Drawing on the traditions of Sumerian literature, the Akkadians, Assyrians and Babylonians compiled a substantial textual tradition of mythological narrative, legal texts, scientific works, letters and other literary forms. Similarly, Akkadian exerted an influence upon Sumerian.
Literature in Akkadian society
Most of what we have from the Assyrians and Babylonians was inscribed in cuneiform with a metal stylus on tablets of clay, called laterculae coctiles by Pliny the Elder; papyrus seems to have been also employed, but it has perished.[3]
There were libraries in most towns and temples in Sumer, Akkad, Assyria and Babylonia; an old Sumerian proverb averred that "he who would excel in the school of the scribes must rise with the dawn." Women as well as men learned to read and write, and after the time the Sumerians themselves had been absorbed by the Semites circa 2000 BC, this involved a knowledge of the extinct Sumerian language, and a complicated and extensive syllabary. The Assyrians and Babylonians' very advanced systems of writing, science, medicine, civil administration, legal and economic structures and mathematics contributed greatly to their literary output.[3]
Many works of Akkadian literature were commissioned by kings who had scribes and scholars in their service. Some of these works served to celebrate the king or the divine, while others recorded information for religious practices or medicine. Poetry, proverbs, folktales, love lyrics, military campaigns and accounts of disputes were all incorporated into Akkadian literature.[4]
Relation to other ancient literatures
Cardiff Castle (Wales). Castle apartments: Library (1870s) - Allegory of Assyrian literature (relief by Thomas Nicholls).
A considerable amount of Akkadian, Assyrian and Babylonian literature was translated from Sumerian originals, and the language of religion and law long continued to be the old agglutinative language of Sumer, which was a language isolate. Vocabularies, grammars, and interlinear translations were compiled for the use of students, as well as commentaries on the older texts and explanations of obscure words and phrases. The characters of the syllabary were all arranged and named, and elaborate lists of them were drawn up.[3]
Assyrian culture and literature came from the same source as Babylonia, but even here there was a difference between the two ethnolinguistically same countries. Assyrian literature was similar to that of Babylonia, however in the early periods education was mostly restricted tona single class of society in Assyria, whereas in Babylonia. Under the second Assyrian empire, when Nineveh had become a great centre of trade, Aramaic— the language of commerce and diplomacy — was added to the number of subjects that the educated class was required to learn, dialects of which still shrvive among the Assyrian people today.[3]
Under the Seleucids, Greek was introduced into Babylon, and fragments of tablets have been found with Sumerian and Assyrian (i.e. Semitic) words transcribed into Greek letters.[3]
Notable works
According to A. Leo Oppenheim, the corpus of cuneiform literature amounted to around 1,500 texts at any one time or place, approximately half of which, at least from the first millennium, is extant in fragmentary form, and the most common genres included (in order of predominance) are omen texts, lexical lists, ritual incantations, cathartic and apotropaic conjurations, historical and mythological epics, fables and proverbs.[5]
Annals, chronicles and historical epics
The Assyrian dialect of Akkadian is particularly rich in royal inscriptions from the end of the 14th century BC onward, for example the epics of Adad-nārārī, Tukulti-Ninurta, and Šulmānu-ašarēdu III and the annals which catalogued the campaigns of the neo-Assyrian monarchs. The earliest historical royal epic is, however, that of Zimri-Lim (c.1710–1698 BC short) of Mari. Similar literature of the middle Babylonian period is rather poorly preserved with a fragmentary epic of the Kassite period, that of Adad-šuma-uṣur and of Nabû-kudurrī-uṣur I and Marduk.[6]
The chronicle traditional is first attested in the compositions of the early Iron Age which hark back to earlier times, such as the Chronicle of Early Kings, the Dynastic Chronicle, Chronicle P and the Assyrian Synchronistic History. A series of fifteen neo to late Babylonian Chronicles have been recovered which narrate the period spanning Nabû-nasir (747–734 BC) to Seleucus III Ceraunus (243–223 BC) and were derived from the political events described in Babylonian astronomical diaries.
