005755/.
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