Relief image on the Tablet of Shamash (Sippar, 800s BC).
This relief shows the sun god Shamash on the throne, in front of the Babylonian king Nabû-apla-iddina (r. 888 – 855 BC) between two interceding deities. The text tells how the king made a new cultic statue for the god and gave privileges to his temple.
It’s Old Stuff Day! Take a moment to enjoy the oldest item in our collection - a cuneiform tablet from about 2,000 BCE. It was excavated from Umma in Mesopotamia and is written in Sumerian. (Pre-1650 MS 0218)
For this week’s #historicalhappyhour we are going WAY back. This is Neo-Sumerian cuneiform clay tablet from the 21st c. B.C.E. It utilizes the Umma calendar, a city in modern day Iraq. This tablet is actually serves to document the receipt of a delivery of beer. Can you imagine your happy hour receipt this evening lasting another four thousand years? #iglibraries #librariesofinstagram #cuneiform #beer #happyhour
This is an excerpt from a lengthy Akkadian ritual that we know from multiple tablets, all of them unfortunately broken. The ritual starts by describing the patient: he is constantly depressed and has other physical symptoms, from pain to nausea. Such symptoms are clearly a sign that he has been attacked by witchcraft. To combat the witchcraft, the ritual practitioner relies on a combination of magical actions (such as burning figurines of the magicians who caused the illness) and prayers to Shamash, the Sun-god, who represents an all-seeing force of justice.
This is the first of the incantations recited by the practitioner. Below the cut, I’ve included the transliteration of the incantation (in case anyone wants to try it) and a short comment on the untranslated word “Namraṣit.”
I call to you, Shamash. Listen to me! Accept my sleepless sighing. Learn swiftly of the suffering that seizes me. I am sluggish; I am sleepless; I am exhausted; I am anxious. I focus on Namraṣit, your light, o my lord. Shamash, lord of justice, to you I turn. Pay attention to my lifted hands; listen to my speech. Listen to me; accept my petition; judge my case; decide my verdict.
This week, I’m recreating some Akkadian bread, as seen in some cuneiform inscriptions, as well as visual representations in carved panels in Akkadian palaces.
The original bread has a striking similarity to modern Iraqi samoon - from it’s shape to it’s description in Akkadian!
In any case, let’s now take a look at the world that was! Follow along with my YouTube video, above!
Ingredients 1 cup wholemeal flour 2 cups plain flour salt water active dry yeast (or 1/3 cup sourdough starter) milk sesame seeds
Method
1 - Preparing the Dough and letting it Rest To begin with, we need to make a starter. The easiest way to do this today is to use some dry active yeast, opening a sachet, and placing it in a bowl with a bit of warm water. But if you have some sourdough starter, you can use 1/3rd of a cup of that instead! But keep in mind that the sourdough starter will affect how hydrated your dough is later on.
Pour in 1 cup of wholemeal flour, along with two cups of plain white flour into the yeasty mix, and mix everything together until the dough starts to pull away from the sides of the bowl cleanly. If it’s too dry and crumbly, add some water - little by little - until it comes together into a smooth ball.
When it’s ready, place a damp cloth or a bit of clingfilm over the top of your bowl, and let the whole thing prove in a warm area for a few hours - or until it’s doubled in size.
2 - Forming your Bread When your dough has expanded hugely, tip this out onto a lightly floured worksurface, and get to kneading. Fold and twist this around for about 10 minutes, just to help develop a better texture of the loaf down the line. When you’re finished kneading it, roll the whole thing into a long snake of dough. Cut this in half, and these halves in half again, so you wind up with four roughly evenly-sized balls of dough.
Carvings of Akkadian banquets show off lemon-shaped loaves of bread, and modern samoon are formed in a similar way. So roll a ball of dough in your hand, leaving two nubs at either end of it. Flatten the centre of the loaf down, by stretching and pulling at the dough until it smooths down.
