Position in chronology
SAA 14 460. Land Lease (TIM 11 33)
Translation · reference
High confidence(Beginning destroyed) (1) An estate of 5 hectares 7 decares of [...] ditto Ṣidqaya, the Sido[nian ...] Nineveh, ditto the river. (3) An estate of 2 hectares [...] adjoining the river, adjoining the road of the town of Ad[ad-...], adjoining the maintenance field of the king's house [...], adjoining the sacred precint, adjoining Ṣidqaya, (7) An estate of 2 hectares "thin" (land) adjoining [...] (8) adjoining the road to Adad-[... ...] (9) Su-bal from [...] (10) adjoining Ṣidq[aya, ...] (11) well, adjoining [...] (12) of Tur[...] (13) Issar-ša[......] (14) adjoining the side road of [...] (15)…
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/P224976/
Why it matters
Transliteration
⸢É⸣ 05 ⸢ANŠE 7(bán)?⸣ [x x x x x x] / :. mṣi-id-qa-a.a ṣi-du-na-[a.a x x] / URU.NINA.KI :. ÍD É 02 ANŠE [x x x] / SUḪUR ÍD SUḪUR KASKAL.2 ša URU.d⸢IM?⸣—[x x] / SUḪUR ma-ʾu-u-te ša É—LUGAL ⸢x⸣+[x x] / SUḪUR ḫa-am-ri SUḪUR mṣi-id-qa-a.[a] / É 02 ANŠE qa-ta-nu SUḪUR [x x x x] / SUḪUR KASKAL.2 ša URU.mdIM—[x x x] / msu-u—ba-al TAv [x x x x x x] / SUḪUR mṣi-id-qa-[a.a x x x x x] / bu-ru SUḪUR ⸢x⸣+[x x…
Scholarly note
Neo-Assyrian legal transaction at the royal court of Nineveh, edited by Raija Mattila (SAA 14, 2002). ORACC text P224976.
Attribution
Image: Adapted from Raija Mattila, Legal Transactions of the Royal Court of Nineveh, Part II: Assurbanipal Through Sin-šarru-iškun (State Archives of Assyria, 14), 2002. Lemmatised by Melanie Groß, 2010–2011, as part of the FWF-funded research project "Royal Institutional Households in First Millennium BC Mesopotamia" (S 10802-G18) directed by Heather D. Baker at the University of Vienna. The annotated edition is released under the Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike license 3.0. Please cite this page as http://oracc.org/saao/P224976/..
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/P224976/.
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.