DOCSLIB.ORG

Middle Babylonian Period

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Middle Babylonian Period MESOPOTAMIA MIDDLE BABYLONIAN PERIOD Kathryn Slanski Middle Babylonian is a linguistic term describing the language of documents written in Akkadian in Babylonia (southern Mesopotamia) in the sixteenth through eleventh centuries. Middle Babylonian is also used to designate the historical period of that place and time. The Kingdom of Babylonia, known in international correspondence as màt Kardunia“, was ruled by two successive dynasties during this period.1 Following the collapse of the Old Babylonian Kingdom in 1595, a dynasty identified as Kassite took hold in northern Babylonia and by 1475 had extended control over the south as well. A dynasty claiming to hale from the ancient city of Isin claimed the Babylonian throne in 1157. The Isin II kings ruled for over a century, until 1026. Upstream from Babylon on the Middle Euphrates lay the ›ana Kingdom. The ›ana Kingdom has recently been dated to the Middle Babylonian period,2 and it is likely that the Middle Euphrates region was at times independent and at times a vassal state under foreign control. 1. S L Although there are abundant archaeological and textual sources for this period, these have yet to be systematically studied, and so knowl- edge of the history of the period, including the history of law, is provisional. 1 For the history of Babylonia under the Kassite and Isin II dynasties, see Brinkman, “Kassiten,” and “Isin. B. II. Dynastie.” For a general overview of the Kassites, see Sommerfeld, “Kassites . .” Regnal dates follow Brinkman, “Chronology...” 2 Podany, “Middle Babylonian...” 486 1.1 Public-display inscriptions Neither law codes nor royal edicts composed during this latter part of the second millennium have been found.3 However, a new kind of public-display inscription is introduced during the Middle Baby- lonian period: the Babylonian Entitlement narû. Formerly known as kudurrus (“boundary markers” or “boundary stones”) recent research indicates that these artifacts stood not on field boundaries but in temples.4 They were known to the Babylonians simply as narû “(stone) monument,” and rather than marking bound- aries, their function was to commemorate acquisition of entitlement to a source of income in perpetuity. In most cases, this source of income was a plot of agricultural land, but income from temple prebends and real income stemming from release from traditional tax or labor obligations due the crown are also attested. The Entitle- ment narûs (henceforth simply narûs) commemorated acquisition to an entitlement and were intended to ensure that the entitlement be permanent, that is, inheritable, and remain part of the recipient’s family holdings theoretically forever. The narû inscriptions have formal characteristics both of monu- mental and legal texts. On the one hand, like other (i.e., royal) mon- umental inscriptions from Mesopotamia, the texts are written in archaizing script and elevated language. They are inscribed on stone and partnered with pictorial images of divine symbols or scenes of royal or cultic activity. On the other hand, the inscriptions charac- teristically open with a pithy description of the entitlement and go on to list witnesses to the entitlement transaction, give account of sealing of the entitlement, and provide a time and place of the trans- action—all elements associated with Mesopotamian legal records. Regardless of their formal classification, the narûs are a rich source of information for Middle Babylonian social and legal history. 1.2 Private or Archival Legal Records Far fewer private legal texts are available from the Middle Babylonian period than from the preceding Old Babylonian and succeeding Neo- 3 Note, however, that the text of the Law Stele of Hammurabi was known in the scribal schools of this time. See Finkelstein, “Hammurapi Law Tablet . .,” and Borger, BAL I, 2–4. 4 See Slanski, Study....
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Neo-Assyrian Treaties As a Source for the Historian: Bonds of Friendship, the Vigilant Subject and the Vengeful KingS Treaty
    WRITING NEO-ASSYRIAN HISTORY Sources, Problems, and Approaches Proceedings of an International Conference Held at the University of Helsinki on September 22-25, 2014 Edited by G.B. Lanfranchi, R. Mattila and R. Rollinger THE NEO-ASSYRIAN TEXT CORPUS PROJECT 2019 STATE ARCHIVES OF ASSYRIA STUDIES Published by the Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project, Helsinki in association with the Foundation for Finnish Assyriological Research Project Director Simo Parpola VOLUME XXX G.B. Lanfranchi, R. Mattila and R. Rollinger (eds.) WRITING NEO-ASSYRIAN HISTORY SOURCES, PROBLEMS, AND APPROACHES THE NEO- ASSYRIAN TEXT CORPUS PROJECT State Archives of Assyria Studies is a series of monographic studies relating to and supplementing the text editions published in the SAA series. Manuscripts are accepted in English, French and German. The responsibility for the contents of the volumes rests entirely with the authors. © 2019 by the Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project, Helsinki and the Foundation for Finnish Assyriological Research All Rights Reserved Published with the support of the Foundation for Finnish Assyriological Research Set in Times The Assyrian Royal Seal emblem drawn by Dominique Collon from original Seventh Century B.C. impressions (BM 84672 and 84677) in the British Museum Cover: Assyrian scribes recording spoils of war. Wall painting in the palace of Til-Barsip. After A. Parrot, Nineveh and Babylon (Paris, 1961), fig. 348. Typesetting by G.B. Lanfranchi Cover typography by Teemu Lipasti and Mikko Heikkinen Printed in the USA ISBN-13 978-952-10-9503-0 (Volume 30) ISSN 1235-1032 (SAAS) ISSN 1798-7431 (PFFAR) CONTENTS ABBREVIATIONS ............................................................................................................. vii Giovanni Battista Lanfranchi, Raija Mattila, Robert Rollinger, Introduction ..............................