Humorous literature
Exemplars of comical texts span the genres of burlesque to satire and include humorous love poems and riddles. “At the cleaners” is a tale of the dispute between an insolent scrubber and his client, a “sophomoric fop” who lectures the cleaner in ridiculous detail on how to launder his clothes, driving the exasperated cleaner to suggest that he lose no time in taking it to the river and doing it himself.[7] The Dialogue of Pessimism was seen as a saturnalia by Böhl, where master and servant switch roles, and as a burlesque by Speiser, where a fatuous master mouthes clichés and a servant echoes him. Lambert considered it a musing of a mercurial adolescent with suicidal tendencies.[8]
The Aluzinnu (“trickster,” a jester, clown or buffoon) text, extant in five fragments from the neo-Assyrian period concerns an individual, dābibu, ākil karṣi, “character assassin,” who made a living entertaining others with parodies, mimicry, and scatological songs. The Poor Man of Nippur provides a subversive narrative of the triumph of the underdog over his superior[9] while Ninurta-Pāqidāt's Dog Bite is a school text of a slapstick nature.[10]
Laws
The earliest Akkadian laws are the “Old Assyrian Laws” relating to the conduct of the commercial court of a trading colony in Anatolia, c. 1900 BC. The Laws of Eshnunna were a collection of sixty laws named for the city of its provenance and dating to around 1770 BC. The Code of Ḫammu-rapi, c. 1750 BC, was the longest of the Mesopotamian legal collections, extending to nearly three hundred individual laws and accompanied by a lengthy prologue and epilogue. The edict of Ammi-Saduqa, c. 1646 BC, was the last issued by one of Ḫammu-rapi’s successors.
The Middle Assyrian Laws date to the fourteenth century BC, over a hundred laws are extant from Assur. The Middle Assyrian Palace Decrees, known as the “Harem Edicts,” from the reigns of Aššur-uballiṭ I, c. 1360 BC, to Tukultī-apil-Ešarra I, c. 1076 BC, concern aspects of courtly etiquette and the severe penalties (flagellation, mutilation and execution) for flouting them. The Neo-Babylonian Laws number just fifteen, c. 700 BC, probably from Sippar.[11]
Mythology
One of the most famous of these was the Epic of Gilgamesh,[3] which first appears in Akkadian during the Old Babylonian period as a circa 1,000 line epic known by its incipit, šūtur eli šarrī, ‘‘Surpassing all other kings,’’ which incorporated some of the stories from the five earlier Sumerian Gilgamesh tales. A plethora of mid to late second millennium versions give witness to its popularity. The Standard Babylonian version, ša naqba īmeru, ‘‘He who saw the deep,’’ contains up to 3,000 lines on eleven tablets and a prose meditation on the fate of man on the twelfth which was virtually a word-for-word translation of the Sumerian “Bilgames and the Netherworld.” It is extant in 73 copies and was credited to a certain Sîn-lēqi-unninni[12] and arranged upon an astronomical principle. Each division contains the story of a single adventure in the career of Gilgamesh, king of Uruk. The whole story is a composite product, and it is probable that some of the stories are artificially attached to the central figure.[3]
Another epic was that of the "Creation" Enûma Eliš, whose object was to glorify Bel-Marduk by describing his contest with Tiamat, the dragon of chaos. In the first book, an account is given of the creation of the world from the primeval deep, and the birth of the gods of light. Then comes the story of the struggle between the gods of light and the powers of darkness, and the final victory of Marduk, who clove Tiamat asunder, forming the heaven from half of her body and the earth from the other. Marduk next arranged the stars in order, along with the sun and moon, and gave them laws they were never to transgress. After this, the plants and animals were created, and finally man. Marduk here takes the place of Ea, who appears as the creator in the older legends, and is said to have fashioned man from clay.[3]
The legend of Adapa, the first man — a portion of which was found in the record-office of the Egyptian king Akhenaton at Tell-el-Amarna — explains the origin of death. Adapa, while fishing, had broken the wings of the south wind, and was accordingly summoned before the tribunal of Anu in heaven. Ea counselled him not to eat or drink anything there. He followed this advice, and thus refused the food that would have made him and his descendants immortal.[3]
