40 J. Best / L. Rietveld [UF42

von Dassow, Eva, 2008: State and Society in the Late Bronze Age Alalah under the Mittani Empire. Studies of the Civilisation and Culture of Nuzi and the Hurrians 17. Bethesda, Maryland: CDL Press.

Wilhelm, Gemot, 1989: The Hurrians. Warminster: Aris & Phillips. Wiseman, Donald J., 1953: The Alalakh Tablets. London: British Institute of

Archaeology at Ankara. Woudhuizen, Fred C. 2007: On the Byblos Script. UF 39, 659-756.

S e t t i n g t h e D a t e s

Re-evaluation of the Chronology of Babylonia in the 14th—11th Centuries B. C. E. and Its Implications

for the Reigns of Ramesses II and Hattusili III

Yigal Block, Jerusalem

I Introduction 41 II Chronology of the conquest of Babylonia by Tukulti-Ninurta 1 44

II. 1 Assyrian sources 44 II.2 Babylonian sources 59

III Babylonian chronology of the 14,h-l 1th centuries B.C.E 67 III. 1 Precise dating of the reigns of the Babylonian kings 67 III.2 The astronomical datum of the Religious Chronicle 71

IV Correlation between the chronologies of Babylonia, the Hittite empire and Egypt in the 13th century B.C.E 73 IV. 1 Synchronisms between the reigns of Ramesses II and Hattusili III 73 IV.2 The evidence of the letter KBo 1.10+ 76 IV.3 Synchronisms dating the end of the reign of Hattusili III,

and their implications for dating the reign of Ramesses II 80 IV.4 The existence of the kingdom of Hanigalbat during the-period

of preparations for the first Hittite marriage of Ramesses II 81 V Historical implications of the chronology of Hattusili 111 and Ramesses II:

the motivation for the Egyptian-Hittite peace treaty 84 VI References 89

I Introduction1

The chronological framework for the history of the entire Near East in the se­cond half of the second millennium B. C. E. is ultimately based on the Assyrian chronology of the relevant historical period (the Middle Assyrian period). This is due to the fact that the Assyrian King List (AKL) constitutes the only docu­mentary source that presents a continuous chronology of the second half of the second millennium B. C. E. and connects it to the chronology of a later period (viz., the 9 -8 centuries B. C. E.),2 for which the precise absolute regnal dates

1 The bibliographical abbreviations used in this article follow those listed in CAD U-W, vii-xxxix. 2 For a complete publication of the extant manuscripts of the AKL, see Grayson, 1980-

42 Y. Bloch [UF42 2010] Setting the Dates 43

ni »

of the Assyrian kings can be established based on continuous lists of Assyrian yearly eponyms and on astronomical data.3

In a series of recent studies, the present author has offered some modifica­tions to the currently common reconstructions of the chronology of the Middle Assyrian period (more specifically, of the Assyrian chronology of the XZ^-M centuries B. C. E.). First of all, the present author has reconstructed a chrono­logically ordered sequence of eponyms for the 30 years of the reign of Shalma-neser I and for the .first 22 years of the 3 7-years-long reign of Tukulti-Ninurta I, with a possible extension of the sequence to years 23-26 of his reign (Bloch, 2008; Bloch, 2010a).

Second, for those instances, in which different manuscripts of the AKL con­tain divergent figures for the duration of the reigns of some Assyrian kings of the 13 -12 th centuries B. C. E., a specific set of figures has been reconstructed as original, based on several lines of evidence (Bloch, 2010b).

Third, evidence has been presented supporting the reconstruction of the As­syrian calendar in the 13 -12 centuries- B. C. E. - before the adoption of the Babylonian calendar in Assyria in the reign of Tiglath-pileser I (1114-1076 B. C. E.)4 - as purely lunar, i. e., with the year beginning-always on day 1 of the month Sippu and consisting uniformly of twelve lunar months, each of which lasted ca. 29.53 days on the average. Thus, the Assyrian calendar year in the 13th-12th centuries B. C. E. must have had the average duration of ca. 29.53 x 12 = ca. 354.36 days, compared to the 365.25 days of the Julian year (Bloch, forth­coming). The results of, the last study enabled a precise absolute dating of the first day of each Assyrian calendar year in the 13 -12 centuries B. C. E., with the margin of erroj* amounting to only a day or two (Bloch, forthcoming, Table 4).5

83, 101-115. 3 For the Assyrian eponyms in 910-649 B.C.E., see Millard, 1994, with further discus­sion by Finkel/Reade, 1998. The key astronomical evidence, enabling the precise ab­solute dating of the Assyrian eponyms, and hence also of the regnal dates of the Assyrian kings, in the 9'h-7th centuries B.C.E., is the solar eclipse in the month of Simanu of the eponym year of Bur-saggile, which is dated to June 15, 763 B.C.E. (Julian date). For a discussion of the date of-this'eclipse,' see, most recently, Hunger, 2008. 4 For the adoption of the luni-solar1'Babylonian calendar in Assyria in the reign of Tig­lath-pileser I, see Cohen, 1993, 300-301. 5 In fact, since the Assyrian months were lunar and their order was fixed, one can estab­lish the absolute dating of any Assyrian-calendar date in the 13th'-12'h centuries B.C.E., with the margin of error arhounting to a couple of days at most (this margin of error is conditioned by the assumption that the beginning of each calendar month was dependent on the actual visibility of the new lunar crescent, which would be subject to factors of unpredictable nature, such as the weather conditions in the city of A§sur or the eyesight capabilities of the persons charged with the observation). Those specific Assyrian dates which will be discussed in the present study will be accompanied by calculations of their absolute dating (see below, n. 13).

In the present study we will suggest a more presice reconstruction than has been heretofore available for the chronology of Babylonia in the 14"**-11th centu­ries B. C. E. In addition, we will propose precise, or almost precise, regnal dates for two non-Mesopotamian rulers who played important part in the political history of the Ancient Near East in the 13th century B.C.E.: Ramesses II of Egypt, for whom precise regnal dates can now be specified, and Hattusili III of the Hittite empire, whose reign can now be dated with the margin of error amounting to 7-8 years at most. We will demonstrate that the precise (or almost precise) dating of the reigns of Ramesses II and Hattusili III has implications for understanding the motivating factors that drew the two kings to conclude the famous peace treaty between them, in the 21st regnal year of Ramesses II, which brought an end to a conflict between the Hittite empire and Egypt that had lasted for a decade and a half.

The present study will proceed in four stages. Its first and most extensive section will discuss the chronology of the conquest and the subsequent domina­tion of Babylonia by Tukulti-Ninurta I, which provides an important set of syn­chronisms between Assyria and Babylonia during the last third of the 13l cen­tury B. C. E. The Assyrian chronological data pertaining to the conquest of Bab­ylonia by Tukulti-Ninurta I have been already discussed by the present author elsewhere (Bloch, 2010a, 9-25; Bloch, 2010b, 70-73). However, several im­provements can now be made to those discussions, and the establishment of precise Assyrian chronology for the 13 century B. C. E. (Bloch, forthcoming, Table 4) makes it possible to correlate the Assyrian dates pertaining to Tukulti-Ninurta l 's campaigns against Babylonia with dates derived from Babylonian sources, thus attaining a greater chronological precision for this important period in Mesopotamian history.

Second, we will consider data pertaining to the chronology of Babylonia in the 11* century B. C. E. Those data provide another key synchronism between Assyria and Babylonia, thus enabling a precise reconstruction of the chronology of the Babylonian kings in the 14th—11th centuries B. C. E. Furthermore, Babylo­nian chronological data supply a likely astronomical confirmation of the chro­nology based on the Assyro-Babylonian synchronisms.

Third, based on the newly reconstructed chronology of Babylonia, we will examine the evidence connecting the Mesopotamian chronology of the 13 cen­tury B. C E . with the chronologies of Egypt and of the Hittite empire in the same period. We will demonstrate that of the three possible dates for the en­thronement of Ramesses II indicated by astronomical evidence: 1304, 1290 and 1279 B. C. E. (von Beckerath, 1997, 51), only the date of 1290 B. C. E. is feasi­ble. Thus, the regnal dates of Ramesses II, and by implication, of all the other

For the most up-to-date publication of the peace treaty between Ramesses II and Hattu­sili III, in its Egyptian and Akkadian versions, see Edel, 1997. For an English translation, see Beckman, 1999, 96-100.

44 Y. Bloch [UF42 2010] Setting the Dates 45

Ml

kings of Egypt in the 13th century B. C. E., can be fixed precisely. Based on the precise regnal dates of Ramesses II, it will be also possible to date the reign of Hattusili III with a margin of erroi amounting to only 7-8 years.

Finally, we will discuss the historical context of the peace treaty concluded by Hattusili III and Ramesses II. We will demonstrate that a commonly held view, ascribing the willingness of Hattusili III to establish peace with Egypt to a new political situation that materialized on the eastern flank of the Hittite empire -• with the final Assyrian takeover of northeastern Syria (Hanigalbat), which placed a new aggressive' power right on the border of the Hittite territory - can­not be maintained for chronological reasons.7 Consequently, we will argue that another motivating factor for the willingness of Hattusili III to conclude the peace treaty with Egypt must be sought, and the personal circumstances of Hat­tusili in ' s rise to the throne, which left him in the need of seeking legitimation for his rule both within his kingdom and on the international scene, appear to offer the most likely explanation.8 The issue of the motivating factors behind the conclusion of the peace treaty between Hattusili III and Ramesses II provides an example of the relevance of chronological calculations for understanding wider historical issues.

II Chronology of the conquest of Babylonia by

Tukulti-Ninurta I

II . l Assyrian sources

Most of the contemporary evidence concerning the chronology of the conquest of Babylonia by Tukulti-Ninurta I comes from Assyrian sources.

1. The document VAT 17999 {MARVl l)9 mentions, on the one hand, supply of barley to several,thousand Babylonian captives in the Assyrian capital city Kar-TukultT-Ninurta,10 and on the other hand, supply of barley to Assyrian army

7 For the view of the Assyrian takeover of northeastern Syria as the prime motive behind Hattusili Ill's policy of rapprochement with Egypt, see, e.g., Kitchen, 1982, 74-75; Klengel, 1999, 268-269; Klengel, 2002, 127; Desroches-Noblecourt, 2007, 145-146, 154. 8 As proposed already by Bryce, 2005, 275-276; Bryce, 2006, 4-9. 9 Documents published in the MARV series will be cited, on their first,mention, by their number in Vorderasiatisches Museum zu Berlin and by their number in the MAR V series. Subsequently, they will be cited only by their number in the MARV series. The document MARVl 1 was published in transliteration and translation by Freydank, 1974, 58-73. 10 Although the royal inscriptions of TukultT-Ninurta I, narrating the foundation of the new capital city Kar-Tukulti-Ninurta on the eastern bank of the Tigris opposite the city of Assur, date all from the period after the capture of Kastilias IV, the building of Kar-TukultT-Ninurta had begun over a decade before the victory over Kasiilial IV (Gilibert, 2008, 178-179). Consequently, it is impossible to date the capture of Kastilias' IV by as-

fhat went on a campaign to Babylonia (Kardunias). The document is dated to the eponym year of Etel-pi-Assur son of Kurbanu (Freydank, 1991a, 136); this is the 13th regnal year of TukultT-Ninurta I. Supply of barley to the Babylonian captives is recorded for the months Sa-kenate and Abu-sarrane, which were the ninth and the eleventh month of the Middle Assyrian year, respectively.11 Sup­ply of barley to the Assyrian army is mentioned after the record of the supply of barley to the Babylonian captives in the month Abu-sarrane, and hence is also likely to have been carried out in that month.12 The 13th regnal year of Tukulti-Ninurta I began on April 11, 1229 B. C. E. The ninth month of that year began on December 3, 1229 B.C.E., and the eleventh month began on January 31, 1228 B.C.E.13

suming that all the eponyms, attested in documents from Kar-Tukulti-Ninurta, postdate that event (as done by Nemirovsky, 2007, 24-27). 1" Summary of the quantities of barley delivered to Babylonian captives in the month Sa-kenate is recorded in MARV I 1, i 44'^16' (Freydank, 1974, 60-61; and see Bloch, 2010a, 16, n. 58). Summary of the quantities of barley delivered to Babylonians in the month Abu-sarrane is recorded in MARVl 1, iv 24-26 (Freydank, 1974, 68-69). Part of this delivery is recorded in 11. 22-23 as "rations of the Babylonians (who are) within the sphere of responsibility of Libur-zanin-AgSur" (22... SUG-a/ Kas-si-e 23sa pi-it-ti mLi-bur-za-nin-AA-sur). Since in MARV I 1, i 32', delivery of barley for Babylonians within the sphere of responsibility of Libur-zanin-Assur is recorded as part of the total delivery of barley for Babylonian captives in the month Sa-kenate (summarized in MARVl 1, i 44'-46'), it appears that the Babylonians, for whom barley was issued in the month Abu-Sarrane, were the same Babylonian captives residing in Kar-Tukulti-Ninurta. Under the responsibility of Libur-zanin-Assur alone, there were ca. 8,000 Babylonian captives in the month Sa-kenate, and ca. 3,200 captives in the month Abu-sarrane (Jakob, 2003a, 89-90). 12 Summary of the quantities of barley delivered to the "hungry troops" of the Assyrian army is recorded in MARVl 1, iv 32-35 (Freydank, 1974, 70-61; and see Bloch, 2010a, 17, n. 59). It is not clear, whether at the moment of the delivery the troops set out for a campaign in Babylonia or returned from a campaign. 13 All dates, employing the names of months used in both the Julian and the Gregorian calendars, are specified in the present study in the terms of the Julian calendar. The first day of each Assyrian year is given according to Bloch, forthcoming, Table 4. The first day of each Assyrian month is reckoned as beginning on the midnight following an evening of the first visibility of the lunar crescent (the same convention was adopted for the Babylonian calendar of the first millennium B.C.E. by Parker/Dubberstein, 1946, 24; Parpola, 1983, 382, n. 672). The dates of the first visibility of the lunar crescent have been obtained through Alcyone Astronomical Software (http://www.alcyone.de), for the locality of Babylon. The distance from ASsur to Babylon is negligible for the purpose of calculating the date of the first visibility of the lunar crescent.

46 Y. Bloch [UF42 2010] Setting the Dates 47

2. A royal inscription of TukultT-Ninurta I, RTMA 1, A.0.78.18, mentions his victories over several countries located on the northeastern, northern and northwestern borders of Assyria (II. 5-28), yet makes no mention of a victory over Babylonia. The inscription is dated to the eponym year of Assur-bel-ilane (the 15th regnal year of TukultT-Ninurta I), month Allanatu (the sixth month of the Middle Assyrian year). The year in question began on March 20, 1227 B. C. E., and its sixth month began on August 16, 1227 B. C. E.