3 - Baking When they’re formed, place them onto some baking paper, and cover them with a damp towel for about 20 minutes. After this, brush them with a bit of milk, before sprinkling some sesame seeds over the top of them if you want. Bake these in an oven preheated to 230C / 450F for 15-20 minutes, or until they turn golden brown.
Serve up warm, and dig in!
The bread is delicious and fluffy, with a nice crisp crust. The sesame seeds - if added to the top - become toasted and flavourful when baked.
The original name for this bread would have been “ninda ensu” - which literally translates to “the bread of the king/ruler”. “ninda”being a catch-all word for a variety of breads and cakes in the Akkadian language, so while it’s likely that “ninda ensu” referred to a savoury bread, it’s also likely that this may have been sweetened too!
It’s real and it does exactly what it says it will: send Dumb Cuneiform a tweet or an SMS message and they’ll translate it into ancient Persian cuneiform, stamp it into a clay tablet and mail it to you. $20. It’s Snow-Crash-a-riffic.
If these are made of baked ceramic tiles, then there’s every likelihood that they will outlast the overwhelming majority of other contemporary textual sources
Cuneiform tablet counting beer for the workers. Circa 3100-3000 B.C, from Uruk in what is now southern Iraq. Now in the British Museum.
The beer on the tablet is represented by a jar with a pointed base. Food is symbolized by a head eating from a bowl (bottom left). The semicircular imprints (possibly made by the edge of a finger) stand for the measurements.
A letter written from the Neo-Assyrian (circa 911-612 B.C.) priest Nergal-šarrani to his king asking for medical aid for an STD he contracted by having lot’s of sex with women. Original language is Akkadian. From Nineveh in northern Iraq and now in the British Museum. Archival view.
What is interesting is the STD is being called “hand of Venus”, or in the original text “qatu Dilibat(ordil-bat).” In Mesopotamian medical texts the hand could signify a disease label or the ultimate disease cause agent. Transliterated cuneiform and translation of text (link).
Two years ago, I made a set of cuneiform cookie tablets, using an American gingerbread recipe and the text of the Babylonian text Enuma Elish.
The results were tasty, but the dough puffed a little during baking, losing some of the writing details. For this year’s New Year’s Eve, I made a new batch: different recipe, different text.
As the recipe, I chose these Gingerbread Thins from the BBC. (Fellow British Baking Show fans may recognize it as Candace’s gingerbread house furniture.) I picked it because most American recipes fall into one of two categories: either they’re designed for eating and contain eggs and baking soda, which cause the leavening that makes the dough puff up, or they’re designed for construction and have a fairly bland flavor.
The results did indeed retain the impressions much more clearly, and the flavor was wonderful — more ginger-forward than spice-forward, but that’s not a bad thing. The texture was quite hard, though, due to the lack of leavening, and I recommend rolling them quite thin to maintain a crispy texture.
As the text, I used excerpts from the Ugaritic text KTU 1.23, Šaḥru-wa-Šalimu (sometimes called “The Goodly/Gracious/Good Gods”). I’ll soon be posting my translation and discussion of the text, which is a fascinating combination of myth and ritual, but the top lines contain the following section:
The Death-Lord is seated: in his hand, a staff of sterility; in his hand, a staff of widowhood. The vine-pruner prunes it; the vine-tier ties it; like a vine, he drops it on his death-field.
This enigmatic passage has been interpreted in many ways, but many scholars use it to judge the time of year when the ritual may have taken place. To me, this is a clear depiction of wintertime: a barren absence of fertility, accompanied by the pruning of grapevines, which takes place in midwinter in the Mediterranean. Thus, the text seemed like a relatively seasonal choice.
