Tell Sifr Explained

Tell Sifr is an ancient Near East archaeological site in Dhi Qar Governorate Iraq generally thought to be the small ancient town of Kutalla. It lies about nine miles east from the ancient city of Larsa. The city lay on a branch of the ancient Iturungal canal that also runs to Bad-tibira.^[1]

Not to be confused with the Iron Age site of Tell Sifr near Aleppo in Syria.

History

The site was occupied in the Isin-Larsa and Old Babylonian periods. In Parthian times it was used as a cemetery. The Parthian graves are brick vaulted oblongs and painted red inside.

Archaeology

The site is a small conical mound on top of a platform of about 40 feet in height. It was excavated by a crew of William Loftus for a few days in 1854.^[2] A number of unbaked clay cuneiform tablets were found, many "enveloped". The tablets, 100 in total with most complete, were found in a brick structure, protected by reed matting. The envelopes partially surrounding the tablets were also inscribed and sealed using cylinder seals.^[3] An Old Babylonian period assemblage of copper tools was found.

The copper assemblage, which had also been wrapped in reed matting, and the tablets are now held at the British Museum.^{[4] [5]} The tablets were later published. They were dated to the reigns of Larsa king Rim-Sin, and Babylon kings Hammurabi and Samsu-iluna. Most come from the family archive of one Sillii-Eshtar and his brother Awil-ili, sons of Ilu-Sukkal. While the brothers were active for about 20 years the texts in the archive include earlier texts dating back to Nur-Adad, Rim-Sin, and Warad-Sin of Larsa^{[6] [7]} Most of the texts were sealed, some multiple times and 200 different seals were found.^[8] After further analysis it has been suggested that one third of the tablets actually came from Ur (excavated by J. E. Taylor) and were inadvertently mixed in with the Loftus tablets from Tell Sifr during shipping. Mislabeled Tell Sifr text actually from Ur are "1–2, 4–9, 11, 13–16, 20–26, 87–94, 96–98, and 105–10". Some additional Tell Sifr have since appeared resulting from clandestine excavation.^{[9] [10] [11]} Most of the texts involve property and legal maters. One snippet from a tablet reads:

Kutalla

Larsa king Silli-Adad (c. 1771–1770 BC) referred to himself as the governor of Kutalla in a brick inscription found at Ur "... provider of Nippur, governor of Ur, Larsa, Lagas, and the land (ma-da) of Kutalla ...".^[12] His successor Warad-Sin used that same royal tutelary on an inscribed cone.^[13] In one of his writings Hammurabi refers to an orchard keeper from Kutalla:

In the time of Samsu-iluna (c. 1749–1712 BC), ruler of Babylon, it is known that one Ili-ippalsam served as a rabiãnum (mayor) in Kutalla.^[14]

A god, possibly the city god, known to reside at Kutalla was Lugal-ki-suna (Lugal-kiduna). A deified symbol of Marduk, Marru(m)-Ía-Marduk, the "Spade of Marduk" is also attested there.^[15] The 18th year name of Larsa ruler Gungunum read "Year the temple of Lugal-kiduna was built" (mu e ^dlugal-ki-du-na ba-du).^[16]

See also

• Cities of the ancient Near East

Further reading

• Maspero, G., "Les contrats babyloniens de Tell-Sifr", Journal des Debats, 1894, 20 avril, ed. du soir
• Holoien, Renee A., "A Computer Data Base for Babylonian Economic Documents Richard D. Ward and." Computing in the Humanities, pp. 163-179, 1981
• R. Ward, "The Family History of Silli-Ishtar: A Reconstruction based on the Kutalla Documents", University of Minnesota Unpublished PhD. Dissertation, Minneapolis, 1973

External links

• Tell Sifr texts (minus those actually from Ur) at CDLI

Notes and References

1. Thorkild Jacobsen, "The Waters of Ur", Toward the Image of Tammuz and Other Essays on Mesopotamian History and Culture, Cambridge, MA and London, England: Harvard University Press, pp. 231-244, 1970
2. Hilprecht, H. V., "First Successful Attempts In Babylonia", Explorations in Bible Lands During the 19th Century, Piscataway, NJ, USA: Gorgias Press, pp. 138-186, 2004
3. https://archive.org/download/travelsresearche00loft/travelsresearche00loft.pdf
4. Moorey, P. R. S., "The Loftus Hoard of Old Babylonian Tools from Tell Sifr in Iraq", Iraq, vol. 33, no. 2, pp. 61–86, 1971
5. Moorey, P. R. S., et al., “New Analyses of Old Babylonian Metalwork from Tell Sifr", Iraq, vol. 50, pp. 39–48, 1988
6. C. F. Jean, "Tell Sifr. Textes cuneiformes conserves au British Museum", 1931
7. Charpin, Dominique, "Archives familiales et propriéte privée en Babylonie ancienne: étude des documents de 'Tell Sifr'", vol. 12, Librairie Droz, 1980
8. Ward, R.D., "The Seal Impressions of the Tel Sifr Documents", AOAT 203, pp. 173-94, 1979
9. Renger, Johannes, "Review - Archives familiales et propriété privée en Babylonie ancienne: Études des Documents de "Tell Sifr" by Dominique Charpin", Journal of the American Oriental Society, vol. 105, no. 2, pp. 331–34, 1985
10. Charpin, Dominique, "Outline for a Diplomatics of Mesopotamian Documents", Writing, Law, and Kingship in Old Babylonian Mesopotamia, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, pp. 25-42, 2010
11. Charpin, Dominique, "Epigraphy of Ur: Past, Present, and Future", Ur in the Twenty-First Century CE: Proceedings of the 62nd Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale at Philadelphia, July 11–15, 2016, edited by Grant Frame, Joshua Jeffers and Holly Pittman, University Park, USA: Penn State University Press, pp. 181-194, 2021
12. De Graef, Katrien, "Bad Moon Rising: The Changing Fortunes of Early Second-Millennium BCE Ur", Ur in the Twenty-First Century CE: Proceedings of the 62nd Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale at Philadelphia, July 11–15, 2016, edited by Grant Frame, Joshua Jeffers and Holly Pittman, University Park, USA: Penn State University Press, pp. 49-88, 2021
13. Frayne, Douglas, "Larsa", Old Babylonian Period (2003-1595 B.C.): Early Periods, Volume 4, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, pp. 107-322, 1990
14. Michalowski, Piotr, "From the collections of an old Babylonian literary connoisseur", Revue d’Assyriologie et d’archéologie Orientale, vol. 107, pp. 15–22, 2013
15. Frayne, Douglas R. and Stuckey, Johanna H., "A Handbook of Gods and Goddesses of the Ancient Near East: Three Thousand Deities of Anatolia, Syria, Israel, Sumer, Babylonia, Assyria, and Elam", University Park, USA: Penn State University Press, 2021
16. Fitzgerald, Madeleine André, "The Rulers of Larsa", Yale University Dissertation, 2002