Time at Emar: The Cultic Calendar and the Rituals from the Diviner's Archive (House)

370 Pages·2000·4.43 MB·English

by  Daniel E. Fleming

Time at Emar
General Editor
Jerrold S. Cooper, Johns Hopkins University
Editorial Board
Walter Farber, University of Chicago Marvin Powell, Northern Illinois University
Jean-Pierre Grégoire, C.N.R.S. Jack Sasson, University of North Carolina
Piotr Michalowski, University of Michigan Piotr Steinkeller, Harvard University
Simo Parpola, University of Helsinki Marten Stol, Free University of Amsterdam
Irene Winter, Harvard University
1. The Lamentation over the Destruction of Sumer and Ur
Piotr Michalowski
2. Schlaf, Kindchen, Schlaf! Mesopotamische Baby-Beschwörungen und -Rituale
Walter Farber
3. Adoption in Old Babylonian Nippur and the Archive of Mannum-mesu-lißßur
Elizabeth C. Stone and David I. Owen
4. Third-Millennium Legal and Administrative Texts in the Iraq Museum, Baghdad
Piotr Steinkeller and J. N. Postgate
5. House Most High: The Temples of Ancient Mesopotamia
A. R. George
6. Textes culinaires Mésopotamiens / Mesopotamian Culinary Texts
Jean Bottéro
7. Legends of the Kings of Akkade: The Texts
Joan Goodnick Westenholz
8. Mesopotamian Cosmic Geography
Wayne Horowitz
9. The Writing on the Wall: Studies in the Architectural Context of Late Assyrian Palace Reliefs
John M. Russell
10. Adapa and the South Wind: Language Has the Power of Life and Death
Shlomo Izre'el
11. Time at Emar: The Cultic Calendar and the Rituals from the Diviner’s Archive
Daniel E. Fleming
Time at Emar
The Cultic Calendar and the Rituals
from the Diviner’s Archive
Daniel E. Fleming
Eisenbrauns
Winona Lake, Indiana
2000
ç Copyright 2000 by Eisenbrauns.
All rights reserved.
Printed in the United States of America.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Fleming, Daniel E.
Time at Emar : the cultic calendar and the rituals from the diviner’s
archive / Daniel E. Fleming
p. cm. — (Mesopotamian civilizations ; 11)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 1-57506-044-2 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. Emar (Extinct city)—Religion. 2. Rites and ceremonies—Syria—
Emar (Extinct city) 3. Religious calendars—Syria—Emar (Extinct city)
I. Title. II. Series.
BL1640.F55 2000
299u.2—dc21
00-048461
CIP
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of the American
National Standard for Information Sciences—Permanence of Paper for Printed Library
Materials, ANSI Z39.48-1984. †
for William Moran
sa . . . nißirta imuruma katimtu iptû
I dedicate this book to my adviser, William Moran, with respect and affection.
During my years of study, he set a standard for rigorous thought, sensitivity to lit-
erature and life, and unalloyed intellectual delight that I can never match but
will always imitate.

Contents
List of Figures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xi
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xii
Abbreviations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . xiv
Chapter 1 Emar and the Question of Time . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Emar in Syria 2
The Ritual Archive and the Calendar Texts 8
Chapter 2 The Diviner’s Archive . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
The Collection of a Generalist 13
The Range of Interest 14
The Chronological Range 21
The Diviner Who Does Not Divine 26
The Diviners as Scribes 26
The Diviner as Cult Supervisor 29
The Diviners of Zu-Baºla’s Family 32
The Building M as the House of the Gods 35
1
The Gods and the House of the Gods 36
The City and the House of the Gods 38
The Achievement of Zu-Baºla 43
Chapter 3 The Zukru . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
The Festival Text 49
Text Construction with Concurrent Calendars 50
King and Calendar: The Expansion to Festival Form 54
The Last Expansion: Separate Preparatory Days 57
The Middle Expansion: The Seven-Year Cycle 63
The First Expansion: The Seven-Day Feast 68
The Main Event: At the Stones outside the City Walls 76
The Feast for All Emar: The People, the Gods,
and the Sassabeyanatu Spirits 78
vii
viii Contents
The Anointing of the Stones 82
The Procession of Dagan between the Stones 87
The Return to the City with the City God dnin.urta 93
The Center of the zukru 96
The Old Syrian zukru: Invoking the Chief God 98
Emar’s Alternative Tradition 99
The Alternative Text 100
The zukru in Its Annual Format 105
Emar 375 as an Archaic Local Text 109
Mari and the Yaminite zukrum 113
The Essential zukru: A Spoken Offering 121
The zukru and the Axes of the Year 126
The Problem of Year and New Year 127
A Year with Two Axes 130
The zukru at the Axis of the Year 132
Leaving the City: The akitu, the Hittite Festivals, and the
Emar zukru 133
The á-ki-ti/akitu 134
The Hittite Festivals 136
The Emar zukru in Context 138
Chapter 4 The Annual Cycle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
The Ritual Text for Six Months 143
The Orientation of the Text 143
The Tablet 143
The Calendar 144
The Season 145
The City and the Diviner 146
The Syrian Setting 150
Six Months in the Emar Ritual Calendar 152
(Zarati) 152
dnin.kur.ra 161
dAn-na 162
dA-dama 164
Mar-za-ha-ni 165
dHal-ma 168
Two Related Texts for Individual Months 173
Emar and Ugarit: A Syrian Text Tradition 174
The Month of Abî 175
The Text and the Frame 175
The Middle of the Month 181
The 25th–27th Days 184
Contents ix
The Month of Halma (Hiyar) 190
The New Moon of Dagan and the Rite for Barring and
Opening Doors 192
Chapter 5 Calendrical Time in Ancient Syria . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 196
The Emar Calendars 196
Definition of Three Emar Calendars 197
Dated Legal Documents: The Tablet Types 198
Dated Legal Documents: Calendar Patterns 203
Calendar Tradition and Innovation 208
The Turning of Time: Calendrical Issues in Emar Ritual 211
Annual Ritual and the Seasons 211
Intercalation: The Problem of Seasonal Adjustment
in a Lunar Calendar 214
The Nature of Ritual Time 218
Emar in the Ancient Near East 222
Emar and Early Urban Society 222
Emar in Syria 225
Appendix Texts and Translations, with Collation Notes . . . . . . . . 233
A. The zukru Festival: Emar 373, Msk 74292a+ 234
B. The Annual zukru: Emar 375 (/448/449) 258
C. The Text for Six Months: Emar 446, Msk 74280a+74291a 268
D. The Texts for Individual Months: Emar 452, Msk 74146b;
and Emar 463, Msk 7468 280
1. Emar 452, Msk 74146b 280
2. Emar 463, Msk 7468 290
E. Collation Notes 294
1. Join of Msk 74297c (formerly Emar 376) to Msk 74292a+
(Emar 373, the zukru festival) 294
2. Join of Msk 74287b (formerly Emar 428) to Msk 74298b
(Emar 375, the annual zukru) 294
3. Selected collations for the zukru festival, Emar 373 295
4. Selected collations for the text with the annual zukru,
Emar 375 300
5. Selected collations for the text for six months,
Emar 446 303
6. Selected collations for the text for the month of Abî,
Emar 452 307
7. Selected collations for the text for an unnamed month,
Emar 463 309