Spat-altbabylonische Tontafeln: Texte und Siegelabrollungen.

• Author: Richardson, Seth F.C.
• Position: Book review

Spat-altbabylonische Tontafeln: Texte und Siegelabrollungen. By HORST KLENGEL and EVELYN KLENGEL-BRANDT. Vorderasiatische Schriftdenkmaler des Staatlichen Museen zu Berlin, vol. 29. Mainz: VERLAG PHILIPP VON ZABERN, 2002. Pp. 76, plates. $29.80 (paper).

It has been two decades since Horst Klengel last gave us one of his masterful volumes of Old Babylonian copies in the series Vorderasiatisches Schriftdenkmaler, and this third and concluding volume is thus very welcome indeed. With its expanded catalog and commentary covering 132 texts and envelopes, indices, autographs, and including 105 rendered sealings (with a separate catalogue, all prepared by Evelyn Klengel-Brandt and Daniela Hinz), the volume gives detailed attention to tablets which are the last, lesser cousins of materials from past OB volumes (VS 7, 9, 16, 18, and 22). Already nineteen of the 132 texts only contain or preserve between two and four lines of text (exclusive of the date), more than VS 18 and 22 combined; and this volume certainly brings us close to the end of the late OB tablet holdings of the Vorderasiatisches Museum.

The volume's title is slightly misleading with respect to the period of the tablets, since at least a third date to the time of Samsuiluna (and most of these from his first decade of rule). The dates of the texts may be broken down as follows: thirty-nine from the reign of Samsuiluna (Si); one or two from Abi-esuh (Ae); thirty-seven from Ammiditana (Ad); fourteen each from Ammisaduqa (As) and Samsuditana (Sd), two of which should be linked to the century of Samsuiluna (Middle--rather than Late--OB); and twenty-three of uncertain date. This rundown is useful for two reasons: it subsumes several revised and reassigned dates from the notes at the end of this review; more importantly, because it is sometimes hard to collect summary information from Klengel's Inhaltsubersicht der Texte.

The texts are catalogued with often lengthy entries (a separate one-page concordance of VS 29 texts in date-order would have been helpful), partly ordered according to the following subjects: two lawsuits (nos. 1-2), sixteen sales (slaves, animals, real estate, nos. 3-19), nine hires of persons (nos. 20-28), six field leases (nos. 29-33, 36), five house rentals (nos. 38-43), forty-five loans (nos. 44-88), and forty-three miscellaneous texts (nos. 89-131, principally receipts). Yet since neither date- nor VAT number-order consistently prevails within these categories, the overall structure is not fully clear. Still, if one were to choose between clarity and extended commentary, the latter is more desirable. And yet there are diamonds sparkling among these texts.

We might first simply note the contribution of fourteen new texts from the time of Samsuditana to a previously known total of only 172 (Pientka, IMGULA 2/2). Of individual note, Texts 14 and 66 bear "prayer-type" sealings; the former is very like one appearing on BM 81310 (As 17, Text 7.102 in S. Richardson, "The Collapse of a Complex State," Ph.D. diss., Columbia Univ., 2002 [henceforth CCS]). Text 58 is an interest-bearing loan (ku.babbar u mas.bi), scarce as hen's teeth in the Late OB period. Text 6 is a slave sale in which the slave's origin is specified as Mardaman, a north Syrian place last heard of in Mari texts, joining a small but growing number of such Late OB references to northern places like Karana and Tadanne. The business activities of princesses (including, but not limited to, persons bearing the ubiquitous name of Iltani) are seen in Texts 18 (a house sale), 44, 48-49, 53, and 78 (all loans of silver, gold, or grain). Some rare or new terms and titles are note-worthy: dam.gar's (rare in this time!) in 63 and 79; 68, an Sd-dated house sale; the new title (perhaps) gala.mah [.sup.d.u]tu ka.dingir.ra.ki in 84; 91 bears the odd professional names nagar ku.babbar, nagar um.mi.a, and nagar sa i-r[i.sup.?]-bu-[.sup.[??].x.sup.[??]].

Several texts refer to journeys and expeditions: (probably) 46, a short-term loan for procuring a slavegirl; 66 belongs with a group of texts from Sd's reign seeking grain from Esnunna and elsewhere (cf. VS 22 37; and VS 29 61, a loan for a journey which weighs silver by the n[a.sub.4] Esnunn[a.sup.ki]); and most intriguingly, 95 (Sd 10) is a memorandum about a kaskal e Kassi. Like its famous cousin, BM 78378 (Sd 11, CCS Text 7.150), this text refers to a...