In addition to some large slabs of writing, I also cut cookies with individual signs on them and their English counterpart. Ugaritic is written in cuneiform (i.e. wedges pressed into clay), but it’s not the complex system of syllabograms and ideograms used by Akkadian. It’s actually an abjad (a vowelless alphabet) very similar to other Northwest Semitic languages like Hebrew and Phoenician; A and B are the first two letters. This means that if you want to write English messages in cuneiform, the Ugaritic alphabet is a good choice.
Happy new year, everyone! May 2018 bring us all new beginnings.
Today’s #MuseumWeek theme is one of our favourites - Behind the Scenes These photos offer a sneak peek inside our new Ancient Middle East gallery, opening 26 June.
This gallery will take you on a journey across some 10,000 years. You’ll be able to explore village life at the dawn of farming, discover the world’s first cities and the invention of writing, and imagine what life was like in magnificent palaces and temples. You can also listen to Sumerian poetry and write in cuneiform, encounter the art of empires reaching from Iran to Egypt - and find out why the objects that tell these stories are in Oxford.
Stay tuned for more information and come check out the new gallery later this month! Don’t forget that FREE tickets are required for General Entry to the Museum.
Cuneiform terracota tablets, ca. 1400 BC, Qatna, Syria.
63 cuneiform tablets were discovered in 2002, in a subterranean corridor. They were covered by the burned remains of several roofbeams. Maybe they were hidden during the Hittite invasion. The texts probably belong to the archive of King Idanda and contain both intelligence reports on the political situation in northern Syria, the Hittite threat and domestic and administrative texts. The texts are written in a mixture of the Akkadian and Hurrian languages hitherto unknown. - wikipedia.org
This is an excerpt from a lengthy Akkadian ritual that we know from multiple tablets, all of them unfortunately broken. The ritual starts by describing the patient: he is constantly depressed and has other physical symptoms, from pain to nausea. Such symptoms are clearly a sign that he has been attacked by witchcraft. To combat the witchcraft, the ritual practitioner relies on a combination of magical actions (such as burning figurines of the magicians who caused the illness) and prayers to Shamash, the Sun-god, who represents an all-seeing force of justice.
This is the first of the incantations recited by the practitioner. Below the cut, I’ve included the transliteration of the incantation (in case anyone wants to try it) and a short comment on the untranslated word “Namraṣit.”
I call to you, Shamash. Listen to me! Accept my sleepless sighing. Learn swiftly of the suffering that seizes me. I am sluggish; I am sleepless; I am exhausted; I am anxious. I focus on Namraṣit, your light, o my lord. Shamash, lord of justice, to you I turn. Pay attention to my lifted hands; listen to my speech. Listen to me; accept my petition; judge my case; decide my verdict.
Note:In Abusch and Schwemer’s translation, they translate Namraṣit as “who-shines-for-me-at-rising” (namra-ṣit), clearly intended to be an epithet for Shamash. But Namraṣit is a known name, and it’s used elsewhere for Sin, the Moon-god. The question is whether this line (the exact midpoint of the incantation) belongs to the first half, where the symptoms are described, or the second half, where Shamash is invoked. In other words, is the speaker saying that he focuses on Shamash as a source of justice, or is he saying that he focuses on the moon as a sign of sleepless depression? I am unsure.
While doing some research on the Mesopotamian goddess Belet-Ṣeri, I came across this well-preserved Akkadian incantation for someone who “constantly sees dead people.” Ereškigal is queen of the Netherworld, and Ningeštinanna/Belet-Ṣeri is her (female) scribe. I am not familiar with “Abatu the Queen,” but her name literally means “to destroy,” so presumably she was another goddess associated with death.
…
Incantation:
Dead people, why do you encounter me—you whose cities are ruined mounds, you who are bones? I do not go to Kutha, the assembly of ghosts. Why do you constantly chase me? You are adjured by Abatu the Queen, by Ereškigal the Queen, by Ningeštinanna the Scribe of the Gods, whose stylus is lapis and carnelian.
Recitation (to be used when) one continually sees dead persons.
