Position in chronology
SAA 14 445. Silver Loan (*621-I-21) (TIM 11 25)
Translation · reference
High confidence(1) 10 shekels of silver (r 1) He shall pay [......]. (r 2) [I]f he does not pay, he shall pay in the centre of Nineveh. (r 4) Month Nisan (I), 21st day, eponym year of Bel-iqbi. (r 6) Witness Šarru-isse'a. (r 7) Witness Puṭiše.
Source: Mattila, R. 2002. Legal Transactions of the Royal Court of Nineveh, Part II: Assurbanipal through Sin-šarru-iškun. SAA 14. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa14/P224969/
Why it matters
Transliteration
⸢10? GÍN⸣ KUG.UD / [x x x x x x]-u-a / [x x x x x] SUM-an / ⸢šúm⸣-ma la id-din / ina qab-si NINA.KI SUM-an / ITI.BARAG UD 21-KÁM / lim-mu mEN—E / IGI mMAN—KI-ia / IGI mpu-ṭi-še
Scholarly note
Neo-Assyrian legal transaction at the royal court of Nineveh, edited by Raija Mattila (SAA 14, 2002). ORACC text P224969.
Attribution
Image: Adapted from Raija Mattila, Legal Transactions of the Royal Court of Nineveh, Part II: Assurbanipal Through Sin-šarru-iškun (State Archives of Assyria, 14), 2002. Lemmatised by Melanie Groß, 2010–2011, as part of the FWF-funded research project "Royal Institutional Households in First Millennium BC Mesopotamia" (S 10802-G18) directed by Heather D. Baker at the University of Vienna. The annotated edition is released under the Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike license 3.0. Please cite this page as http://oracc.org/saao/P224969/..
Translation excerpted from Mattila, R. 2002. Legal Transactions of the Royal Court of Nineveh, Part II: Assurbanipal through Sin-šarru-iškun. SAA 14. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa14/P224969/.
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.
The earliest historical document in human history. Before this, we have lists, accounts, and dedications. Here, for the first time, a ruler tells us what happened — with names, places, and consequences.
The oldest surviving law code in human history. The principle that the state — not the wronged family — defines and enforces justice begins here.