Position in chronology
SAA 10 033. A Mongoose Under the King’s Chariot (ABL 0385) [from astrologers]
Translation · reference
High confidence(1) To the king, my lord: your servant Issar-šumu-ereš. Good health to the king, my lord! May Nabû and Marduk bless the king, my lord! (6) As to what the king, my lord, wrote to me: "Does (the omen) '(If something) passes between the legs of a man' apply to something that came out from underneath a chariot?" — it does apply. (11) The king, my lord, say[s]: "'The legs of a m[an]' (means) 'legs' (only) when (something literally) emerges between a man's (legs); that [mongoose passed] between [...]" — perhaps [...] (Break) (r 1) We still take it as a portent. The [mongoose] pa[ssed] from the left…
Source: Parpola, S. 1993. Letters from Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars. SAA 10. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa10/P334261/
Why it matters
Transliteration
a-na LUGAL EN-ia / ARAD-ka m15—MU—KAM-eš / lu DI-mu a-na LUGAL EN-ia / dPA u dAMAR.UTU / a-na LUGAL EN-ia lik-ru-bu / ša LUGAL be-li iš-pur-an-ni / ma-a ú-la? ina bi-rit pu-ri-di / a-me-li e-ti-iq / ina UGU ša šap-la GIŠ.GIGIR-e / tu-ṣu-u-ni ina UGU-ḫi šu-⸢u*⸣ / LUGAL be-li i-qab-[bi] / ma-a pu-ri-di ⸢a⸣-[me-li] / pu-ri-di ki-ma ⸢bi*-rit*⸣ [pu-ri-di] / ša LÚ ú-⸢ṣa⸣ [dNIN.KILIM] / šu-u bi-⸢rit⸣ [x…
Scholarly note
Letter from a scholar (astrologer, exorcist, physician, lamentation-priest) to Esarhaddon or Ashurbanipal, edited by Simo Parpola (SAA 10, 1993). ORACC text P334261.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) ? — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/artifacts, P334261). source
Translation excerpted from Parpola, S. 1993. Letters from Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars. SAA 10. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa10/P334261/.
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