Position in chronology
SAA 05 128. Fragment of a Report on Urarṭu (CT 53 215)
Translation · reference
High confidence(1) [T]o the king, [my lord]: your [servant] Na[bû-le'i]. Good health to the king, [my] l[ord]! (4) The forts are well; the land of the king, [my] lord, is well. (6) As to the order which the king, my lord, ga[ve me]: "Send your messenger to Bi[rate] and send me a detailed repo[rt on] the [Urarṭian]" — (10) [...] to the country [......] (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/P313630/
Why it matters
Transliteration
[a]-⸢na⸣ LUGAL [be-lí-ia] / [ARAD]-ka md⸢PA⸣—[ZU?] / ⸢lu⸣ DI-mu a-na LUGAL ⸢be⸣-[lí-ia] / ⸢DI⸣-mu a-na URU.bi-ra-⸢ti⸣ / DI-mu a-na KUR ša LUGAL be-lí-[ia] / ša LUGAL be-lí ṭè-e-mu iš-⸢kun⸣-[an-ni] / ma-a LÚv.A—KIN-ka a-na URU.bi-[ra-ti] / ⸢šup-ru⸣ ma-a ⸢ṭè-e-mu⸣ [ša] KUR.[URI-a.a] / [ḫu]-ur-ṣu šup-[ra x x x x] / [x] ⸢a⸣-na KUR.[x 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 P313630.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/artifacts, P313630). 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/P313630/.
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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.