Volume 10, Issue 2

This article explores the emerging role of wooden wax-covered writing boards in Kassite administration, as indicated by their mentions in three letters and one cattle account from Kassite period Nippur. Even though the number of textual references is scarce, the use of wooden wax-covered writing boards is supported by the depictions on late Kassite kudurru monuments. By incorporating perspectives from Middle Assyrian texts and Neo-Assyrian sealings, this study interprets references to writing board usage in Kassite letters, revealing their role in documenting conscripted workers and their rations. This interpretation finds support in evidence from the Ur III period, contemporary Emar, and the Neo-Babylonian period, collectively suggesting that writing boards were regarded as durable and highly reliable sources. The appearance of seal rings in Babylonia in 13th century BC allows for the hypothesis that wooden wax-covered writing boards could have been sealed in a similar fashion as is assumed for Neo-Assyrian writing boards containing lists of ERIN 2 .MEŠ troops of the king. Notably, the Kassite period letters indicate that writing boards were archived for minimum of 50 years and were checked to verify claims.

The reigns of Adad-nārārī II (911–891) and his son Tukultī-Ninurta II (890–884) are vital to understanding the rise of Neo-Assyria; yet, reconstruction of these is hampered by the scarce and fragmentary sources available. This study surveys the reigns of these two kings, and examines five fragmentary early Neo-Assyrian royal inscriptions from the city of Aššur published in 2009 by Frahm within Keilschrifttexte aus Assur literarischen Inhalts 3, providing solid ascriptions of three of these to Adad-nārārī II and two to Tukultī-Ninurta II on philological and historical grounds. These findings are then integrated into present knowledge of this period in order to present new portraits of these kings’ respective reigns. This results in a clearer historical articulation of Adad-nārārī II’s remarkably successful incumbency, particularly shedding light on his early victories. In turn, Tukultī-Ninurta II’s difficult reign spent consolidating his father’s territorial gains can also be better understood. Interestingly, various innovations can be ascribed to this latter king, not least the ‘calculated frightfulness’ for which his son would become so (in)famous within Assyriology. Finally, some repercussions of these findings for the study of 10th and 9th century royal inscriptions are explored .

Forty-three years after the publication of Simo Parpola’s article “The Murderer of Sennacherib,” the events of his assassination in 681 BC and Esarhaddon’s accession to the throne continue to provoke debate. More than a simple act of murder, the assassination of Sennacherib should be understood as an attempted coup d’ état , a strategically planned attempt to use force to bring about a change in political leadership. Combining a new examination of the many sources associated with this event with fresh theoretical perspectives derived from the study of modern coups d’état , this article refutes recent suggestions that Esarhaddon played a role in the murder of his father. It argues that Sennacherib did in fact disinherit Urad-Mullissu in favor of Esarhaddon, that Urad-Mullissu successfully recruited professional chariot units based in Nineveh to participate in his conspiracy, and that Esarhaddon was likely based in the city of Dur-Katlimmu at the time of his father’s assassination. Esarhaddon avoided assassination and prevailed in the conflict which followed by leveraging his status as the designated heir to create the perception that his candidacy for the throne was endorsed by the gods and therefore his victory was inevitable. Nevertheless, the assassination and the brief civil war that followed cast a pall over Esarhaddon’s reign, shaping his own succession arrangements as well as the atmosphere of paranoia which marked his final years.

This paper argues, in contrast to some previous scholarship, that debt bondage was not practiced in Egypt’s Late Period (c. 8th–5th centuries BC). The phenomena of self-sales into slavery and the inclusion of children in lists of security in loan contracts have been offered as evidence of debt bondage in past studies: in the former, arguing that self-sales were a means to satisfy debts; in the latter, that seizure of children into bondage was precipitated by default on a debt. But there is no evidence for these manifestations of debt bondage in practice. In an examination of all relevant self-sales and loan contracts of the period, it can be shown that in no case was a person seized for security or in distraint, and that self-sales did not occur specifically as a result of debtor default. In practice, creditors likely pursued punitive measures such as fine or high interest rather than the potentially expensive and troublesome seizure of debtors. The conditional clauses regarding seizure or distraint reflected in loan documents must thus be regarded as notional rather than actionable, more representative of the social rather than financial capital at stake when one defaulted on a debt. Excluding debt bondage from the Egyptian socio-economic landscape of the period opens the discussion to the implications for social practice, family life, and credit systems.