Position in chronology
SAA 10 160. Twenty Able Scholars, Fit for Royal Service (CT 54 057+) [from astrologers]
Translation · reference
High confidence(1) [To the ki]ng of the lands, the strong king, the king of the world, his lord: your servant Marduk-šapik-zeri, the dead body, the leprous skull, the constricted breath whom the king, my lord, raised up and appointed from among corpses. May I die as the substitute of the king, my lord! May Nabû and Marduk bless the lord of kings, my lord! (6) I have now been kept in confinement for two years and, for fear of the king, my lord, though there have been good and bad portents for me to observe in the sky, I have not dared to report them to the king, my lord. (9) Now, however, afraid that it…
Source: Parpola, S. 1993. Letters from Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars. SAA 10. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa10/P237220/
Why it matters
Transliteration
[a-na] ⸢LUGAL⸣ KUR.KUR LUGAL dan-nu LUGAL kiš-šat be-lí-šú / ⸢ARAD-ka⸣ mdAMAR.UTU—DUB—NUMUN LÚ.pa-ag-ru mi-i-ti gul-gul-lu / gur-ru-ṣu ZI-tim si-iq-ti šá ul-tu bi-rit LÚ.ÚŠ-MEŠ LUGAL EN-a / iz-qu-⸢pan⸣-ni-ma ip-qí-dan-nu a-na di-na-an LUGAL EN-ía lul-lik / dAG u dAMAR.UTU a-na EN LUGAL-MEŠ EN-ía lik-ru-bu / a-du-ú 02 MU.AN.NA-MEŠ ṣab-ta-ku-ma ina pu-luḫ-ti LUGAL EN-ía / ki-i GISKIM-MEŠ SIG₅-MEŠ u…
Scholarly note
Letter from a scholar (astrologer, exorcist, physician, lamentation-priest) to Esarhaddon or Ashurbanipal, edited by Simo Parpola (SAA 10, 1993). ORACC text P237220.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/artifacts, P237220). 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/P237220/.
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