Mademoiselle J. M. Munn-Rankin, dans une étude fondamentale, a récemment démonté et expliqué les rouages de la vie diplomatique au début du IIème millénaire av.J.C., d'après les archives de Mari. Elle a fort justement rappelé que ces divers mécanismes: traités, mariages entre les Cours, arbitrages, échanges de lettres et de présents, missions, etc. remontent beaucoup plus haut, mais, surtout, qu'étendus à l'Ouest par la fraternité des dynasties amorrhéennes, ils se développérent grandement au cours des siècles ultérieurs, notamment aux XIVème et XIIIème où les témoignages à ce sujet se multiplient.

The brief discussion of warfare in Asia Minor which here follows will be limited to the Hittite period (about 1800–1200 B.C.). It is the only period of Anatolian history illuminated by written sources which are indispensable for deeper penetration into life, motivations and thinking of the ancient. I have to forewarn you that nothing much can be said that has not been said before.

No doubt warfare in Asia Minor goes back to the very beginnings when the land was first settled. But what could be said about warfare in prehistoric times? Only the fortifications of the prehistoric settlements have survived, the weapons found in them; the tombs of their warriors and that which accompanied them into the beyond. These relics acquire significance beyond the antiquarian interest they command as soon as they can be fitted into a comprehensive picture of historical development; as soon as states, archaic and primitive as they may seem, city-states, kingdoms etc., emerge. This is the case in Asia Minor with the beginning of the second millennium B.C.

Vor allem aus zwei Gründen haben die Kriege und die Kriegführung der Assyrer die Historiker seit hundert Jahren besonders interessiert: Erstens haben die Assyrer von einem kleinen und in den Anfangszeiten des Reiches nicht besonders volkreichen Stammland aus das Grossreich aufgebaut, das unter allen Reichen des alten Orients den längsten Bestand hatte und die Voraussetzungen für die späteren Grossreiche der Chaldäer und der Achämeniden schuf. Zweitens lassen die Inschriften wie die Bildwerke die Kriegführung der Assyrer als besonders brutal erscheinen. Wegen der so oft berichteten Massenexekutionen haben moderne Gelehrte nicht selten die Assyrer mit Alfred von Gutschmidt “ein unsäglich scheussliches Volk” genannt, und Soziologen unserer Tage, die wie Alexander Rüstow scharfe Antithesen lieben, lassen an den Assyrern nicht viel Gutes. Assyrien gilt da als das Muster eines Militärstaates, dessen kulturelle Leistung recht bescheiden gewesen sei.

The primary question about Assyrian warfare in the Sargonid period, the constitution of the army, was long ago settled in its broader aspects by Manitius in two able articles of which the conclusions, as far as they go, stand largely unchallenged. Manitius showed that numerically the greater part of the grand army of Assyria was composed of levies raised from the provinces, under the control of the provincial governors, but that there was also a central standing army, which included units drawn from conquered territory, maintained by the king as a safeguard against over-ambitious satraps. As to the numbers concerned, Manitius pointed out that the forces under one governor alone comprised not less than 1500 cavalry and 20,000 archers, suggesting a potential grand army running into hundreds of thousands. This agrees with the fact that in major actions enemy casualties approaching two hundred thousand are claimed, which, even if exaggerated, do indicate the order of the number of troops engaged. Prisoners also are numbered in hundreds of thousands.

Trotz der zahlreichen, bisher durchgeführten Untersuchungen über den Streitwagen im Altertum möchte ich mich hier noch einmal in einem kurzen Referat mit dem Typ des assyrischen Streitwagens und mit seinem Aussehen zu den verschiedenen Zeiten beschäftigen, denn wie im folgenden gezeigt wird, haben sich einige neue Gesichtspunkte ergeben.

Von den bedeutendsten Arbeiten sind in erster Linie zu nennen die Abhandlungen von E. Unger, Der Rennwagen in Vorderasien, U. Popplow, Pferd und Wagen im Alten Orient, J. Wiesner, Fahren und Reiten in Alteuropa und im Alten Orient aus den Jahren 1929, 1934 und 1939, sowie die ausgezeichneten lexigraphisch-kulturgeschichtlichen Untersuchungen A. Salonens über die Landfahrzeuge, die 1951 erschienen sind.

