Position in chronology
SAA 20 011. Report on Rituals Performed on Adar 8 (OrSP 22, 036)
Translation · reference
High confidence(1) On the 8th day the king [went up] to the Ho[use of God]. He ki[ssed] the ground before Aššur. [He poured out a libation bowl]. (3) He ascended the dais [and set] the ta[ble before Lord Tiara]. The king [...] from [......]. He f[il]led a golden pithos on [...]. The priest of Aššur placed a napki[n on the] king’s shoulder. He of[fer]ed hand-water, strewed sal[t], and p[erformed] the f[ee]ding ritual. (9) He swung the purification device. He w[en]t (and) swung it over the censers, [... sw]ung it [on the censer]. He po[ur]ed out a libation bowl, tr[eated] the gods, performed the sheep…
Source: Parpola, S. 2017. Assyrian Royal Rituals and Cultic Texts. SAA 20. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa20/P336308/
Why it matters
Transliteration
UD 08-KÁM LUGAL ina ⸢É—DINGIR⸣ [e-ti-li] / kaq-qar ina IGI aš-šur i-[ti-šiq x x x] / ina BARAG e-ti-li GIŠ?.⸢BANŠUR? x x⸣ [x x x x x] / ⸢x⸣ ḫa ⸢x⸣ LUGAL ⸢TA*⸣ [x x x x x] x MAN / kir-ru KUG.GI ina UGU ⸢x⸣ [x]-⸢ti un?-tal-li?⸣ / LÚ*.SANGA šá aš-šur TÚG.sa-su-⸢pu⸣ [ina UGU] ⸢MAŠ.QA LUGAL⸣ / ik-ta-ra-ár ⸢A⸣-MEŠ ŠU.2 ⸢uq-ṭar-rib MUN⸣ / ik-ta-ra-ár ⸢ša⸣-ku-su ⸢ú⸣-[sa-kil] / šá—te-li-si ú-⸢se⸣-ti-iq…
Scholarly note
Neo-Assyrian royal ritual or cultic text, edited by Simo Parpola (SAA 20, 2017). ORACC text P336308.
Attribution
Image: Adapted from Simo Parpola, Assyrian Royal Rituals and Cultic Texts (State Archives of Assyria, 20), 2017. Adapted by Jamie Novotny and lemmatised by Mikko Luukko, 2017, as part of the research programme of the Alexander von Humboldt Chair in the Ancient History of the Near and Middle East at LMU Munich (Karen Radner, Humboldt Professorship 2015). The annotated edition is released under the Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike license 3.0. Please cite this page as http://oracc.org/saao/P336308/..
Translation excerpted from Parpola, S. 2017. Assyrian Royal Rituals and Cultic Texts. SAA 20. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa20/P336308/.
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.
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.