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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 August 2014
The very interesting Ur III text UET V, 796, that was treated by W. F. Leemans in 1960, was recently given fresh attention by M. Roaf, in an article which appeared in this same journal. The main problem raised by this text, which records a very large shipment of copper received at Dilmun, is the relationship between the weight standard of Dilmun and that of Ur: the former makes only use of minas, while the latter uses minas and talents. Already in Leeman's treatment of UET V, 796 it was established that the Dilmun mina weighed 2⅔ Ur minas. Collation of the text, provided by J. N. Postgate, allowed Roaf to suggest the restoration, in line 1, of the figure 13, ˹7˺ [50] which perfectly fits the equivalence between 611 Ur talents 6⅔ Ur minas and the corresponding numbers of Dilmun minas (i.e. 13,750 minas).
Given this, it seems appropriate to attempt an evaluation of the absolute weights of the Dilmun and Ur units and to make some comment about (a) the articulation of the Dilmun system, (b) the possible relationship between this system and the others that were in use in various areas and periods of the ancient Near East.
1 Leemans, W. F., Foreign Trade in the Old Babylonian Period (Leiden, 1960), 38–9 and 48–50Google Scholar. The present article is a product of the research project “Trade routes and circulation of goods in the ancient Near East”, which I direct at the Istituto di Storia Antica of the University of Bologna, with the financial support of the Italian Ministry of Education. It is a pleasure for me to acknowledge the help of N. F. Parise, with whom I have long shared closely similar interests in the field of ancient Near Eastern metrology; he drew my attention to M. Roaf's article—the starting point of the present paper—and read the paper itself, providing me with useful comments thereon.
2 Roaf, M., Weights on the Dilmun Standard, Iraq 44 (1982), 137–41CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
3 See the reckonings by W. F. Leemans, in accordance with Kraus, F. R., Foreign Trade, 49 Google Scholar with n. 1.
4 Cf. ibid., 49 n. 1.
5 T. G. Bibby, … according to the standard of Dilmun, , Kuml. Årbog for jysk Arkaeologisk Selskab, 1970 (København, 1971), 350 Google Scholar.
6 The contemporary presence of a subdivision of the mina into 80 and 100 shekels is not unknown in the ancient Near East. See, e.g., the case of the weight measures for wool at Nuzi: C. Zaccagnini, A Note on Nuzi Textiles, in Morrison, M. A. and Owen, D. I. (eds.), Studies E. R. Lacheman (Winona Lake, In., 1981), 359–60Google Scholar. Cf. the well-known subdivision of the “Western” mina (i.e. ~470 gr) into 50 shekels of 9.4 gr (Syrian system) and into 40 shekels of 11.75 gr (Hittite system): see most recently Parise, N. F., Unità ponderali e rapporti di cambio nella Siria del nord, in Archi, A. (ed.), Circulation of Goods in Non-Palatial Context in the Ancient Near East (Roma, 1984), 125–38Google Scholar, with previous bibliography. Also cf. the fractioning of the so-called “Aegean” unit of ~65 gr (for which see Parise, N. F., Un'unità ponderale egea a Capo Gelidonya, Studi Micenei ed Egeo-Anatolici 14 [1971], 163–70Google Scholar) into 8 × 7.9 gr or into 10 × 6.5 gr: for these “shekels” see most recently my remarks in Aspects of Copper Trade in the Eastern Mediterranean During the Late Bronze Age, in Marazzi, M. and Tusa, S. (eds.) Traffici Micenei nel Mediterraneo: problemi storici e documentazione archeologica (Palermo, 1985)Google Scholar, in press. The “shekel” of ~ 6·5—6·8 gr will be considered further in the course of the present article.
7 A purely arithmetical interpretation.
8 Cf. above, n. 6.
9 Hemmy, A. S., System of Weights at Mohenjo-Daro, in Marshall, J., Mohenjo-Daro and the Indus Civilization 2 (London, 1931), 589–98Google Scholar; id., System of Weights, in Mackay, J. H., Further Excavations at Mohenjo-Daro (Delhi, 1938), 601–12Google Scholar; Vats, M. S., Excavations at Harappā (Delhi, 1940), 360–5Google Scholar; Hemmy, A. S., Weights at Chanhu-daro, in Mackay, E. J. H., Chanhu-Daro Excavations 1935–36 (New Haven, Conn. 1943), 236–43Google Scholar; Hendrick-Baudot, M. P., The Weights of the Harappa-Culture, OLP 3 (1972), 1–34 Google Scholar.
