SAA 06 267. Purchase of a Slave (677-X-1) (ADD 0194)

~700 BCE·Neo-Assyrian·P335142

Translation — scholar edition

SAA 6

High confidence

(1) Seal of Se'-sakâ, major-domo, owner of the man being sold. (three stamp seals) (3) [...]rî, servant [of Se'-sak]â, major-domo — (5) [Šer]-uari [has contracted and bought him] (Break) (r 1) Witness [Si]n-belu-uṣur. (r 2) Witness Sin-zeru-iddina. (r 3) Witness Se'-šumki. (r 4) Witness Salsali, scribe. (r 5) Month Tebet (X), 1st day, eponym year of Abi-ram.

State Archives of Assyria, volume 6 — scholar edition (ORACC).

Spotted an error? Suggest a correction — confirmed corrections feed the engine's knowledge base.

Transliteration

NA₄.KIŠIB mse-e—sa-ka-a / ⸢LÚv⸣.GAL—É EN LÚ SUM-nu / m*[x x]-ri-i : ARAD-šú / [ša mse-e—sa]-ka-a LÚ.GAL—É / [ú-piš-ma mšér]—⸢ú⸣-a-ri / IGI [m]⸢30—EN*—PAB⸣ / IGI m30—NUMUN*—SUM-na / IGI mse-e—šúm-ki / IGI msal-sa-li LÚv.A.BA / ITI.AB UD 01-KAM / lim-mu mAD—ra-mi*

Scholarly note

Neo-Assyrian legal transaction at the royal court of Nineveh, edited by Theodore Kwasman & Simo Parpola (SAA 6, 1991). ORACC text P335142.

Attribution

Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.earth/artifacts, P335142). source
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/P335142/.

Related tablets

Related sources

~3200 BCE

Proto-Cuneiform Account Tablet (VAT 15211)

An early example of administrative writing from Uruk. Its fragmentary numerical entries and commodity signs document record-keeping during the formative period of writing.

~2450 BCE

Stele of the Vultures

An early surviving historical monument that joins named rulers, a territorial dispute and religious oaths. It shows how a city-state turned victory into a lasting public claim, without establishing that this was the first recorded conflict.

~2100 BCE

Code of Ur-Nammu

Among the oldest surviving written law collections. It provides an early witness to royal justice and specified compensation, rather than a starting date for law itself.