3. The document KAJ 106 records the delivery of 66.67 homers (ca. 6,667 liters) of barley to the mayor of the city of Assur, for the rations of seventy "Kassites'' (i. e., Babylonians). The record states that the barley was delivered "on the day when the king brought back many boats from the sea" (l2sa i+na u4-

14-me LUGAL l JUbMA.MES ma-da-te is-tu A.AB.BA u-ta-e-ra-ni, KAJ 106, A6X_ 12-14), and was "given to him (viz., to the mayor) for six months" ( sa 6 ITU

UD.MES X1 ta-ad-na-ds-su, 11. 16-17).14 The boats in question probably carried booty, and booty is more likely to be taken from populated territory than from seafaring vessels. Hence, in the context of KAJ 106, the "sea" is likely to be understood as a reference to the Sealand, the southeastern province of Babylonia that served in the 14th-! l lh centuries B.C.E. as a source of different kinds of produce, such as wheat, dates, sheep and cattle.15 The province of the Sealand appears to have included Larsa in its southern part, and may have reached the Tigris in the north (Nashef, 1982, 194). Delivery of booty from the Sealand may indicate a complete control or" Tukulti-Ninurta I over the province, or part there­of, but it may also reflect nothing more than a one-time military raid.16 The cau­sative verbal form uta'eranni (lit., "he made, return") does not necessarily indi­cate that the king himself returned from Babylonia with the boats, but the men­tion of the king in the ina ume formula, specifying the temporal context of an administrative transaction, suggests that the king did return with the boats to Assyria.17 KAJ 106 is'dated to day 1 of the month Sippu-of the eponym year of

14 The document KAJ 106 has been published, in transliteration and translation, by Post-gate, 1988, N2 58, and Jakob, 2003a, 152. For the understanding of the collocation Gl5MA.MES ma-da-te as "many boats" (following Jakob) rather than "tribute-boats" (as suggested by Postg'ate), see Bloch, 2010a, 18, n. 67. 13 For the Sealand as a Babylonian province in the 14m-l 1th centuries B. C.E., and for the occasional references tp it in Babylonian sources as A.AB.BA rather than KUR A.AB.BA, see Brinkman, 1993, 8. 16 Thus, a previous statement by the present author, according to which KAJ 106 indi­cates, "Assyrian control over the land of Babylonia stretching -southwards as far as 'the Sea' (i.e., the.Persian Gulf)" (Bloch, 2010a, 18),,is to be rejected as overenthusiastic. 17 In all other instances, in which the ina ume formula mentioning an action by the king is used in Middle Assyrian administrative documents, the king participated personally in the action mentioned (for the docume'nts utilizing the ina ume formula, see Freydank, 1982; Harrak, 1989).

% -a?

Assur-zera-iddina - i.e., the very first day of the 16' Ninurta I (March 10,1226 B. C. E.).

regnal year of Tukultl-

4. The document KAJ 103 records the delivery of 351.12 homers (ca. 35,112 liters) of barley to the mayor of the city of Assur, "for the rations of captive Kassites from Babylonia, from two campaigns" ( ana SUG ERTN.MES kas-

14, IS- KUR, •- 16 sl-e "hu-ub-te "sa ^Kar-du-ni-as i0sa 2 har-ra-na-te, KAJ 103, 12-16). The document is dated to day 1 of the month Kuzallu of the eponym year of Assur-zera-iddina, i.e., four months after day 1 of Sippu of the same year (July 6, 1226 B. C. E.). Remarkably, although the barley came from the same administrative source as in KAJ 106 (from the sphere of responsibility of Assur-bel-ilane, the provincial governor of Assur), was handed out to the same official (Elilipi son of Alguza, the mayor of the city of Assur) and was intended for the same purpose (rations of deportees from Babylonia), the quantity of barley mentioned in KAJ 103 is over five times higher than in KAJ 106. In addition, although the barley mentioned in KAJ 106 was given for six months, the transaction recorded in KAJ 103 took place only four months after the date of KAJ 106. This suggests that shortly before the date of KAJ 103, a large new contigent of Babylonian depor­tees was placed under the authority of Ehlipi son of Alguza - hence the mention of the captives "from two campaigns" mKAJ 103 (see Jakob, 2003a, 152).19 The new deportees (from what was, in the terms of KAJ 103, the second campaign) may have been brought to Assyria already when TukultT-Ninurta I returned with the boats from the Sealand in March 1226 B. C. E., and held for some months in the new capital Kar-TukultT-Ninurta; or they may have been brought to Assy­ria in the early summer of 1226 B. C. E. by another detachment of the Assyrian army, different from the one that accompanied the king on his journey back from the Sealand.

5. The document VAT 20261 {MARV VIII 7) records quantities of barley bread, produced from "the flour of the booty" (rZIDn sa-le-te, 1. 4) and amount­ing to "altogether 1 homer 2 seahs of bread (made) from barley, which on the day (when) the king went up to Babylon in order to perform the mesanu-rite,

The document KAJ 103 has been published, in transliteration and translation, by Post-gate, 1988, N2 57, and Jakob, 2003a, 153.

Jakob, 2003b, 106, proposed to interpret the collocation Sitta harranate as referring to two detachments of the Assyrian army, which brought different groups of captives to ASsur from different operations in Babylonia that were not necessarily chronologically separated. However, the considerations outlined above suggest that the two groups of captives did arrive to the city of Assur on different dates, even though the two campaigns mentioned in KAJ 103 were clearly not the only campaigns in the war of TukultT-Ninurta I against Babylonia (see Bloch, 2010a, 16-17).

Similarly to the Babylonian captives held in Kar-TukultT-Ninurta that are mentioned in MARVll.

r

48 Y. Bloch [UF42

were [br]ought out in great quantity as [b]ooty" CSU.NiGIN 1 ANSE 2-BAN NINDA ut-ta-te 1sa i+na u4-me LUGAL sa-na KA.DINGIR 9me-sa-na 10a-na sal-lu-u-me ni-lu-u-ni l2[s]al-lu-ta ma-d-da u[se']-su-u-m, 11. 6-13). The visit of the king to Babylon appears to have been carried out for cultic purposes, but he exercised his rights as a conqueror to take home some booty.

The date of MARV VIII 7 has been reconstructed by the present author as day 10 of the month Allanatu, the eponym year of Assur-zera-iddina (Bloch, 2010a, 24). The sixth month of the 16th regnal year of TukultT-Ninurta 1 began on Au­gust 5, 1226 B. C. E., and day 10 of the same month was August 14. Thus, by the summer, of 1226 B. C. E., TukultT-Ninurta I must have held control over the city of Babylon, and his army must have penetrated, at least once, the southern part of the country.

6. The royal inscription RIMA 1, A.0.78.6, is the earliest datable source that explicitly mentions the victory of TukultT-Ninurta I over the Babylonian king Kastilias IV. This victory is mentioned in the section of the titulary of the Assy­rian king, where he appears as "(the one who) brought about the defeat of Sumer and Akkad and (thereby) made manifest his power forever, (the one who) captured Kastiliasu,-king of the Kassites" (RIMA 1, A.0.78.6,11. 20-24). Except for this mention of the victory over Kastilias IV, the royal titulary section of RIMA 1, A.0.78.6 parallels exactly the royal titulary section of the earlier in-scriptiomRJMA 1, A.0.78.18. This suggests that the capture of Kastilias IV took place between the time of the composition of RIMA 1, A.0.78.18 and the time of the composition of RIMA I, A.0.78.6. The inscription. RIMA 1, A.0.78.6 is dated to the eponym year of Ina-Assur-suml-asbat, which was the 18" regnal year of TukultT-Ninurta I. In a previous study, the present author observed that

21 The verbal form in 1. 11 of the document, mistakenly read in Bloch, 2010a, 19 as i-lik-u-ni, shouldbe read i-lu-u'-ni, i.e., Tluni "he went up." The verbal form ind. 13 appears to be S-stem stative of the verb (w)asulusau "to bring out": [se]suni (the damaged space to the left of the sign su is sufficient to contain only one sign). The logical subject of this stative form must then be the barley (uttate) mentioned at the end of 1. 6. In contradis­tinction, the action of the king is expressed in 1. 11 by the preterite verbal form Tluni, which fits the general pattern of the use of the preterite to signify actions carried out by the grammatical subject of the ina ume clause (see Freydank, 1982, 42, n. 6) For the noun salliitu "booty" (used in MARV VIII 7 as an adverbial accusative), see Bloch, 2010a, 19, n. 69. 22 For the use of the verb elulela'u "to go up" with reference to a visit of an Assyrian king to Babylon for cultic purposes, one may compare the passage about SamSI-Adad V (823-811 B.C.E.) in the Synchronistic History (Glassner, 2004, Ne 10, iv, 9-10; cited in CAD E, 117a). The use of the logogram KA.DTNGIR (literally, Bab-ili, "gate of the god") to designate the city of Babylon without the postposed place-name determinative Kl is exceptional, but a parallel may be found in the administrative'document KAJ 249, 8 (where the restoration KA.DINGIR.rRA\[KI?] by Freydank, 1979, 269, and Faist, 2001, 91, is'conjectural). In any event, the'mention of booty in MARWIlh7 suggests that the city of Babylon, rather than some temple gate in one of the Assyrian cities, is referred to.

2010] Setting the Dates 49

the specific day and month of composition are not mentioned in RIMA 1, A.0.78.6 (Bloch, 2010a, 14). But in fact, one of the three different stone tablets containing the inscription does mention the month name Sippu beside the name of the eponym Ina-Assur-sumT-asbat (RIMA 1, A.0.78.6, 247, n. 43.2). Thus, by the first month of the 18th eponym year of TukultT-Ninurta I (February 16 -March 16, 1224 B. C. E.), the capture of Kastilias IV must have taken place.

7. The letter DeZ 3836+4036, discovered at Tell Seh Hamad (DQr-Kat-limmu) on the Lower Habur and addressed by the king of Assyria to the Grand Vizier Assur-iddin, makes a reference to the events in Babylonia (Cancik-Kirschbaum, 1996, N° 9). The king reproves Assur-iddin for his failure to take some necessary action and for what the king presumes to be Assur-iddin's scru­ples about the humiliation of an unnamed person connected with Babylonia. The present author has followed the identification of that person with Kastilias IV (as proposed by Cancik-Kirschbaum, 1996, 146-147), but argued that the letter does not make it clear whether the final attack of TukultT-Ninurta I had been al­ready completed by the time when the letter was written, or was still in the pro­cess of accomplishment (Bloch, 2010a, 10-14). The letter Cancik-Kirschbaum, 1996, Ne9, is dated to day 5 of the month Sin (the fourth month of the Middle Assyrian calendar), the eponym year of ma-Assur-sumT-asbat. The month Sin of that year began on May 15, 1224 B. C. E., and the letter was written on May 19. Now, the dating of one of the copies of the inscription RIMA 1, A.0.78.6 to the month Sippu of the eponym year of Ina-Assur-sumT-asbat indicates that Kastilias IV was indeed captured at least three months before the date of the letter Can­cik-Kirschbaum, 1996, N- 9.

The fact that the letter Cancik-Kirschbaum, 1996, N2 9, treats the alleged misconduct of the Grand Vizier during the period of war in Babylonia as a mat­ter of current concern for the Assyrian king suggests that the capture of Kastilias IV took place only a few months before the letter was written - i. e., in the win­ter of 1225/1224 B. C. E. (this still fits the general conclusion of Bloch, 2010a, 13-14). Remarkably, from the document MARV VIII 7 it follows that TukultT-Ninurta I had controlled Babylon at least a year and a half before he captured Kastilias IV. The present author has suggested that during the interim period, from at least the middle of the 16th until the beginning of the 18th regnal year of Tukulti-Ninurta I, Kastilias IV held out in Dur-Kurigalzu, modern cAqar Quf, ca. 20 km west of Baghdad (Bloch, 2010a, 13, n. 43).23 As will be demonstrated

In the framework of the same proposal, the present author has also suggested that TukultT-Ninurta I reproached Assur-iddin for failure to take action against possible de­ployment of a military detachment from Suhu, on the Middle Euprates, to assist KastiliaS IV holding out in in Dur-Kurigalzu, and that the letter Cancik-Kirschbaum, 1996, N9 9, reflects a situation, in which the commanders of the troops from Suhu had gone over to the side of the Assyrian king, so that the danger, which Assur-iddin had been expected to forestall, did not materialize (Bloch, 2010a, 13, n. 43). In a recent discussion of the As-

r

50 Y. Bloch [UF42 2010] Setting the Dates 51

below, this proposal is supported by Babylonian sources.

8. The letters DeZ 2519 and DeZ 3289, discovered at Tell Seh Hamad, speak of a military conflict centered on the city of Lubdu to the east of the Tigris (Cancik-Kirschbaum, 1996, N~ 11-12). Both letters are dated to the eponym year of Ina-Assur-sumT-asbat: the first of them to day 27 of a month whose name is not preserved but has been reconstructed by Cancik-Kirschbaum as Sin;24 the second is dated to day 6 of the-month Kuzallu, immediately following Sin.25 As argued elsewhere by the present author, these letters appear to reflect a situation, in which Lubdu, -seized shortly before by the Assyrians, was now be­sieged by some other forces - "perhaps troops commanded by a Babylonian noble attempting to wrest for himself a part of the country, which he would use as his power base, in'a future struggle for the throne, or a local Trans-Tigridian tribe or chiefdom attempting to plunder the city" (Bloch, 2010b, 45). The pre­sent author has also suggested that reports concerning the situation in Lubdu were sent to the faraway Dur-Katlimmu, rather than to the capital cities Assur and Kar-TukultT-Ninurta, located on the Tigris, because the king was away on a campaign against. Babylonia, and the Grand Vizier, residing at Dur-Katlimmu, was the highest Assyrian official that remained in the country (Bloch, 2010b, 43^44), in other words, it appears that around the beginning of the month Sin of the 18th regnal year of TukultT-Ninurta I (mid-May 1224 B. C. E.), the Assyrian king was still settling some issues in Babylonia, in the wake of his capture of Kastilias IV shortly before.

This implies that the inscription RIMA 1, A.0.78.6 - or at least the copy of it dated to the month Sippu of the eponym year of Ina-Assur-sumT-asbat - was composed in Assur- while TukultT-Ninurta I .was on a campaign in Babylonia.

