All tablets.

~675 BCE·Neo-AssyrianRINAP 4

Esarhaddon 2010

(1') [They (the gods) entered the orch]ards, groves, ... [...] ... [... through the] craft of the sage [“the washing of] the mouth,” “the open[ing of the] mouth,” [“bathing,” (and) “pu]rifica[tion”] (were recited) before [the stars of] the night: the gods [Ea, Šamaš], Asallu[ḫi, Bēlet-ilī], Ku[su], and [Ni]ngirima. (11') I washed its mouth ... [...] exalted [...] ... [...] ... [...] Label on the gown of figure on the left: (1) Image of Naqīʾ[a ...]

~675 BCE·Neo-AssyrianOur engine

SAA 16 081. Jewellery for the King (ABL 0847)

To the king, my lord: your servant Nabû-sagib, son of Paruṭi, goldsmith of the Queen's Household. May all be well with the king [my lord]; may Nabû and Marduk [bless] the king, my lord. [...] year(s) from the palace / [...] they asked [...] of the month [...] / [...] silver / A 'babbar-dil' stone, 3 fingers broad, / a crystal ornament — / I gave (them) to Matanaḫ-ili, / the doorkeeper, / together with a letter, / saying: 'Let the king, my lord, / decide — whether he gave (it) / or whether he did not give (it). / Let the king, my lord, inquire.'

Daily Life

Astronomy & MathematicsReligion & Myth

SAA 08 001. Thunder in Ab, King Ill (RMA 257) [weather]

1. In the month of Ab, if the Storm-god raises his voice and the sky is overcast, the sky pours down rain, lightning flashes, [and] waters are held back in the underground spring — 1. If in a day without clouds the Storm-god cries out, darkness: ditto. Famine will be in the land. Because of this unfavorable body-sign, the king, my lord, should not speak from his heart [i.e., speak out / act on impulse]. This illness belongs to that year. As many of the people as are ill — all [will be] well. Turn back [to favor], O king my lord: he who fears the gods, those [gods] day and night the gods intercede for him […]

Daily LifeReligion & MythAstronomy & Mathematics

SAA 10 044. Timing a Journey of the King (ABL 1141+) [from astrologers]

[To the king, our lord,] / [your servants Balasî] / [and Nabû-aḥḥē-erība.] / [May there be well-being] for the king [our lord.] / [May Nabû (and)] Marduk bless the king / our lord. / Concerning the journey to the city [NN] / about which the king our lord / sent word to us: / if the king is at Eanna / in the month of Tishri (month VII), it is propitious / for the journey. / Or else the king may say: / 'No, [I will not …]' / [They] said [(to us):] / 'This month, / the road / is clear; / let it be released (for travel). / The month of arrival — / let the king go! / Let the ground be kissed. / Let sacrifices / be performed.'

Daily LifeReligion & MythAstronomy & Mathematics

SAA 10 206. Prayers and Rituals against Retrograding Mars (ABL 1401) [from exorcists]

[May Nabû (and) Marduk] bless [the king, my lord]. [Concerning the planet] Mars, [about which the king, my lord] sent me a message: [The king, my lord] does not know [how/when ... ] ... it is — [... ] ... [Within the constellation] Virgo it moves, [the 'leap' of] the locust — [... ] ... ... [It] bears [radi]ance. [... evil/ominous for] Subartu. [... ] these we remove. [The namburbi-ritual and] the lifted-hand prayers [before the planet Mars —] [... ] constantly/regularly. [The ritual performance:] there is no [sin/fault]. [May the heart] [of the king, my lo]rd [be glad ... ]

Daily LifeReligion & MythAstronomy & Mathematics

SAA 10 259. Who to Come out Next? (ABL 0364) [from exorcists]

To the king, our lord, your servants Adad-šumu-uṣur (and) Marduk-šakin-šumi: may there be well-being for the king, our lord; may Nabû (and) Marduk bless the king, our lord. Concerning the personnel of the king, our lord, about whom he wrote to us: 'Is it not you who are holding (them) back? Which (ones) of the first group have come out? The second group, who have not yet performed (their duty) — let them come out tomorrow and perform (it).' The king, our lord, knows which (ones) of the first group have performed (their duty) (and) which (ones) of the first group have not performed (their duty). We ourselves — how should we know? May (they) proceed under the protection of the king, the lord; may Nabû lead (them) out (and) let them perform (their duty).

