Position in chronology
SAA 10 195. At the Crown Prince’s Service (ABL 0654) [from exorcists]
Translation · reference
High confidence(1) [To] the great crown prince, the son of the king of the whole world, my lord: your servant Adad-šumu-uṣur. Good health to the son of the king of all lands! [May] Aššur, Sin, Šamaš, Nabû [and] Marduk, [and the great god]s of heaven [and] earth very greatly bless the [son of the k]ing of all lands, my [lord]. (r 3) [Because] I was sent for, [I have come n]ow. [The son] of the king of all lands, my lord, [can] be happy.
Source: Parpola, S. 1993. Letters from Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars. SAA 10. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa10/P334454/
Why it matters
Transliteration
[a-na] DUMU—LUGAL GAL-u / DUMU—LUGAL ŠÚ KUR.KUR / be-lí-ia / ARAD-ka mdIM—MU—ŠEŠ / lu-ú DI-mu / a-na DUMU—LUGAL KUR.KUR / [be]-lí-ia daš-šur / [d]30 dUTU dAG / [ù] dAMAR.UTU / [DINGIR-MEŠ GAL]-MEŠ šá AN-e / [ù] KI.TIM / [a-na DUMU]—⸢LUGAL⸣ KUR.KUR / [be-lí]-⸢ia⸣ / [a]—⸢dan⸣-niš a—dan-niš / [lik]-ru-bu / [ša] šap-ra-ku-ni / [an-nu]-rig / [at-tal-ka] lib-bu / [šá DUMU]—LUGAL KUR.KUR be-lí-ía / [lu-u] ⸢ṭa⸣-a-ba
Scholarly note
Letter from a scholar (astrologer, exorcist, physician, lamentation-priest) to Esarhaddon or Ashurbanipal, edited by Simo Parpola (SAA 10, 1993). ORACC text P334454.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/artifacts, P334454). 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/P334454/.
Related tablets
Related sources
A window into the world's first total state. The Ur III administration tracked every animal, every worker, every shekel — for a population in the millions. The level of paperwork was not exceeded until the modern era.
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.