(The description of the ritual follows, but is somewhat broken. It involves pouring a ritual liquid into a western-facing pit while reciting the incantation.)
In the interest of helping y’all stalk a guy who’s been dead for three thousand years, I present to you another document excavated from the archives of Ea-Naṣir! This one is a purely practical one: a record of sale for 50 garments to Ea-Naṣir. The guy apparently liked his clothing (or, more likely, bought it to sell as a merchant).
11 garments: value: 1/3 mina, 2 2/3 shekels of silver 5 garments: value: 13 shekels of silver 2 garments: value: 6 ½ shekels of silver 5 garments: value: 10 2/3 shekels of silver 27 garments: value: 5/6 mina, 4 ½ shekels, 15 še ______________ 50 garments: value: 1 2/3 mina, 7 1/3 shekels, 15 še: in the hands of Mr. Ea-Naṣir
(A mina was about 500g; a shekel was 8.3g; a mina was .05g. So the total weight in silver for 50 outfits was about 895g, or two pounds.)
TheAmarna letters are an archive of cuneiform Akkadian letters between Egypt and various Canaanite city-state rulers in the mid-14th century. They often employ Canaanite linguistic features — for instance, in the first letter below, the author follows the logogram for “linen garments” with the proto-Canaanite for “clothing.”
This pair of letters is written to and from Milkilu, the “mayor” of Gezer, a city in central Canaan. We don’t know if the second letter is a direct response to the first one, but it certainly seems plausible. The difference between tone in the letters is notable. (I should note that the second letter is highly damaged, and I follow the ORACC reconstruction.)
—
To: Milkilu, representative of Gezer From: the king
He hereby sends this tablet to command you.
He hereby dispatches to you Hanya, stablemaster of the ordinary soldiers, along with everything necessary to get tall, good-looking female cupbearers: silver, linen garments (clothes), carnelian, all (kinds of) stones, an ebony chair—in the same way, all of those things are good-looking.
In total: 32 pounds [160 deben]. In total: 40 female cupbearers. 40 silver is the price of the female cupbearers.
So dispatch good-looking, beautiful female cupbearers, without a single bad one among them, so that the king, your lord, may say: “This is good!”, according to the instructions he sent you.
Now, you may know that the king is as well as the sun. His soldiers, his chariots, and his horses: in perfect wellness. Amon has hereby placed the Upper Land and Lower Land, the sun’s rising and its setting, between the two feet of the king.
—
To: The king, my lord, my god, my Sun-god From: Milkilu, your slave, the dust on your feet
I fall at the feet of the king, my lord, my god, my Sun-god, seven and seven times.
The king, my lord, should know that it is well—the city of the king, my lord, which he assigned to my care.
Moreover, I have obeyed the command which the king, my lord, sent to me—and I am fulfilling it for the king, my lord.
So I am hereby dispatching, in Haya’s care, 46 female slaves, 5 slave-boys, and 5 aširūma-personnel to the king, my lord.
Telītum, la[dy of …] — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! […] — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! The pri[estess …] — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! The yo[ung men …] — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! The young wo[men …] — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! One person ca[me to her.] — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! “Come! Submit to m[e!”] — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! Then a second came to her. — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! “Come! Let me stroke your vulva!” — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! “Once I submit to you,” — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! “Assemble the young men of the city for me.” — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! “Let’s go to the shadow of the wall!” — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! Seven at her front, seven at her thighs. — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! Sixty and sixty keep climaxing in her genitals. — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! The young men wearied; Ishtar did not weary. — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! “Put (it) in the lovely vulva, men!” — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! Even as the young woman said it, — Jubilation is the foundation of the city! The young men heard and submitted to her order. — Jubilation is the foundation of the city!
Total: 20 (lines). A pārum of Ishtar. (From) the year that Hammurabi became king. ŠEG₅.ŠEG₅–bēlu–rēṣūšu, son of Šumu-libši, wrote (this).