Syrian administrative documents VAT 18058 (MARVIV 27) and VAT 18068 (MARVIV 30), Jaume Llop has proposed that TukultT-Ninurta I undertook a campaign against Suhu in the eponym year of Etel-pi-A§5ur (Llop, 2010). If-Llop's proposal is correct (which is not certain, given that the eponym dating the documents MARVIV 27 and 30 has not been preserved), it appears that the campaign against Suhu took place several months be­fore the month Abu-sarrane, when the Assyrian army was either about to set on, or had just returned from, a campaign to Babylonia proper, which is mentioned as hu-ra-de sa KURKar-du-ni-ds ia'MARVl 1, iv 34, 40-41 (see above, n. 12). Thus, even if a campaign against Suhu was undertaken in the 13th regnal year'of TukultT-Ninurta I, it may well have ended in a failure; which would require the Assyrian king to set on a different cam­paign against Babylonia proper later in the same year, as a face-saving measure. In such case, TukultT-Ninurta I would still have reasons to fear hostile action by troops coming from Suhu in his 18th regnal year. For another consideration suggesting that a hostile action of Suhean troops was prevented by a political agreement between TukultT-Ninurta ahd the leaders of Suhu on'the eve of the capture of Kastilias IV, see below, n. 35.

24 i9[*ru>xXX] UD.27.KAM li-mu 2\mI+na]-*A-sur-M\3-as-bat (Cancik-Kirschbaum, 199$, NM 1,19-20). 25 46 ^xu-zal-lu UD.6.KAM A7li-mu mI+na-dA-sur-MU-as-[bat] (Cancik-Kirschbaum, 1996, N9*:l2, 46-47).

Such a scenario, although surprising at the first sight, is not implausible. The main purpose of the inscription RIMA 1, A.0.78.6 was to celebrate TukultT-Nin­urta I's repair of the rooms of the royal palace, constructed earlier by Shal-maneser I on the eastern side of the city of Assur.26 This project, not mentioned in any other extant inscription of TukultT-Ninurta I, must have been of relatively minor importance,27 and it stands to reason that the king would have allowed the royal chancellery to prepare official copies of the inscription while he would be away from home on a final campaign against Kastilias IV.

The scribe responsible for RIMA 1, A.0.78.6, on his part, had probably in­tended to refrain, in the absence of the king, from innovations in the section of the royal epithets and to copy this section wholesale from the earlier inscription RIMA 1, A.0.78.18; however, when the news of the capture of Kastilias IV reached him, he thought it necessary to insert a mention of this important As­syrian victory into the section of the royal epithets.28 TukultT-Ninurta I, on his part, is known to have allowed one of his officials, on another occasion, to inter­fere with his own administrative or diplomatic correspondence, where the room for manipulation would be considerably wider than in official building inscrip­tions that followed well-established formulaic patterns.29 -Similarly, the king

This is the only event mentioned in the narrative part of the inscription (RIMA 1, A.0.78.6, 27-35)

Compared, e. g., to the construction of a wholly new palace on the northern side of the city of Assur, which is narrated in several royal inscriptions of TukultT-Ninurta I span­ning the period from the first decade of his rule until after the victory over Kastilias IV (RIMA 1, A.0.78.1, iv 40-61 ;'A.0.78.2, 39-45; A.0.78.3, 18-36; A.0.78.4, 6'-10'; A.0.78.5, 70-83). The identification of the building project narrated in RIMA 1, A.0.78.6 as a "New Palace" by Harrak, 1987, 254 is improper, since the palace in question is mentioned to have been constructed by Shalmaneser I (RIMA 1, A.0.78.6, 30-32).

* Courriers carrying express messages could travel in the second millennium B.C.E. with the speed of ca. 80 km per day (Cancik-Kirschbaum, 2009, 123). Since the distance between Dur-Kurigalzu and ASsur is ca. 250 km, news of the capture of Kastilias IV could reach Assur in 3-4 days.

The official allowed to alter the king's missive sent to an Assyrian or a foreign official was, -surprisingly, none other than the Grand Vizier Assur-iddin, accused by the king of misconduct in the issue of the Babylonian war: Ana-ds-peri-ta a-na UGU mA-da-ia al-t[a-pdr] ^'ma-ak-na-ak-ta it tup-pa NA4.KISIB.MES-/a 6'ak-ta '-na-ak mdA-sur-tap-pu-ti ul-te-bi-laK-ku 7mdXXX-SES-SUM-ra DUMU Sa-da-li *'ki'-i DUMU.'MES sf-ip-ru-ut-te a-na UGU "'A-da-ia ^a-nd1 sa-pa-rn al-tap-ra-ak-ku l0rtup^-pa sa mA-da-ia a-napa-ni-ka u[li-i]p-te-u U-is5-si-u n[te-m]a sa Hb-bi-ka sa se-lu-i-ka se-li 13[w s]a se-ru-di~ka se-'ri"-id [tup-pa ha]r-ri-im" ma-ak-na- ak'-tu l5[i+na pi-i]t-tu- ka-ma su-ga-ar-ri-ir

[m XX]X-SES-SUM-rta se-bi-il, "I have written the missive to Adaya. The envelope and the tablet I have sealed with my seals. I have made Assur-tapputT bring (them) to you. (Furthermore,) I have sent to you Sin-aha-iddina son of Sadalu in order to send him as an emissary to Adaya. Let them [o]pen and read before you the letter to Adaya! (Ac­cording to) your own [understand] ing, add what (you think necessary) to add [and] omit

52 Y. Bloch [UF42

may have allowed a court scribe to produce an official version of a building in­scription, copying in large part earlier texts of the same genre, in his absence.

9. The letter DeZ 3490 from Tell Seh Hamad speaks of an expected visit to Dur-Katlimmu by the.Assyrian king with his courtiers and the Kassite king with his courtiers (Cancik-Kirschbaum, 1996, N2 10). The Kassite king appears to be the captive Kastilias* IV, and the letter is dated to day 21, without specification of the month. Based on comparison with the administrative document DeZ 4022, TukultT-Ninurta I's visit to Dur-Katlimmu appears to have taken place at the end of the month Sa-kenate of the eponym year of Ina-Assur-sumT-asbat (Cancik-Kirschbaum, 1996, 16, 150; Bloch, 2010a, 10-11). Sa-kenate, the ninth month of the Middle Assyrian year, began in the 18lh regnal year of TukultT-Ninurta I on October 10,1224 B. C. E. Day 21 of that month occurred on October 30.

10. The administrative document VAT 18100 (MARVIV 34) mentions the building of boats, commanded by the Assyrian king in order to bring barley from a military campaign to Babylonia (see Bloch, 2010b, 70). The document is dated to day 16 of the month Belat-ekalle (the seventh month of the Middle As­syrian calendar), the eponym year of AbT-ilT.30 The mention of a campaign to Babylonia suggests that the eponym Abi-ilT son of Katiri, from the reign of Tu­kultT-Ninurta I, is referred to.

On the one hand, at least two eponyms are to be placed between the eponym years of Ina-Assur-sumT-asbat and AbT-ilT son of Katiri: Ninu'ayu and Adad-samsT (son of Mariannu?), which indicates that the eponym year of AbT-ilT was at least the 21st regnal year of TukultT-Ninurta I (Bloch, 2010a, 21-27, 31-32). On the other hand, the identification of the eponym year of AbT-ilT with the 21st

regnal year of TukultT-Ninurta I stretches the interpretation of age-category rec­ords for two working-class girls in ration lists from Tell Seh Hamad to its appar­ent maximum. Mannu-bal-Istar, a daughter of Piradi and Surieli, is recorded in the ration list DeZ '2490 as talmittu "apprentice" (one stage before a full-scale adult worker) in the eponym year of Salmanu-suma-usur, which followed im­mediately after fhe'epohym year of AbT-ilT son of Katiri; if the eponym year of Salmanu-suma-usur was the 22nd regnal year of TukultT-Ninurta I, Mannu-bal-Istar should have been at least 20 years old in that year (Bloch, 2010a, 27-28; Rollig, 2004, 38-39). Another girl, Rabat-Nisaba, a daughter of Assur-ubla, is recorded in the ration list DeZ 3272 as taritu "adolescent" (one stage before talmittu) in the eponym year of Salmanu-suma-usur; if that year was the 22n

regnal year of TukultT-Ninurta I, Rabat-Nisaba should have been at least 15

[wh]at (you think necessary) tp omit! [Place the letter in an en]velope, roll over the seal [under] your own [authority, and let Sin-aha-iddina bring it (to its destination)" (Cancik-Kirschbaum, 1996, N2 9, 4-16). 30 The date formula should be read 24''™dNrN-E.GAL-/i UD.16.KAM 25'l[i-mu] r!aA-bf-DINGIR (MARVIV 34, 24',--25'), rather than l[i-mu d]r,4-&f-DINGIR, as specified erro­neously in Bloch, 2010b, 70, n. 37.

2010] Setting the Dates 53

years old at that time (Bloch, forthcoming, n. 72; Rollig, 2004, 39, 42). Assum­ing that the eponym years of AbT-ilT son of Katiri and Salmanu-suma-usur were precisely the 21st and the 22nd regnal years of TukultT-Ninurta I, the age-category data concerning Mannu-bal-Istar and Rabat-Nisaba barely fall within the range of reasonable possibilities in the framework of the demography of working-class populations in ancient Mesopotamia (see Bloch, 2008, 159-165).31 However, transposing the eponym year of AbT-ilT son of Katiri any later than the 21st reg­nal year of TukultT-Ninurta I would make Mannu-bal-Istar and RaMt-Nisaba occupy pre-adult age-categories later in their life than can be reasonably al­lowed.32

Thus, the eponym year AbT-ilT son of Katiri should be identified exactly with the 21st regnal year of TukultT-Ninurta I. The month Belat-ekalle in that year be­gan on July 7, 1221 B. C. E., and the document MARVIV 34 was written on July 22.

11. The document VAT 18007+ {MAR VII17), which lists quantities of barley issued by the Assyrian state administration to different groups of people, men­tions

"12 homers of barley, (measured) by the swfa-measure of the hiburnu-house, for the rations of 120 boatmen [who] went, in order to carry (?) to the city of Suhu its two door-leaves - boards of cedar-wood - with Samas-suma-id[dina] son of Ukal-sTqe-Assur, as royal troops" 2312 -"ANSE1 se-um ri+na" GISBAN sa hi-bur-ne a-na SUG- rar 1 ME

31 In fact, based on the data of ration lists from Tell Seh Hamad from the reign of Shal-maneser I, the present author has argued that the transition from the category of tdri-'ultaritu to that of talmiduItalmittu occurred about the age of 14 years, and for girls, this transition may have taken place slightly earlier than for boys (Bloch, 2008,164-165). On the other hand, since the passage from one age-category to another depended probably on the,actual physiological and behavioral progress of an individual rather than on pre­cise age records, variation of several months, perhaps up to a year, should be allowed for such passage (Bloch, 2008, 161, 165). Consequently, it is still possible that Rabat-Nisaba would be classified as taritu at the age of 15, but it is difficult to assume that such classi­fication would apply to her at any older age.

Stefan Jakob has proposed that Abi-ilT son of Katiri is the latest eponym from among those attested in the documents from the Middle Assyrian settlement at Tell Huwera, which would place his eponym year around the 25th regnal year of Tukulti-Ninurta I. Jakob's proposal is based on his interpretation of the document TCh 92.G.201 (Jakob, 2009, N2 37), which bears only a seal of some official and a record of the date in the eponym year of AbT-ilT, as a bulla that had originally sealed the archival room, in which it was found; this is contrary to the interpretation of the excavators of Tell Huwera, ac­cording to which the document in question was the envelope of a cuneiform tablet (Ja­kob, 2009, 3, 73). Jakob's interpretation seems too hypothetical, and it would be difficult to rely on it in order to overrule the considerations based on the data concerning the age-categories of Mannu-bal-Istar and Rabat-Nisaba, presented above.

54 Y. Bloch [UF42

20 ERIN.MES sa GI§MA.ME[S Sa] 24a-na mvSu-ri?u dal-te9-su GIS7e ,-a-rne sa rGl&e-re~nen iS-tu mtlUTU-rMU,-S[UM-rttf] 25DUMU U-kal-si-qe-AA-sur rERLN.MES7 LUGAL 'a*-no1 na-sa-e" (M4.KKII17/23-25).33

ihli-ku-u-ni

The "city of Suhu" mentioned in the document appears to be the city of Anat (modern cAna on the Middle Euphrates, ca. 90 km to the east of the present-day Syrian-Iraqi border), which was the center of the land Suhu/Suhi.

The fastest way to supply by boat door-leaves to "the city of Suhu" - proba-

33 Deller and Postgate, 1985, 74, read the city name in 1. 24 as VRUSu-hu-ri-ti-su. How­ever, no such city is known from other Mesopotamian records, whereas the toponym Su­hu/Suhi is, of course, well known (for the spelling of the toponym, see the following note). Reading the sign Rl after hu as dal, one obtains the dual form daltesu, with the 3 m. sg. pronominal suffi referring to the city: "its two door-leaves" (for dalat le'i "door (made) of (wooden) leaves," see Salonen, 1961, 21; for doors made of cedar wood -Sumerian EREN, Akkadian erenu - see ibid., 97-98). The use of the dual is attested in Middle Assyrian, including administrative documents, although it is admittedly rare (Mayer, 1971, 49, §51). In Micfdle Assyrian, the case ending of the singular genitive was -e, and the ending of plural/dual oblique was -e (Mayer, 1971, 48, §49.1). Consequently, wherever the sign TI is attested at the end of a nominal form standing in one of these cases, the sign is probably to be read as teg - e.g., sa qa-te9-su-nu "under their authority (lit., hand)" (MARVl 1, iv 33); iTUsa-sa-ra-te9 "month Sa-sarrate" (T96-3, 12 [Tell SabT Abya& Wiggermann, 2000, 207]); EN pa-he-te9 "provincial governor" (KAJ 109, 10; 121,4; etc.); E tup-pa-teg "house of tablets" (KA V 119, 15). This consideration supports the reading dal-teg-su in MARVll 17, 24. 34 It is true that in Middle Assyrian and Middle Babylonian sources, references to the land of Suhu are always spelled ^Su-hi/he (Nashef, 1982, 235-236), and in any event, in the syntactic environment of MARVll 17, 24, the genitive case ending -e (Assyrian, parallel to Babylonian -i) would be required, because of the determinative-relative pro­noun Sa. Instead, the spelling in MARVll 17, 24, is a-na um>Su-rhu. It is partly paral­leled by the spelling ana ^Su-ii-hu il-lik "he marched to the land of Suhu" in the Fall of Nineveh Chronicle from Babylon (Glassner, 2004, Ne 22, 32), but the latter spelling may merely reflect the abandonment of noun cases in Late Babylonian (cf. GAG, §81e). However, a clear parallel to the name of a foreign country used with the URU determi­native (apparently to refer to the country's central city), and with what appears as nomi­native case ending in a syntactic environment that would require the genitive, is present in MARVll 17 itself. The country in question is Nilipahru/Nilipahri, located in the re­gion of Uruatri (in the general-vicinity of Lake Van). In an inscription of Shalmaneser I, the name of this country is spelled KURNi-li-pa-ah-ri (RIMA I, A.0.77.1, 35). however, the document VAT 18007+ (MAR V IT 17 + IV '156) mentions personnel "who were put in order to go speedily from Kar-TukultT-Nin[urta] to the city of Nilipahru" ( ...rsa is-tu ^u^ar-mGI%JKUL-/i-rtiNIN\[URTA] "ra-di ^'Ni-lt-pa-ah-ru a-na kal-le-e sa-ad-ru-ni\ MARVll 17 + IV 156, 11. 16-17; transliteration follows'Freydank, 2000, 257). Whatever factor was responsible for the form of the collocation adi UR Nilipahru (instead of the expected adi VRUNilipahre), the same factor may be assumed as responsi­ble for the collocation ana URUSuhu in 1. 24.

