The letters from Nemed-Laguda (nos. 145-148)

The dispatch of Kinâ and Ereši (no. 145) attests the submission of Nemed-Laguda under Sargon's sovereignty in 709, which put an end to his south Babylonian campaign agamst Merodach-Baladan — cf. pages XVIII and XXI.

The names of the two senders of letter no. 146 are lost. The dispatch alludes to the situatio n described in no. 145. It also refers to the impending march of Sargon's troops to Dur-Yakin the hereditary seat of Merodach-Baladan.[[59]]

Normally one identifies Kinâ who addressed letter no. 147 to his 'brother' Negal-naṣir as the co-author of no. 145 in Nemed-Laguda.[[60]] The question concerning ostnch eggs, which had come to southern Babyloma by sea and which had been transported further by land, might support such an assumption: i.e. to locate him in Nemed-Laguda. It is, however, problematic because Kinâ reports to Nergal-naṣir that the ostrich eggs are not in stock in Nippur: he could have hardly done this if he had not been a resident of Nippur and had not known the stocks of ostrich eggs there. Hence no. 147 probably originated in Nippur. Determining the place of origin of this letter does not affect the time of its writing; this business letter does not offer any clues that allow us to date it.

Given that Kinnâ is an orthographic variation of Kinâ and that both names referred to the same person, we can assume that Nemed-Laguda is the place of origin of letter no. 148. Its author is a certain Kinâ who sent it to his 'brother,' whose name unfortunately is lost. However, there are reasons to doubt that this connection is correct.[[61]] The principal reason is that the letter concerns a generous reward for the addressee should he capture and deliver a certain high ranking Haza'-il. Hence it seems to refer to an event that occurred in Gambulu rather than near the southern Babylonian town of Nemed-Laguda. Therefore Kinnâ is not the same person as the Kinâ of Nemed-Laguda: during Sargon's campaign in Babylonia in 710, 8 sheikhs from Gambulu and the Babylonian-Elamite frontier-zone, among them a certain Haza'-il submitted voluntarily to the Assyrian ruler.[[62]] This all probably occurred in Gambulu and not near Nemed-Laguda where Haza'-ii (as letter no. 148 indicates) would have been in danger of being captured by Kina - or does this concern a possible flight of Haza'-il, implying that the sheikh had fled to them before their submission to Sargon in 710? Regardless of whether Kinâ and Kinnâ are the same person or not, Haza'-ii is in all probability the sheikh who submitted to Sargon in 710.



59 Cf. SAA 15 xxi for SAA 15 179.

60 M. Dietrich, WO 4/1, 91-92; N. Vanderrost, PNA 2/1, 617, no. 2c.

61 Cf. V. Verardi, PNA 2/1, 618, who does not refer to Kinâ (PNA 2/1, 616-617).

62 A. Fuchs, Sar. (1994), n. 272a: 328.

Manfried Dietrich

Manfried Dietrich, 'The letters from Nemed-Laguda (nos. 145-148)', The Neo-Babylonian Correspondence of Sargon and Sennacherib, SAA 17. Original publication: Helsinki, Helsinki University Press, 2003; online contents: SAAo/SAA17 Project, a sub-project of MOCCI, 2020 [http://oracc.org/saao/saa17/presentationoftheletters/fromnemedlagudanos145148/]

 
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