This Neo-Assyrian prophecy is part of a tablet of collected prophecies to Esarhaddon by the prophet La-dagil-ili; some prophecies are from the god Aššur, but this one is from Ištar.
…
The word of Ištar of Arbela to Esarhaddon, king of Assyria:
As if I did not give you something that couldn’t be done!
Didn’t I twist the four buttresses of Assyria and give them to you? Didn’t I defeat your enemy? Didn’t I gather your raging rivals and your foes like butterflies?
But you — what have you given to me? The food for my banquet is missing, as if there were no temple! My food is denied to me; my cup is denied to me. I’m waiting for them, gazing in anticipation.
I’m serious: set up ten liters of stewed food and a ten-liter goblet of fine beer! I want to spoon vegetables and soup into my mouth! I want to fill the cup and drink from it! I want to restore my glamour!
In this unpublished tablet, held by the British Museum, we find the copper merchant Ea-Naṣir and his associate Ilushu-illassu writing to a couple of men to reassure them. Although the situation is missing some context, there are some real gems in the context of the famous letter to Ea-Naṣir.
One of the men intimidating the recipients is named Mr. Shorty (kurûm).
Ea-Naṣir complains that people don’t believe him.
Ea-Naṣir mentions giving “the ingots that we talked about” to someone.
The repeated encouragements — “don’t be scared!” “don’t be critical!” “don’t worry!” — sound a lot like Ea-Naṣir is trying to reassure someone that a situation hasn’t gone sideways (but it has).
…
Say to Shumun-libshi and the Zabardabbû: [1]
Ea-Naṣir and Ilushu-illassu say:
As for the situation with Mr. “Shorty” and Erissum-matim, who came here, don’t be scared.
I made them enter the temple of the Sun-God and take an oath. They said, “We didn’t come about these matters; we came for our businesses.”
I said, “I will write to them” — but they didn’t believe me!
He said, “I had a quarrel with Mr. Shumun-libshi.” He said, “[…] to his partner. I took, and you did not […] You didn’t give to me.”
Within 3 days, I’ll come to the city of Larsa.
Also, I spoke with Erissum-matim and said, “What is your sign?” [2]
I said to the kettle-maker (?), “Go with Ilum-gamil the Zabardabbû, and take the shortfall for me, and put it in the city of Enimma.”
Also, don’t neglect your […].
Also, I have given the ingots that we talked about to the men.
P.S. Don’t be critical! Get the […] from them! Don’t worry! We’ll come to you. [3]
[1]Zabardabbû is a Sumerian loanword that literally means “bronze-holder” but came to mean some sort of official title in the palace and temple. Given the context, though, it may literally mean “coppersmith” here.
[2] The “sign” could mean an occult omen, a personality type, or even a password.
[3] This “postscript” was written on the sides of the tablet.
These omens come from Šumma Ālu tablet 104, a fascinating set of omens that predict the future for men who engage in various sexual practices. (Another gem is “If a man repeatedly looks at his woman’s vulva, his health will be good; he will grasp anything that he does not have.”) Unfortunately, this tablet has never been published in a full modern edition or translation.
These lines are complicated by the ongoing ambiguity around the identities of the assinnu and the girseqû. Both were AMAB. The former was a type of Ishtar priest who was associated with genderqueerness; the cuneiform for “assinnu” literally means “man-woman.” The latter was a type of palace servant who may have been a eunuch, although some had wives and (adopted?) children. The question of why sex with them is favorable, while sex with one’s own slave is unfavorable, is a subject of debate. (An ethically optimistic view might suggest that the former groups are able to consent freely, while a slave cannot consent … but this is decidedly anachronistic.)
—
32. If a man (sexually) approaches an assinnu, his difficulties will be released.
33. If a man (sexually) approaches a girseqû, for one whole year, the losses that befall him will be blocked.
34. If a man (sexually) approaches a male slave born in his house, difficulties will seize him.