2010] Setting the Dates 55

.35 bly for the city gate - would be to sail ca. 280 km downstream the Tigris from Kar-TukultT-Ninurta to the vicinity of Dur-Kurigalzu, then connect via the Patti-Ellil canal to the Euphrates (ca. 60 km),36 and then-sail ca. 220 km up the Euphrates until the final destination. The journey downstream the Tigris, relying on the river current, could be reasonably accomplished in 4-5 days, at the speed of 62-83 km per day. 7 The journey upstream the Euphrates would be probably speedier than a journey over a comparable distance upstream the Tigris, but covering the distance of ca. 220 km from the western end of the Patti-Ellil canal to the city of Anat would still require ca. 10 days at least, at the speed of ca. 23 km per day. In addition, ca. 3 days would be probably necessary to cross the Patti-Ellil canal from its eastern to its western end. Thus, the transportation of the door-leaves from Kar-TukultT-Ninurta to the "city of Suhu" would require 17-18 days at least.

Now, the boatmen mentioned in MARVll 17 "were issued one sutu of barley each, for 10 days" (1-BAN.TA.AM SE sa 10 TJD.MES% [(x x)] ta-din, 1. 26). Their rations would not suffice for the whole duration of the journey from Kar-TukultT-Ninurta to the city of Anat, and hence, during the journey, the boatmen would have to be provided with new rations somewhere in the Babylonian ter­ritory. This indicates that at the time when the Assyrian boat team set out to

33 Supply of door-leaves from Assyria for the gate of the central city of Suhu would be a reasonable political move, if rapprochement between the Assyrian king"and the leaders of Suhu took place a few years earlier, at the time of the capture of KastiliaS IV (see above, n. 23). A possible indication of such rapprochement may be seen in an inscription of TukultT-Ninurta I, RIMA I, A.0.78.23, which was written after the capture of Kastilias IV and which mentions tribute received by the Assyrian king from different countries, including some lands on the Middle Euphrates, but does not mention tribute from Suhu (see Cancik-Kirschbaum, 2009, 124-128). By switching to the Assyrian side at a pro­pitious moment, the leaders of Suhu would be able to achieve a favorable status in the framework of the Assyrian-dominated political order in the Middle Euphrates valley, and to spare themselves the duty to supply tribute to Assyria. 36 For the canal Patti-Ellil passing near Dur-Kurigalzu, see Novak, 1999, 88. 37 This speed can be inferred from data from the early 19th century C. E., before the intro­duction of steamship traffic on Mesopotamian rivers, when cargo boats covered the dis­tance downstream the Tigris from Baghdad to Basra, ca. 500 km, in 6-8 days (Wallis Budge, 1920,214).

For the Euphrates being better navigable for upstream traffic than the Tigris (at least in the lower course of the Tigris, to which the data given by Wallis Budge and mentioned in the preceding note pertain in part), see de Graeve, 1981, 14. The estimate for the speed of movement upstream the Euphrates, in its middle course, can be derived from the letter ARMTI 36 (Durand, 1998, N2 447). In his discussion of this letter, Jean-Marie Durand has established that it should have taken at least two weeks to tow boats upstream the Euphrates from Rapiqum (in the vicinity of modern Falluga) to Mari (Durand, 1998, 16). The distance between these two locations along the Euphrates is ca. 320 km, so the speed of the upstream movement of boats would be ca. 23 km per day.

56 Y. Bloch [UF42

Suhu - probably at the end of the eponym year of AbT-ilT son of Katiri, in Octo­bers-December 1221 B. C. E.39 - Assyria controlled at least the northern part of Babylonia. In other words, the Assyrian military campaign to Babylonia in the first half.of 1221 B.C.E., mentioned in MARV IV 34, must-have met with at least some measure of success.40

12. A very fragmentarily preserved letter from the Assyrian king to his Hittite counterpart (KBo 28.61-64) appears to mention a coup that dethroned the Ba­bylonian king Sagarakti-gurias, who was the immediate predecessor of Kastilias IV. The letter is probably dated to the eponym year of Ill-pada, from the reign of TukultT-Ninurta I. In an earlier study, the present author has suggested that the eponym year of Ill-pada. was the 27th regnal year of TukultT-Ninurta I (Novem­ber 11, 1216 B.C.E. - October 30, 1215 B.C.E.), and that the letter KBo 28.61-64 was written by TukultT-Ninurta I in order to justify his direct takeover of the Babylonian throne after the deposition of Kastilias IV and after a period, during which Babylonia was ruled by vassal kings (Bloch, 2010b, 76, n. 53). According to this proposal^ the 'justification presented in the letter was that the Babylonian king whom TukultT=-Ninurta I had originally deposed - viz., Kastiliag IV - had been himself a usurper, and just as the Hittite king did not act against Kastiliag IV's takeover of the throne from Sagarakti-surias, he had no justifica­tion to act now against the seizure of the Babylonian throne by TukultT-Ninurta I. 41

A different interpretation of the historical situation reflected in KBo 28.61-64 has been proposed by Itamar Singer.. According to his interpretation, KBo 28.61-64 was-written by TukultT-Ninurta I to protest the takeover of the Baby-

39 MARVll 17 records the time-spans, during which some groups of people who received the rations mentioned in the document performed their work. These time-spans cover period from the final three months of the eponym year of AbT-ilT son of Katiri'to the first three months of the following eponym year of Salmanu-suma-usur (see Bloch, forth­coming, section'IV.2). The records of the time-spans begin about the middle of the tablet (from 11. 50-51 onwards), and it stands to reason that the groups recorded at the begin­ning of the tablet performed their missions somewhat earlier than the groups recorded in the second half of the tablet. The eponym year of Salmanu-suma-usur began on January 3,1220 B.C.E. 40 Another indication of the success of the military campaign mentioned in MARVIV 34 is the fact that according to MARVll 17, 110-111, the Assyrian king marched to north­eastern Syria* (rjanigalbat) on a military campaign (see Freydank, 1982, 43; Harrak, 1987, 205-206). The mention of this campaign at the end of the document suggests that the campaign took place in the, early part of the eponym year of Salmanu-suma-usur, i. e., in the first quarter of 1220 B.C.E. (see the preceding note). If TukultT-Ninurta I could take his army .to northeastern Syria, without fearing any significant threat on the South Mesopotamian front, tins suggests that his campaign to Babylonia in the preceding year had, accomplished its goals. 41 For the interpretation of KBo 28.61-64 as referring'to usurpation of the Babylonian throne by Kastilias IV, see Durand/Marti, 2005/127-128; Bloch, 2010a, 13, n..43.

r 2010] Setting the Dates 57

Ionian throne by Adad-suma-usur (whom Singer considers the "servant of/from the land Suhu" mentioned in the letter) nine years after the capture of Kastilias IV (Singer, 2008). However, the identification of the "servant of/from the land Suhu" (IR sa KURSw-#/) with Adad-suma-usur is problematic, if the arrangement of the fragments KBo 28.61 and 62, adopted in most editions of the letter, is accepted:

14';; sum-ma m$a-g[a-ra-ak-ti-su-ri-ds ...]-sablp a-na XJGU-ka ra-nd* §ES-15', GIS ut-te 1J la-a i-sap-\pdr ... UK,G]U.ZA-ia is-bat SES-Ja raf-ta qa-la-ta x

- KUR, 17'. [... (-)]'lu-u sa TR" sa ^^Su-hi ' ' il-li-[... Sa-ga-ra-ak-t]i-su-ri-ds SES--.? 19', ka ba-la-at , 0KUR-ra Tta"1-[...] tu-ta-a-ar IR.MES-»«-w<-a> ^li-idlt-x

[...] (May I die) if Sag[arakti-surias, when a usurper ... on his throne s]at, did not repeatedly wri[te] to you concerning brotherhood! [... (This is what he wrote:) "Since(?)] he seized [the th]rone of mine, you, my brother, have been keeping silent" [ . . . ] . . . of the servant from the land Suhu . . .[ . . . While Sagarakt]i-surias, your brother, was alive, his land was s[eized(?) ... and] you would [not (?)] reply. (May) < my > servants [.. . ] (KBo 28.61+62, obv. 14'-19') 42

42 Transliteration follows Mora and Giorgieri, 2004, 119, who adopted the mutual ar­rangement of KBo 28.61 and 62 proposed by von Soden, 1988, 338-339, and Freydank, 1991b, 24-25, and corrected some of their readings of individual signs. Insofar as the translation is concerned, Mora and Giorgieri, 2004, 125-126, followed Freydank, 1991b, 29-30, in interpreting the sentences quoted here as an expression of modus irrealis. However, while Mora and Giorgieri are right in observing that the preterite form isbat in 1. 15' is not likely to appear in a main clause expressing a real situation in the past, their interpretation leaves the change of the verbal form in what they perceive as the apodoses of irreal conditional sentences - present-future (la) isappar (1. 15') vs. stative qalata (1. 16') - unexplained. Moreover, judging by their own criteria, a calamity, which befell Sagarakti-surias and in the course of which his throne was seized by someone else, is described in KBo 28.61-64 as a real event in the past:3 [...] xsi'-lu sa DUMU.MES Sa-'gd'-ra-a[k-ti-su-ri-ds ...] 4 [...] x-su-nu id-du-ku-su-nu DUMU7 x Bl NU NU [...] 5 [... ]MES-5W id-du-ak su-ut GISGU.ZA is-sa-bat [...], "protection of/to the sons of Sa-gara[kti-surias ...] them. They killed them. The son(?) ... [...] his [...]s he killed. The throne he seized [...]" (KBo 28.64, obv. 3'-5'; these lines are cited by Mora and Gior­gieri, 2004, 125-126, as an example of the perfect verbal form expressing real situations in the past in KBo 28.61-64). But if KBo 28.61-64 spoke of the dethronement of Saga­rakti-surias as a real historical event, the sentences in KBo 28.61+62, obv. 14'-16' are not likely to be understood as hypotheticals. Rather, it appears that the collocation la isappar at the beginning of 1. 15' expresses repeated action (for the present-future ex­pressing durative or habitual situation in the past, see GAG, §78e). The sentence span­ning 1. 14' and the beginning of 1. 15' is then likely to be understood as an asseverative oath formula, stressing the fact the dethroned Sagarakti-surias had repeatedly turned for help to the Hittite king (as proposed by Durand and Marti, 2005, 128, n. 30, although we do not accept some of their restorations of the text lost in the break). Then, the sentence spanning the end of 1. 15' and the beginning of 1. 16' may be understood as a quotation,

58 Y. Bloch [UF42

2l'm IR Sa KURSu-hi KUR

'Sa-g[a-ra-ak-ti-Su-ri-ds ...] x-te 'sa Kar-du-ni-dS is-bu-tu-ni SES-[*a ... ] ta-qu-al

IT. il-[... -n]a

Sag[arakti-surias ...] of the servant from the land Suhu [.. . (who) ...] seized the land of Kardunias (Babylonia). [My] brother, [ . . .] you were keeping silent. (KBo 28.61+62, obv. 21'-23') 43

These passages demonstrate that "the servant from the land Su}iu," or at least someone associated with him, was involved hi the episode, during which Saga­rakti-surias lost his throne and control over Babylonia. It is reasonable to suppose that "the servant from the land Suhu" was himself the usurper, in which case he must have been none other than Kastilias IV.44

In any event, Adad-suma-usur could not have been connected with the strug­gle for the Babylonian throne at the end of the reign of Sagarakti-surias (as pointed out also by Nemirovsky, 2010, 20-21).45 Thus, although Adad-suma-

or at least an expression of the general message, of Sagarakti-surias's plea for help, for­mulated as a complex sentence with a temporal clause (in this instance, the use of the stative qalata in the main clause to express a situation that was still going on at the time of writing: "you have been keeping silent," would be especially apt; on such use of the stative, see Cancik-Kirschbaum, 1996, 64). If Sagarakti-Surias was able to ask the Hittite king for help after the cdup that dethroned him, it follows that he was not captured in the coup; hence, we prefer to read KUR- w at the beginning of 1. 18' as massu "his land" (following Mora/Giorgieri, 2004, 120), rather than iksassu or isbassu "he seized him" (as proposed by Durand and Marti, 2005, 128, n. 31). 43 Transliteration follows Mora/Giorgieri, 2004, 119. Insofar as the translation is con­cerned, since the passage in question appears to deal with the same situation as the pre­ceding one - viz., the uzurpation of control over Babylonia from Sagarakti-surias - it is not likely that the verb qdlulqu'alu "to be(come) silent, to heed, to pay attention" is used here with a different semantic nuance compared to the stative form qalata in 1. 16' (con­tra Mora/Giorgieri, 2004, 120, 126). For the durative/habitual meaning of the present-future form taqu'al in the-context of the past, see the preceding note.

If the verbal form at the end of KB6 28.61+62, obv. 22', is singular (isbutuni) rather than plural (isbutuni), its subject is likely "the servant from the land Suhu." If the verbal form is plural, its subject would be some people associated with the "servant."'"The servant from the land Suhu" is probably also the same person mentioned as la-a DUMU Kudur-il-li-i[T], "(one who is) not a,son of Kudur-EUil (the father of Sagarakti-suria§)" in KBo 28.61+62, obv. 10' (Durand/Marti, 2005,128, n. 29).

