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Distribution of Meat in Eanna

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 August 2014

Gilbert J. P. McEwan
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Extract

In view of the fact that so many of the texts from Mesopotamia are concerned with offerings for the various feasts of the Mesopotamian temples it is surprising that we know so little about the actual mechanisms of offering and distribution of the sacrificial remains. For the earlier periods of Mesopotamian history we have virtually no information about offering procedures. We do not know whether the Sumerian priests destroyed the offering animals totally in the manner of a holocaust, whether they were consumed by the priests during the temple feasts or whether only certain pieces were offered to the gods during the sacrificial meal with the remainder being distributed among the temple personnel as a form of income—which we know to have been the practice in the later periods.

For the Old Babylonian period we are almost as ill-informed. We know, however, that certain cuts of meat were received from the temple by nadītu priestesses as “betrothal gifts” and we have lists of recipients of meat cuts, but in neither case do we know if offering animals were the source of the meat.

The earliest texts expressly concerned with the distribution of offering remains date to the Middle Assyrian and early Neo-Babylonian periods. These take the form of royal rescripts or temple ordinances regulating which temple officials are to receive what remains. The most complete and explicit of these is a temple ordinance for the Eanna in Uruk, composed originally during or shortly after the reign of Nabu-apla-iddin, which we possess in the form of a later copy.

Type
Research Article
Information
IRAQ , Volume 45 , Issue 2 , Autumn 1983 , pp. 187 - 198
Copyright
Copyright © The British Institute for the Study of Iraq 1983

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References

1 The only possible reference to offering procedure in Sumerian texts would seem to be the qualification UZU.A.BAL given to various offering animals, but we are not certain what this qualification means, cf. Oppenheim, , Eames, 45Google Scholar.

2 See Harris, , Festschrift Oppenheim, 110 ffGoogle Scholar.

3 E.g. Edzard, Tell ed-Dēr, Nos. 104 and 105.

4 The MA text is SVAT IV, which is to be dated to the reign of Tukulti-Ninurta I if Postgate's understanding of the last line is correct, cf. NRGD, 120 f. Early NB regulations are found in BBSt 36, col. IV f. (Nabu-apla-iddin) and RA 16 (1919), 117 fGoogle ScholarPubMed. (Marduk-zakir-šumi).

5 Partial studies of the text were made by Langdon, op. cit., 25–7; and Holma, , OrNS 13 (1944), 223–33Google Scholar, who had the benefit of collations made by A. Salonen.

6 PHPKB, 348 f. and notes 2141 and 2142.

7 Ibid., 349.

8 The text is republished here courtesy of the Visitors of the Ashmolean Museum.

9 For a discussion of this reading and other anatomical questions see the appendix to this article.

10 The placement of the sign TI makes it probable that it was preceded by another sign, and since the gan ṣēli is known from other NB texts this restoration seems not unlikely.

11 It is not certain if anything is actually wanting at the beginning of the line, but if so it is certainly not Langdon's [aš-šum] which is unparalleled in this sense and certainly too long for the space available.

12 Or better perhaps “his title”. This refers to the officials listed on the right side of the tablet.

13 Cf. GC I, 238 ffGoogle Scholar. where five sides (uzuDAmeš) 2 shoulders, 2 rumps and 1 … are listed for the ŠUKhá LUGAL.

14 The remaining titles could either be understood as nominative absolutes or as genitives with kurummat as the unexpressed regens.

15 Both cuts would normally belong to the king as we can see from line 30, but he had given one leg as a boon to Nabu-kuzub-ilani.

16 Cf. line 19 for the restoration. In line 19 and in the restored line 17 f. and their parallels the phrase would seem to be used simply for “one half”, probably on incorrect analogy with this line. The phrase is otherwise unparalleled with the simple meaning “one half”, for which we should expect aḫu as in line 96.

17 This was the priest who was in charge of the ceremonial chariot. This office is otherwise unattested, but cf. SWU, 46 r.7′; 160, 5′; 161, 9′; 162, 10′, for the ceremonial chariot at Uruk in the NB period. This line seems to be intrusive in this section, occurring as it does between qatattu ḫašḫurě, cf. line 33 where these two occur in the same line.

18 The function of the bīt ḫilṣu in the temple is not well understood. In Uruk during the Chaldean period it was under the control of a lúÉ.BAR priest, AnOr 8, 36, 5, cf. TCL XIII, 232, 26Google Scholar, and in the Seleucid period of a lúGAL, cf. Oelsner, , WZJ 19 (1970), 909Google Scholar. Note that in SWU, 160 r.6′, the bīt ḫilṣu occurs in a series after dGIGIR and that in SWU, 150 r.5′, it is connected with dUNUGki-i-ti.