    [Show full text]
  • Who Is the Daughter of Babylon?
    WHO IS THE DAUGHTER OF BABYLON? ● Babylon was initially a minor city-state, and controlled little surrounding territory; its first four Amorite rulers did not assume the title of king. The older and more powerful states of Assyria, Elam, Isin, and Larsa overshadowed Babylon until it became the capital of Hammurabi's short-lived empire about a century later. Hammurabi (r. 1792–1750 BC) is famous for codifying the laws of Babylonia into the Code of Hammurabi. He conquered all of the cities and city states of southern Mesopotamia, including Isin, Larsa, Ur, Uruk, Nippur, Lagash, Eridu, Kish, Adab, Eshnunna, Akshak, Akkad, Shuruppak, Bad-tibira, Sippar, and Girsu, coalescing them into one kingdom, ruled from Babylon. Hammurabi also invaded and conquered Elam to the east, and the kingdoms of Mari and Ebla to the northwest. After a protracted struggle with the powerful Assyrian king Ishme-Dagan of the Old Assyrian Empire, he forced his successor to pay tribute late in his reign, spreading Babylonian power to Assyria's Hattian and Hurrian colonies in Asia Minor. After the reign of Hammurabi, the whole of southern Mesopotamia came to be known as Babylonia, whereas the north had already coalesced centuries before into Assyria. From this time, Babylon supplanted Nippur and Eridu as the major religious centers of southern Mesopotamia. Hammurabi's empire destabilized after his death. Assyrians defeated and drove out the Babylonians and Amorites. The far south of Mesopotamia broke away, forming the native Sealand Dynasty, and the Elamites appropriated territory in eastern Mesopotamia. The Amorite dynasty remained in power in Babylon, which again became a small city-state.
    [Show full text]
  • Ancient Foundations Unit Two CA * the Babylonians
    Marshall High School Mr. Cline Western Civilization I: Ancient Foundations Unit Two CA * The Babylonians • By the mid-20th century BC, Sumerian Civilization had already been through a lot: • It had been co opted by the Akkadians • It had been conquered by the Guti. • It had thrown off its invaders, and started a new Sumerian Empire with Ur as its capitol • Then, in 1950 BC, a new group of people entered the scene, the Elamites, a fierce people living to the southeast of Mesopotamia. • The Elamites, like the Guti before them, seem to have been more interested in pillaging than empire building. • It would take another thousand years before the Elamites would mount their own bid for control of the empire. • Nevertheless, the Elamites destroyed the power structure that held the Sumerian empire together. • After a thousand years, the Sumero-Akkadian empire was dead at last. * The Babylonians • Yet the idea of a united Mesopotamian empire lived on as new peoples tried their hand at imperialism. • With the break down of the empire at the hands of the Elamites, a new people, the Amorites, came to conquer much of southern Mesopotamia, including an important religious center called Babylon. • Like the Sumerians before them, the Amorites began by creating minor kingdoms or city states, which vied with one another for power. • The earliest of these were two cities, Isin and Larsa. • For about 200 years, these two were rivals and struggled with each other for supremacy. • Then around 1830, the city of Babylon took advantage of the distraction of these two power players and established itself as an independent kingdom.