Remarkably, Singer based his proposal concerning the Suhean origin of Adad-suma-usur on the very same document, which the present author used to argue that Kastilias* IV was ausurper rather than the legal heir of Sagarakti-surias-viz., VAT 17020 (VS XXIV 91), a Late Babylonian copy or adaptation of a letter sent by a king of Elam to the nobles of Babylonia in the 12th century B.C.E. (van Dijk, 1986; and. see Bloch, 2010a, 13, n. 43). Singer's argument rests on the fact that in VS XXIV 91, 30, Adad-suma-usur is mentioned as DUMU mDu-un-na-\Sa]-ah sa GU iDBURANUNKI, "son'of Dunna-[S]ah from the riverbank of the Euphrates" (van Dijk, 1986, 161). The interpretation proposed by van Dijk, 1986, 166j n. 17/according to which Dunna-Sah was the mother of Adad-

2010] Setting the Dates 59

usur had in fact seized control over the city of Babylon, and probably over the whole northern Babylonia, earlier than previously assumed by the present author (as will be shown below), he appears not to be a protagonist of the letter KBo 28.61-64.46

The letter KBo 28.61-64 is the latest Assyrian source from the reign of TukultT-Ninurta I, which is datable to a specific year and which bears, even if only indirectly, on his relations with Babylonia.47

II.2 Babylonian sources

In contradistinction to the Assyrian sources, an important part of the Babylonian sources bearing on the chronology of the country during its conquest by TukultT-Ninurta I and the subsequent decades are historical and chronographic docu­ments composed during the first millennium B. C. E.

suma-usur, was rejected by Singer because of the determinative m (DIS) before the name of Dunna-Sah, which is normally not used for feminine personal names (Singer, 2008, 232). However, in VS XXIV 91, at least one other feminine name appears to be used with the determinative m: 9mPi-hi-ra-nu-d\J7 mrx"-d[a-a]t-gal-[... NTN7-.™7] l0sd LUGAL dan-nu mKu-ri-gal-zu [i-ta-ha-az1], "Pihiranu-dU [took in marriage] xLdat-gal-[..., the sister(?)] of Kurigalzu (I), the great king" (van Dijk, 1986, 161, 163). Although the exact relation of x-dat-gal-[...] to Kurigalzu is not clear, the restoration of the perfect form Ttahaz "he took in marriage" at the end of 1. 10 is required by the formulaic pattern of the relevant part of the text, and consequently, the name spelled as mrx'-a\a-a]t-gal-[...] must be feminine. This consideration, and the fact that VS XXIV 91 consistently con­nects the right to the Babylonian throne with descent through the feminine line, suggest that Dunna-Sah was indeed the mother of Adad-suma-usur, and she may have borne him to Kastilias' IV, as argued by van Dijk. The origin of Dunna-Sah "from the riverbank of the Euphrates" may well be a reference to the region of Suhu (Singer, 2008, 233) - espe­cially if, as proposed here, Kastilias IV stemmed himself from that country. But this does not necessarily imply that Adad-suma-usur was born himself in Suhu, or used that coun­try as his power base when he commenced his rule. 46 The objection, raised in Bloch, 2010b, 76, n. 53, against dating the conquest of Baby­lon by Adad-suma-usur earlier than 15 years after the death of TukultT-Ninurta I, must now be abandoned (see below, n. 53). 47 The document VAT 18000 (MAR VI 9 + MAR V III 17) mentions produce received in Kar-TukultT-Ninurta as result of a military campaign against the land Zamban on the banks of the river Turran/Diyala. The document is dated to the eponym year of Qarrad-Assur son of Assur-iddin (Freydank, 1974, 79-82). The land Zamban lay on one of the routes used by Assyrian army in the 9th-7th centuries B.C.E. to reach Babylonia (Frey­dank, 1.974, 82). However, MARVl 9 + MARVlll 17 does not mention Babylonia ex­plicitly, and an Assyrian operation specifically against Zamban, rather than against Baby­lonia, could be involved.

60 Y. Bloch [UF42

1. The Babylonian King List A (BKL-A) records that KastiliaS IV reigned over Babylonia eight .years, then Ellil-nadin-sumi and Kadasman-Harbe III reigned each for a period recorded as MU 1 ITU 6 (which is probably to be un­derstood as "1 year and 6 months"),48 then Adad-suma-iddina reigned six years, and Adad-suma-usur reigned thirty years (Grayson, 1980-83, 91-92).

2. Chronicle P includes a passage mentioning the conquest of Babylonia by TukultT-Ninurta I, the deportation of the cultic statue of Marduk to Assyria, the domination of Babylonia by the Assyrian king through his officials, the rebellion of Babylonian nobles that put Adad-suma-usur on the throne, the murder of TukultT-Ninurta I in a coup staged by hisson Assur-nasir-apli (which appears to be .an error for Assur-nadin-apli),49 and the subsequent return of the Marduk statue to Babylon by Tukulti-Assur (which appears to be an abridged form of the name Ninurta-tukulti-Assur). The only chronological data in this section are the seven years, during which TukultT-Ninurta I dominated Babylonia and the [x]+6 years that elapsed between the deportation of the Marduk statue to Assyria and its return to Babylon (Glassner, 2004, N2 45, iv 3-13).50

The following two passages in Chronicle P, each of which is separated from the previous one by a dividing line, speak of attacks against Babylonia by Kidin-Hutrudis (Kidin-Hutran) king of Elam during the reigns of Ellil-nadin-sumi and Adad-suma-iddina. Concerning Ellil-nadin-sumi it is mentioned that the Elamite invasion brought an end to his reign; a similar mention may have been made concerning Adad-suma-iddina, but the relevant part of the text is mostly broken (Glassner, 2004, N2 45, iv 14-21). Since the reigns of Ellil-nadin-sumi and Adad-suma-iddina preceded that of Adad-suma-usur, the arrangement of the passages in Chronicle, P is thematic, rather than chronological (Yamada, 2003, 154, and the earlier studies cited there).

48 For the interpretation of MU 1 ITU 6 as "1 year and 6 months," rather than "1 (offi­cial) year, that is, 6 months," see Yamada, 2003, 173, n. 11; Bloch, 2010b, 73; and see further below. For the numeration of the ^-century B.C.E. Babylonian king as Ka­dasman-Harbe III, rather than Kadasman-Harbe II, see Bloch, 2010b, 71, n. 42 (we adopt this numeration in order to allow for the possibility of a reign of Kadasman-Harbe II in the mid-14111 century B.C.E., as proposed by Sassmannshausen, 2004, 61, n..3, while not intending to pass judgment on the validity of that proposal, which requires a separate dis­cussion). 49 See Pedersen, 1985, 107-108, n. 5;Pedersen, 1999r 50 The restoration'of the1 number [7]67 MU.MES at the beginning of 1. 12 by Glassner, 2004/280, is purely conjectural. The photograph of the tablet contaning Chronicle P, published in Grayson, 1975, pi. XXIV, shows clearly that nothing is preserved to the left of the six-vertical wedges expressing the digit 6. The fact that the figure for the time-span between the*capture ofrthe statue of Marduk and its return to Babylon has not been fully preserved in Chronicle P makes it difficult to use this figure for the'purpose of chrono­logical reconstruction.

2010] Setting the Dates 61

3. Another source often considered relevant for TukultT-Ninurta I's conquest and domination of Babylonia is the Babylonian Chronicle 25 (Walker, 1982; Glassner, 2004, N2 46). C.B.F. Walker, who published the editioprinceps of the chronicle, restored the name of TukultT-Ninurta I in the broken beginning part of the first line, which would imply that TukultT-Ninurta I is the one who seized some city or territory and ruled Babylonia.51 This restoration is based on the statement of 11. 3-8 of the chronicle, according to which Adad-suma-usur conquered the city of Babylon only after a war with Ellil-kudurrT-usur, the third Assyrian king after TukultT-Ninurta I, and after Ellil-kudurrT-usur had been de­throned in a coup. That statement made it necessary, in turn, to assume that Adad-suma-usur had initially established himself as king in southern Babylonia, and took control of the city of Babylon only five years or so before the end of his thirty-years-long reign (Walker, 1982, 407^108). The conclusions of Walker were accepted by Yamada, 2003, 156-159, and by the present author (Bloch, 2010b, 75-76, nn.52-53).52

On the other hand, Julian Reade proposed a different restoration for Chroni­cle 25. According to his restoration, the beginning part of the first line men­tioned Adad-suma-usur, and it would be he who seized some city or territory and ruled Babylonia. Subsequently, according to Reade's restoration of the bro­ken beginning part'of 1. 4, Ellil-kudurrT-usur of Assyria started a war against Adad-suma-usur, captured Babylon, and Adad-suma-usur had to retake that city, which is the conquest mentioned in 11. 7-8 of the chronicle (Reade, 2000). Reade's restoration turns out now to be correct, since an economic document discovered in Babylon, Bab. 39043, is dated to the tenth regnal year of Adad-suma-usur (Pedersen, 2005, 98, N2 16), which indicates that Adad-suma-usur controlled the city of Babylon well before the reign of Ellil-kudurrT-usur.53

However, one still has to pay attention to a late copy of an inscription of Adad-suma-usur, BM 36042, which distinguishes between the favor shown to Adad-suma-usur by Ami and Enlil, on the one hand, and his commission as the ruler of all the lands by Marduk, on the other hand (Stein, 2000, 166-167). In Babylonian royal inscriptions from the Kassite period, it is normally Enlil who occupies the position of the chief god, and he would be expected to commission

51 The full text of 1. 1, as restored by Walker, reads: ^TukuUi-ANinurta sar KURAs-su^ Babilf*1 u Sip]-par 'isbat\rDlB)-ma KURKdr-an-du-ni-id-as u-ma-a-a-er, "[Tukulti-Nin­urta (I), king of Assyria,] seized [Babylon and Sip]par and controlled Karduniash" (Wal­ker, 1982, 400-401). However, the restoration of the name of the city of Sippar before and after the break in 1. 1 is problematic, as demonstrated by Yamada, 2003, 157. 52 Glassner, in his edition of Chronicle 25, also adopted the restoration of the name of TukultT-Ninurta I in the first line (Glassner, 2004, N2 46, 1).

Thus, the earlier statement of the present author to the effect that Adad-suma-usur "took control of the city of Babylon ... only .15 years after the death of TukultT-Ninurta I" (Bloch, 2010b, 76, n. 53), and the objection to Singer's interpretation of KBo 28.61— 64 based on that statement, are now to be abandoned.

62 Y. Bloch [UF42 2010] Setting the Dates 63

a king to rule (see Sommerfeld, 1982, 169-174).54 The mention of Marduk as kingmaker in BM 36042is exceptional, and suggests that the kingship of Adad-suma-usur was announced in Babylon on a special occasion, later than he rose to kingship in Uruk and Nippur, the cult centers of Anu and Enlil (Walker, 1982, 406-407). Remarkably, as will be shown below, the 10th regnal year of Adad-suma-usur was just one year later than the year of the murder of TukultT-Ninurta I in Assyria, and Adad-suma-usur may have seized control of Babylon only around the time of the-death of.the Assyrian king.55<Still, this possibility is hypo­thetical, and Chronicle 25 has no clear connection to TukultT-Ninurta I's domi­nation of Babylonia.

In addition to later historical and chronographic sources, the date formulae of some Babylonian economic and legal documents from the reigns of rulers con­temporary with TukultT-Ninurta I shed important light on the chronology of Ba­bylonia during the relevant period.

4. The latest known documents from the reign of Kastilias IV come from Ur, Nippur and Dur-Kurigalzu. The documents from Ur {UET VH 3; Gurney, 1983, N2 3) and from Nippur (Ni. 6088) are dated to days l[+x] and 16, re­spectively, of the tenth'Babylonian month (Tebetu/Kanunu)of the 7 regnal year of Kastilias IV. The document from Dur-Kurigalzu (DK3-114) is dated to day 25 of the fifth Babylonian month (Abu) of the 8tl? regnal year of Kastilias IV (Brinkman, 1976, 184). According to the BKL-A, Kastilias IV reigned eight years, so that the document DKjrl 14 must belong to his last regnal year. As ob­served in the preceding section of the present article, based on Assyrian evi­dence, Kastilias IV was captured by TukultT-Ninurta I in the winterof 1225/ 1224 B.C.E. Consequently, his last regnal1 year began in the spring of 1225 B.C.E., and the document DK3-114 was written during the summer of 1225 B. C. E. The fact that this document comes from Xmr-Kurigalzu supports the proposal expressed above, according' to which Kastilias IV held out in Dur-

54 One text mentioning Nazi-maruttas, a king from the late 14th - early 1311* centuries B.C.E., appears to mention Marduk as the one who subjugated "the lands" to the Baby­lonian king (Stein, 2000, 178). However, the text is too fragmentary to make any definite conclusion concerning its character,, and it may be a late literary composition rather than a copy of a royal inscription ofNazi-Maruttas. 55 It is not known, when in his five-years-long reign Ellil-kudurrT-usur had retaken Baby-Ion from Adad-suma-usur (as required by Reade's restoration of Chronicle 25). It is possible that after the conquest of Babylon by Ellil-kudurrT-usur, (the city was governed by a local king as an Assyrian yassal; this king would be "somebody, the son of a no­body, whose name is not mentioned," recorded in Chronicle 25 (a-a-um-ma DUMU la mam-ma-na-ma sa sum-su la za-kar, Glassner, 2004, N9 46, 1. 8; translation follows Reade, 2000). He may be identical with "the son of the daughter" (DUMU DUMU. SAL), whose reign-was-brought to an end by Adad-suma-usur, According to VS XXIV 91, 32 (van Dijk, 1986, 161, 168). In this case, the Assyrian vassal would be a legitimate Kassite prince but would not be recognized as such after his downfall at the hands of Adad-suma-usur.

Kurigalzu during the final year and a half of his reign. -On the other hand, the date formulae of the documents from Tebetu/Kanunu

of the 7th regnal year of Kastilias IV indicate that in the winter of 1226/1225 B. C. E., the rule of Kastilias IV was still recognized in southern Babylonia. The Assyrian documents KAJ 106 and MARV VHI 7, discussed in the preceding section of the present article, indicate that by the spring and the summer of 1226 B. C.E., TukultT-Ninurta I had carried out a military raid to, or perhaps even established some control over, the southeastern Babylonian province of the Sea­land, and also held full control over the city of Babylon. The evidence of the Ba­bylonian documents from the 7th regnal year of Kastilias IV does not necessarily contradict this conclusion. There is nothing to deny the possibility that the army ofi TukultT-Ninurta I approached the Sealand in 1226 B. C. E. through the banks of the Tigris (thus leaving Nippur and Ur out of its reach, for the time being), and Assyrian control over the city of Babylon would not necessarily sever the communications between Dur-Kurigalzu and the cities of southern Babylonia (Nippur and Ur), which remained faithful to Kastilias IV at least until the spring of 1225 B.C.E.

