Sumerian·Book

Position in chronology

SAA 04 222. Fragment of a Query (PRT 092) [unclassifiable]

~675 BCE·Neo-Assyrian·P237009

Translation — scholar edition

SAA 4
High confidence
(Beginning destroyed) (2) [... the subject of] this que[ry ......] (Break) (r 1) [......] of the left [......] (r 2) Šumâ [and NN, reporters]. (r 3) [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)].

State Archives of Assyria, volume 4 — scholar edition (ORACC).

Transliteration

[x x x x] ka [x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x] / [x x EN—MU].MU NE-[i x x x x x x x x x x x x x x] / [x x x x] ⸢šá⸣ 150 ⸢x⸣+[x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x] / [o] mšu-ma-[a x x x x x x x x x x x x x x] / [i-na ŠÀ] UDU.NÍTA an-ni-[i GUB-za-am-ma an-na GI.NA GIŠ.ḪUR-MEŠ SILIM-MEŠ] / [UZU]-MEŠ ta-mit ⸢SIG₅⸣-[MEŠ SILIM-MEŠ šá SILIM-tim šá KA DINGIR-ti-ka GAL-ti šuk-nam-ma lu-mur]

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 P237009.

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/P237009/..
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/P237009/.

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