Among the other legends of Babylonia may be mentioned those of Namtar, the plague-demon; of Erra, the pestilence; of Etana and of Anzu. Hades, the abode of Ereshkigal or Allatu, had been entered by Nergal, who, angered by a message sent to her by the gods of the upper world, ordered Namtar to strike off her head. She, however, declared that she would submit to any conditions imposed on her, and would give Nergal the sovereignty of the earth. Nergal accordingly relented, and Allatu became the queen of the infernal world. Etana conspired with the eagle to fly to the highest heaven. The first gate, that of Anu, was successfully reached; but in ascending still farther to the gate of Ishtar, the strength of the eagle gave way, and Etanna was dashed to the ground. As for the storm-god Anzu, we are told that he stole the tablets of destiny, and therewith the prerogatives of Enlil. God after god was ordered to pursue him and recover them, but it would seem that it was only by a stratagem that they were finally regained.[3]
Omens, divination and incantation texts
The magnitude of omen literature within the Akkadian corpus is one of the peculiar distinguishing features of this language's legacy. According to Oppenheim, 30% of all documents of this tradition are of this genre.[13] Exemplars of omen text appear during the earliest periods of Akkadian literature but come to their maturity early in the first millennium with the formation of canonical versions. Notable among these is the Enuma Anu Enlil (astrological omens), Šumma ālu (terrestrial omens), Šumma izbu (anomalous births), Alamdimmû (physiognomic omens), and Iškar Zaqīqu (dream omens). It is among this genre, also, that the Sakikkū (SA.GIG) “Diagnostic Handbook” belongs.
The practice of extispicy, divination through the entrails of animals, was perfected into a science over the millennia by the Babylonians and supporting texts were eventually gathered into a monumental handbook, the Bārûtu, extending over a hundred tablets and divided into ten chapters.[14] Divination, however, extended into other fields with, for example, the old Babylonian libanomancy texts, concerning interpreting portents from incense smoke,[15] being one and Bēl-nadin-šumi's omen text on the flight paths of birds, composed during the reign of Kassite king Meli-Šipak, being another exemplar.[16]
Incantations form an important part of this literary heritage, covering a range of rituals from the sacred, Maqlû, "burning" to counter witchcraft, Šurpu, “incineration” to counter curses, Namburbi, to preempt inauspicious omens, Utukkū Lemnūtu (actually bilingual), to exorcise “Evil Demons,” and Bīt rimki, or “bath house,” the purification and substitution ceremony, to the mundane, Šà.zi.ga, “the rising of the heart,” potency spells, and Zu-buru-dabbeda, “to seize the ‘locust tooth’,” a compendium of incantations against field pests.[17]
Wisdom and didactic literature
A particularly rich genre of Akkadian texts was that represented by the moniker of “wisdom literature,” although there are differences in opinion concerning which works qualify for inclusion.[18] One of the earliest exemplars was the Dialogue between a Man and His God from the late Old Babylonian period. Perhaps the most notable were the Poem of the Righteous Sufferer (Ludlul bēl nēmeqi) and the Babylonian Theodicy. Included in this group are a number of fables or contest literature, in varying states of preservation, such as the Tamarisk and the Palm, the Fable of the Willow, Nisaba and Wheat (kibtu), the Ox and the Horse (Inum Ištar šurbutum, “When exalted Ishtar”), the Fable of the Fox, and the Fable of the Riding-donkey.[19]
W. G. Lambert and others include several popular sayings, and proverbs (both bilingual and Babylonian) together with the Lament of a Sufferer with a Prayer to Marduk, Counsels of Wisdom, Counsels of a Pessimist, and Advice to a Prince in this genre. “A Dialogue between Šūpê-amēli and His Father” (Šimâ milka) is a piece of wisdom literature in the manner of a deathbed debate from the Akkadian hinterland.[18] There are also Akkadian translations of earlier Sumerian works such as the Instructions of Shuruppak which are often considered belonging to this tradition.
