The civilization of Babylonia and Assyria

Its remains, language, history, religion, commerce, law, art, and literature

by Morris Jastrow | 1915 | 168,585 words

This work attempts to present a study of the unprecedented civilizations that flourished in the Tigris-Euphrates Valley many thousands of years ago. Spreading northward into present-day Turkey and Iran, the land known by the Greeks as Mesopotamia flourished until just before the Christian era....

While not strictly within the limits of our subject, it will nevertheless be considered proper to close this chapter with a brief account of the decipherment of Class II of the trilingual inscriptions of Persepolis and surrounding districts. Already in his first paper on the Persepolitan inscriptions, Grotefend added some remarks on the script of Class II which he recognized as more complicated than Class I, but not so complicated as Class III. He continued his researches in this second variety from time to time and in 1837 [1] was able to recognize the use of a vertical wedge (as in Class III), placed before proper names in order to distinguish them.

It was not, however, until 1844 that any decided success in deciphering the script of Class II was achieved. In that year appeared a work [2] by a Danish scholar, Westergaard, in which, through a comparison of the proper names in Class II and Class I, he succeeded in assigning correct values to 18 of the signs.

This was only a small proportion of the 111 signs to be distinguished in Class II, but it was a beginning. Progress would have been more rapid had not Westergaard fallen into some serious errors which had to be corrected by subsequent researches.

He picked out correctly the signs representing the names Cyrus, Darius, Xerxes, Hystaspis, Achaemenian and Persian; and he also recognized the mixed syllabic and alphabetic character of the script, but he erred, as was quite natural, in the vowel signs and in the selection of signs representing syllables and those representing merely a consonant. For twenty-two signs he could not determine any values through the mere comparison of proper names. Hincks again came to the rescue in correcting some of Westergaard's errors.

In two papers on the subject [3] he identified the three signs for the vowels, a, i, u. He recognized the determinative placed before the names of deities, added nine signs to those correctly fixed by Westergaard. The publication of the version of Class II in the great Behistun inscription by Edward Norris, in 1855, [4] to whom Rawlinson had given his copies and squeezes of this part of the great rock inscription, marked a decided advance through the recognition by Norris of the close relationship of the signs of Class II to those of Class III.

By this means the value of a number of signs could be fixed by comparison with the Babylonian-Assyrian signs, and when later on the principles governing the modifications that the signs of Class III had undergone in their transformation to Class II, had been ascertained, the bulk of the syllabary of the latter class became perfectly transparent. In this way the decipherment of Babylonian-Assyrian became of service in reading the second variety of the cuneiform script. Westergaard now took up the subject again [5] and succeeded in increasing the number of signs correctly read to sixty-seven.

Steady progress was made through the efforts of various scholars, among whom M. Haig, A. D. Mordtmann, Oppert and Sayce are to be specially mentioned, so that by the year 1879, when Oppert published his work, Le Peuple et la Langue des Medes, the decipherment, so far as the reading of the signs was concerned, was practically completed.

The final work on the subject, giving a full account of the course of the decipherment and detailing the results in the most exact manner, is the publication of the inscriptions of Class II by Weissbach, in 1890. [6] The question, however, as to the language of the inscriptions was a more difficult one.

Scholars wavered as to the name to be given to the language. The firsl; suggestion to call it Scythic was abandoned in favor of Median, proposed by Oppert, but this designation yielded in time to others so that at present it is generally designated from the region in which it was spoken as neo-Susian or neo-Elamitic. [7]

The resemblance of the signs to those of Class III showed conclusively that the script was a derivative from the Babylonian-Assyrian cuneiform, and in view of the comparative ease in determining through this resemblance the values to be assigned to the 113 signs to be distinguished, and the existence of certain signs as in Class III, as determinatives indicating whether a word was the name of a person, a deity, a city or a country, it was possible, through the comparison with Class I and III on the large Behistun Inscription to fix the sounds of many words in the language, the meanings of which were furnished by the comparison. This extended to verbal forms as well as to nouns, to pronouns and to particles.

The language turned out to be a type which was neither Semitic nor Aryan, and yet totally different from the Sumerian. Excavations conducted by the French government for several years at Susa, under the general direction of J. De Morgan, brought to the surface a large number of historical and votive inscriptions and hundreds of commercial tablets such as were found in great abundance in the Babylonian and Assyrian mounds.

