Position in chronology
SAA 14 237. Fragment of a Witness List (ADD 0156)
Translation · reference
High confidence(Beginning destroyed) (1) in [......] (2) to[wn of ......] (r 1) Witness [......] (r 2) Witness [......] (r 3) Wi[tness ......] (r 4) Witness [......] (r 5) Witness [......] (Break) (Aramaic caption: Contract of [...].)
Source: Mattila, R. 2002. Legal Transactions of the Royal Court of Nineveh, Part II: Assurbanipal through Sin-šarru-iškun. SAA 14. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa14/P335107/
Why it matters
Transliteration
ina [x x x x x x x x] / ⸢URU⸣ [x x x x x x x] / IGI [x x x x x x x] / IGI [x x x x x x x] / ⸢IGI⸣ [x x x x x x x] / IGI [x x x x x x x] / IGI m[x x x x x x x]
Scholarly note
Neo-Assyrian legal transaction at the royal court of Nineveh, edited by Raija Mattila (SAA 14, 2002). ORACC text P335107.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/artifacts, P335107). source
Translation excerpted from Mattila, R. 2002. Legal Transactions of the Royal Court of Nineveh, Part II: Assurbanipal through Sin-šarru-iškun. SAA 14. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa14/P335107/.
Related tablets
Related sources
One of the earliest specimens of human writing. Not literature, not law — accounting. The need to keep track of grain in a temple bureaucracy is what pushed marks-on-clay into a system that could one day carry epics.
The earliest historical document in human history. Before this, we have lists, accounts, and dedications. Here, for the first time, a ruler tells us what happened — with names, places, and consequences.
The oldest surviving law code in human history. The principle that the state — not the wronged family — defines and enforces justice begins here.