Position in chronology
SAA 04 116. Fragment of a Military Query (AGS 028) [military and political]
Translation · reference
High confidence(Beginning destroyed) (1) [o]r in the days [......] (2) [o]r [will] a strong enemy [attack NN, and the men, horses] and army at [his] disposal, and kill (and) plunde[r (them)? Will Esarhaddon, king of Assyria, be trou]bled and angry? (5) [Will he who can see, see it? Will he who can hear, hear it? Does your great divinity know it]? (6) [Disregard that] the enemy's army (may) arriv[e ...]. (7) [Disregard what] they speak with (their) mouths [or what they think]. (8) [Disregard the (formulation) of the pr]ayer for today's case, be it [good, be it faulty]. (r 1) [Disregard that he who touches the forehead of the sh]eep [is dressed in his] ordin[ary soiled] garments (Rest destroyed)
Source: Starr, I. 1990. Queries to the Sungod: Divination and Politics in Sargonid Assyria. SAA 4. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa04/P238982/
Why it matters
Transliteration
[lu]-ú ina UD-MEŠ [x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x] / [lu]-ú LÚ.KÚR dan-ni ana UGU [mx x x x x x x x ERIM-MEŠ ANŠE.KUR.RA-MEŠ] / ⸢ù⸣ Á.KAL mál it-ti-[šú i-ma-aq-qu-tu-ú] / [i]-duk-ku-ú i-ḫab-ba-⸢tu⸣-[ú ŠÀ-bi šá mdaš-šur—ŠEŠ—SUM-na LUGAL KUR—aš-šur.KI] / [i]-⸢mar⸣-ra-ṣu i-lam-mì-ni [IGI-ru IGI-ra ŠE.GA-ú ŠE.GA-e DINGIR-ut-ka GAL-ti ZU-e] / [e-zib šá] Á.KAL šá LÚ.KÚR i-KUR-⸢da⸣ [x x x x x x x x…
Scholarly note
Extispicy query addressed to Šamaš, the sungod and patron of divination, edited by Ivan Starr (SAA 4, 1990). The king asks the deity to render a yes/no verdict on a political or military question. ORACC text P238982.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/artifacts, P238982). source
Translation excerpted from Starr, I. 1990. Queries to the Sungod: Divination and Politics in Sargonid Assyria. SAA 4. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa04/P238982/.
Related tablets
Related sources
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.
The single most influential Mesopotamian king list — the model for every later attempt to chronicle the deep history of the region. It transmits the political theology of divinely granted kingship, an idea that would echo through Babylon, Assyria, and into the Hebrew Bible. The Weld-Blundell prism (WB 444) at the Ashmolean is the most complete surviving copy.