The tablet presented here in honour of C. J. Gadd is the property of Signor Giancarlo Ligabue of Venice. The writer wishes to thank this gentleman for permission to publish it, and also to express his gratitude to Signora Ligabue-Mazza for making necessary arrangements so that the original could be studied at leisure. Thanks are also due to Dr. Franz Köcher, who read through the first draft of the purely medical portion of the Middle Assyrian tablet and from his unique knowledge of this kind of text made valuable suggestions and supplied references to similar passages. He is not, however, responsible for the opinions expressed.

This tablet, of baked clay, is one of the small number of Middle Assyrian library tablets, and contains 62 lines of script, most of them perfectly preserved. The writing begins on the obverse, is continued on the reverse and top edge, and the four last lines are put on the left edge (Plates V–VI). The first thirty-one lines prescribe treatment for a pregnant woman suffering from colic. Rulings divide this section into four subsections. The first two prescribe treatment for two consecutive days. The third offers further treatment in case that of the first two days was ineffective. The last offers still another treatment for the same trouble, not specifically related to the previous ones. Line 32 is a kind of colophon, which may have been composed for the first time by the scribe of this tablet, or he may have copied it from his original. In either case it proves that these treatments were part of a larger whole, but for some reason (the third word of the line is unintelligible) the rest was not known or was disregarded. Lines 33–62 contain two incantations for use with women in childbirth, taken from a source different from that of the prescriptions.

In recent numbers of this journal, P. R. S. Moorey has, as readers will remember, contributed two very useful articles, attempting to reconstruct certain operations of the Oxford (Weld)—Field Museum excavations at Kish (1923–1933), which had never till then been adequately reported. For this purpose, he had at his disposal both the interim reports published at the time and the unpublished correspondence between Langdon and Watelin, still surviving in the Ashmolean Museum, on which these reports were partly based. Of these two articles, it is perhaps the second which has proved most stimulatingly informative to Mesopotamian archaeologists, since it goes far towards clarifying vitally important stratigraphic evidence, which the excavators at the time were hardly in a position to understand. Moorey's work on the records of the Ingharra sounding had also to take into consideration a great volume of information subsequently acquired by means of comparable excavations elsewhere and a diversity of more recent archaeological studies. This would have been easier if the records themselves had been of the sort which we should today expect from a competent field director, supported by the usual specialist assistants. Instead they present a curious picture of collaboration between a French archaeologist in the field and an American philologist at Oxford. Watelin was doubtless, in Langdon's words “a great archaeologist”; but his reports, translated, interpreted and sometimes “improved on” by Langdon, are in some passages mutually contradictory and in others incomprehensible. There are no sections save for two inadequate diagrams; plans, only of selected buildings, and approximate levels are only occasionally given in feet or metres beneath an arbitrary “plain-level” or below the surface of the mound, (which naturally undulates precipitately). Unhappily Watelin died in 1934, the year in which the outstanding report was published, having made clear that he regarded it only as “an interim record of work still proceeding”.

The interest shown by Professor Gadd in all aspects of Babylonian literature is sufficiently well-known to justify the publication in his honour of two pieces from a Šurpu-type litany which now completes one of a series of texts hitherto known only from other fragments (Plates XXXVIII–XL).

Among the tablets found in the Nabû temple at Nimrud in 1958 were two fragments (ND4389; 4405/77 = A) which, though physically touching are regrettably too broken at the juncture to provide a continuous text. This loss is, however, not serious since the intervening text (ll. 11′–30′; 80′–93′) is provided by a Šurpu-type text (AO 6775 = B) already published by Nougayrol. A further small fragment giving the left side of ten lines (K. 7164 = C), published by Reiner, was classified as Type I.2 and identified with that published by Nougayrol. To the 3 8 lines thus previously known can be added a further 56 lines from which it is clear that the deities with their entourages and shrines were first invoked to remove any curse (lipšur). These were followed by the months of the year and by the days of the month. The catchline on the reverse of ND 4405/77 (KUREnlil) indicates that at Kalḫu this text preceded that on which the mountains and rivers were invoked for the same purpose. Since ‘Mt. Sābu, the home of Enlil’ begins the latter tablet (Reiner Type I.1) it is probable that our present text (Reiner Type I.2) should be placed before it and that the Litany type numbers be re-arranged accordingly.

