SAA 08 552. Meteor (RMA 246E) [occasional]

~670 BCE·Neo-Assyrian·P238627

Translation — scholar edition

SAA 8

High confidence

(1) [If a meteor flashes from east] to west [and sets]: the main army of the enemy [will fall]. (4) If a star flares up again and again, ... [...] is scattered [...]: the ruler in ... [......]. (Rest destroyed)

State Archives of Assyria, volume 8 — scholar edition (ORACC).

Spotted an error? Suggest a correction — confirmed corrections feed the engine's knowledge base.

Transliteration

[1 MUL—GAL TA dUTU.È.A] / a-na dUTU.ŠÚ.⸢A⸣ [SUR-ma ir-bi] / ERIM KÚR ina ⸢DUGUD⸣-[šú ŠUB-ut] / 1 MUL im-šu-uḫ im-šu-[uḫ-ma] / iš-kun iš-kun-⸢ma⸣ [x x x] / is-sa-pi-[iḫ x x x] / NUN ina KI ⸢x⸣+[x x]

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 P238627.

Attribution

Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.earth/artifacts, P238627). 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/P238627/.

Related tablets

Related sources

~1800 BCE

Plimpton 322

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.