Position in chronology
SAA 15 323. Issuing Barley Rations (CT 53 499)
Translation — scholar edition
SAA 15(Beginning destroyed) (2) in the presence of the king, [my] l[ord ...] (3) barley rations in [...] (4) to Bel-ša[rru-uṣur ...] (5) saying, "[...] barley rations (6) and what [......] (7) [the t]own [......] (Break) (r 1) set asi[de ......] (r 2) will hear [......] (r 3) will retrieve [......] (r 4) let him mov[e ......] (r 5) to the kin[g ......] (r 6) and [......] (Break) (e. 1) [......] I will give him
State Archives of Assyria, volume 15 — scholar edition (ORACC).
Transliteration
⸢x⸣ [x x x x x x x] / ina IGI ⸢LUGAL EN⸣-[ia x x x] / ŠE.PAD-MEŠ ina GIŠ.[x x x x] / a-na mdEN—⸢MAN⸣—[PAB x x x] / ma-a ŠE.PAD-⸢MEŠ⸣ [x x x x] / ù šá [x x x x x] / ⸢URU⸣ [x x x x x x] / ⸢ú⸣-se-e-[x x x x x] / i-šá-am-me [x x x x x] / ú-šá-làḫ [x x x x x] / li-ir-ḫa-⸢áš⸣ [x x x x] / ina UGU ⸢LUGAL⸣ [x x x x] / ⸢ù⸣ [x x x x x x x] / [x x x x x] la-din-šú
Scholarly note
Royal correspondence from Babylonia and the eastern provinces under Sargon II, edited by Andreas Fuchs & Simo Parpola (SAA 15, 2001). ORACC text P313912.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/artifacts, P313912). source
Translation excerpted from Fuchs, A. & Parpola, S. 2001. The Correspondence of Sargon II, Part III: Letters from Babylonia and the Eastern Provinces. SAA 15. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa15/P313912/.
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.
Part of the earliest known body of international diplomatic correspondence. Akkadian, written in cuneiform on clay, was the lingua franca of Late Bronze Age statecraft — used between Egypt, the Hittites, Mitanni, Babylon, Assyria, and the Levantine vassals.