~665 BCE·Neo-AssyrianOur engine

SAA 13 073. Complaint of Sickness (ABL 0203)

To the king, my lord: your servant Nergal-šarrani. May there be peace for the king, my lord. May Nabû and Marduk bless the king, my lord, exceedingly. This month, on this very day, I have been ill since the house [where I fell sick]. It is a colic — that is what it is. Since the house where it seized me, the physicians examined [me]; they diagnosed [it as] colic. [They said:] 'The hand of Venus [is upon you] — you are sick. [It is] because of the heat of the fire that I am afraid. Without the king I cannot act.' Now, therefore, I have written to the king, my lord. By the word of the king, let [a remedy] be chosen; let [it] be performed. May [my] illness be made to pass.

Daily LifeReligion & Myth

~655 BCE·Neo-AssyrianOur engine

Ashurbanipal 001

Documents Ashurbanipal's forced resettlement of conquered populations into Egypt and the Levantine town of Qirbit — a concrete case of Assyrian demographic engineering as an instrument of imperial control.

Ashurbanipal 002

Lists nine deities who legitimise Ashurbanipal's rule, each sponsoring a different royal quality — a snapshot of the theological machinery the Neo-Assyrian court used to underwrite imperial authority.

Ashurbanipal 003

Claims divine sanction for Ashurbanipal's literacy — the gods granted him 'a broad mind' to master the scribal arts — embedding scholarly kingship ideology at the heart of Assyrian royal self-presentation.

Ashurbanipal 004

Claims divine sanction not just for Ashurbanipal's military power but for his scribal learning — one of the clearest royal assertions that literacy itself was a gift of the gods and a mark of legitimate kingship.

Ashurbanipal 005

Claims divine sanction for Ashurbanipal's legendary scribal literacy — a rare royal boast that a king personally mastered cuneiform learning, framing intellectual mastery as a god-given mark of legitimate rule.

Ashurbanipal 006

Claims Ashurbanipal completed Esarhaddon's unfinished temples — including Eḫursaggalkurkurra at Aššur — framing construction piety as dynastic continuity and divine sanction for his kingship.

Ashurbanipal 007

Records Ashurbanipal's restoration of Marduk's chariot and shrine roof, linking Assyrian royal piety toward Babylon's chief god to the ideological balancing act of ruling both Assyria and Babylonia simultaneously.

Ashurbanipal 008

Documents Ashurbanipal's restoration of Sîn and Nusku to their temples and his refurbishment of sanctuaries across Assyria and Akkad, anchoring the king's legitimacy in cultic patronage rather than military conquest.

Ashurbanipal 009

Attests the Sargonid practice of legitimating a crown prince through divine pre-election — Sîn's nomination in the womb — positioning Ashurbanipal's rule as cosmically ordained before Esarhaddon's formal designation.

Ashurbanipal 010

Ashurbanipal's titulature — king of Assyria, Babylon, Sumer, and Akkad simultaneously — encapsulates the ideological claim that one ruler could hold the entire Mesopotamian world-order, north and south, under a single divine mandate.

Ashurbanipal 011

Declares Ashurbanipal's kingship divinely foreordained from the womb by Aššur, Sîn, Šamaš, Adad, and Ištar — anchoring Sargonid legitimacy theology in a chain of gods stretching from conception to coronation.

Ashurbanipal 012

Records Ashurbanipal's lavish furnishing of Ezida at Borsippa — an ebony bed for Marduk, silver wild-bull guardians, and 83 talents of zaḫalû-metal — documenting Assyrian royal patronage of the great Babylonian sanctuaries.