    [Show full text]
  • The Archaeology of Elam Formation and Transformation of an Ancient Iranian State
    Cambridge University Press 0521563585 - The Archaeology of Elam: Formation and Transformation of an Ancient Iranian State D. T. Potts Frontmatter More information The Archaeology of Elam Formation and Transformation of an Ancient Iranian State From the middle of the third millennium bc until the coming of Cyrus the Great, southwestern Iran was referred to in Mesopotamian sources as the land of Elam. A heterogenous collection of regions, Elam was home to a variety of groups, alternately the object of Mesopotamian aggres- sion, and aggressors themselves; an ethnic group seemingly swallowed up by the vast Achaemenid Persian empire, yet a force strong enough to attack Babylonia in the last centuries bc. The Elamite language is attested as late as the Medieval era, and the name Elam as late as 1300 in the records of the Nestorian church. This book examines the formation and transforma- tion of Elam’s many identities through both archaeological and written evidence, and brings to life one of the most important regions of Western Asia, re-evaluates its significance, and places it in the context of the most recent archaeological and historical scholarship. d. t. potts is Edwin Cuthbert Hall Professor in Middle Eastern Archaeology at the University of Sydney. He is the author of The Arabian Gulf in Antiquity, 2 vols. (1990), Mesopotamian Civilization (1997), and numerous articles in scholarly journals. © Cambridge University Press www.cambridge.org Cambridge University Press 0521563585 - The Archaeology of Elam: Formation and Transformation of an Ancient Iranian State D. T. Potts Frontmatter More information cambridge world archaeology Series editor NORMAN YOFFEE, University of Michigan Editorial board SUSAN ALCOCK, University of Michigan TOM DILLEHAY, University of Kentucky CHRIS GOSDEN, University of Oxford CARLA SINOPOLI, University of Michigan The Cambridge World Archaeology series is addressed to students and professional archaeologists, and to academics in related disciplines.
    [Show full text]
  • Sumero-Babylonian King Lists and Date Lists A
    XI Sumero-Babylonian King Lists and Date Lists A. R. GEORGE The Antediluvian King List The antediluvian king list is an Old Babylonian (b) a tablet from Nippur, now in Istanbul text, composed in Sumerian, that purports to (Kraus 1952: 31) document the reigns of successive kings of (c) another reportedly from Khafaje (Tutub), remote antiquity, from the time when the gods now in Berkeley, California (Finkelstein first transmitted to mankind the institution of 1963: 40) kingship until the interruption of human histo- (d) a further tablet now in the Karpeles Manu- ry by the great Flood. The list exists in several script Library, Santa Barbara, California, versions. Sometimes it appears as the opening given below in a preliminary transliteration section of the Sumerian King List, as in text (No. 97) No. 98 below. More often it occurs as an inde- (e) a small fragment from Nippur now in Phil- pendent list, of which one example is held by adelphia that bears lines from the list fol- the Schøyen collection, published here as text lowed by other text (Peterson 2008). No. 96. Other examples of the Old Babylonian A more extensive treatment of the lists of ante- list of antediluvian kings copied independently diluvian kings, including No. 96 and the tablet of the Sumerian King List are: in the Karpeles Manuscript Library, is promised (a) the tablet W-B 62, of uncertain prove- by Gianni Marchesi as part of his forthcoming nance and now in the Ashmolean Museum larger study of the Sumerian king lists. (Langdon 1923 pl. 6) No.
    [Show full text]
  • Trade from Assyrian Aššur to Anatolian Kaneš in the 19Th Century B.C.E
    Journal of Management and Marketing Research Trade from Assyrian Aššur to Anatolian Kaneš in the 19th Century B.C.E. M. Wayne Alexander Minnesota State University Moorhead William Violet Minnesota State University Moorhead ABSTRACT Evidence of trade in the Ancient Near East between Aššur in Assyria, now northern Iraq, and Kaneš in Anatolia, now central Turkey, comes from Cuneiform writing on over 23,000 clay tiles unearthed at Kaneš. The tiles tell of 19 th century B.C.E. Assyrian traders who established a trading colony at Kaneš. Merchants in Aššur imported tin and textiles from the east and south, packed them into bags, and loaded the bags on donkeys. Transporters led caravans of 10 to 50 donkeys some 1200 kilometers over rough, narrow roads to Kaneš. After the proper taxes were paid traders sold the tin, textiles, and donkeys in the market for silver which they sent back to Aššur to start the process anew. To facilitate buying and selling the merchants drew up contracts and wrote letters concerning purchases, sales, and market conditions. The trade proved quite profitable but ended with the violent destruction of Kaneš. Keywords: Aššur, Kaneš, Trade in the19th Century B.C.E., Assyria, Anatolia Copyright statement: Authors retain the copyright to the manuscripts published in AABRI journals. Please see the AABRI Copyright Policy at http://www.aabri.com/copyright.html Trade Aššur to Kaneš, Page 1 Journal of Management and Marketing Research INTRODUCTION Traders bought, sold, and moved goods from one place to another in prehistoric Mesopotamia as early as the eighth millennium. For example, people transported obsidian (7500-3500 B.C.E.
