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Inscribed Barrel Cylinder of Marduk-Apla-Iddina II

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2014

C. J. Gadd
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Extract

The object which bears the following inscription (Plates IX–X) measures 15·7 cms. by 7·6 cms. (middle). The cylinder is made up of three separate pieces found at Nimrud on different days (of April, 1952) in chamber 4 of the as yet unidentified building called provisionally Z(iggurrat) T(errace), near a doorway on the south side of the room, where it was evidently not in situ but loose among the filling, having been cast or ruined out from some other location. Into the same room had been tipped as rubbish a large number of Assyrian letters, found embedded in the earth along the north side, and blocking two doorways. How strangely far away it was from its true original site is revealed by the inscription, which proves that it was brought to Calah from distant Erech, not so much as a trophy of war, though in consequence of it, but rather for reasons of policy.

Type
Research Article
Information
IRAQ , Volume 15 , Issue 2 , Autumn 1953 , pp. 123 - 134
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 1953

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References

page 123 note 1 See Iraq, XV, Pt. 1, 29–34Google Scholar, for a description of the buildings in which these documents were found; plan of the room 4 on Fig. 3, p. 31, photograph on Pl. IV. This same room may originally have been used by the scribes for the storing of tablets, for a long bench and brick boxes were found within it, cf. loc. cit., p. 33.

page 126 note 1 Nor by his commentators, Goetze, A. in J N.E.S. IV, 249Google Scholar, and von Soden, W., Z.A., N.F., XV, 332Google Scholar, also Orientalia, 1951, 152Google Scholar.

page 128 note 1 This natural conjunction, in place or metaphor, of ‘foundations’ with ‘mountains’ is found in a variety of phrases relating to uššu and išdu; cf. the material collected by Baumgartner, W., Z.A., N.F. II, 236 ffGoogle Scholar. It could be much more widely exemplified.

page 129 note 1 A still more impressive example of such a displacement could be adduced, if it were possible to accept a statement which has gained some currency, that the Merodach-baladan Stein itself was discovered in Cyprus, for it would then have been a natural inference that it was taken there by Sargon, the only Assyrian king who left a monument (the Sargon stele) in that island. Unfortunately this seems to be a myth, of strangely obscure origin. The assertion was first made, so far as I can find, by F. X. Steinmetzer in a footnote (‘aufgefunden in Cypern’) to p. 80 of his book Die babylonischen Kudurru (Grenzsteine) als Urkundenform, (1922), and it was repeated (with a question) by Leemans, W. F. in J.E.O.L., no. 10 p.442Google Scholar. In the older writers, Belser, Delitzsch, Peiser, and Winckler, there is nothing about its origin beyond a remark of Peiser and Winckler (Z.A., VII, 184Google Scholar) that it was acquired by the Berlin Museum in 1889. Recently, at my request, Dr. G. R. Meyer, Director of the Vorderasiatische Abteilung of the Staatliche Museen, Berlin, had the kindness to consult the Museum records, and he has informed me that in these ‘ist unter “Fundort” nur zu ersehen, dass der Stein angekauft wurde’.

page 130 note 1 It has been discussed, with many similar passages, by Leemans, W. F. in his paper ‘Kidinnu’ (Symbolae Van Oven, 36 ff., esp. 54–59)Google Scholar. The words of Sargon in this place are curious and unusual: besides declaring his interest and care for these people, he deprecates their own apathy in defending their rights and undertakes to cure this defect in them, (31) aî ibbaši ešiṭsun, (32) egitsunu limaṭṭema, (33) lipassis ḫiṭetsun, “may there be no carelessness on their part, may he abate their laziness and do away their neglect”. In line 36 the reading ki-ma tim(!)-mi(!)-na is doubtless to be restored, cf. col. I, 39.

page 130 note 2 The likeness of Merodach-baladan's and Sargon's brick-inscriptions was noted by Dr. J. Jordan, the first German excavator of Erech, (U.V.B., II, 10Google Scholar), who thought it inconceivable that the great Sargon should copy his rival. It is perhaps worth noting (since the passage has been quoted) that the nature and purpose of Sargon's E-anna inscription has been strangely mis-described by Meissner, , Babylonien md Assyrien, II, 331Google Scholar, who called it a ‘Tafel’ and regarded it as an Assyrian contribution to ‘die Bibliothek von Uruk’.

page 131 note 1 Clay, Miscellaneous Inscriptions, no. 36.

page 131 note 2 U.V.B., VIII, 24 ffGoogle Scholar.

page 131 note 3 By Schott, A., in Z.A., N.F., VIII, 93 fGoogle Scholar. Whether the usage in these present passages supports Schott's interpretation is dubious; one does not understand why demolition of the inner side only of a wall should reveal the temen, as here. But it is still less favourable to ‘bastion’.

page 131 note 4 I have not been able to discover in the accounts a clear statement upon the relative levels of the inner and outer courts, but the section in U.V.B., V, Tafel 8d seems to bear this out.

page 131 note 5 U.V.B., I, 6 ff., 56, and Tafeln 2, 3Google Scholar.

page 131 note 6 U.V.B., VIII, 24Google Scholar.

page 131 note 7 See plan in U.V.B., X, Tafel 6.

page 131 note 8 Lenzen, H. in U.V.B., VIII, 25Google Scholar, referring to U.V.B., I, 11 ffGoogle Scholar.

page 132 note 1 U.V.B., I, 12Google Scholar.

page 132 note 2 U.V.B., VIII, 25Google Scholar.

page 132 note 3 U.V.B., I, 13Google Scholar.

page 132 note 4 U.V.B., I, 11, Abb. 3, Tafeln 5, 6Google Scholar: U.V.B., VIII, Tafel 5.

page 132 note 5 See U.V.B., III, 32 ff., VII, 27 ff., VIII, 25Google Scholar.

page 132 note 6 U.V.B., III, 34, and Tafel 24Google Scholar. The Inscription of this is unpublished, but it is not thought to contain any indication in favour of the possibility here put forward.

page 132 note 7 U.E.T., I, no. 142.

page 132 note 8 Woolley, C. L., Ur Excavations, V, plates 44, 45, 68, 70Google Scholar.

page 132 note 9 Idem, A J, III, 318.