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Notes on the Akkadian-Aramaic Bilingual Statue from Tell Fekherye

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2014

Jonas C. Greenfield  and
Aaron Shaffer
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Extract

The discovery in 1979 of an anthropoid statue at Tell Fekherye (the site of Sikan, the sacred precinct of ancient Gozan) with an extensive bilingual inscription in Akkadian and Aramaic has renewed speculation about the extent of the Aramaic-Assyrian symbiosis in the earlier Neo-Assyrian period. First edited by A. Abou Assaf, it has recently been re-edited in a monograph by the latter together with Pierre Bordreuil and Alan R. Millard.

A date of around the 9th century for the statue is favoured by the Editors. This date seems reasonable on most grounds, though some adjustment up or down may prove necessary. Arguments based on Aramaic palaeography may be used to push the date higher. On the other hand, strong topical similarities with the Mati-ilu treaty (mid-8th century) may be sufficient grounds to lower the date (cf. comments to ll. 32, 34, 37). Abou Assaf first dated the statue to the 9th century mainly on art historical grounds. The Edition seeks to pinpoint this by identifying Sassu-nuri, the father of Adad-id'i, the statue's donor (l. 12), with the Assyrian eponym of 866.

Type
Research Article
Information
IRAQ , Volume 45 , Issue 1 , Spring 1983 , pp. 109 - 116
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 1983

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References

1 MDOG 113 (1981) 3 ff.

2 La Statue de Tell Fekherye, Paris 1982Google Scholar (henceforth Edition or Editors). Severe limitations of space preclude a full treatment of this inscription here; we hope to do this elsewhere with full documentation. We give here a revised normalized Akkadian text, a slightly emended Aramaic text, a translation and a discussion of some salient points. The Akkadian and Aramaic versions have been set off against each other in phrases, numbered to the right and to the left. These are the line numbers quoted in the discussion. Actual lines on the statue are given in the body of the text in small superscript.

3 Edition, 103 ff.

4 This West Semitic style opening is the model for the extra superscription in line 1 of the Aramaic version.

5 It is a pity that no attempt has been made to provide a copy of the cuneiform in the Edition. For a roughly inked photograph cf. MDOG 113 (1981), Abb. 6 opposite p. 21.

6 KAH II, 84 100 ff., cf. Seidmann, J., MAOG IX/3 (1935), 28 ffGoogle Scholar.