It seems appropriate to select as a subject for discussion in honour of my friend C. J. Gadd, some long lost bones, now resuscitated, from Arpachiyah, for these relate to material published in the second volume of this Journal, thirty-six years ago, by which time each of us had written a first article for a periodical which was destined to be long lived.

For the sake of younger students it may be necessary to recall that Arpachiyah, a small prehistoric site, about four miles east of Nineveh was the first archaeological expedition directly sponsored by the British School of Archaeology in Iraq, in 1933. The excavations were directed by me and published jointly with a colleague, J. Cruikshank Rose, with whom I had previously worked at Ur. We were accompanied by my wife who shared the work with us, and never has so small a supervisory staff worked harder or with more enjoyment and better reward.

Selon la table des matières K. 1352, le “chapitre” X (Multabiltum) de la série canonique de l'extispicine renfermait une quinzième tablette commençant par: “Si le Présage est comme un couvercle”. Il ne semble pas que cette tablette même nous ait été conservée, ou, du moins, qu'elle ait été publiée jusqu'à présent.

On peut pourtant s'en faire quelque idée en relisant le texte bien connu K. 2130 (duplic. BM. 67404) où ce “signe” revient plusieurs fois (l. 27, 30, 35), assorti de qualifications diverses mais toujours accompagné de “présages historiques”. De tels présages sont d'ailleurs une caractéristique constante de ce texte, ainsi que l'examen de base du Présage, c'est-à-dire: du foie, dans son aspect global.

Plus directement rattachés sans aucun doute à Bārûtu X, tabl. 15, il nous reste également quelques fragments importants de Recueils de variantes commentés qui devaient s'y rapporter et qui couvrent aussi, probablement ou sûrement, d'autres parties de Multabiltum, si ce n'est davantage encore, comme par exemple 83–1–18, 458 dont la première colonne s'applique au “Chapitre” IX (Ḫašû), d'après le duplicat K. 1999: IV 10–18.

Le fragment du Louvre AO 7756 est un commentaire de ce genre encore inédit.

Lorsque l'invitation nous fut adressée de nous associer à l'hommage que des amis du professeur C. J. Gadd se proposaient de lui offrir à l'occasion de son 75e anniversaire, notre acceptation fut immédiate. Comment ne pas désirer témoigner de cette façon l'attachement que l'on porte à un collègue orientaliste dont une partie de la carrière se déroula à Ur, à quelques dizaines de kilomètres de Lagash ou de Larsa où nous étions nous-même, il est vrai à une date plus récente. Cependant nous avions aussi une dette à régler à l'égard de C. J. Gadd et ceci nous amène à une confession: en 1931 alors que nous commencions à Tello notre carrière mésopotamienne, nous avions fait à Bagdad l'acquisition du A Sumerian Keading-Book, persuadé qu'avec lui les inscriptions sumériennes que nous comptions bien découvrir, n'auraient plus pour nous ni mystère, ni secret … Nous devons à la justice de dire que si cela nous permit la lecture de quelques briques de Gudéa, d'Ur-Ningirsu et d'Ugme, il devint rapidement évident qu'il nous faudrait choisir entre deux voies: ou l'épigraphie, ou l'archéologie. Nous avons choisi l'archéologie et c'est pourquoi, aujourd'hui, nous offrons à l'heureux jubilaire non pas des textes mais quelques monuments encore inédits, sortis du sol de l'antique Larsa, le dernier en novembre 1967.

The title abu Amurrim means literally “father of Amurrum”. It is attested for five rulers of the Old Babylonian period: Kudur-Mabuk, Warad-Sin, Rim-Sin, Hammurabi and Ammiditana.

