Position in chronology
SAA 05 039. Fragment Concerning Tree Trunks (CT 53 726)
Translation · reference
High confidence(Beginning destroyed) (1) [... wh]ich are in the cit[y ...] (2) [...] he [...] (3) [...] in the river [...] (4) [...] ... [...] (5) [...] the beams [...] (6) [...] afterwards [...] (7) [... wh]ich we [...] (8) [...] to [...] (Rest destroyed)
Source: Lanfranchi, G.B. & Parpola, S. 1990. The Correspondence of Sargon II, Part II: Letters from the Northern and Northeastern Provinces. SAA 5. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa05/P314136/
Why it matters
Transliteration
[x x x] ⸢ša⸣ ina ⸢URU⸣.[x x x] / [x x x]+⸢x⸣ šu-u [x x x x] / [x x x] ina ÍD [x x x x] / [x x x] tu ⸢x⸣+[x x x x] / [x GIŠ].⸢ÙR⸣-MEŠ [x x x x] / [x x] ⸢id⸣—da-a-[te x x x] / [x x] ⸢ša⸣ nu-[x x x x x] / [x x x] a-na [x x x x x]
Scholarly note
Royal correspondence from Assyria's northern frontier under Sargon II, edited by Giovanni B. Lanfranchi & Simo Parpola (SAA 5, 1990). ORACC text P314136.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/artifacts, P314136). source
Translation excerpted from Lanfranchi, G.B. & Parpola, S. 1990. The Correspondence of Sargon II, Part II: Letters from the Northern and Northeastern Provinces. SAA 5. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa05/P314136/.
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.