    [Show full text]
  • Karduniaš. Babylonia Under the Kassites
    557 BIBLIOTHECA ORIENTALIS LXXV N° 5-6, september-december 2018 558 §2 The Early Kassite Period (pp. 45-92) by Frans van Koppen The generally neglected Early Kassite period is discussed at length by van Koppen. This chapter provides an in-depth study discussing first the Kassites in the Old Babylonian period and their military background, i.e., military specializa- tion, command structure, settlements and social organization, followed by a careful description of Kassite-Babylonian interactions in the Late Old Babylonian period, i.e., the Samḫarû and Bimatû under Ammī-ṣaduqa and the Kassite kingdoms in the Diyala under Samsu-ditāna, and finally the role of the Kassites in the Fall of Babylon and their position thereafter. §3 Political Interactions between Kassite Babylonia and Assyria, Egypt and Ḫatti during the Amarna Age (pp. 93-111) by Jared L. Miller Miller focuses on political history in the Late Bronze Age, providing a concise introduction to the political interactions between Kassite Babylonia and its neighbours in the Amarna Age. An interesting contribution is Miller’s update of the chronological synchronisms between Babylon, Assyria, Egypt and Ḫatti, resulting in a helpful chart (pp. 105-106). Finally, an enticing scenario is presented, based on a passage in a prayer of Muršili II (KUB 14.4 ii 3’-8’) regarding the Hittite tawannanna, the Babylonian wife of Šuppiluliuma I: here, Miller advocates a different reading than hitherto accepted, suggesting that she was siphoning off wealth from Hattuša to Babylon and discusses its possible political implications. §4 Of Kings, Princesses, and Messengers: Babylonia’s ASSYRIOLOGIE International Relations during the 13th century BC (pp.
    [Show full text]
  • The Mortal Kings of Ur: a Short Century of Divine
    3 THE MORTAL KINGS OF UR: A SHORT CENTURY OF DIVINE RULE IN ANCIENT MESOPOTAMIA PIOTR MICHALOWSKI, UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN Assyriologists are at a disadvantage whenever the subject of divine kingship comes up. The issue is not an old one, but it has its lingering ghosts, James Frazer and Edward Evans­ Prichard, and it has its favorite haunting ground, the continent of Africa and the island of Mad­ agascar. Ever since Frazer delineated the problem in 1890, the focus of investigation has been on Africa, and the definition has encompassed three central components: duality, regicide, and the mediating role of the king. Of the three, regicide has been the most contentious issue, but it is one that is hardly important outside of the Africanist debates. Moreover, as Kasja Ekholm Friedman (1985: 250) has written, some have viewed divine kingship as "an autonomous sym­ bolic structure that can only be understood in terms of its own internal symbolic structure." Writing about the Lower Congo (Friedman 1985: 251), she undertook to demonstrate that "it is a historical product which has undergone transformations connected to the general structural change that has turned Africa into an underdeveloped periphery of the West." Here, I follow her example and attempt to locate the eruptions of early Mesopotamian divine kingship as historically defined phenomena, rather than as moments in a developmental trajectory of an autonomous symbolic structure. Most studies of the early history of Mesopotamian kingship concentrate on the develop­ ment of a specific figure in text and art; the underlying notions are social evolutionary, and the methodology is philological, often relying on etymology and the study of the occurrence and history of lexical labels, as summarized well in a recent article by Nicole Brisch (forth­ coming).
    [Show full text]
  • Babylonian Empire 9/13/11 3:47 PM
    Babylonian Empire 9/13/11 3:47 PM home : index : ancient Mesopotamia : article by Jona Lendering © Babylonian Empire The Babylonian Empire was the most powerful state in the ancient world after the fall of the Assyrian empire (612 BCE). Its capital Babylon was beautifully adorned by king Nebuchadnezzar, who erected several famous buildings. Even after the Babylonian Empire had been overthrown by the Persian king Cyrus the Great (539), the city itself remained an important cultural center. Old Babylonian Period Kassite Period Old Babylonian Period Middle Babylonian Period Assyrian Period King Hammurabi and Šamaš Capital of the stele with the Laws The city of Babylon makes its first appearance in our sources after the Neo-Babylonian Period of Hammurabi (Louvre) fall of the Empire of the Third Dynasty of Ur, which had ruled the city Later history states of the alluvial plain between the rivers Euphrates and Tigris for Related more than a century (2112-2004?). An agricultural crisis meant the Mesopotamian Kings end of this centralized state, and several more or less nomadic tribes Chronology settled in southern Mesopotamia. One of these was the nation of the Amorites ("westerners"), which took over Isin, Larsa, and Babylon. Their kings are known as the First Dynasty of Babylon (1894-1595?). The area was reunited by Hammurabi, a king of Babylon of Amorite descent (1792-1750?). From his reign on, the alluvial plain of southern Iraq was called, with a deliberate archaism, Mât Akkadî, "the country of Akkad", after the city that had united the region centuries before. We call it Babylonia.
