Position in chronology
SAA 08 423. New Moon on 1st Day (RMA 020) [lunar]
Translation · reference
High confidence(1) [If the moon] becomes visible on the 1st day: reliable speech; the land will become happy. (3) If the day reaches its normal length: a reign of long days. (5) If it hails in Shebat (XI): plenty for the people, rising of business. (r 2) Aššur, Šamaš, Nabû, and Marduk have granted a stable throne forever, for [long] days, to the king [my lord]. (r 7) [From] Nabû-iqbi.
Source: Hunger, H. 1992. Astrological Reports to Assyrian Kings. SAA 8. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa08/P237310/
Why it matters
Transliteration
[1 30] UD 01-KÁM IGI-ir / KA GI.NA ŠÀ KUR DÙG-ab / 1 UD ana ŠID-MEŠ-šú GÍD.DA-ik / BALA-e UD-MEŠ GÍD.DA-MEŠ / 1 ina ITI.ZÍZ NA₄ DU-ik / nu-ḫu-uš UN-MEŠ [o] / [ša]-qé-e KI.LAM / [d]aš-šur dUTU dAG u dAMAR.UTU / [GIŠ].GU.ZA šá ki-na-a-ti / [a]-na da-riš a-na UD-MEŠ / [GÍD].⸢DA⸣-MEŠ a-na LUGAL / [be-lí]-⸢ia⸣ it-tan-nu / [šá m]dAG—iq-bi
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 P237310.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/artifacts, P237310). 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/P237310/.
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.