Inscriptions of Nebuchadnezzar II were first published at the beginning of the 19th century, at a time when the decipherment of cuneiform was still in its earliest stages. A copy of the large stone tablet bearing the so-called "East India House Inscription" (Nbk. 2) was published by H. Jones (Inscription) in 1804.[[120]] In 1818, G.F. Grotefend (FO 6) disseminated information about an inscription of Nebuchadnezzar written on a clay cylinder (presumably) from Babylon (Nbk. 19 [C34]). Over twenty years later, in 1840, in Neue Beiträge zur Erläuterung der babylonischen Keilschrift nebst einem Anhange über die Beschaffenheit des ältesten Schriftdrucks bei der vierten Secularfeier der Erfindung des Bücherdrucks von Gutenberg, Grotefend attempted to translate (into German) several passages of that Akkadian text, together with another inscription written on another completely-preserved cylinder (Nbk. 12 [C27] ex. 1). These first attempts at translating individual lines of Akkadian texts are far from modern translations, as the understanding of the Babylonian language and cuneiform script was still in its infancy. Grotefend called the cylinders Betwalze ("prayer roller") since he thought that they were inscribed with religious texts.
The first reliable, scholarly editions of Nabopolassar and Nebuchadnezzar's inscriptions, including hand-drawn facsimiles and translations, were published in the late 1880s by H. Winkler and J.N. Strassmaier.[[121]] In 1890, Winckler provided the first significant publication of this group of texts in volume 3/2 of the then-important series Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek. In that volume, he edited three inscriptions of Nabopolassar and seventeen of Nebuchadnezzar.[[122]]
Twenty-two years later, in 1912, S. Langdon edited all Neo-Babylonian royal inscriptions known to him at that time in his Die neubabylonischen Königsinschriften. Langdon's seminal work contained five inscriptions of Nabopolassar and fifty-two of Nebuchadnezzar; the transliterations were accompanied by German translations.[[123]] Despite the importance of Neo-Babylonian royal inscriptions, Langdon's 1912 edition was the last successful attempt to collect and publish all of the known texts of that genre and period in a single place.
Sixty years later, in the 1970s, P.-R. Berger, planned to fulfill that desideratum by publishing a three-volume edition (with up-to-date transliterations, translations, and studies) of the then-known corpus of texts. The first volume, Die neubabylonischen Königsinschriften: Königsinschriften des ausgehenden babylonischen Reiches (626–539 a. Chr.), which contained a catalogue and bibliographical information, appeared in 1973, but the planned second and third volumes were never published, so Langdon, NBK continued to be the standard edition of the inscriptions of Babylon's last native kings.
Excavations of Iraqi archaeologists in the 1970s and 80s brought to light new inscriptions of Nabopolassar and Nebuchadnezzar, especially from Babylon. These texts were published individually in the journal Sumer.[[124]] No attempts were made during that time to gather the ever-growing number of published Neo-Babylonian inscriptions together in a single place. This might have been (partially) due to the fact that the Toronto-based Royal Inscriptions of Mesopotamia (RIM) Project, led by A. Kirk Grayson, had announced that it had aimed to tackle this monumental task. The inscriptions of Nabopolassar and Nebuchadnezzar II were to be published in the planned third volume of its Royal Inscriptions of Mesopotamia: Babylonian Periods (RIMB) sub-series.[[125]] That volume, however, was never fully realized.[[126]]
In 2008, R. Da Riva published a very informative, general study of the genre entitled The Neo-Babylonian Royal Inscriptions: An Introduction. Although that book does not include editions of the texts themselves, it does include a wealth of information about this important group of texts, including extensive bibliography and a comprehensive catalogue of inscriptions. Several years later, in 2013, Da Riva performed a similar service to Assyriology by publishing up-to-date editions and studies of the known inscriptions of Nabopolassar, Amēl-Marduk, and Neriglissar. Her book The Inscriptions of Nabopolassar, Amel-Marduk and Neriglissar included transliterations and translations of fifteen inscriptions of Nabopolassar, six inscriptions of Amēl-Marduk, and nine inscriptions of Neriglissar. Between 2009 and 2013, Da Riva also published new, critical editions of several very important inscriptions of Nebuchadnezzar, especially those written on rock reliefs in modern-day Lebanon (the so-called "Nahr el-Kalb Inscriptions" and "Brisa Inscriptions").[[127]]
Since 2015, the Neo-Babylonian royal inscriptions have been included in the LMU Munich-based Royal Inscriptions of Babylonia online (RIBo) Project, in its "Babylon 7" sub-project, in a lemmatized (linguistically annotated) and Open Access format.[[128]] The inscriptions of Nabopolassar were made public in August 2015, while those of Nebuchadnezzar were made available in December 2019.
120 A reprint was published in 1861 by Rawlinson, in 1 R (pls. 53-58). The text, written in archaizing signs, was reproduced in the same volume in nineteenth-century typeset sign forms (1 R pls. 59–64).
121 Winkler, ZA 1 (1886) pp. 337–348; Winkler, ZA 2 (1887) pp. 69–75 and 123–147; and Strassmaier, ZA 4 (1889) pp. 106–123.
122 In the same volume, C. Bezold edited the then-known inscriptions of Neriglissar and F.E. Peiser published the then-attested inscriptions of Nabonidus. French translations of a few inscriptions of Neo-Babylonian kings did appear in Ménant, Babylone et la Chaldée, which was published in 1875. That book did not, however, include transliterations of those sources.
123 His book also included three texts of Neriglissar and fifteen of Nabonidus. Inscriptions of Amēl-Marduk were not included in Langdon, NBK. The Nabopolassar and Nebuchadnezzar II texts were adapted from his 1905 book Building inscriptions of the Neo-Babylonian Empire: Part 1, Nabopolassar and Nebuchadnezzar, which was based on his Ph.D. dissertation (Columbia University).
124 For example, Ismail, Sumer 35 (1979) pp. 167–168; Cavigneaux, Sumer 37 (1981) pp. 118–121; and Ismail, Sumer 41 (1985) pp. 34–35.
125 This volume is mentioned on the back cover of ARRIM 1 (1983), but without G. Frame being assigned as its principal author.
126 The RIMB series was abandoned after the publication of Frame, RIMB 2 in 1995.
127 Da Riva, Nahr el-Kalb pp. 255–302; Da Riva, Twin Inscriptions; and Da Riva, ZA 103 (2013) pp. 196–229.
128 http://oracc.org/ribo/babylon7/pager, as well http://oracc.org/ribo/pager [last accessed 14 February, 2024].
Jamie Novotny & Frauke Weiershäuser
Jamie Novotny & Frauke Weiershäuser, ' Overview of Previous Editions ', RIBo, Babylon 7: The Inscriptions of the Neo-Babylonian Dynasty, The RIBo Project, a sub-project of MOCCI, 2024 [/ribo/babylon7/RINBE11Introduction/OverviewofPreviousEditions/]