Position in chronology
SAA 08 023. Full Moon on 15th Day (RMA 159) [lunar]
Translation · reference
High confidence(1) If on the 15th day the moon and sun are s[een] together: a strong enemy will raise his weapons against the land; the enemy will tear down the city gates. (5) If the moon does not wait for the sun but se[ts]: raging of lion and w[olf]. (7) If at the appearance of the moon one horn passes the other: the kings of all lands will bec[ome] enemies. (r 1) In Sivan (III) on the 16th day let him take upstream the rope of a b[oat]: his saving protective deity will guide [him] again and again. (r 6) From Issar-šumu-ereš.
Source: Hunger, H. 1992. Astrological Reports to Assyrian Kings. SAA 8. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa08/P336474/
Why it matters
Transliteration
1 UD 15-KÁM 30 u 20 KI a-ḫa-meš ⸢IGI⸣-[MEŠ] / KÚR dan-nu GIŠ.TUKUL-MEŠ-šú / a-na KUR i-na-áš-šá-[a] / KÁ.GAL-MEŠ LÚ.KÚR i-na-[qar] / 1 30 u 20 la ú-qí-ma ir-[bi] / na-an-dur UR.MAḪ u UR.[BAR.RA] / 1 30 ina IGI.LAL-šú SI SI i-⸢ti*⸣-[iq] / LUGAL-MEŠ šá KUR DÙ.A.BI KÚR-[MEŠ] / 1 ina ITI.SIG₄ UD 16-[KÁM] / áš-la ša GIŠ.⸢MÁ?⸣ / a-na ma-ḫi-ir-ti li-iṣ-⸢bat⸣ / dLAMA mu-šal-li-im-[šú] / it-ta-na-ar-[ri] / ša m15—MU—KAM-[eš]
Scholarly note
Astrological report from a court scholar to an Assyrian king, edited by Hermann Hunger (SAA 8, 1992). Celestial and meteorological observation correlated with omens. ORACC text P336474.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/artifacts, P336474). source
Translation excerpted from Hunger, H. 1992. Astrological Reports to Assyrian Kings. SAA 8. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa08/P336474/.
Related tablets
Related sources
Whatever its purpose, this single tablet shows that Babylonian mathematicians, working in base-60, had an arithmetic understanding of right triangles a millennium before Pythagoras was born.
The single most important literary discovery of the 19th century. It rewired the understanding of the Bible's literary context and proved that the Mesopotamian flood tradition is older. It is the oldest surviving epic poetry in human history.
The literary tradition is no longer anonymous from this point. Authorship — the idea that a specific human voice composes a specific work — enters the historical record with her.