Ashurbanipal 013

Preserves Ashurbanipal's own account of his divine mandate, naming seven patron deities across Assyrian and Babylonian pantheons — evidence of deliberate theological synthesis at the height of Sargonid imperial ideology.

Ashurbanipal 014

Fuses two registers of Sargonid kingship in a single text: the lone-archer lion hunt staged as cosmic spectacle, and the Addaru akītu-festival linking royal legitimacy to the queen of the gods.

Ashurbanipal 015

Ashurbanipal claims the wisdom of the antediluvian sage Adapa as personal divine endowment — coupling scribal mastery with military might to justify one king's embodiment of both priestly and warrior ideals.

Ashurbanipal 016

Chronicles the chaotic succession crisis in Elam after Urtaku's death — rival claimants dying of mouse-bite and dropsy before the demon-like Teumman seized the throne — framing Assyrian intervention as cosmic necessity.

Ashurbanipal 017

Records Elamite court violence — the killing of Indabibi and enthronement of Ḫumban-ḫaltaš III — framed as divinely ordained Assyrian dominance, linking Sargonid royal ideology directly to datable Elamite dynastic upheaval c. 655 BCE.

Ashurbanipal 018

Preserves Ashurbanipal's account of Elamite vassal Indabibi's submission — fragmentary but direct evidence of how Assyrian royal inscriptions legitimised dominance over post-Teumman Elam.

Ashurbanipal 019

Documents Assyrian military operations against Elamite royal survivors after the fall of Teumman, then records a diplomatic rupture: Ummanigaš detained Ashurbanipal's envoy and broke off communication — a prelude to renewed Assyrian-Elamite war.

Ashurbanipal 020

Records Ashurbanipal's desecration of Elamite royal tombs and the repatriation of Nanāya's cult statue to Uruk after 1,635 years — anchoring a precise, self-serving Assyrian chronology of divine abandonment and imperial restoration.

Ashurbanipal 021

Lists cult centers and temple furnishings restored by Ashurbanipal — including Emeslam at Cuthah, seat of Nergal — documenting the king's systematic program of sanctuary patronage across Assyria and Babylonia.

Ashurbanipal 022

Records Ashurbanipal's furnishing of Marduk's sanctuary at Babylon — an ebony bed clad in gold, silver pirkus weighing six talents each — charting the Assyrian king's calculated piety toward the Babylonian god after decades of fraught Assyro-Babylonian conflict.

Ashurbanipal 023

(1) [For the goddess Mul]lis[s]u, exalted ruler, the pre-eminent one among the Igīgū and Anunnakū gods, the most splendid of goddesses, the que[en of que]ens, the Ištar worthy of praise, who is endo[w]ed with sexual charm (and) filled with awe-inspiring radiance, the supreme lady whose lordly majesty is the most outstanding (and) whose divinity is the greatest among the gods of [a]ll settlements, the very competent one, the lady of all things that (are found) in the whole (lit. “territory”) of heav[e]n and netherworld, [the one who holds] the bond of the bright firmament, who[se] place is…

Ashurbanipal 024

(1) I conquered, plund[ered, ...] the city Birtu-ša-Adad-rēmanni, of/which [...] the Manneans.

Ashurbanipal 025

(1) Teumman, <who>, during a loss of (all) reason, said to his son: “Shoot the bow!”

Ashurbanipal 026

(1) Teumman, the king of the land Elam who had been struck during a mighty battle (and) whose hand Tammarītu, his eldest son, had grasped — they fled in order to save his (Teumman’s) life (and) slipped into the forest. With the support of (the god) Aššur and goddess Ištar, I killed them. I cut off their head(s) in front of one another.

Ashurbanipal 027

(1) The head of Teum[man, the king of the land Elam], which a common soldier in my army [had cut off] in the midst of bat[tle]. They dispatched (it) quickly to As[syria] to (give me) the good ne[ws].

