Position in chronology
SAA 10 367. King of Elam Coming to Babylon (CT 53 121) [miscellaneous]
Translation · reference
High confidence(Beginning destroyed) (1) A citizen of [Ba]bylo[n ca]lled [NN] told me [as] follows: "[Now t]hen the king of Elam [...] is coming [to Ba]bylon; [regarding the p]relacy, either the prel[ate ... (Rest destroyed)
Source: Parpola, S. 1993. Letters from Assyrian and Babylonian Scholars. SAA 10. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa10/P313536/
Why it matters
Transliteration
[x x]+⸢x⸣+[x x x x] a ⸢x⸣+[x x x x x] / [i-qab]-bu-niš-šú DUMU [KÁ].DINGIR.⸢RA⸣.[KI] / [ki-i] an-ni-i iq-ṭi-bi-a ⸢ma⸣-[a ú-ma-a] / [an]-⸢nu⸣-rig LUGAL KUR.NIM.MA.⸢KI⸣ [x x x] / [ina KÁ].DINGIR.RA.KI il-la-ka ma-[a x x x] / [LÚv].⸢ŠÀ⸣.TAM-mu-ti šúm-ma LÚv.ŠÀ.⸢TAM⸣ [x x] / [x x x] ⸢x x⸣ i ⸢x x x⸣ [x x x 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 P313536.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/artifacts, P313536). 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/P313536/.
Related tablets
Related sources
A window into the world's first total state. The Ur III administration tracked every animal, every worker, every shekel — for a population in the millions. The level of paperwork was not exceeded until the modern era.
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.