The material covered an extensive period; and as it was studied and interpreted by one of the most distinguished Assyriologists of the day, Vincent Scheil, [8] it was shown that the language was closely related to that of Class II. It was evident, therefore, that the inscriptions of this class represented the language spoken by the inhabitants of Elam, lying to the east and northeast of Babylonia and which, as we know from the annals of Babylonian and Assyrian rulers, was for many centuries the rival of Babylonia and at various times made inroads into the Euphrates Valley. [9]

The excavations at Susa confirmed the data derived from Babylonian and Assyrian monuments as to the great age of the Elamitic kingdom, for the material unearthed carries us back beyond the third millennium before our era. The script also shows traces of having passed through a long development, the oldest forms representing a much closer approach to the original pictures from which the linear wedges were derived. The decipherment of the older Elamitic inscriptions, successfully inaugurated by Scheil, is not, however, complete. More material will no doubt be forthcoming which will enable scholars to clear up doubtful points.

It seems certain that the language also changed somewhat with the lapse of centuries so that scholars now distinguish between ihe oldest form of Elamitic as proto-Elamitic, and the latest form, represented by Class II, as neo-Elamitic. The relationship of the Elamitic and neo-Elamitic cuneiform to the Babylonian is evident, but exactly how the proto-Elamitic characters were derived from the Babylonian script is a question that must be left open for the present. As for the language, we must rest content with the statement that it is of a Turanian type and was one of the languages spoken in the districts lying to the east of Babylonia. The Elamites at one time extended their rule far into Asia Minor, for around the lake of Van in Armenia inscriptions have been found which are written in a cuneiform variety practically identical with that of Class II. [10]

The extensive use of cuneiform script as a writing medium for various languages and the development of various distinct forms, all eventually to be traced back to some early variety of picture writing, is a remarkable testimony to the profound influence exerted by the civilization that arose in the Euphrates Valley through the combination of the Sumerians and Semites or as we ought to say, Sumerians and Akkadians. Even with a consideration of these chief forms representing four distinct languages, Sumerian, Babylonian-Assyrian, Elamitic and Persian, we have not exhausted the scope of cuneiform writing.

In Cappadocia a variety derived from the more specifically Assyrian form of cuneiform characters was used in connection with commercial interchange. A considerable number of tablets, all of a commercial character, have been found dating from about the eleventh century, in which cuneiform is used to write the current tongue of Cappadocia, [11] while at Boghaz-Keui, a capital of a Hittite kingdom, a large archive of clay tablets was discovered by the late Hugo Winckler, [12] containing hundreds of tablets in cuneiform writing, but representing the Hittite language — the same as the one found in hieroglyphic form on the Hittite inscriptions.

Among the tablets of the cuneiform archive found at Tell el-Amarna to which reference will be made, [13] there were letters in cuneiform written by rulers of Mitanni — a district to the northeast of Mesopotamia — in their own language, which is represented again by some of the tablets found at Boghaz-Keui. Even Greek was written in cuneiform characters, as some tablets published a number of years ago by Pinches showed. [14]

It is evident from this that the influence exerted by the civilization of Babylonia and Assyria extended throughout the ancient world, prompting the Egyptian scribes to learn cuneiform so as to carry on a correspondence with Babylonian rulers and with the governors of Palestinian and Phoenician centres, and leading the Hittites in the north to exchange cuneiform as a more convenient mode of writing for their own hieroglyphic script, [15] and resulting in the adoption of a cuneiform script by the Elamites as well as by their successors, the Persian rulers.

Within Babylonia and Assyria the script, developing from an archaic to several varieties of more modern forms, survived the fall of the Babylonian empire through Cyrus' conquest and even the coming of the Greeks, for cuneiform inscriptions from the days of the Greek supremacy have been found, and it is not until almost the threshold of the Christian era that the use of this form of writing finally disappears. The latest cuneiform inscription dates from the year 80 B.C.

Lastly a word as to the origin of the cuneiform script from a pictorial form. We have carried back the forms of cuneiform writing used outside of Babylonia and Assyria to the influence exerted by these two empires, whose civilization originating in the Euphrates Valley is the result of the commingling of Sumerians and Akkadians. The oldest form of cuneiform writing, therefore, is that represented by the oldest inscriptions of Babylonia which, we have seen, are couched in Sumerian.