    [Show full text]
  • Death in Sumerian Literary Texts
    Death in Sumerian Literary Texts Establishing the Existence of a Literary Tradition on How to Describe Death in the Ur III and Old Babylonian Periods Lisa van Oudheusden s1367250 Research Master Thesis Classics and Ancient Civilizations – Assyriology Leiden University, Faculty of Humanities 1 July 2019 Supervisor: Dr. J.G. Dercksen Second Reader: Dr. N.N. May Table of Content Introduction .................................................................................................................... 3 List of Abbreviations ...................................................................................................... 4 Chapter One: Introducing the Texts ............................................................................... 5 1.1 The Sources .......................................................................................................... 5 1.1.2 Main Sources ................................................................................................. 6 1.1.3 Secondary Sources ......................................................................................... 7 1.2 Problems with Date and Place .............................................................................. 8 1.3 History of Research ............................................................................................ 10 Chapter Two: The Nature of Death .............................................................................. 12 2.1 The God Dumuzi ...............................................................................................
    [Show full text]
  • The Isin-Larsa Dynasties
    connected with it. Register after register shows in low relief carved in the smooth limestone, the enthroned figures of Nannar and Ningal (Fig- ure 39) opposed in marked parallelism. Ur-Nammu stands in turn in front of each. His name is inscribed on his fringed shawl. He pours a libation over green palms and bunches of dates in a tall vase shaped like an hour-glass. He receives the command to build the tower. Pre- ceded by his patron god and shouldering the mason's tools he goes to lay the foundation brick. Workers carry baskets of mud and climb ladders to the top of the wall. Youthful aerial figures pour from heaven the fer- tilizing rain, a reward for the pious work. Ritual scenes (Figure 40) fol- low on the back. A bull is sacrificed. The priests open its body, perhaps to read in the liver the signs of the divine will. A kid is beheaded and the blood is poured on the ground, while a piper, standing on a small base in front of a sacred grove, plays on the double pipes. Prisoners with hands tied behind their backs are led from one enthroned deity (?) towards a second. Two men beat huge drums with short round-headed sticks, a loud accompaniment to the sacrifice. In the last register a liba- tion is poured over palms and date bunches, in front of an altar, and perhaps the statue of the deified king. The Isin-Larsa Dynasties The cult of the moon-god survived the ruin of the city. After forty years the statue of Nannar was brought back to Ur.
    [Show full text]
  • In Accordance with the Words of the Stele: Evidence for Old Assyrian Legislation
    Chicago-Kent Law Review Volume 70 Issue 4 Symposium on Ancient Law, Economics & Society Part I: The Development of Law in Classical and Early Medieval Europe / Article 15 Symposium on Ancient Law, Economics & Society Part I: The Development of Law in the Ancient Near East June 1995 In Accordance with the Words of the Stele: Evidence for Old Assyrian Legislation Klaas R. Veenhof Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarship.kentlaw.iit.edu/cklawreview Part of the Law Commons Recommended Citation Klaas R. Veenhof, In Accordance with the Words of the Stele: Evidence for Old Assyrian Legislation, 70 Chi.-Kent L. Rev. 1717 (1995). Available at: https://scholarship.kentlaw.iit.edu/cklawreview/vol70/iss4/15 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Scholarly Commons @ IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law. It has been accepted for inclusion in Chicago-Kent Law Review by an authorized editor of Scholarly Commons @ IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected]. "IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE WORDS OF THE STELE": EVIDENCE FOR OLD ASSYRIAN LEGISLATION KLAAS R. VEENHOF* INTRODUCTION Ancient Mesopotamia is generally known as the country that pro- duced the world's earliest law codes, written in cuneiform script. The oldest code, written in the Sumerian language, goes back to before 2000 B.c., while several others, written in Sumerian or Babylonian, date to the first centuries of the second millennium B.C. All of the codes, however, come from the southern part of the country. Conse- quently, Assyria, which is located in the north, thusfar has not yielded such a composition.
    [Show full text]