Hittite political history consists of a continuous series of wars. The Hittite empire, situated amidst bellicose neighbours and lacking natural frontiers, called for rulers whose power relied on strong armed forces. Every king, when he ascended the throne, at first had to fight against aggressive enemies, in order to keep the inherited territory intact, whereas later on during his reign, he usually endeavoured to expand its borders.

The sources on the warfare of Hittite kings are rather numerous; they can be traced from the very beginning of the Old kingdom until its disappearance (ca. 1600–1200 B.C.).

Der Titel meines Vortrags scheint von dem Gegenstand unserer Tagung abzuführen. Ich hoffe, man wird gleich sehen, dass er ebenfalls ein militärisches Problem in sich schliesst.

Die ERIN-Manda (oder EREM-Manda) treten zuerst in dem Text der Narâmsin-Sage auf, die wir jetzt dank der Sultantepe-Tafeln und ihres verdienstvollen Entzifferers in ihren ganzen Umfang überschauen. Damals traten ERIN-Manda von Kleinasien aus einen Siegeszug über alle vorderasiatischen Länder bis Elam hin an. Die Heere des Königs von Akkad wurden immer wieder geschlagen, so dass ihm der Mut gänzlich entfällt. Dann aber wandte sich plötzlich das Geschick. Der Erzähler erkennt darin nur den unerforschlichen Willen der Götter. – Nun darf man diese Erzählung gewiss nicht in ihren Einzelheiten als geschichtlich nehmen; aber wenn in der späteren Literatur Narâmsin als Unglücksherrscher gilt, während in Wirklichkeit sein Sohn Sarkali-Šarri noch ein Vierteljahrhundert ungestört weiter regierte, ehe das Unheil über Akkad zusammenschlug, so dürfen wir doch schliessen, dass der Sage ein wirkliches Ereignis, ein vorübergehendes Unheil zugrunde liegt.

U.E.T. VI, Part II will consist of about 150 plates of copies prepared by C. J. Gadd from some 200 pieces varying in size from fairly well-preserved four column tablets to small fragments and “buns” inscribed with but a few lines of text. Tentatively, the arrangement of the volume is planned to be as follows:

Lamentations. All in all there are nineteen tablets and fragments inscribed with several different lamentations. Thus, there is a fragment which is probably part of the long known Nippur lament, which begins with a bitter wailing over the destruction of Nippur and Sumer as a whole, and ends on a note of joy celebrating their delivery and restoration by king Išme Dagan of Isin. There is a well preserved tablet inscribed with lines 110–171 of “The Curse of Agade”, the historiographic lament which concerns the rise and fall of Sargon's capital, Agade. There is a fragment inscribed with part of a composition which may be designated “The Lamentation over the Destruction of Erech and Sumer”, for which there are available at present four published and five unpublished pieces; as yet only a small part of this composition can be restored, a passage of about 120 lines containing the partially preserved text of kirugu 4, 5, and 6. Six of the Ur pieces are inscribed, not unexpectedly, with “The Lamentation over the Destruction of Ur”, which I published some 25 years ago as no. 12 of the Oriental Institute's Assyriological Studies. Five of these are excellently preserved tablets, but since the text has been almost completely available in published form for many years, the new Ur material will add but little that is new except, of course, a considerable supply of new variants which should prove to be of some significance.

Among the small minority of literary texts from Ur written in Akkadian probably the most interesting are two presented here, which are of a specially vivid and humorous character. But while the first was meant very seriously, and becomes rather absurd only through the over-earnestness of the composer, the second appears to be ludicrous of set purpose, and as such would once have been thought surprising. But in recent years several glimpses have been caught of a thin vein of humour underlying the massive strata of Babylonian gravity. Without more introduction we proceed to

U.16900 F is a complete tablet, long and narrow (13 × 5 cms.), having the external peculiarity of a hole pierced from edge to edge. This has been carefully located, for if a rod is inserted and held horizontally the tablet rests with its obverse at a slope convenient for reading, but in order to read the reverse the tablet must be held; when released it goes back to its former position with obverse facing the reader. Anticipating the contents, we may suppose that it was set up on a support facing an image of the Moon-god, and was designed, with the usual importunity of Babylonian petitioners, to be there incessantly obtruded upon the divine attention until satisfaction was granted.