Position in chronology
SAA 15 113. The King of Elam Leaves Bit-Bunakki and Goes to Burati (CT 53 089+)
Translation — scholar edition
SAA 15(1) To the king, my lord: your servant Šamaš-belu-uṣur. Good health to the king, my lord! The city of Der and the fort are well. (6) Perhaps the king, my lord, will say: "What is the news of the king of Elam?" He entered Bit-Bunakki on the 11th of Tammuz (IV), left it on the 13th, and went up to the mountain. [My] messenger [has written to me] as follows: (12) "A town called Burati, (one of) his forts outside the house of Daltâ, has turned hostile against him; he is going there, and will either pacify it or bring them down through battle. From there he will march to Ellipi against the s[on of…
State Archives of Assyria, volume 15 — scholar edition (ORACC).
Spotted an error? Suggest a correction — confirmed corrections feed the engine's knowledge base.
Transliteration
a-na LUGAL be-lí-ia / ARAD-ka mdUTU—EN—PAB / lu-u DI-mu a-na LUGAL be-lí-ia / DI-mu a-na URU.de-e-ri / DI-mu a-na URU.ḪAL.ṢU / is—su-⸢ri⸣ LUGAL be-lí i-qab-bi / ma-a ša LUGAL KUR.NIM.MA.KI mi-i-nu / ṭè-en-šu UD 11-KÁM ša ITI.ŠU / a-na URU.É—bu-nak-ki e-ta-rab / UD 13-KÁM it-⸢tu⸣-ṣi a-na KUR-ú / e-te-li ⸢a⸣-ki an-ni-i LÚv.A—KIN-[e-a i-sap-ra] / ma-a ⸢URU⸣.bu-⸢ra⸣-a-te i-qab-bu-⸢ú⸣-[ni]-⸢šu*⸣ /…
Scholarly note
Royal correspondence from Babylonia and the eastern provinces under Sargon II, edited by Andreas Fuchs & Simo Parpola (SAA 15, 2001). ORACC text P313504.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.earth/artifacts, P313504). source
Translation excerpted from Fuchs, A. & Parpola, S. 2001. The Correspondence of Sargon II, Part III: Letters from Babylonia and the Eastern Provinces. SAA 15. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa15/P313504/.
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.
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.