Ashmolean Museum: 9 (2023-06-15)

Created by: Wagensonner, Klaus

One of about two dozen texts from Babylonia inscribed with Akkadian or Sumerian texts using a local variant of the Greek alphabet; 1st century AD or possibly even later; Ashmolean Museum, Oxford; Ashm 1937-993.

These fragmentary and poorly understood texts testify to the longevity of the cuneiform writing system, and the importance of the cuneiform culture even at a transformational time when Mesopotamia was no longer ruled by native dynasties. A majority of the so-called Greaco-Babyloniaca, but not this exemplar in the Ashmolean Museum, have an inscription in cuneiform on one side and a Greek transcription on the other, and can therefore be described as school exercises. Ashm 1937-993 is monolingual, but perhaps a transcription of a Sumerian-Akkadian bilingual incantation (Maul 1991), although this has been contested (Geller 1997). S. M. Maul, “Neues zu den ‛Graeco-Babyloniaca’,” ZA 81 (1991) 87-107. M. J. Geller, “The Last Wedge,” ZA 87 (1997) 43–95. CDLI entry: P412445

credit: Dahl, Jacob L.