The Akkadian disputation poem or Akkadian debate, also known as the Babylonian disputation poem, is a genre of Akkadian literature in the form of a disputation. They feature a dialogue or a debate involving two contenders, usually cast as inarticulate beings such as particular objects, plants, animals, and so forth. Extant compositions from this genre date from the early 2nd millennium BC, the earliest example being the Tamarisk and Palm, to the late 1st millennium BC. These poems occur in verse and follow a type of meter called 2||2 or Vierheber, which is the same meter found in some other Akkadian texts like the Enuma Elish.[20]
Other genres
Besides the purely literary works, there were others of varied nature, including collections of letters, partly official, partly private. Among them the most interesting are the letters of Hammurabi, which have been edited by Leonard William King.[3]
List of works
The following gives the better-known extant works, excluding lexical and synonym lists.
Shin Shifra (2008). Words as Magic and the Magic in Words. Tel Aviv, Tel Aviv, The Israeli Ministry of Defence Press (in Hebrew). These are transcriptions of Shifra's discourses on literature of the Ancient Near East, first broadcast as a "University on the Air" course on the Israeli Army Radio.
Related Research Articles
Babylonia was an ancient Akkadian-speaking state and cultural area based in the city of Babylon in central-southern Mesopotamia. It emerged as an Akkadian populated but Amorite-ruled state c. 1894 BC. During the reign of Hammurabi and afterwards, Babylonia was retrospectively called "the country of Akkad", a deliberate archaism in reference to the previous glory of the Akkadian Empire. It was often involved in rivalry with the older ethno-linguistically related state of Assyria in the north of Mesopotamia and Elam to the east in Ancient Iran. Babylonia briefly became the major power in the region after Hammurabi created a short-lived empire, succeeding the earlier Akkadian Empire, Third Dynasty of Ur, and Old Assyrian Empire. The Babylonian Empire rapidly fell apart after the death of Hammurabi and reverted to a small kingdom centered around the city of Babylon.
Marduk is a god from ancient Mesopotamia and patron deity of Babylon who eventually rose to power in the 1st millennium BC. In Babylon, Marduk was worshipped in the temple Esagila. His symbol is the spade and he is associated with the Mušḫuššu.
Anzû, also known as dZû and Imdugud, is a monster in several Mesopotamian religions. He was conceived by the pure waters of the Abzu and the wide Earth, or as son of Siris. Anzû was depicted as a massive bird who can breathe fire and water, although Anzû is alternately depicted as a lion-headed eagle.
Ancient Semitic religion encompasses the polytheistic religions of the Semitic peoples from the ancient Near East and Northeast Africa. Since the term Semitic represents a rough category when referring to cultures, as opposed to languages, the definitive bounds of the term "ancient Semitic religion" are only approximate but exclude the religions of "non-Semitic" speakers of the region such as Egyptians, Elamites, Hittites, Hurrians, Mitanni, Urartians, Luwians, Minoans, Greeks, Phrygians, Lydians, Persians, Medes, Philistines and Parthians.
Babylonian religion is the religious practice of Babylonia. Babylonia's mythology was largely influenced by its Sumerian counterparts and was written on clay tablets inscribed with the cuneiform script derived from Sumerian cuneiform. The myths were usually either written in Sumerian or Akkadian. Some Babylonian texts were translations into Akkadian from Sumerian of earlier texts, but the names of some deities were changed.