5.* No clearly dated documents from the reign of Ellil-nadin-sumi are known yet. From the reign of his successor recorded in the BKL-A, Kadasman-Harbe III, a few documents are known. The earliest of them is CBS 12917, from Nip­pur, dated to day 11 [+x] of the ninth month (Kissillmu) of the accession year of Kadasman-rjarbe III (Brinkman, 1976, 148).57 Documents from the reign of Ka­dasman-Harbe III are also known from Ur: UET VII 2 (Gurney, 1983, N2 2), dated to day 28 of the tenth month (Tebetu/Kanunu) of the accession year of Kadasman-Harbe III; and UET VII34 (Gurney, 1983, N2 34), dated to day 9 of the fifth month (Abu) of what appears to be his first regnal year.58

The latest known document from the reign of Kadasman-Harbe III has been considered until recently YBC 7652, from Nippur, dated to day 14[+x] of the sixth month (Ululu) of his first regnal year (Brinkman, 1976, 148). However, an unpublished economic document from the city of Babylon, Bab. 39045, has been reported by Pedersen, 2005, 98, N2 18. According to Pedersen, the docu-fnent is dated to day 10 of the tenth month (Tebetu/Kanunu) of the tenth regnal year of a king Kadasman-Harbe; the archive, to which this document belongs,

An economic document from Tell Zubeidi (Kessler, 1985, pi. 161, NQ 719) is dated to the reign of Ellil-nadin-sumi, but the month name and the record of the year are not preserved (see Bloch, 2010b, 73, n. 46). 57 Brinkman used the traditional numeration Kadasman-Harbe II for the king in question, in contradistinction to the numeration Kadasman-Harbe III adopted for the same king in the present study, following Sassmannshausen, 2004, 61, n. 3 (see above, n. 48).

P The date formula in UET VII 34 is damaged, but the reading [MU.]1.KAM Ka-dds-man-Har-be LUGAL.E is most likely (see Gurney, 1983, 105-106).

m_

64 Y. Bloch [UF42

indicates clearly that the B^-century king is involved (numbered here as Ka­dasman-Harbe III). Of course, a 10th regnal year of Kadasman-Harbe III>contra­dicts the data of the BKL-A (Pedersen, 2005, 94); moreover, adding 8.5 years to his reign, beyond what is indicated in. the BKL-A, would increase -the period covered by the late Kassite dynasty and the Second Dynasty of Isin, in the terms of Babylonian chronology, beyond what is allowed for the same period by As­syrian chronological data (Bloch, 2010b, 74-*78; and see the next section of the present article). Hence,.it appears that the Winkelhaken recording the year num­ber "10" in Bab. 39045 is a scribal mistake for a vertical wedge that should de­note the number "1"; the scribe may have made this mistake under the influence of the record.of day, JO in the date formula of Bab. 39045.

Consequently, Bab. 39045 increases the period of time, directly attested by contemporary documents for the reign of Kadasman-Harbe III, to 14 months at least (from the 9. month of his accession year to the 10 month of his first reg­nal year), and supports the interpretation of the record MU 1 ITU 6 in the BKL-A,.pertaining to Ellil-nadin-sumi and Kadasman-Harbe III, as "one year and six months." If, as observed above, Kastilias IV was captured by TukultT-Ninurta I in the winter of 1225/1224 B. C. E., then Ellil-nadin-sumi must have been en­throned, as an Assyrian vassal, shortly thereafter, perhaps on the occasion of the Babylonian New Year celebrations in Nippur, in the spring of 1224 B.C.E.59

His reign would" come to an end, in an Elamite invasion, before the ninth month (KissilTmu) of the next Babylonian year, i. e., at the end of 1223 B. C. E.; at that point, the pro-Elamite Kadasman-Harbe ill must have been already reigning.60

The reign of Kadasman-Harbe III must have come to an end in the first quarter of 1221 B.C.E.

6. Only two documents are dated to a specific regnal year of Adad-suma-iddina, the successor of Kadasman-Harbe III according to the BKL-A. Both stem from Ur: UET VII 21 (Gurney, 1983, N2 21) is dated to day 13 of the first Babylo­nian month (Nisannu) of the accession year of Adad-suma-iddina; and UETVH 23 (Gurney, 1983, N2 23) is dated to day 6 of the fifth month (Abu) of the-same year (Brinkman, 1976, 87). The document UET VU 21 indicates a complete

59 As observed above, the Assyrian letters Cancik-Kirschbaum, 1996, N35 11-12, suggest that by mid-May of 1124 B.C.E,, TukultT-Ninurta I was still in Babylonia. Apparently, he remained in Babylonia for a few months following the capture of Kastilias IV, to arrange the coronation of Ellil-nadin-sumi. Babylonian kings of the 14,h-13th centuries B.C.E. appear to have paid relatively regular visits to Nippur around the beginning of the Babylonian year (Sassmannshausen, 2001, 10); and Kastilias IV had probably pro­claimed himself king in Nippur on the occasion of the New Ydar's festival, judging by the fact that two documents from that city are dated to day 3 of Nisannu of his accession year (Brinkman, 1976, 177). It stands to reason that TukultT-Ninurta I would also use the New Year's festival to crown Ellil-nadin-sumi in Nippur. 60> For Ellil-nadin-sumi and Kadasman-Harbe III as proteges of Assyria and Elam, respectively, see Bloch, 2010b, 72-73.

2010] Setting the Dates 65

control over Ur by Adad-suma-iddina, and the expectation of that control by the city authorities to last in the foreseeable future, at a very early date in Adad-suma-iddina's reign, less than two weeks after he had assumed the royal title.61

Since Babylonia appears to have been a bone of contention between Assyria and Elam at the time, with different parties supporting different claimants for the throne, it is unlikely that Adad-suma-iddina would be recognized as king in Ur so speedily if he had announced his enthronement elsewhere. Hence, it appears that Adad-suma-iddina had proclaimed himself king in Ur, in the spring of 1221 B. C. E., and collaborated with the Assyrians, whose suzerainty he recognized, to overthrow Kadasman-Harbe III. The Assyrian document MARV IV 34, men­tioned above, indicates that the Assyrian army stayed in Babylonia at least until late July of 1221 B. C. E. - i. e., the campaign against Kadasman-Harbe III and his Elamite supporters must have lasted a few months.

From the formal point of view, the fact that the year starting in the month Nisannu of 1221 B. C. E. was recorded as the accession year of Adad-suma-id­dina, indicates that the reign of Kadasman-Harbe III included two official New Year Days (Nisannu 1). Thus, based on the norms of the official year count in Babylonia, the duration of the reign of Kadasman-Harbe III should have been reckoned as two years. However, the BKL-A - or rather, the source, which its author used for his treatment of the chronology of the 13th century B. C. E. - was precise enough to indicate that the summary period covered by the reigns of Ellil-nadin-sumi and Kadasman-Harbe III was three years, and that each of those reigns had actually lasted about a year and a half.

<In addition to the documents mentioned above, a legal decision of Adad-suma-iddina pertaining to a piece of real estate in the vicinity of Nippur is rec­orded in a hidurru from the first half of the 12th century B. C. E. (BBSt 3). This record indicates that the rule of Adad-suma-iddina was recognized in other parts of Babylonia beside Ur, and that his decisions were cited as authoritative well after the end of the Assyrian domination of Babylonia (Brinkman, 1976, 88).

1, An economic document from Nippur, Ni. 65, is dated to day 7 of the twelfth Babylonian month (Addaru) of the accession year of TukultT-Ninurta I (Brinkman, 1976, 315, 386, pi. 7, N2 13). Apparently the accession year of Tu­kultT-Ninurta I as the king of Babylonia, i. e., the beginning of his direct rule over the country, is referred to. That rule was probably established following the dethronement of Adad-suma-iddina, which took place after six years of his reign

UET VII 21 is a document recording the sale of a slave boy. A relative of the sellers, who may in the future infringe upon the terms of the transaction, is threatened with the following punishment: *... ki-i ri-kil-ti 2LUGAL n,<1ISKUR-MU-SUM-«13 ip-pu-su-su 3si-kdt URUDU i-napi-su i-ri-tu-u, "they shall deal with him according to the order of King Adad-suma-iddina; they shall drive a copper peg into his mouth" (Gurney, 1983, N2 21, rev. 1-3). 'The scribe and the witnesses must have expected the orders of King Adad-suma-iddina to be obeyed for many years after the transaction.

r

66 Y. Bloch [UF42

62 - i. e., in the early months of 1215 B. C. E. Ni. 65 dates either from the very end of the Babylonian year, in which Adad-suma-iddina was dethroned, or from the very end of the following year, in which the rule of Adad-suma-usur was established in southern Babylonia (in the latter instance, Adad-suma-usur had probably taken Nippur no later than three weeks-after the date of Ni. 65).

62 Since the BKL-A'records for Kadasman-Harbe III the (relatively) precise length of reign, rather than the number of 'official years, the same may apply to the length of the reign of Adad-suma-iddina as specified in the BKL-A. In other words, the six years recorded for'Adad-suma-iddina in the BKL-A may include his accession year (which was, at least in Ur, an almost complete'calendar year, judging from the document UET Vlf, 21), and five official regnal years. Alternatively, it should be noted that the direct rule of TukultT-Ninurta I over Babylonia is not recognized in BKL-A (in contradistinc­tion to the direct rule of Babylonia in the 8th-7lh centuries B.C.E. by Tiglath-pileser III, Shalmaneser V, Sargon II, Sennacherib and Esarhaddon - see Grayson, 1980-83, 93). Thus, the period between the establishment of TukultT-Ninurta I's direct rule over Baby­lonia and'the enthronement of Adad-suma-usur in the southern part of the country, which probably lasted about a year (see the following note), may have been counted by the BKL-A - or rather by the source'which the author of the BKL-A used for the 13th cen­tury B. CE. - as the 6th official year of Adad-suma-iddina, in order to avoid the inclusion of a foreign conqueror-(TukultT-Ninurta I) in the list of Babylonian kings. 63 On the one hand, it is not likely that more than one year passed between the end of the reign of Adad-suma-iddina and the beginning of the reign of Adad-suma-usur, due to chronological considerations (Bloch, 2010b, 78, n. 59). On the other hand, in inscriptions dating from the late part of his reign, TukultT-Ninurta I adopted- an extensive titulary presenting him as the king of Babylonia. The most elaborate version of this titulary reads: 12... MAN KURKar-du-ni-as l3MAN KUR §u-me-ri u Ak-ka-di-i "*MAN URUSi-ip-pars ii ^KA.DINGIR ,5MAN KURTil-mu-un u KURMe-luh-hi ,6MAN A.AB.BA AN.TA ii su-pa-li-ti, "King of Kardunia§ (Babylonia), king of Sumer and Akkad, king of Sippar and Babylon, king of Tilmun and Meluhha, king of the Upper and Lower Seas" (RIMA 1, A.0.78.24, 12-17; and see Yamada, 2003, 171). Part of this titulary expresses the concept of domination over Babylonia, and indeed over the whole inhabited world, in general terms, without a necessary connection to any specific historical situation. How­ever, another part of the titulary mentions specific locations, over which TukultT-Ninurta I exercised kingship, and Yamada has argued convincingly that the unique title "king of Sippar and Babylon" appears to reflect direct rule over these important Babylonian cen­ters (Yamada, 2003, 172). Now, the title "king of Tilmun and Meluhha" is no less unique than "king of Sippar and Babylon" (both titles are attested only for TukultT-Ninurta I -see Seux, 1967, 301, 303); and while TukultT-Ninurta I had not controlled Meluhha, the sea-coast of modern Balochistan, the title does express pretension to rule countries lo­cated overseas from Babylonia, beyond the Persian Gulf (Heimpel, 1993, 55). For such a pretension to be formulated, actual control at least over the Babylonian coast of the Per­sian Gulf seems to be required, and it is likely that TukultT-Ninurta I did exercise such control for some time after the establishment of his direct rule over Babylonia. At least a few months of direct rule over the coast of the Persian Gulf, and by implication, over southern Babylonia as a whole, seem to be necessary for the title "king of Tilmun and Meluhha" to have entered the-titulary of Tukulti-Ninurta: I (after that,tthe title could re­main in use even after southern Babyloriia had been lost to Adad-suma-usur). The con-

2010] Setting the Dates 67

The accession year of Adad-suma-usur, as counted in southern Babylonia, was apparently 1215/1214 B.C.E., and his first regnal year would then be counted from the spring of 1214 B. C. E.

8. The earliest known documents from the reign of Adad-suma-usur are UET VII10,37 and 72 (Gurney, 1983, N~ 10, 37, 72). All these documents are dated to the third regnal year of Adad-suma-usur (Brinkman, 1976, 91), which would be 1212/1211 B. C. E. The fact that these documents come from Ur supports the notion that the rule of Adad-suma-usur commenced in southern Babylonia. The document Bab. 39043, from Babylon, is dated to the tenth regnal year of Adad-suma-usur (Pedersen, 2005, 98, N2 16), and indicates that he had taken control "of Babylon, at the latest, by 1205/1204 B. C. E. The last regnal year of TukultT-Ninurta I lasted from July 25, 1206 B. C. E., to July 13, 1205 B. C. E. (Bloch, forthcoming, Table 4), and Adad-suma-usur may have taken Babylon only around the time of the death of TukultT-Ninurta I.64

The Babylonian documents dated to the first decade of the reign of Adad-suma-usur are the latest group of documents contemporary with the domination of Babylonia (or part thereof) by TukultT-Ninurta I.

th Hi III Babylonian chronology of the 1 4 - 1 1 centuries B. C. E.

III . l Precise dating of the reigns of the Babylonian kings

To the Assyro-Babylonian synchronisms from the period of the conquest and domination of Babylonia by TukultT-Ninurta I, established above, one should add another synchronism, based on the Middle Assyrian chronicle fragment VAT 10453+10465 (Weidner, 1954-1956, 384-385; Glassner, 2004, N2 15). According to this fragment, Marduk-nadin-ahhe, the sixth king of the Second Dynasty of Isin, died, and his son Marduk-sapik-zeri ascended to the throne of

siderations outlined above suggest there was an interval of about one year between the establishment of TukultT-Ninurta I's direct rule over Babylonia and the point, at which he lost control over the southern part of the country to Adad-suma-usur.

A considerable number of documents from the reign of Adad-suma-usur bear the so-called "double dating" of the format MU.x.KAM.y.KAM (where x varies from 1 to 9, and y is always 2 or 3). Similar "double dating" formulae are attested for the two im­mediate successors of Adad-suma-usur: Meli-SThu (Meli-STpak) and Marduk-apla-iddina I (the list of "double darings," provided by Brinkman, 1976, 410, must now be supple­mented by documents listed by Pedersen, 2005, 83, 94). The "double dating" formulae have been most recently discussed by Sassmannshausen, 2006, 169, who suggested that they reflect renewed accessions of the king to the throne after his reign had been inter­rupted by the nomination of a "substitute king" (for the ancient Mesopotamian practice of nominating a "substitute king" for a short period of time to bear an evil portent of astrological nature, see Parpola, 1983, xxii-xxxi). The question of the meaning of "dou­ble datings" cannot be explored in the framework of this study.