10 Incidentally, I would like to call attention to some Indus weights that have been either interpreted as “exceptional” or “aberrant” by A. S. Hemmy, or have been included in the series centred on the 13.6 gr unit, in spite of the fact that their weight was above the accepted range of oscillation, being 14–15 gr and even more. In my opinion, these weights clearly reveal the presence of the well-known shekel of 7.8–7.9 gr, which is best represented in Syria, from the 3rd down to the 1st millennium, and for which see most recently N. F. Parise, in A. Archi (ed.), Circulation of Goods; Archi, A. and Klengel-Brandt, E., I pesi provenienti da Zincirli, Studi Micenei ed Egeo-Anatolici 24(1984), 245–61Google Scholar; and my remarks in M. Marazzi and S. Tusa (eds.), Traffici Micenei. It seems appropriate to quote some Mohenjo-Daro (excavators' prefixes: DK, HR, VS), Chanhu-Daro (= CD) and Harappā (= H) weights:
CD 2326n: 1.93 gr = ¼ × 7.72 gr
H 11896: 1.92 gr = ¼ × 7.68 gr
CD 2317: 1.89 gr = ¼ × 7.56 gr
HR 3906: 1.86 gr = ¼ × 7.44 gr
H 8877: 1.80 gr = ¼ × 7.20 gr
Dilmun: 1.80 gr = ¼ × 7.20 gr
(cf. above, main text, p. 19)
H 1184: 3.95 gr = ½ × 7.90 gr
DK 220: 3.93 gr = ½ × 7.86 gr
VS 3058: 3.90 gr = ½ × 7.80 gr
CD 2418: 3.86 gr = ½ × 7.72 gr
CD 2326: 3.80 gr = ½ × 7.60 gr
H Ae159: 3.65 gr = ½ × 7.30 gr
DK 10522: 7.90 gr = 1 × 7.90 gr
DK 10790: 7.90 gr = 1 × 7.90 gr
CD 921: 7.45 gr = 1 × 7.45 gr
CD 2326b: 7.34 gr = 1 × 7.34 gr
DK 3746: 15.93 gr = 2 × 7.98 gr
H 278: 15.00 gr = 2 × 7.50 gr
CD 1888: 14.90 gr = 2 × 7.45 gr
CD 2415: 23.70 gr = 3 × 7.90 gr
CD 1096: 23.12 gr = 3 × 7.70 gr
CD 1389: 32.38 gr = 4 × 8.09 gr
DK 6778: 31.96 gr = 4 × 7.99 gr
DK 6693: 30.81 gr = 4 × 7.70 gr
CD 2545: 30.39 gr = 4 × 7.59 gr
CD 1072: 30.28 gr = 4 × 7.57 gr
DK 11232E: 40.40 gr = 5 × 8.08 gr
DK 3176: 47.30 gr = 6 × 7.88 gr
CD 1927: 45.55 gr = 6 × 7.59 gr
Even if some weights may raise problems concerning their state of preservation, the overall consistency of the metrologic evidence listed above seems remarkable.
11 Cf. N. F. Parise, ponderali, Ricerche, Annali dell' Istituto Italiano di Numismatica 9–11 (1962–1964), 17 Google Scholar; id., Per uno studio del sistema ponderale ugaritico, Dialoghi di archeologia 4–5 (1970–1971), 23 Google Scholar n. 25; also the brief remarks of Pctruso, K. M., Early Weights and Weighing in Egypt and in the Indus Valley, Bulletin of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston 79 (1981), 44–51 Google Scholar.
12 Parise, N. F., Un'unità ponderale egea a Capo Gelidonya, Studi Micenei ed Egeo-Anatolici 14 (1971), 163–70Google Scholar.
13 This unit seems to be absent in the Indus repertoire.
14 Cf. my article quoted at the end of n. 6.
15 See Archi, A., Considerazioni sul sistema ponderale di Ebla, Annali di Ebla 1 (1980), 1–29 Google Scholar (separate offprint); Maigret, A. de, Riconsiderazioni sul sistema ponderale di Ebla, OA 19 (1980), 161–9Google Scholar; N. F. Parise in A. Archi (ed.), Circulation of Goods, esp. 133–7.
16 The weights are quoted from Archi, A., Annali di Ebla 1 (1980), 4–5 Google Scholar.
17 For this weight, which bears six incised lines see lastly Parise, N. F. in Archi, A. (ed.), Circulation of Goods, 135 Google Scholar, and my remarks in M. Marazzi S. Tusa (eds.), Traffici Micenei.
18 Most recently Parise, N. F., in Archi, A. (ed.), Circulation of Goods, 134 Google Scholar.
19 Ibid.
20 Same weight as that of A 25 and A 26.
21 Archi, A., Annali di Ebla 1 (1980), 4 Google Scholar; Parise, N. F. in Archi, A. (ed.), Circulation of Goods, 135 Google Scholar.
22 Ibid.
