SAA 01 011. Building a Private Army (ABL 0304)[via saao/saa01]

Obverse
o 1o 1

a-bat LUGAL a-na mman-nu—ki—dIM

(1) The king's word to Mannu-ki-Adad:

o 22

01 lim 01 me 19 LÚv.ERIM-MEŠ KALAG-MEŠ

(2) 1,119 able-bodied men — all together they were 5,000 persons, those of them who have died have died, and those who are alive are alive — were given to the exempts of the Palace and entrusted as charges to your care. So why are you appropriating them, turning some to recruits, others to chariot-men, and others again to cavalrymen, into your own regular troops?

o 33

05 lim šú-nu ZI-MEŠ ina UGU a-ḫe-iš

o 44

am—mar mé-tu-u-ni TAv ŠÀ-bi-šú-nu

o 55

mé-e-tu ù am—mar bal-ṭu-u-ni

o 66

bal-ṭu a-na LÚv.zu-ku ša É.GAL

o 77

ta-ad-nu ki-i pi-qit-ti ina pa-ni-ka

o 88

paq-du at-ta a-ta-a ta-na-áš-ši

o 99

an-nu-ti a-na LÚv.rak-su-ti

o 1010

an-nu-ti a-na LÚv.A—SIG-MEŠ

o 1111

an-nu-ti a-na ANŠE.ša—BAD-ḪAL-la-ti

o 1212

a-na ki-iṣ-ri ša ra-mi-ni-ka

o 1313

tu-ta-ar-šú-nu TAv ŠÀ-bi-ka

(13) Have you not said to yourself: "When the time comes for me to summon them, to whose house shall I go for help?"

o 1414

la ta-ad-bu-ú-bu!

o 1515

ma-a ki-i na-šu-ú re-ši-šú-nu

o 1616

il-la-kan-ni ma-a pa-ni-ia

o 1717

ina É man-nu a-šak-kan

o 1818

ú-ma-a an-nu-rig

(18) I am writing to you right now: You have sent many of them to the south and to the north or wherever on (various) errands; summon them wherever they are, they must be there before my eunuch arrives. I shall now send my eunuch to make a review of them.

o 1919

a-sa-ap-rak-ka

Reverse
r 1r 1

ma-ʾa-ad TAv ŠÀ-bi-šú-nu

r 22

a-na ZAG KAB me-me-e-ni a-na

r 33

ši-pir-ti ta-as-sa-par

r 44

bé-et šu-nu re-es-su-nu

r 55

i-ši pa-na-at LÚv.SAG-ia

r 66

lu qur-bu an-nu-rig

r 77

LÚv.SAG-ia a-šap-pa-ra

r 88

a-šir-ta-šú-nu i-šak-kan


Adapted from Simo Parpola, The Correspondence of Sargon II, Part I: Letters from Assyria and the West (State Archives of Assyria, 1), 1987. Lemmatised by Mikko Luukko, 2009-11, as part of the AHRC-funded research project “Mechanisms of Communication in an Ancient Empire: The Correspondence between the King of Assyria and his Magnates in the 8th Century BC” (AH/F016581/1; University College London) directed by Karen Radner. The annotated edition is released under the Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike license 3.0. Please cite this page as http://oracc.org/saao/P334193/.