68 Y. Bloch [UF42 2010] Setting the Dates 69

Babylonia, no later than the antepenultimate regnal year of Tiglath-pileser I (Bloch, 2010b, 74, n. 48).

As demonstrated by. the present author, chronological data concerning the Babylonian kings from the late Kassite dynasty and from the Second Dynasty of Isin, according to the Babylonian* King Lists A and C (BKL-C), indicate that from the dethronement of Kastilias IV to the death of Marduk-nadin-ahhe there elapsed at.least 147 Babylonian luni-solar years.65 On the other hand, according to the AKL, from the 18th regnal year of TukultT-Ninurta I to the antepenultimate (37th) regnal year of Tiglath-pileser I there elapsed 151 Assyrian years (Bloch, 2010b, 74-78). .Since the Assyrian calendar years were lunar (Bloch, forthcom­ing), 151 Assyrian years amount to 147 luni-solar years. In other words, the minimal possible distance from the dethronement of Kastilias IV to the death of Marduk-nadin-ahhe, according to Babylonian sources, equals precisely the dis­tance from the 18th regnal year of TukultT-Ninurta I (when Kastilias IV was de­throned) to the 37th regnal year of Tiglath-pileser I (which is the latest possible year for the death of Marduk-nadin-ahhe). Consequently, Marduk-nadin-ahhe must have died precisely in the 37th regnal year of Tiglath-pileser I (1078/1077 B.C.E.).66

Based on the Assyro-BabyIonian synchronisms established thus far, and on the data concerning the lengths of the reigns of the Babylonian kings preserved in the BKL-A and BK1.-6 (Grayson, 1980-83, 90-97), it is now possible to reconstruct the precise chronology'of the kings of Babylonia from the end of the 14th to the end of the 1-1th centuries B. C. E., as specified in the following table.67

65 These 147 years include an overlap of one year between the official reign of the last Kassite king, Ellil-nadin-ahi,_as recorded in the BKL-A, and the reign of the founder of the Second Dynasty of Isin, Marduk-kabit-ahhesu, as recorded in the BKL-C. Marduk-kabit-ahhesu had probably commenced his rule in Isin a year before he was able to take control over Babylon, in the wake of the dethronement of Ellil-nadin-ahi in an Elamite invasion (Bloch, 2010b, 77, n. 54). 66 At the end of the reign of Tiglath-pileser I, Assyria had probably already adopted the Babylonian calendar, with intercalation and with the year beginning in spring, on Nisan­nu 1 (see above, n. 4).

Notes to the table are marked by letters (rather than numbers) and appear after the table.

Table 1: Regnal dates of the kings of Babylonia in the late 14 t h-ll t h

centuries B. C. E.a

King Kurigalzu II Nazi-maruttas Kadasman-Ellil II

Kadasman-Turgu Kadasman-Ellil III Kudur-Ellil Sagarakti-Surias Kastilias IV Ellil-nadin-sumi Kadasman-Harbe HI

- Adad-suma-iddina TukultT-Ninurta I (in southern Babylonia) Adad-suma-usur (enthronement in southern Babylonia, further reign over the whole country) Meli-SThu (Meli-Slpak) Marduk-apla-iddina I Zababa-suma-iddina Ellil-nadin-alii Marduk-kabit-ahhesu Itti-Marduk-balatu Ninurta-nadin-sumi Nebuchadnezzar I Ellil-nadin-apli Marduk-nadin-ahhe Marduk-sapik-zeri Adad-apla-iddina Marduk-ahhe-eriba Marduk-zer-[...] Nabu-sumu-lTbur

Simbar-slhu (Simbar-slpak) Ea-mukln-zeri Kassu-nadin-ahhe

Regnal dates 1332-1307 B.C.E.b

1307-1282 B.C.E. 1282 B.C.E.c

1281-1264 B.C.E. 1263-1255 B.C.E.d

1254-1246 B.C.E.e

1245-1233 B.C.E. 1232-1225 B.C.E. 1224-1223 B.C.K* 1222-1221 B.C.E.g

1221-1216 B.C.E.h

1215 B.C.E.1

1214-1185 B.C.E.

1184-1170 B.C.E. 1169-1157 B.C.E.

1156 B.C.E. 1155-1153 B.C.E. 1152-1136 B.C.E.J

1135-1128 B.C.E. 1127-1122 B.C.E. 1121-1100 B.C.E. 1099-1096 B.C.E. 1095-1078 B.C.E. 1077-1065 B.C.E. 1064-1043 B.C.E.

1042 B.C.E k

1041-1030 B.C.E. 1029-1022 B.C.E. 1021-1004 B.C.E.1

1004 B.C.E. 1003-1001 B.C.E.

70 Y. Bloch [UF42

Notes to Table 1 a Unless specified otherwise, the dates for each king begin with the beginning

of his first official regnal year, and end with the beginning of his last official regnal year.

b Precise chronoldgy of the Kassite kings preceding Kurigalzu II cannot be reconstructed at present, because the BKL-A is broken at the relevant point.

c A king named Kadasman-Ellil reigned for a few months after Nazi-maruttas and before Kadasman-Turgu (Sassmannshausen, 2006, 167; Boese, 2009, 85-88). This king had probably reigned less than one year, which may be the reason that he is not mentioned in the BKL-A. Still, it is this king that is to be numbered properly Kadasman-Ellil II, and the successor of Kadasman-Turgu should be numbered Kadasman-Ellil III.

d The figure for the reign of Kadasman-Ellil III (Kadasman-Ellil II in the tradi­tional numeration) is damaged in the BKL-A beyond recognition. Brinkman, 1976, 131, !n. 6, discussed the possible reading of this figure, and concluded that it can be anything between "8" and r10+x\ A reign of less than 8 years for Kadasman-Ellil^ III is impossible, since economic documents dated to his 8th regnal year are known. At the bottom line, Brinkman proposed a reign of 9 years for Kadasman-Ellil III (II), as "something of a compromise between the likely readings of 8-10 years, depending on the traces in Kinglist A.. . and the evidence of the economic-text dates" (Brinkman, 1976, 142, n. 24). His proposal is followed here.

e For Kudur-Ellil, the BKL-A specifies six regnal years. However, economic documents from his reign indicate that he ruled for nine official years, and the figure in the BKL-A must be an error (Brinkman, 1976, 23-24, 443, 446).

68 Brinkman's proposal amounts to postulating that the last regnal year of Kadasman-Ellil III is not attested in economic documents. A consideration in support of this pro­posal is the fact that the same situation pertains to the three predecessors of Kadasman-Ellil III who reigned more than a few months: Kurigalzu II, Nazi-maruttas and Kadas­man-Turgu (however, for Nazi-maruttas, the penultimate regnal year is likewise unat­tested in economic documents - see Brinkman, 1976, 23). A diametrically opposite .ap­proach has been adopted'by'Boese, 2009, 89-93, who us6d the evidence of ecoribmic documents to postulate for-Kurigalzu II, Nazi-maruttas' and Kadasman-Turgu reigns shorter by one year, than the figures specified in the BKL-A. However, Boese's proposal ignores the fact that at least for Kurigalzu II, the attestation of his regnal years in eco­nomic documents is less than complete: no known documents are clearly dated to the period between Tebetu/Kanunu-of the 2nd regnal year of Kurigalzu II and the intercalary Ululu of his 4th regnal year, i.e., for 20 months in total (Brinkman, 1976, 232; the docu­ment UM 29-13-340 from Nippur may date to this period, but that is ultimately unclear - see Sassmannshausen, 2001, 267-268, N2 84). Hence, if for a given king less years are attested in economic documents than in the BKL-A, this situation is more likely to result from the uneven chances of preservation and discovery of Middle Babylonian economic documents than from inflated figures in the BKL-A.

2010] Setting the Dates 71

J*

The dates are given from the beginning of the accession year of Ellil-nadin-sumi (which is assumed to coincide with the Babylonian New Year's day in the spring of 1224 B. C. E.) to the beginning of his first official regnal year in the spring of 1223 B. C. E. The dates are given from the beginning of the first official regnal year of Kadasman-Harbe III (spring 1222 B. C. E., after enthronement in the autumn or early winter of 1223 B. C. E.) to the beginning of his second official regnal year (spring 1221 B.C.E., with the rival rule of Adad-suma-iddina estab­lished, at least in Ur, less than two weeks after the beginning of the year). The dates are given from the accession of Adad-suma-iddina to the begin­ning of the year in which his reign came to an end, assuming that the figure of 6 years in the BKL-A records the precise length of his reign, rather than the number of official regnal years included therein (i. e., without the acces­sion year).70

Assuming the duration of ca. one year for the direct rule of Tukulti-Ninurta I over southern Babylonia.71

Starting with the first regnal year as would be counted in Babylon, after the takeover of the city by the founder of the Second Dynasty of Isin in the wake of the Elamite invasion that brought an end to the reign of Ellil-nadin-ahi.72

The duration of the reign of Marduk-ahhe-eriba is recorded in the BKL-A as MU 1 6 ITU (Grayson, 1980-83, 92). As with Ellil-nadin-sumi and Kadas­man-Harbe III, this figure is likely to be understood as "1 year and 6 months." However, since the reigns of both the predecessor and the succes­sor of Marduk-ahhe-eriba are recorded in the BKL-A in full years, we have to reckon the reign of Marduk-ahhe-eriba as consisting of one official year only.

We follow the BKL-A, rather than the Babylonian Dynastic Chronicle (Glassner, 2004, N2 3) for the reigns of the kings of the Second Dynasty of the Sealand: Simbar-sThu, Ea-mukTn-zeri and Kassu-nadin-ahhe. The figures specified in the Dynastic Chronicle are less reliable than those of the BKL-A, in part due to the fact that they contain inner discrepancies (see Grayson, 1975, 142).

II 1.2 The astronomical datum of the Religious Chronicle

Remarkably, the chronology of the Babylonian kings presented in Table 1 above receives independent confirmation from an astronomical datum preserved in a Babylonian chronicle from the first millennium B. C. E. - the so-called Reli-

69 See above, n. 59.

See above, n. 62.

See above, n. 63.

See above, n. 65.

72 Y. Bloch [UF42

gious Chronicle (Glassner, 2004, N2 51). This chronicle, which lists various portents observed in Babylon during the late 11th - early 10th centuries B. C. E., mentions the following event in the reign of a king, whose name is not preserved but who is most likely to be identified, from the context, as Simbar-SThu, the founder of the Second Dynasty of the Sealand:

ina UUSIG4 UD.26.KAM Sa MU.7.KAM uA-mu a-na GI6 GUR-ma IZI ina SA AN-e x [x] x On the twenty-sixth day of the month Simanu, in the seventh year, day turned to night and [there was(?)] fire in the sky. (Glassner, 2004, Ne 51, ii 14)73

The phenomenon mentioned in this line appears to be a solar eclipse, especially one that took place shortly before the sunset, when the shadow of the moon covering the setting sun "would indeed set the sky aflame" (Rowton, 1946, 106).14 An alternative could be darkening of the.sky due to a severe storm, in which case the mention of "fire" in the chronicle would be a reference to light­ning (Grayson, 1975, 135). However, a thunderstorm can hardly be expected in Babylon in-summer (end of Simanu).

Now, a partial solar eclipse was observable in Babylon on July 11, 1015 B.C.E., and reached its maximal magnitude ca. 18:30 local time, when about half the surface of the visible solar disc was covered by the moon's shadow. The year 1015/1014 B. C. E. was precisely the seventh regnal year of Simbar-sThu according to the chronological reconstruction presented in Table 1 above, and the Julian date of July 11 is perfectly reasonable for day 26 of Simanu.

73 Translation based on Grayson, 1975, 135; and see ibid., 134, 136, for the probable identification of the king mentioned in the Religious Chronicle ii 1-25 as Simbar-sThu. As observed by Grayson, the possibility of identification of the king in question as Eul-mas-sakin-sumi, the successor of Kas'su-nadin-ahhe and the founder of the dynasty of Bazi, cannot be completely ruled out (although it is much less likely). Hence, the datum of the Religious Chronicle ii 14 cannot be used as the sole foundation of a precise chro­nology of the Babylonian kings in the 14th-! 1th centuries B.C.E. However, this datum can lend supportive weight to chronology established'on other grounds, as done in the present study. 74 Rowton mistakenly 'identified the date of the recorded phenomenon as Simanu 20 rather than 26. 75 Astronomical data for the solar eclipse and the dates of the visibility of the lunar cres­cent in Babylon in 1015 B.C.E. (-1014 in the astronomical notation) have been obtained through Alcyone Astronomical Software (see above, n. 13). Data concerning "the solar eclipse of July 11, 1015 B.C.E. are also presented in Kudlek and Mickler, 1971,26. 76 If July 11 was day 26 of Simanu in 1015 B.C.E., the relevant month must have begun on June 16 of that year (actually, on the evening of June 15 - see above, n. 13). This is two days later than the actual date of the first visibility of the lunar crescent in Babylon in June 1015 B.C.E. (the evening of June 13, 18:59 local time). However, a delay of two days in the official announcement of-the beginning of the month could have been caused by some administrative malfunction (such a delay would be required in any event for a

2010] Setting the Dates 73

Indeed, 1015 B. C. E. is the only year in the penultimate decade of the 11th cen­tury B. C. E. - the period that must have included the seventh regnal year of Simbar-sThu in any event (see Sassmannshausen, 2006, 170-174) - in which a solar eclipse was observable in Babylon in summer.77

IV Correlation between the chronologies of Babylonia,

the Hittite empire and Egypt in the 13 th century B.C.E.

IV. l Synchronisms between the reigns of Ramesses IT and Hattusili III

Having established the precise chronology of the Babylonian kings in the late 14 -11 centuries B. C.E., we can now explore its implications for the chronol­ogy of the reigns of two non-Mesopotamian kings who played a key role in the political history of the Near East in the 13th century B. C.E.: Ramesses II of Egypt and Hattusili III of Hatti.

