Position in chronology
SAA 03 006. Assurbanipal’s Hymn to Tašmetu and Nabû (KAR 122)
Translation · reference
High confidence(1) [Let me praise the wi]se [...], Tašmetu [...], (2) [...] lady, queen [......], (3) [Good-l]ooking, attractive [...], (4) [Goddess] of goddesses, queen of queens [...], (5) Princess of Ešarra, temple of the universe [...], (6) She who beseeches, wife of Nabû, the beloved of [...], (7) She who raises and lowers, sage of Ezida. (8) On the fifth day, monthly, is the procession of Tašmetu; (9) When she emerges from the holy workshop to [our] Nabû, the son of Bel raises his head from the tablet house to the nuptial bedroom, reci[tes ...]: (12) Say something, my Tašmetu, why [......]? (13) Bless…
Source: Livingstone, A. 1989. Court Poetry and Literary Miscellanea. SAA 3. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa03/P336226/
Why it matters
Transliteration
[x pal-kat] ⸢uz⸣-ni dtaš-me-⸢tum⸣ [x x x x x] / [x x x x]+⸢x⸣ NUN-tum šar-ra-⸢tum⸣ [x x x x x] / [ba-al]-ta-ni-tum ku-uz-ba-ni-⸢tum⸣ [x x x x x] / [i-lat] i-la-a-ti šar-rat šar-ra-a-⸢ti⸣ [x x x] / [ša]-nu-kàt É.ŠÁR.RA É kiš-šu-ti AN [x x x] / ⸢mu⸣-ṣal-li-tu ḫi-rat dAG na-ra-am-ti d[x x] / mu-šá-qi-tú mu-šá-píl-tú ⸢NUN⸣.ME É.ZI.⸢DA⸣ [x x] / UD 05-KÁM ITI-šam-ma šá-da-aḫ dtaš-[me-tum] / TAv qi-rib…
Scholarly note
Neo-Assyrian court poetry or literary text, edited by Alasdair Livingstone (SAA 3, 1989). ORACC text P336226.
Attribution
Image: Adapted from Alasdair Livingstone, Court Poetry and Literary Miscellanea (State Archives of Assyria, 3), 1989. Lemmatised by Mikko Luukko, 2019-20, 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/P336226/..
Translation excerpted from Livingstone, A. 1989. Court Poetry and Literary Miscellanea. SAA 3. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa03/P336226/.
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.
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.
The literary tradition is no longer anonymous from this point. Authorship — the idea that a specific human voice composes a specific work — enters the historical record with her.