Position in chronology
SAA 10 242. A Sick King (ABL 0348) [from exorcists]
Translation — scholar edition
SAA 10(1) To the kin[g, my lor]d: your servant Marduk-šakin-šumi. Good health to the king, my lord! May Nabû and Marduk bless the king, my lord! (5) As to what the king, my lord, said: "My arms and legs are without strength!" and "I cannot open my eyes; I am scratched and lie prostrate"— (10) (all) that is because this fever has lingered inside the very bones. It is not serious — Aššur, Šamaš, Bel and Nabû will provide health. (r 3) (Break) (r 6) His illness will depart — he will be just fine. True, they should wait and eat (only) what is appropriate.
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 be⸣-[lí-ia] / ARAD-ka mdAMAR.UTU—⸢GAR*⸣—MU / lu-u DI-mu a-na LUGAL EN-ía / dPA u dAMAR.UTU a-na LUGAL EN-ía / lik-ru-bu ša LUGAL be-lí / iq-bu-ni ma-a a-ḫi-ia / še-pi-ia la-mu-qa-a-a / ù ma-a IGI.2-ia la a-pat-ti / ma-a mar-ṭak kar-rak / ina ŠÀ ša ḫu-un-ṭu / šu-ú ina ŠÀ eṣ-ma-a-ti / ú-kil-lu-u-ni / ina ŠÀ-bi šu-ú / la-áš-šú ḫi-ṭu / aš-šur dUTU dEN dPA / DI-mu i-šak-ku-nu / e* ⸢x x x…
Scholarly note
Letter from a scholar (astrologer, exorcist, physician, lamentation-priest) to Esarhaddon or Ashurbanipal, edited by Simo Parpola (SAA 10, 1993). ORACC text P334226.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) ? — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.earth/artifacts, P334226). 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/P334226/.
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.