The script, however, in these Sumerian inscriptions, while archaic, is far removed from the state in which each sign represented a picture. Moreover, we have seen that contrary to the opinion at first held by scholars, the Sumerian in the form that we have it is no longer a purely ideographic mode of writing, but has already advanced to the syllabic stage in which a sign is used to represent a sound and no longer merely the word for which it stands.

A careful study, however, of the forms of the characters enables us to pass beyond the wedge-shaped variety of cuneiform to a linear type; and in many cases it is not difficult to recognize in the linear outlines the remains of a picture, representing one of the words for which the sign stands.

Thus the linear form Cuneiform for Sun / Day / Light (linear form) of the sign for sun, day, light, which in the wedge-form becomes Cuneiform for Sun / Day / Light (wedge form) is clearly a derivative of a picture of the sun sending forth its rays.

The sign for eye, face, seeing, which in the wedge-shape takes on the form Cuneiform for Eye / Face / Seeing (wedge form) is in the linear form Cuneiform for Eye / Face / Seeing (leinear form) and it is not difficult to recognize in this the outlines of an eye.

The sign for man Cuneiform sign for Man (wedge form). is in the linear form Cuneiform sign for Man (linear form), which suggests a man lying on his back.

To set forth in detail how, starting with a series of pictures, the writing, passing through various stages, developed to a linear form, suitable for transferring characters to a hard material and then by further stages was transformed to a wedge-shaped variety, better adapted for writing on a soft substance like clay, would carry us too far.

Nor is it necessary for our purpose, which is merely to call attention at the close of this chapter to the manner in which the cuneiform script originated, to do so. Prof. Barton, who has recently published an elaborate work on the "Origin of Cuneiform Writing", [16] in which he has embodied the results of many years of study, has added valuable tables of signs showing the changes they underwent in passing from the oldest to the latest period. He has also endeavored to reconstruct the objects represented by the signs. Thanks to the ingenious method pursued by him and to his wide and accurate scholarship, he has succeeded in a large number of instances in giving us the picture originally represented.

Naturally some of his identifications are open to question. In a problem of this kind one must not expect that all phases of it can be satisfactorily solved. From a survey of the objects represented animals, parts of the body, instruments, pictures of water, of stars, trees and plants and making due allowance for doubtful cases, we reach the general conclusion that the script originated at a time when already a considerable advance in culture had been made, and in a land in which agricultural conditions prevailed, in which animals had been domesticated, and the gods identified with personifications of the stars, by the side of the moon and sun.

There is nothing, however, to indicate more precisely where the script originated. It may have been brought by the Sumerians to the Euphrates Valley and perfected by them there, or it may have originated in the Euphrates Valley or the neighboring district of Elam. It is not impossible that the proto-Elamitic script, to which a reference has above been made, [17] may revert to the same source as the picture-writing underlying the oldest form of Sumerian inscriptions.

Until we can determine more accurately whence the Sumerians came and how far back the Sumerian culture can be traced, it is idle to speculate further. Archaeology has given us so many surprises that it is not out of the question that we should come across traces of a still earlier culture than the Sumerian or the proto-Elamitic, [18] from which both may have derived their inspiration, and with this a pictorial script further developed by each group and adapted to its purposes. [19]

From the linear form we can without difficulty trace the further development to the latest stage of wedgewriting. Variant forms continued to arise both in Assyria and Babylonia and there can be no question that the neo-Elamitic cuneiform or Class II represents a variety of the Babylonian script simplified and adapted to Elamitic about the twelfth century B.C., further modified in the course of time, while the Persian variety represents another more simplified adaptation made in the sixth or possibly as early as the seventh century B.C.

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

Neue Beitrage zur Erlduterung der Persepolitanischen Keilschrift (Hanover, 1837).

[2]:

N. L. Westergaard, Zur Entzifferung der Achamenidischen Keilschrift zweiter Gattung (Zeits. fur die Kunde des Morgenlandes, vol. vi, pp. 337-466) ; also published in English, On the Deciphering of the Second Akh&menian or Median Species of arrowheaded Writing (Memoires de la Societe Royale des Antiquaires du Nord, 1840-44, pp. 271-439).

[3]:

(a) On the First and Second Kinds of Persepolitan Writing, (6) On the Three Kinds of Persepolitan Writing and On the Babylonian Lapidary Characters; both published in the Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy, vol. xxi, Part II, pp. 114-131 and 233-248.

