Position in chronology
SAA 06 025. The Governor of Parsua Borrows 50 Cavalrymen (717-I) (ADD 0695)
Translation — scholar edition
SAA 6(1) 50 cavalry[men ...] (and) their sons [...] in the ci[ty ...] — (4) they along with [...] and along with their oxen [...], which ...[...], at the disposal of [NN], governor of Pars[ua]. (r 1) He shall give them back in [full] by the month Tishri (VII). (r 3) As soon as he has gi[ven] them all back in full, they shall release Sahhî [to him]. (r 6) Month Nisan (I), eponym year of Ṭab-šar-[Aššur].
State Archives of Assyria, volume 6 — scholar edition (ORACC).
Transliteration
50 LÚv.ša—BAD-[ḪAL-MEŠ x x] / DUMU-MEŠ-šú-nu [x x x x] / ina ŠÀ-bi ⸢URU⸣.[x x x] / šú-nu a-du [x x x x (x)] / a-du GUD.⸢NÍTA⸣-[MEŠ-šú-nu x (x)] / ⸢ša⸣ DUMU*-šú-u-ni ⸢ša⸣ [x x x x] / [x x]-⸢ni*⸣ ina pa-an m[x x x] / [LÚv.EN].NAM URU.par-⸢su*⸣-[a šú-nu] / a-du ŠÀ-bi ITI.DUL ú-⸢šal⸣-[lam] / ⸢id⸣-dan-šú-nu [o] / ki-ma gab-bi ú-sa-lim ⸢it⸣-[ti-din] / msa-aḫ-ḫi-i ina pa-ni-[šú] / ú-ram-mu-ú [o] / ITI.BARAG lim-mu mDÙG.GA—IM—[aš-šur]
Scholarly note
Neo-Assyrian legal transaction at the royal court of Nineveh, edited by Theodore Kwasman & Simo Parpola (SAA 6, 1991). ORACC text P335575.
Attribution
Image: Adapted from Theodore Kwasman and Simo Parpola , Legal Transactions of the Royal Court of Nineveh, Part I: Tiglath-Pileser III through Esarhaddon (State Archives of Assyria, 6), 1991. Lemmatised by Melanie Groß, 2010–2011, as part of the FWF-funded research project "Royal Institutional Households in First Millennium BC Mesopotamia" (S 10802-G18) directed by Heather D. Baker at the University of Vienna. The annotated edition is released under the Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike license 3.0. Please cite this page as http://oracc.org/saao/P335575/..
Translation excerpted from Kwasman, T. & Parpola, S. 1991. Legal Transactions of the Royal Court of Nineveh, Part I: Tiglath-Pileser III through Esarhaddon. SAA 6. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa06/P335575/.
Related tablets
Related sources
One of the earliest specimens of human writing. Not literature, not law — accounting. The need to keep track of grain in a temple bureaucracy is what pushed marks-on-clay into a system that could one day carry epics.
The earliest historical document in human history. Before this, we have lists, accounts, and dedications. Here, for the first time, a ruler tells us what happened — with names, places, and consequences.
The oldest surviving law code in human history. The principle that the state — not the wronged family — defines and enforces justice begins here.