19 The neck was the usual cut for the kalü priests, cf. SVAT, p. 19 i 16; and BagM Beiheft 2, 115, 1.

20 Cf. SVAT 13, 33 where the head is given as the perquisite of the lúNAR.GAL; and Dar. 463,2 where it forms part of the perquisites of the isiq lúnāru-ú-tu.

21 Cf. Nbk. 247, 5, although there it forms part of the butcher's prebend.

22 The omasum is also found associated with the baker's prebend in VS V, 83, 5Google Scholar; and Ash. 1930. 563b, 10—for the latter see McEwan, , Texts from Hellenistic Babylonia (OECT IX, 62)Google Scholar.

23 For the restorations of the professions in lines 20–4 see lines 69–73.

24 Lines 58–60 correspond to lines 9–11 with the priests of the three goddesses replacing the temple cook, chariot priest and bīt ḫilṣu.

25 The restoration is suggested by the fact that the section contains three lines and that qātāti occurs in lines 87 and 89. Another possibility would be one half for the king and one quarter for the other two, cf. lines 4–6.

26 Cf. VS VI, 268, 5.8.12Google Scholar, where lambs are offered in the šalām bīti ceremony.

27 BBSt 36, v 7 ff.Google Scholar:

a-ḫu zitti šarri

kurummat šangî ina immerāti meš

niqê šarri šá kal šatti

uzupēmu uzumašku

mi-šil uzukar-ši

mi-šil uzukar-ši

mi-šil uzuqer-bi

2 uzukur-sin-nu

“half share of the king (is now) the ration of the priest in the sheep of the royal offering for the whole year: (namely) a leg, the hide, the back, the sinews, alf of the rumen, half of the small intestines.”

28 RA 16 (1919), i 30–ii 12Google ScholarPubMed.

29 For the Chaldean and Persian periods see Kümmel, , Familie, Beruf und Amt im spätbabylonischen Uruk (Berlin, 1979), 148–54Google Scholar; and Nicolo, San, ArOr 6 (1934), 179 ffGoogle Scholar. For the prebend system in Uruk in the Seleucid period see McEwan, , Priest and Temple in Hellenistic Babylonia, Freiburger Altorientalische Studien IV (67–120)Google Scholar.

30 Kümmel, op. cit., 148.

31 YOS 6, 18, 1.7.8.10Google Scholar and YOS 7, 135, 6Google Scholar.

32 See Kümmel, op. cit., 147 f.

33 Köcher, loc. cit.

34 See TCS II, 109, 79′Google Scholar, where 2 GIŠ.KUNmeš are listed among anomalies such as double heads, double spines etc.

35 SWU 117, 23′.

36 Ibid., 117 note 9.

37 See MSL IX 8, 60Google Scholar for the reading.

38 For the reading pēmu rather than sūnu for uzuÚR in these contexts see Labat, , BiOr 30 (1973), 58aGoogle Scholar.

39 The reading rapaltu ṣeḫru is also possible, cf. MSL IX, 35, 36Google Scholar.

40 See Starr, , The Bārû Ritual, 122Google Scholar; and Jeyes, , JGS 30 (1978), 212 fGoogle Scholar.

41 Note also [uzu x x] = na-a-a-bat = a-bul-lum, MSL IX, 35, 37Google Scholar. Identification with najabtu, “floating rib or cartilage at the tip of the rib”, CAD N1, 151b seems unlikely here since this term is confined to extispicy.

42 Cf. the LB dual form kilalê for kilalān.

43 Cf. Holma, , Körperteile, 96 fGoogle Scholar.

44 BagM Beiheft 2, 115, 1Google Scholar. See also AHw, 1357a s.v. tikku 2a.

45 MSL III, 77, 27Google Scholar.

46 YOS 6, 137, 8 ffGoogle Scholar. Cf. CAD M2, 254a, where kuššiḫṭ is translated simply hide; and Joannès, , RA 74, 148, 1 f.Google Scholar, 6 kušši-ṭa-ṭa mešù gi-da-a-tu 4-šú-nu, “6 hides and their tendons”.

47 Cf. MSL IX, 9, 98–101Google Scholar.

48 BBSt 36, v 14Google Scholar; VS VI, 268, 3Google Scholar; PV 107, 8Google Scholar; VDI 1955, 157 VIII 12Google Scholar.

49 MSL IX, 13, 248.251Google Scholar.

50 Dar. 463, 2 f.