Cuneiform Tablet, Messenger text listing provisions for various messengers, of beer, bread, onions, oil and soda ash.
Unidentified Babylonian maker
Umma
Mesopotamia
550 BCE
Terracotta
Overall: 1 1/16 × 13/16 in. (2.7 × 2.1 cm)
Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth: Gift of The Dartmouth Scientific Association
23.1.7208
Geography
Place Made: Arabian Peninsula, Iraq, West Asia, Asia
Period
1000 BCE-1 CE
Object Name
Written Communication
Research Area
Near East
Not on view
Inscriptions
Incised, obverse, in cuneiform [translation]: "5 sila3 beer, 5 sila3 bread (= 5 + 5 liter), 2 bundles onion, / 3 shekel oil, 2 shekel alkaline (naga) plant (= 25 + 16.7 gram), / (provision for): Šeš-mu. / 5 sila3 beer, 5 sila3 bread (= 5 + 5 liter), 2 bundles onion, / 3 shekel oil, 2 shekel alkaline (naga) plant (= 25 + 16.7 gram), / (provision for): X-DINGIR-X. / 5 sila3 beer, 5 sila3 bread (= 5 + 5 liter), 2 bundles onion, / 3 shekel oil, 2 shekel alkaline (naga) plant (= 25 + 16.7 gram), / (provision for): Šeš-a-ni. / 2 ban2 beer, 2 ban2 bread (= 20 + 20 liter), 2 bundles onion, / 10 shekel oil, 2 shekel alkaline (naga) plant (= 83.3 + 16.7 gram), / (provision for): Ad-da"; Incised, reverse, in cuneiform [translation]: "5 sila3 beer, 5 sila3 bread (= 5 + 5 liter), 2 bundles onion, / 3 shekel oil, 2 shekel alkaline (naga) p (= 25 + 16.7 gram), / (provision for): A-bi2-a-ti. / 3 sila3 beer, 2 sila3 bread (= 3 + 2 liter), 2 bundles onion, / 3 shekel oil, 2 shekel alkaline (naga) plant (= 25 + 16.7 gram), / (provision for): Nu-ur2-eš4-tar2. / 3 sila3 beer, 2 sila3 bread (= 3 + 2 liter), 2 bundles onion, / 3 shekel oil, 2 shekel alkaline (naga) plant (= 25 + 16.7 gram), / (provision for): dSuen-ba-ni. / 4 ban2 (and) 6 sila3 beer, 4 ban2 and 4 sila3 bread (= 46 + 44 liter), 14 / bundles onion, 28 shekel oil (= 150.0 gram), / 14 shekel alkaline (naga) plant (116.7 gram)." Incised, left edge, in cuneiform [translation]: "The 28th day (in) the month: še kar-ra gal2- la. (iii)"
Course History
ANTH 12.2, The Archaeology of the Ancient Near East, Jason Herrmann, Spring 2013
ANTH 39, Archaeology of the Middle East, Jesse Casana, Fall 2019
ANTH 39.01/MES 3.02, Archaeology of the Middle East, Jesse Casana, Spring 2021
Anthropology 39.01, Middle Eastern Studies 3.02, Archaeology of the Middle East, Jesse Casana, Fall 2023
Exhibition History
From Discovery to Dartmouth: The Assyrian Reliefs at the Hood Museum of Art, 1856-2006, Alvin P. Gutman Gallery, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, October 19, 2006-June 17, 2007.
Publication History
Magnus Widell, From Discovery to Dartmouth: The Assyrian Reliefs at the Hood Museum of Art, 1856-2006, A Selection of Cuneiform Tablets from the Hood Museum of Art's Collection, Hanover, New Hampshire: Dartmouth College, 2006, no. 2.
Widell, Magnus, Ur III Economy and Bureaucracy: The Neo-Sumerian Cuneiform Tablets in the Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College (I). Orient: Reports of the Society for Near Eastern Studies in Japan, 55 (1), 2019, illustration pg. 42.
Provenance
Dartmouth Scientific Association; given to present collection, 1923.
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