Position in chronology
SAA 08 324. Morning First of Saturn in Leo (RMA 216) [planetary]
Translation · reference
High confidence(1) Satu[rn] became visible [in]side of Leo. (3) If Leo is dark: for three years, [li]ons and wol[ves] will kill people and cut off traffic with the [Wes]tland. (r 1) If a planet rises in Ab (V): the cemetery of warriors will expand. (r 4) From Ašaredu the older.
Source: Hunger, H. 1992. Astrological Reports to Assyrian Kings. SAA 8. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa08/P237915/
Why it matters
Transliteration
MUL.UDU.IDIM.SAG.[UŠ ina] ŠÀ-bi [o] / šá MUL.UR.GU.LA it-tan-mar / 1 MUL.UR.GU.LA a-dir / 03 MU-MEŠ [UR].MAḪ-MEŠ / u UR.BAR.⸢RA-MEŠ⸣ LÚ.U₁₈.LU GAZ / A.RÁ KUR—[MAR].⸢TU⸣ KUD-MEŠ / 1 MUL.UDU.IDIM ina ITI.NE / KUR-ḫa / KI.NÁ qu-ra-du DAGAL / šá ma-šá-ri-du IGI-ú
Scholarly note
Astrological report from a court scholar to an Assyrian king, edited by Hermann Hunger (SAA 8, 1992). Celestial and meteorological observation correlated with omens. ORACC text P237915.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/artifacts, P237915). source
Translation excerpted from Hunger, H. 1992. Astrological Reports to Assyrian Kings. SAA 8. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa08/P237915/.
Related tablets
Related sources
Whatever its purpose, this single tablet shows that Babylonian mathematicians, working in base-60, had an arithmetic understanding of right triangles a millennium before Pythagoras was born.
The single most important literary discovery of the 19th century. It rewired the understanding of the Bible's literary context and proved that the Mesopotamian flood tradition is older. It is the oldest surviving epic poetry in human history.
The literary tradition is no longer anonymous from this point. Authorship — the idea that a specific human voice composes a specific work — enters the historical record with her.