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A Middle Assyrian Tablet of Utukkū Lemnūtu, Tablet 12

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2014

M. J. Geller
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Extract

The Middle Assyrian Tablet BM 130660 adds new material to the latter part of Tablet 12 of Utukkū Lemnūtu, which is imperfectly known from NA and LB sources, mainly from Kuyunjik and Assur. The gaps in the previous publications can now be restored from the MA tablet, together with unpublished duplicates from Kuyunjik, Babylon, Borsippa, and Nimrud.

The bilingual MA tablet is of particular interest because, although in SB dialect, it differs substantially from the NA and LB copies of Tablet 12. Although many of the MA textual variants are purely orthographic, the following types of significant variants can be distinguished:

First, grammatical variants in the MA Akk. may affect the meaning of a passage, such as the MA use of lipparis in place of liprus in the parallel texts (1. 26′). In some cases the MA grammatical variant may indicate a corrupt text, or a misunderstanding of the Sum., as in 1. 30′, in which the MA Akk. reads, “may the wise judges, holy ones of Ištar(?), exclude him from the house”, whereas the NA/LB recension reads correctly, “may the great wise judge Ištar exclude him from the house”.

Type
Research Article
Information
IRAQ , Volume 42 , Issue 1 , Spring 1980 , pp. 23 - 51
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 1980

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References

1 CT 16, 46–49Google Scholar, and Ebeling, E., “Zwei Tafeln der Serie utukku limnûtu”, AfO 16 (1952–1953), 298–304Google Scholar. Ebeling published the tablet (VAT 13660 + 14047) in transliteration only, although the tablet is clear enough to be collated from photographs. I am grateful to Dr. Schramm for pointing out to me that Ebeling had incorrectly read the colophon of the tablet as Tablet 13, instead of 12.

Two tablets, mss. q and r, cited in the footnotes in CT 16 46–47Google Scholar, are from Babylon, but add little to the text of Tablet 12.

2 I am grateful to Professor Wiseman for allowing me to work from his copy and collations of ND 4375, and for the numbers BM 38131 and 36714, which I identified as duplicates. I am also indebted to Professor Lambert for BM 31446 and K 9397, which he identified. For other unpublished Kuyunjik fragments, cf. Borger, R., Bi Or 30 (1973), 175bGoogle Scholar (photograph of K. 4616, to which I have joined K. 5077), and HKL II, 344, 390Google Scholar. Many of the K fragments were identified by Professor Borger and Dr. Schramm.

3 The NA and LB texts can be considered as examples of a single recension, since the texts are relatively uniform in all surviving copies.

4 See notes to ll. 18–20 of the text edition.

5 Langdon, S., “The Legend of the kiškanû”, JRAS 1928, 843 fGoogle Scholar. Cf. Ferrara, A., Nanna-Suen's Journey to Nippur (Rome, 1973), 109Google Scholar.

6 Cf. Lambert, W. G. and Millard, A. R., Atra-ḫasīs (Oxford, 1969), 36–38Google Scholar; and Lambert, W. G., “A Middle Assyrian Tablet of Incantations”, AS 16, 285Google Scholar; in both texts the MA copies appear to be examples of Assyrian recensions.

7 Reiner, E., Šurpu (AfO Beiheft 11, 1970), 2Google Scholar.

8 Cf. Lambert, , AS 16, 283Google Scholar.

9 Cf. ll… 7′, 23′, and 24′, and Lambert, ibid., 284, in which he notes badly written signs, frequent erasures, and textual corruptions.

10 The composite text does not include obv. col. i of the MA tablet, since it is fragmentary and fills no gaps in the series. Additional notes are included on its textual variants.

11 Copies of MSS. B, C, and i have not been made, since these appear in CT 16, 46–49Google Scholar. Although text O is available only in transliteration in AfO 16, 298–304Google Scholar, many changes have been made in Ebeling's transliteration through collations from photographs. The difficulty is that some lines, marked with the symbol (O), were known to Ebeling from the excavation photographs (Assur 17721g.), and are no longer visible on the tablet.