The query proper usually terminates in the following closing formula:
"Does your great divinity know it? (b) Is it decreed and confirmed in a favorable case, by the command of your great divinity, Šamaš, great lord? (c) Will he who can see, see it? Will he who can hear, hear it?"
The order of the elements of the formula is, however, not absolutely fixed and all queries did not have all the elements. For example, (a) follows (c) in no. 7 and is missing in 20:10, while (b) is missing in 57:7 and 62:13. In some texts (b) is complemented by an infinitive or infinitives summarizing the contents of the query, e.g., "is the capture (ṣabāta) of that city by the enemy decreed and confirmed ..." 43:14, cf. 44:14, 63:4, 88:17, 139:23, 141:5, 142:22, 187:6 etc.
A further element, "Will Esarhaddon be troubled and angry?", and its opposite, "Will Esarhaddon be pleased, be happy, and rejoice," is attested in some texts where enemy action or risky military operations are referred to. See, for example, nos. 5, 7, 24, 59, 61, 66, 111, and 115ff. Where present, it is regularly inserted between the query proper and element (a).
The string of ezibs usually immediately follows element (c).
Ivan Starr
Ivan Starr, 'The Closing Formula of the Query Proper', Queries to the Sungod: Divination and Politics in Sargonid Assyria, SAA 4. Original publication: Helsinki, Helsinki University Press, 1990; online contents: SAAo/SAA04 Project, a sub-project of MOCCI, 2020 [http://oracc.org/saao/saa04/formularyandterminology/closingformula/]