Ashurbanipal 028

(1) Ur[t]aku, an in-law of Teumman who had been struck by an a[rro]w (but) had not (yet) died, called out to an Assyrian to c[ut of]f his (Urtaku’s) own head, saying “Come here (and) cut off (my) head. Carry (it) before the king, your lord, and obtain fame.”

Ashurbanipal 029

(1) Itunî, a eunuch of Teumman, the king of the land Elam, whom he (Teumman) insolently sent again and again before me, saw my mighty battle array and, with his iron belt-dagger, cut with his own hand (his) bow, the emblem of his strength.

Ashurbanipal 031

(1) [Battle line of Ashurbanipal, king of A]ssyria, the one who established the de[feat of the land Elam].

Ashurbanipal 032

(1) The defeat of the troops of Teumman, the king of [the land Elam], which Ashurbanipal, [great king, strong king], king of the world, king of Assyria, [had brought about] (by inflicting) countless (losses) at (the city) Tīl-Tūba, (and during which) he had cast down the corpses of [his (Teumman’s)] w[arriors].

Ashurbanipal 033

(1) The fugitive [U]mmanigaš (Ḫumban-nikaš II), a servant who had grasped my feet. When I gave the command (lit. “at the working of my mouth”) in (the midst of) celebration, a eunuch of mine whom [I had] sent (with him) ushered (him) in[to] the land Madaktu and the city Susa and placed him on the throne of Teu[mman, whom] I [had def]eated.

Ashurbanipal 034

(1) The city (lit. “land”) Madaktu.

Ashurbanipal 035

(1) I, Ashurbanipal, king of the world, king of Assyria, [who] with the support of (the god) Aššur and the goddess Ištar, my lords, conquered my [enemies] (and) achieved my heart’s desire. (3b) Rusâ, the king of the land Urarṭu, heard about the mi[gh]t of (the god) Ašš[ur], my [lo]rd, and fear of my royal majesty overwhelmed him and he (then) sent his envoys to me in Arbela, to inquire about my well-being. I made Nabû-damiq (and) Umbadarâ, envoys of the land Elam, stand before them with writing boards (inscribed with) insolent m[es]sages.

Ashurbanipal 036

(1) (PN₁ and PN₂) uttered grievous blasphemies against (the god) Aššur, the god who created me. I tore out their tongue(s and) flayed them.

Ashurbanipal 038

(1) I, Ashurbanipal, king of the world, king of Assyria, who by the command of the great gods, achieved his heart’s desires: They paraded before [m]e clothing (and) jewelry, royal appurtenances of Šamaš-šu[ma-u]kīn — (my) unfaithful brother — his palace women, his [eun]uchs, his battle troops, a chariot, a processional carriage, [the ve]hicle of his lordly majesty, every necessity of his palace, as much as there was, (and) people — male and female, young (and) old.

Ashurbanipal 039

(1) [... I installed h]im as king [...] ... [...].

Ashurbanipal 040

(1) I surrounded, conquered, (and) plundered the city Ḫamanu, a royal city of the land Elam.

Ashurbanipal 041

(1) I surrounded, conquered, plundered, destroyed, demolished, (and) burned with fire the city Ḫamanu, a royal city of the land Elam.

Ashurbanipal 042

(1) [...] the city [Bīt]-Bunakku, a [(royal)] city [of the land Elam].

Ashurbanipal 043

(1) I, Ashurbanipal, king of the world, king of Assyria, who b[y the command of (the god) Aššur and] the goddess Mullissu, achieved his heart’s desires, surro[und]ed (and) conquered the city Din[šarri, a ci]ty of the land Elam. [I brought] out [chariot]s, wagons, horses, (and) mules and I cou[nted] (them) as booty.

Ashurbanipal 044

(1) I surrounded, conquered, (and) plundered the cit[y] ..., a royal city of the land Elam.