Position in chronology
SAA 01 021. The Widows of Fallen Soldiers (CT 53 128)
Translation · reference
High confidence(Beginning destroyed) (1) ...] your [...], [enqui]re and investigate, [and write down] and dispatch to me [the names] of the [sol]diers killed and their [sons and d]aughters. Perhaps there is a man who has subjugated a widow as his slave girl, or has subjugated a son or a daughter to servitude. Enquire and investigate, and bring (him/them) forth. (11) Perhaps there is a son who has gone into conscription in place of his father; this alone do not write down. But be sure to enquire and find out all the widows, write them down, define (their status) and send them to me. (r 6) [Tomorr]ow or the day after tomorrow, [when] I send [my eunuch, don't say: "]I brought out one widow [......] that she would die [...] she would give [....." (Rest destroyed)
Source: Parpola, S. 1987. The Correspondence of Sargon II, Part I: Letters from Assyria and the West. SAA 1. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa01/P313543/
Why it matters
Transliteration
[x x x x x x]+⸢x-ka*⸣ / [x x ša-ʾa]-⸢al⸣ ú-ṣi-ṣi / [x x x ERIM]-MEŠ ša de-e-ku-ni / [DUMU-MEŠ] ⸢DUMU*⸣.MÍ*-MEŠ-šú-nu / [šu-ṭur še]-bi-la i—su-ri / [i-ba-áš]-⸢ši⸣ LÚ ša MÍ.al-ma-tú / [a-na am]-⸢ti⸣-šú ik-bu-su-u-ni / ⸢ḫa*-ad*⸣-di DUMU lu-u DUMU.MÍ / a-na ARAD-MEŠ-u-ti ik-bu-su-u-ni / ša-ʾa-al ú-ṣi-ṣi / še-ṣi-a i—su-ri i-ba-áš-ši / DUMU ša a-na ERIM-MEŠ—LUGAL-u-ti / ina ku-um AD-šú il-lik-u-ni /…
Scholarly note
Royal correspondence under Sargon II, edited by Simo Parpola (SAA 1, 1987). Letter from a governor or high official to the king of Assyria. ORACC text P313543.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/artifacts, P313543). source
Translation excerpted from Parpola, S. 1987. The Correspondence of Sargon II, Part I: Letters from Assyria and the West. SAA 1. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa01/P313543/.
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.
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.