Marduk-apla-iddina I, contemporarily written in cuneiform as 𒀭𒀫𒌓𒌉𒍑𒋧𒈾ᵈAMAR.UTU-IBILA-SUM-na and meaning in Akkadian: "Marduk has given an heir", was the 34th Kassite king of Babylon c. 1171–1159 BC. He was the son and successor of Meli-Shipak II, from whom he had previously received lands, as recorded on a kudurru, and he reigned for 13 years. His reign is contemporary with the Late Bronze Age collapse. He is sometime referred to as Merodach-Baladan I.
Nebuchadnezzar I was the fourth king of the Second Dynasty of Isin and Fourth Dynasty of Babylon. He ruled for 22 years according to the Babylonian King List C, and was the most prominent monarch of this dynasty. He is best known for his victory over Elam and the recovery of the cultic idol of Marduk.
Ninurta-apal-Ekur, inscribed mdMAŠ-A-é-kur, meaning “Ninurta is the heir of the Ekur,” was a king of Assyria in the early 12th century BC who usurped the throne and styled himself king of the universe and priest of the gods Enlil and Ninurta. His reign overlaps the reigns of his Babylonian contemporaries Adad-šuma-uṣur and Meli-Šipak.
Marduk-nādin-aḫḫē, inscribed mdAMAR.UTU-na-din-MU, reigned c. 1095–1078 BC, was the sixth king of the Second Dynasty of Isin and the 4th Dynasty of Babylon. He is best known for his restoration of the Eganunmaḫ in Ur and the famines and droughts that accompanied his reign.
Nabû-apla-iddina was the sixth king of the dynasty of E of Babylon and he reigned for at least thirty-two years. During much of Nabû-apla-iddina's reign Babylon faced a significant rival in Assyria under the rule of Ashurnasirpal II. Nabû-apla-iddina was able to avoid both outright war and significant loss of territory. There was some low level conflict, including a case where he sent a party of troops led by his brother to aid rebels in Suhu. Later in his reign Nabu-apla-iddina agreed to a treaty with Ashurnasirpal II’s successor Shalmaneser III. Internally Nabu-apla-iddina worked on the reconstruction of temples and something of a literary revival took place during his reign with many older works being recopied.
Adad-šuma-uṣur, inscribed dIM-MU-ŠEŠ, meaning "O Adad, protect the name!," and dated very tentatively c. 1216–1187 BC, was the 32nd king of the 3rd or Kassite dynasty of Babylon and the country contemporarily known as Karduniaš. His name was wholly Babylonian and not uncommon, as for example the later Assyrian King Esarhaddon had a personal exorcist, or ašipu, with the same name who was unlikely to have been related. He is best known for his rude letter to Aššur-nirari III, the most complete part of which is quoted below, and was enthroned following a revolt in the south of Mesopotamia when the north was still occupied by the forces of Assyria, and he may not have assumed authority throughout the country until around the 25th year of his 30-year reign, although the exact sequence of events and chronology remains disputed.
Adad-apla-iddina, typically inscribed in cuneiform mdIM-DUMU.UŠ-SUM-na, mdIM-A-SUM-na or dIM-ap-lam-i-din-[nam] meaning the storm god “Adad has given me an heir”, was the 8th king of the 2nd Dynasty of Isin and the 4th Dynasty of Babylon and ruled c. 1064–1043. He was a contemporary of the Assyrian King Aššur-bêl-kala and his reign was a golden age for scholarship.
Simbar-Šipak, or perhaps Simbar-Šiḫu, was a Babylonian king who reigned c. 1021–1004 BC.
Eulmaš-šākin-šumi, inscribed in cuneiform as É-ul-maš-GAR-MU, or prefixed with the masculine determinative m, “Eulmaš (is) the establisher of offspring”, c. 1000–984 BC, was the founder of the 6th Dynasty of Babylon, known as the Bῑt-Bazi Dynasty, after the Kassite tribal group from which its leaders were drawn. The Dynastic Chronicle tells us that he ruled for fourteen years, the King List A, seventeen years.
