Position in chronology
SAA 04 105. Should the Assyrian Army Go against a City Named on Papyrus? (AGS 113) [military and political]
Translation · reference
High confidence(1) [Šamaš, great lord], give m[e] a firm positive answer [to what I am as]king you! (2) [The city whose name is] written [in this papyrus and placed] before your great divinity — (3) [should ...], the eunuchs, the magnates, (and) the arm[y of Esarhaddon, king] of As[syria, march] against [......] (Break) (r 1) [Be present in this ram], place (in it) a firm positive answer, favorable designs, [favorable, propitious omens by the] oracular command of your great divinity, [and may I see (them)]. (r 3) May (this query) go [to your great divinity, O Šamaš], great [lord], and may an oracle be given…
Source: Starr, I. 1990. Queries to the Sungod: Divination and Politics in Sargonid Assyria. SAA 4. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa04/P336090/
Why it matters
Transliteration
[dUTU EN GAL-ú šá a-šal]-lu-ka an-nam GI.NA a-pal-⸢an⸣-[ni] / [URU šá MU-šú ina ni-a-ri an-na]-a šaṭ-ru-ma i-na IGI DINGIR-ti-ka GAL-ti [GAR-un] / [x x x x x x x x] LÚ.SAG-MEŠ LÚ.GAL-MEŠ ERIM-MEŠ e-mu-⸢qí⸣ / [šá mdaš-šur—ŠEŠ—SUM-na LUGAL] KUR—⸢aš⸣-[šur].KI i-na UGU [x x x x] / [i-na ŠÀ UDU.NÍTA NE-i GUB-za-am-ma] an-na GI.NA GIŠ.ḪUR-MEŠ ⸢SILIM⸣-[MEŠ] / [UZU-MEŠ ta-mit SIG₅-MEŠ SILIM-MEŠ šá…
Scholarly note
Extispicy query addressed to Šamaš, the sungod and patron of divination, edited by Ivan Starr (SAA 4, 1990). The king asks the deity to render a yes/no verdict on a political or military question. ORACC text P336090.
Attribution
Image: Adapted from Ivan Starr, Queries to the Sungod: Divination and Politics in Sargonid Assyria (State Archives of Assyria, 4), 1990. Lemmatised by Mikko Luukko, 2018, as part of the research programme of the Alexander von Humboldt Chair in the Ancient History of the Near and Middle East at LMU Munich (Karen Radner, Humboldt Professorship 2015). The annotated edition is released under the Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike license 3.0. Please cite this page as http://oracc.org/saao/P336090/..
Translation excerpted from Starr, I. 1990. Queries to the Sungod: Divination and Politics in Sargonid Assyria. SAA 4. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa04/P336090/.
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