[4]:

Memoir on the Scythic Version of the Behistun Inscription (Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, vol. xv, pp. 1-213). The paper was read in 1852.

[5]:

In a paper published in the Proceedings of the Danish Academy for 1854, vol. ii, pp. 41-178.

[6]:

Die Achcemenideninschriften zweiter Art, herausgegeben und bearbeitet von F. H. Weissbach (Leipzig, 1890).

[7]:

The second designation is at present the one more commonly employed.

[8]:

The results of the remarkably successful excavations at Susa are being published by the French government. Thirteen large volumes have appeared up to the present time under the title of Delegation en Perse, of which six are devoted to the Elamitic material, edited by Scheil. The expedition also found a magnificent series of boundary stones and the famous Hammurapi Code, all of which were captured as trophies by the Elamites during an incursion into Babylonia in the twelfth century and carried by them to their capital at Susa. See below, p. 283.

[9]:

See Chapter III.

[10]:

See Sayce The Inscription of Mai-Amir and the Language of the Second Column of the Akhcemenian Inscriptions (Actes du VI. Congrea International des Orientalistes, Part II, pp. 639-756).

[11]:

See Delitzsch, Beitrdge zur Entzifferung und Erkldrung der Kappadokischen Kettschrifttafeln (Abhandlungen der Koniglich-Sachsischen Gesellschaft der Wissensehaften, Philologisch-Historische Classe, XIV, pp. 207-270).

[12]:

See Orientalistische Literaturzeitung, Dec. 15, 1906, and Mitteil. d. Deutsch. Orient Gesellschaft, No. 35 (Dec., 1907), and now, also, Delitzsch, Sumerisch-Akkadisch-Hettitische Vokabular-fragmente (Berlin, 1914; Abh. d. Kgl. Preuss. Akd. d. Wiss., 1914, Phil. Hist. Klasse, Nr. 3), embodying a study of 26 fragments of tablets found at Boghaz-Keui, containing in parallel columns Sumerian and Akkadian words and phrases, together with the Hittite equivalents (written in cuneiform characters) in the third column. In this way a large number of words and forms can be identified and, with the complete publication of this kind of material, promised in the near future, there will be little difficulty in determining the exact character of the Hittite language. There is also reason to hope that with the aid of these transliterated Hittite texts it will be possible to find the definite key for the decipherment for the hieroglyphic Hittite script. The publication of the important material found by the late Dr. Winckler is now announced as ready and is expected to be published within this year by Dr. E. F. Weidner.

[13]:

Below, p. 164.

[14]:

Greek Transcriptions of Babylonian Tablets (Proceedings of the Society of Biblical Archeology, vol. xxiv [1902], pp. 118-119). These fragments of tablets, containing transcriptions of Greek words in cuneiform, furnished incidentally a further confirmation though at the time of Pinches' publication no longer necessary of the correctness of the method of reading the Babylonian-Assyrian cuneiform characters.

[15]:

For the Hittite inscriptions see Messerschmidt, Carpus Inscriptionum Hettiticarum (Mitteilungen der Vorderasiatischen Gesellschaft, 1900, No. 4; 1902, No. 3; 1906, No. 5) ; Garstang, The Land of the Hittites (London, 1910) ; Ed. Meyer, Reich und Kultur der Chettiter (Berlin, 1914) ; and the recent attempt at decipherment by R. C. Thompson, A New Decipherment of the Ilittite Hieroglyphics (Archeologia, vol. Ixiv, Oxford, 1913, pp. 1-144).

[16]:

Beitrage zur Assyriologie, vol. ix (1912-1913).

[17]:

Above, p. 113, seq.

[18]:

See King's ingenious suggestion in the appendix to his History of Sumer and Akkad (London, 1910), in which he takes up this problem.

[19]:

See further on this subject besides Barton's book, Fossey's chapter on the Ideographic Origin and Evolution of Cuneiform Writing in his Manuel d'Assyriologie, pp. 245-268, and Delitzsch's Entstehung des dltesten Schri ft systems oder der Ursprung der Keilschriftzeichen (Leipzig, 1897), the first thorough discussion of the subject, full of valuable suggestions, though some of the views set forth must be modified in the light of later researches. 

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