Marduk-balāssu-iqbi, inscribed mdAMAR.UTU-TI-su-iq-bi or mdSID-TI-zu-DUG4, meaning "Marduk has promised his life," was the 8th king of the Dynasty of E of Babylon; he was the successor of his father Marduk-zākir-šumi I, and was the 4th and final generation of Nabû-šuma-ukin I's family to reign. He was contemporary with his father's former ally, Šamši-Adad V of Assyria, who may have been his brother-in-law, who was possibly married to his (Marduk's) sister Šammu-ramat, the legendary Semiramis, and who was to become his nemesis.
Ušumgallu or Ushumgallu was one of the three horned snakes in Akkadian mythology, along with the Bašmu and Mušmaḫḫū. Usually described as a lion-dragon demon, it has been somewhat speculatively identified with the four-legged, winged dragon of the late 3rd millennium BCE.
The office of šandabakku, inscribed Sumerian: 𒇽𒄘𒂗𒈾, romanized: LÚGÚ.EN.NA) or sometimes as 𒂷𒁾𒁀𒀀𒂗𒆤𒆠, the latter designation perhaps meaning "archivist of Enlil," was the name of the position of governor of the Mesopotamian city of Nippur from the Kassite period onward. Enlil, as the tutelary deity of Nippur, had been elevated in prominence and was shown special veneration by the Kassite monarchs, it being the most common theophoric element in their names. This caused the position of the šandabakku to become very prestigious and the holders of the office seem to have wielded influence second only to the king.
Chronicle P, known as Chronicle 22 in Grayson’s Assyrian and Babylonian Chronicles and Mesopotamian Chronicle 45: "Chronicle of the Kassite Kings" in Glassner's Mesopotamian Chronicles is named for T. G. Pinches, the first editor of the text. It is a chronicle of the second half of the second millennium BC or the Kassite period, written by a first millennium BC Babylonian scribe.
The Eclectic Chronicle, referred to in earlier literature as the New Babylonian Chronicle, is an ancient Mesopotamian account of the highlights of Babylonian history during the post-Kassite era prior to the 689 BC fall of the city of Babylon. It is an important source of historiography from the period of the early iron-age dark-age with few extant sources to support its telling of events.
↑ Jack M. Sasson (2005). "Comparative Observations on the Near Eastern Epic Traditions". In John M. Foley (ed.). Companion to Ancient Epic. Wiley-Blackwell. p.221.
↑ D. L. Baker (2009). Tight Fists Or Open Hands?: Wealth and Poverty in Old Testament Law. Wm. B. Eerdmans. pp.4–6.
↑ A. R. George (2003). The Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic: Introduction, Critical Edition and Cuneiform Texts, Volume 1. Oxford University Press. pp.22–33, 379.
↑ Ulla Koch-Westenholz (2000). Babylonian Liver Omens: The Chapters Manzazu, Padanu, and Pan Takalti of the Babylonian Extispicy Series Mainly from Assurbanipal's Library. Museum Tusculanum. p.9.
↑ I. L. Finkel (1983). "A New Piece of Libanomancy". Archiv für Orientforschung. 29: 50–57.
↑ Nicla De Zorzi (2009). "Bird Divination in Mesopotamia - New Evidence From BM 108874". KASKAL: Rivista di storia, ambienti e culture del Vicino Oriente Antico. 6: 91–94.
1 2 Victor Avigdor Hurowitz (2007). Richard J. Clifford (ed.). Wisdom Literature in Mesopotamia and Israel. SBL. pp.xi–xiii, 37–51.
↑ Marianna E. Vogelzang (1991). "Some Questions About the Akkadian Disputes". In aG.J. Reinink and aH.L.J. Vanstiphout (ed.). Dispute poems and dialogues in the ancient and mediaeval Near East. Peeters. p.47.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
Literatureportal 
