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Tablets from the Sippar Library VIII. Omens from the gall-bladder
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 August 2014
Extract
The present article in the series of Tablets from the Sippar Library presents a tablet of omens from the gall-bladder. It belonged to (and no doubt was written by) an apprentice diviner called Šamaš-ēṭir, who was responsible for at least one other tablet of omens in the library. The text was read and identified as Tablet VI of the omen series Šumma martu from the photographs published here (Figs. 1–2). It has not been possible to collate the tablet in Baghdad and the copy has been prepared from the photographs (Figs. 3–4). The upper third of the obverse is to a large extent illegible, but the subsequent identification of four duplicates, three published and one unpublished, enables a good deal of the text of this composition to be recovered. The currently known manuscripts of Šumma martu VI can be tabulated as follows:
With the identification of the Sippar tablet and its duplicates as Tablet VI of Series 6 (martu, the gall-bladder) of the bārûtu, seven of the ten tablets of this series are now known:
Pending a future edition of the series we offer here transliterations of the previously unavailable sources only, beginning with the Sippar tablet, together with a full translation and notes.
- Type
- Research Article
- Information
- Copyright
- Copyright © The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 1999
References
1 The Sippar tablet is published by kind permission of the University of Baghdad and the Iraqi Department of Antiquities and Heritage, the fragment K 6050 with the consent of the Trustees of the British Museum. Dr Al-Rawi's work was again supported by a grant in aid from the British School of Archaeology in Iraq. We also thank A. R. George, who first identified the Sippar tablet as a duplicate of CT 31 26 and, at the authors' request, collated the British Museum tablets.
2 1M 124450 (83/2246), a tablet of Šaumma ubānu, where the name is written mdUTU-SUR DUMU LÚ.ŠID ZIMBIR.KI.
3 For a recent discussion of the bārûtu see Starr, , SAAB 6 (1992), 45–53Google Scholar.
4 The publication of this tablet is forthcoming. Only the fragment 83-1-18, 431 was published as CT 30 11.
5 Emend to irašši(TUK!-šú)?
6 The ends of ll. 33–42 are restored after MS A obv. 12′–21′ (K 6050, below).
7 The beginnings of ll. 35–61 are restored from MS D (CT 31 26).
8 M S D obv. 2′: ⌈i-pa?⌉ (coll. ).
9 MS D obv. 3: ina SAG.
10 MS D obv. 4′: us-su-rat.
11 MS A obv. 22′: BE ŠU [ … ]
12 The middles of ll. 44–6 are restored from MS D obv. 10′–12′.
13 MS D obv. 15′: rap-šú (coll.).
14 MS B rev. 2′ // MS D rev. 13: ZÉ UZU ár-mat-ma.
15 B rev. 4′: ZÉ BÀ GAM-uš-m[a.
16 I.e., rubû ina ālīšu ittarradma.
17 B rev. 10′: ZÉ maš-ká[n-šá] T[AG4-ma.
18 B rev. 11′: ZÉ ma]š-ká[n-šá TAG4-ma.
19 I.e., martu maškanša īzibma.
20 Sic, for ta-a-a-ra-tum.
21 Probably either igerranni or igerrīka.
22 MS A rev. 4′ // MS C rev. 5′: ina 15] ZÉ u 150 ZÉ 2 GIŠ.TU[KUL.MEŠ GAR.MEŠ-ma.
23 Or ili(DINGIR)-šú?
24 CAD, arāru B; AHw, arāru ii.
25 K 8100 (CT 28 46 f.) is now joined to K 3946 + 4013 (CT 30 41 f.).
26 naplastu ( IGI.TAB, IGI.BAR), the “flap” (Goetze) or the “view” (Jeyes), is the OB equivalent of the later mazzāzu, “station”. See Goetze, , YOS 10, p. 5Google Scholar; Jeyes, , Old Babylonian Extispicy, p. 53Google Scholar.
27 K 182 + 3038 (CT 28 47 f.) is now joined to K 3143 (CT 28 38).
28 The passage cited in Bezold, , Catalogue, p. 1432Google Scholar, represents the first eight lines of Tablet I of Series 7 of the bārûtu (ubānu, the “finger”). Sm 753 is now joined to K 2484 +.