There are also two published texts in which it is not certain whether the bearer of the title was a king or, like Kudur-Mabuk, a ruler of equivalent status. UET 5 62 is quoted in full below; for the moment it will be sufficient to note Kupper's plausible suggestion that in that text the person referred to as king is Warad-Sin, whereas the abu Amurrim is Kudur-Mabuk.

Kupper has also suggested that in PBS 8/1 79 the abu Amurrim is Ipiq-Ištar, the king of Malgûm. The text records a MU.TÚM delivery of two head of cattle by a certain Ipiq-Ištar, AD.DA MAR.TU. Here there is nothing in the context to suggest the latter had royal status; the only reason for making the suggestion was that elsewhere the bearers of that title were either certainly of royal status or, as in UET 5 62, probably of royal status.

The Babylonian day began and ended with sunset, apparently the disappearance of the rim of the orb. In practice the umu was divided into two, the light, or day, also UD, umu, and dark. Except at the equinoxes, light and dark are unequal in length. In the purely theoretical calendar year of 360 days, certainly never in official use after the beginning of the Third Dynasty of Ur, perhaps never before that, the twelve months of 30 days were given the names of the true lunar months used in the official government calendars which were adjusted periodically to relate 1st Nisan to the spring equinox. In the theoretical calendar 1st Nisan is always the equinox. Thus the night of 1st Adar was theoretically equal to the 1st Iyyar daylight in length. Light and dark, whatever their length, were each divided into three watches; thus the watch, EN.NUN maṣṣartu, also varied seasonally. The routine for reliefs of guards or observers in ancient times can be inferred from Egyptian practice; no precise information seems to be available from cuneiform texts, but it would be surprising if a team for the maṣṣartu was not divided into two, with alternate reliefs in each half-team. The seasonal variations in time-lengths for duty, and other necessities of daily life, required some measurement, by a standard, of seasonal beru and other time units.

Unter den an Marduk gerichteten Gebetsbeschwörungen nehmen die von L. W. King in Babylonian Magic and Sorcery (London 1896) zuerst veröffentlichten Gebete Nr. 11 und 12 dadurch einen besonderen Rang ein, dass das erstere zu den wertvollsten Stücken der ganzen Gattung zählt, das zweite aber ein besonders charakteristischer Vertreter des Typs der sogenannten Universalbeschwörung ist (vgl. dazu W. Kunstmann, Die babylonische Gebetsbeschwörung, LSS NF 2, Leipzig 1932). Die letzte Bearbeitung durch E. Ebeling, Die akkadische Gebetsserie “Handerhebung” (Berlin 1953), S. 72fr. konnte trotz einiger zusätzlich verwerteter Bruchstücke beide Gebete noch nicht ganz wiederherstellen. Da nun eine – an sich dringend notwendige – Neubearbeitung aller Gebetsbeschwörungen, die nie zu einer umfassenden Serie zusammengeschlossen waren, erst nach systematischer Durchmusterung der Museen vor allem in London, Berlin und Istanbul sinnvoll ist, wird es manchem willkommen sein, wenn ich die mir bekannten Ergänzungen zu den bisherigen Ausgaben beider Gebete hier in möglichst knapper Form bekanntgebe; eine vollständige Notierung aller Schreibvarianten muss hingegen einer späteren Gesamtausgabe vorbehalten bleiben. Ich danke dem Jubilar, Professor Cyril J. Gadd, für die freundlich gewährte Erlaubnis, 1954 im British Museum Gebetstexte kopieren und kollationieren zu dürfen, ebenso Dr. R. D. Barnett und Dr. Edmond Sollberger für die Genehmigung, 1963 und 1968 einige Nachkollationen vorzunehmen. Die Mehrzahl der unveröffentlichten Stücke lernte ich durch die Kopien von Fr. W. Geers†, die ich teilweise durchsehen konnte, kennen. Der Güte dieses Kollegen habe ich viel zu danken. Einige von den hier gegebenen Ergänzungen konnte ich schon für meine Übersetzung beider Gebete in SAHG 298ff. und 302ff. verwenden. Doch bedürfen auch diese Übersetzungen einiger Korrekturen.