Position in chronology
SAA 10 069. God-Stricken Field (CT 53 146) [from astrologers]
Translation — scholar edition
SAA 10(1) [To the king, my lord: your servant Nabû-ahhe-er]iba. [Good health to the king], my [lord. My Nabû and] Marduk bless [the king], my [lo]rd! (7) [Concerning] the large field [of the Ass]yrians [about which the king], my lord, wrote to me: "It was a very productive field; who is removing the grain?" — (13) the farmers who seeded the fields do not revere Adad any more; that is why he let a lightning bolt strike down (and devastate the field). (r 3) Since the king, my lord, commanded (so), an exorcist should perform the (ritual called) "Purification of the Field," and he should at the same…
State Archives of Assyria, volume 10 — scholar edition (ORACC).
Spotted an error? Suggest a correction — confirmed corrections feed the engine's knowledge base.
Transliteration
[a-na LUGAL EN-ia] / [ARAD-ka mdPA—PAB-MEŠ]—⸢SU⸣ / [lu DI-mu a-na LUGAL EN]-⸢ia⸣ / [a—dan-niš d]⸢PA⸣ dAMAR.UTU / [a-na LUGAL] ⸢EN⸣-ia / [lik-ru]-bu / [ina UGU] ⸢A⸣.ŠÀ GAL* / [ša LÚ.áš]-⸢šu⸣-ra-a.a / [ša LUGAL] be-lí iš-pur-an-ni / [ma-a A].ŠÀ id-di-mì-iq / a—⸢dan⸣-niš ŠE.PAD-MEŠ / man-nu ú-pa-sa-ak / LÚ.ENGAR-ME ša ŠE.⸢NUMUN⸣ / i-ru-šu-u-ni / a-ka-an-ni / ana dIM <$x ni$> / la i-pal-⸢lu-ḫu⸣ / ina…
Scholarly note
Letter from a scholar (astrologer, exorcist, physician, lamentation-priest) to Esarhaddon or Ashurbanipal, edited by Simo Parpola (SAA 10, 1993). ORACC text P313561.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.earth/artifacts, P313561). source
Translation excerpted from Parpola, S. 1993. Letters from Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars. SAA 10. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa10/P313561/.
Related tablets
Related sources
An early example of administrative writing from Uruk. Its fragmentary numerical entries and commodity signs document record-keeping during the formative period of writing.
A surviving administrative record of named people and livestock in the Ur III period. Together with other archives, such accounts reveal the work of managing animals, deliveries and institutional responsibility.
Part of the earliest known body of international diplomatic correspondence. Akkadian, written in cuneiform on clay, was the lingua franca of Late Bronze Age statecraft — used between Egypt, the Hittites, Mitanni, Babylon, Assyria, and the Levantine vassals.