Concerning Ramesses II, Papyrus Leiden I 350 mentions a New Moon on day 27, month 6, of his 52nd regnal year. Since the reign of Ramesses II belongs in any event to the 13th century B. C.E., the New Moon in question can only be that of December 25, 1253 B. C.E., December 22, 1239 B. C.E., or December 19, 1228 B.C.E. Consequently, the enthronement of Ramesses II must have taken place in 1304, 1290 or 1279 B. C E . (von Beckerath, 1997, 51).79

solar eclipse to be observed on day 26, rather than 28, of a lunar month). For the month Simanu to begin after the sighting of the lunar crescent of June 13, the first month of the Babylonian year, Nisannu, must have begun after the sighting of the lunar crescent in Babylon on the evening of April 15, 18:22 local time. This is within the limits for the beginning of Nisannu in Babylonia during the 13th—12th centuries B.C.E., between late February and mid-May (see' Bloch, forthcoming, section 111.3). 7 Rowton, 1946, 106 identified the eclipse of the seventh year of Simbar-sThu with the

solar eclipse of May 9, 1012 B.C.E., which was also visible in Babylon shortly before the sunset. However, this identification would require the month Nisannu of the relevant Babylonian year to begin after the sighting of the lunar crescent on the evening of Febru­ary 11, 1012 B.C.E., which is too early for the Babylonian calendar. Noteworthy, the identification of the event mentioned in the Religious Chronicle ii 14 as a solar eclipse constitutes another consideration against identifying the king, to whose reign it belongs, as Eulmas-sakin-sumi (see above, n. 73). The seventh regnal year of Eulmag-Sakin-sumi is to be placed, in any event, in the first decade of the 101*1 century B.C.E. (Sassmanns­hausen, 2006, 174), and no solar eclipse was observable in Babylonia in summer during that decade (see Kudlek and Mickler, 1971, 26).

In Egyptian terms, the New Moon event (psdntyw) was the day when the moon be­came invisible after a period of visibility (von Beckerath, 1997, 49, n. 175).

* In an earlier study, von Beckerath reckoned also with the possibility that the New Moon event recorded in Papyrus Leiden I 350 occurred on December 16, 1214 B.C.E., or December 13, 1203 B.C.E., which would entail the dates of 1265 or 1254 B.C.E.,

74 Y. Bloch [UF42

In his 5th regnal year (1300/1299, 1286/1285 or 1275/1274 B. C.E., depen­dent on the date of the enthronement),80 Ramesses fought at Qadeg on the Oron-tes, in Syria, against the Hittite king Muwattalli II. This battle began a protracted state of hostility between Egypt and the Hittite empire, which ended with the conclusion of the peace treaty between Ramesses II and Hattusili III in the 21s

regnal year of RamessesJI (1284/1283, 1270/1269 or 1259/1258 B. C.E.). Ac­cording to the so-called Apology of Hattusili III (who was a brother of Mu­wattalli II),81 the reign of Muwattalli II wa"s followed by'seven years of the reign of his son, Urhi-Tessub, who then tried to deprive Hajmsilj III of his position as the ruler of a territory on the northern periphery of the Hittite kingdom, and in return, Hattusili III deposed Urhi-Tessub and seized the throne of Hatti (von Beckerath, 1997, 71; Kitchen, 1982, 51-73;-Klengel, 1999, 216-218, 225-231, 256-259, 266-267; Bryce, 2005,234-241, 246-265, 273-279).

The enthronement of Urhi-Tessub must have occurred no earlier than the 6 regnal year of Ramesses II,82 and consequently, the coup, in which Hattusili III seized the throne, must fjave taken place no earlier than the 13th regnal year of Ramesses II. On the other hand, the conclusion of the peace treaty between Hat­tusili III and Ramesses II, in the 21st regnal year of the latter, was probably pre­ceded by diplomatic negotiations that took at least several months; therefore, Hattusili III must have seized the Hittite throne no later than the 20th regnal year of Ramesses II.83 Thus, the coup, in which Hattusili III deposed Urhi-Te§sub and seized the throne, must have taken place between the 13th and the 20ih regnal years of Ramesses II.

respectively, for the enthronement of Ramesses II (von Beckerath, 1994, ,15). Since the present study will demonstrate that 1279 B.C.E. is too late to be considered a feasible date for the enthronement of Ramesses II,. the same conclusion will apply also to 1265 and 1254 B.C.E. 80 During the second half of the -second millennium B. C.E., the regnal years in Egypt were counted from the calendar date of the actual enthronement of the king; the count began from the first year, and the concept of "accession year" was not utilized (von Beckerath, 1997, 1°_1 U- Rawnesses II ascended to the throne on day 27, month 11, of the Egyptian calendar, which in the late 14th- early 13th centuries B.C.E. fell in late May -early June (see yon Beckerath, 1997, 104). 81 A full edition of the Apology of Hattusili III has been published by Often, 1981. For an English translation, see van den Hout, 1997. 82 The battle of Qades* took place at the end of the 5th regnal year of Ramesses II, in the eleventh month of the Egyptian calendar (von Beckerath, 1997, 104). This does not leave enough time for the return of Muwattali II to the home country, his death and the accession of Urhi-Tessub during the same Egyptian year. 83 The peace treaty was concluded in the middle of Ramesses IFs 21st regnal year of Ramesses II, in the fifth month of the Egyptian calendar (von Beckerath, 1997, 104). It is very likely that negotiations, by means of royal messengers* who had to travel from An­atolia to Egypt and back,.began at least in the preceding Egyptian year.

2010] Setting the Dates 75

The conclusion of the peace treaty between Ramesses II and Hattusili III was followed by a protracted period of diplomatic contacts between the two kings, which culminated in two marriages of Ramesses II to daughters of Hattusili III. The first marriage took place in the 341"1 regnal year of Ramesses II, and the second one took place some years later (Kitchen, 1982, 81-95; Klengel, 1999, 267-268; Bryce, 2005,280-286).84

An important clue for dating the second Hittite marriage of Ramesses II is provided by the letter KUB 3.68 (Edel, 1994a, N2 73 [F5]). This letter, ad­dressed by Ramesses II to Puduhepa, the wife of Hattusili III, uses for the Egyp­tian king the title [DINGIR-/]zm LUGAL URU*KU-na (Edel, 1994a, N2 73,1. 2), which parallels the Egyptian title ntr hqr Jwnw "god, ruler of Heliopolis." The latter title is used only in those letters of the Egyptian-Hittite diplomatic corre­spondence, which utilize for the Egyptian king also the title insibia nib tdwa, i. e., the syllabic transliteration of the Egyptian royal title ny-sw{tybi(t) nb t'>wy "King of Upper and Lower Egypt, Lord of the Two Lands" - hence the term "insibia letters" for this part of the Egyptian-Hittite correspondence. In Egyptian sources, the titles ny-sw(t)-bi(t) nb t>wy and ntr hq* 'Iwnw are used jointly for Ramesses II only between his 42nd and 56th regnal years; consequently, the insi­bia letters are to be dated to the same period of his reign (Edel, 1994b, 257).

The letter KUB 3.68 is mostly broken. The key passage connecting this letter with the second Hittite marriage of Ramesses II has been reconstructd by Elmar Edel thus:

[... w ul-te-bi-la-ak-ki su-be-el-ta da-mi-iq-ta a-na s]u-ul-ma-a[n]-ki [a-na SU-ti-su-nu ii ul-te-bi-la su-be-el-ta a-na Su-ul-ma-a]n sa DUMU.

SAL-f«4 [Sa NTN-za ii Sa NTN-za is-pu-ra um-ma-a at-ta ta-sa-ak-ka-a]n-si a-na SAL-ft/4 [GAL]-// [sa LUGAL i-na LMi-is-ri-i NTN-ia kdn-na is-pu-ra a-na ia-Si a]t-tu-nu id-[na] l\a-na su-bu-li DUMU.SAL .a-na ia-Si u a-Sa-ak-ka-an DUMU.SAL LUGAL].GAL LUGAL KURH[a-at-ti] l\a-na SAL-rw4 GAL-fz sa LUGAL i-na YiUR-ti-ia ...] [ . . . I sent to you a good gift, as a g]ift of well-be[ing] for you, [by their agency (viz., of royal officials), and I sent a gift as a gift of well-be]ing for the daughter [of my lady. And (concerning) what my lady wrote to me, saying: "You should establish her as the [prin]cipal wife [of the king in the land of Egypt" - thus my lady wrote to me] - (now), [y]ou, gi[ve]

Klengel and Bryce reckon with a possibility that the second Hittite princess was given in marriage already after the death of Hattusili III, by his son Tudhaliya IV. However, the Koptos stele from Egypt, which describes the second Hittite marriage of Ramesses II, mentions the Hittite ruler sending numerous gifts to Egypt "before his other Daughter, whom he sent to the King of S(outhern) & N(orthern) Egypt, Usimare Setepenre, Son of Re, Ramesses II, given life, to Egypt, on what was the second (such) occasion" (Kitchen, 1996, A11). This indicates that the father of the second Hittite wife of Ramesses II; who arranged her marriage, was also the father of his first Hittite wife - i.e., Hattusili III (see Shulman, 1979, 192;Kitchen, 1999a, 164; Nemirovsky, 2003,4, n. 4).

76 Y. Bloch [UF42 2010] Setting the Dates 77

(an order) [to send the daughter to me, and I will establish the daughter of] the great [king], the king of the land of H[atti, as the principal wife of the king in my land ... ] (Edel, 1994a, N2 73, 14-19) 85

Even though some of Edel's restorations of the broken text may be doubtful, the general connection of this letter with a planned marriage of a Hittite princess to Ramesses II seems secure, given the mentions of "daughter" (DUMU.SAL-ft/4, 1. 15), "[principal wife" (SAL-tu4 [GAL]-i7, 1. 16) and "the great [king], the king of the land of H[atti]" (LUGAL].GAL LUGAL ^Ifta-at-ti], 1. 18).86

Since KUB 3.68 belongs to the group of insibia-ietters, it must date no earlier than the 42nd regnal year of Ramesses II, and the marriage negotiations reflected in this letter cannot be those that preceded the first Hittite marriage of Ramesses II (which took place in his 34*** regnal year). Consequently, the negotiations reflected in the letter KUB 3.68 must be related to the second marriage of Ramesses II to a daughter of Hattusili III (Edel, 1994b, 265-266).87

Thus, KUB 3.68 indicates that the second marriage of Ramesses II to a Hit­tite princess took place no earlier than the 42nd regnal year of Ramesses II (1263/1262, 1249/1248 or 1238/T237 B. C.E., dependent on the date of his en­thronement). At that time, Hattusili III must have still been alive.88

IV.2 The evidence of the letter KBo 1.10+

A key datum for connecting the reigns of Ramesses II and Hattusili III to Meso­potamian chronology is the letter KBo 1.10 (+ KUB 3.72), sent by Hattusili III to Kadasman-Ellil III (Kadasman-Ellil II in the traditional numeration). In this letter, the Hittite king, speaking of his fidelity to a treaty concluded with the addressee's father arid of the diplomatic messages, which he sent to Babylonia to ensure the addressee's accession to the throne upon Kis father's death, writes:

85 Transliteration follows Edel; English translation by the present author. 86 The mention of [s]u-ul-ma-a[n]-ki, "[a g]ift of *well-be[ing]'for you (viz., Puduhepa)," in 1. 14 suggests that the-discussion,of the status of a daughter of the king of Hatti took place within diplomatic negotiations, accompanied by mutual royal gifts, and.was not a reference to an earlier marriage of Ramesses II to a Hittite princess. 87 Theoretically, the letter KUB 3.68 might have been written after the death of Hattusili III, if one assumes that Ramesses II married not two but three Hittite princesses. How­ever, there is no Egyptian evidence to substantiate such possibility, and Occam's Razor requires'to connect the marriage discussed in KUB 3.68 with the second Hittite marriage of Ramesses II, narrated in Egyptian stelae from Koptos and Abydos (Kitchen, 1999a, 163-165; and cf. Kitchen, 1999b, 135). 88 See above, nn. 84, 87. 89 See'h. c to Table 1 above. The letter KBo 1.10+3.72 has been published in translitera­tion and translation by Hagenbuchner, 1989, N2, 204 (with corrections by Beckman, 1992, 177-178). An English translation has been published by Beckman, 1999, 138-143.

But my brother was still a child in those days, and they did not read out the tablets in your presence. Now are none of those scribes still living? Are the tablets not filed? Let them read those tablets to you now. (KBo 1.10+, obv. 17-20)" 90

This statement implies that a considerable time had passed since the enthrone­ment of Kadasman-Ellil III. Since Kadasman-Ellil III reigned only nine years (see Table 1 above), the letter was probably written toward the end of his reign, although its precise date is not known.

The passage in KBo 1.10+, which has immediate bearing on the chronology of the reigns of Hattusili III and Ramesses II, is the following:

[Furthermore, my brother: Concerning] the messenger of the King of Egypt of whom my brother wrote me - I write now as follows to my brother [concerning this messenger of the King] of Egypt: [When your father] and I established friendly relations and became brothers, [we] spoke [as follows]: "We are brothers. To die enemy of one another [we will be hostile, and with] the friend of one another we will be friendly." And when the King of Egypt [and I] became angry [with one another], I wrote to your father, Kadashman-Turgu: "[The King of Egypt] has be­come hostile to me." And your father wrote to me as follows: "[If your troops] go against Egypt, then I will go with you. [If] you go [against Egypt, I will send you] such infantry and chariotry as I have available to go." Now, my brother, ask your noblemen. They shall tell you [whether he would have sent] infantry and chariotry to go with me, as many as he promised, [if I had gone. But] what [did I ever] accept? My enemy who [had escaped] to another country [left] and went to the King of Egypt. When I wrote to him: "Send me my enemy," and he did not send me my enemy, [then, because of this, I and the King of] Egypt became angry with one another. Then [I wrote] to your father: "[The King of Egypt] is coming to the aid of my enemy." [At that time your father] cut off [the messenger of the King of] Egypt. When my brother [became King], you sent [your messenger to the king of] Egypt, and the matter of the messen­ger [of the King of Egypt ... And the King of] Egypt [accepted] your [presents, and] you accepted [his presents]. Now [you are an adult. If] you send [your messenger to the King of Egypt], would I restrain you in any way?

(KBo 1.10+, obv. 55-75) 91

The scholars who first called attention to this passage in the context of chrono­logical discussion - Elmar Edel and Hayim Tadmor - argued that the emphasis

90 English translation by Beckman, 1999, 139-140. Due to their length, the relevant passages from KBo 1.10+ are cited in the present study in translation only. 91 English translation by Beckman, 1999, 141.

78 Y. Bloch [UF42 2010] Setting the Dates 79

of Tlattusili III on the enmity between him and the king of Egypt indicates the letter to have been written before the conclusion of the-peace treaty between the Hittite empire and Egypt, in the 21st regnal year of Ramesses II. Consequently, according to this line of argument, Kadasman-Ellil III must have ascended the Babylonian throne before the 21sl regnal year of Ramesses II (Edel, 1958; Tad-mor, 1958, 139-140).

A modification of this view has been adopted by Jurgen von Beckerath in his fundamental studies of Egyptian chronology. According to von Beckerath's re­construction, the letter KBo 1.10+ was written after the conclusion of the peace treaty between Hattusili III and Ramesses II - hence the ultimate agreement of the Hittite king to the resumption of diplomatic contacts with Egypt by Kadas­man-Ellil III. Yet, the-letter reflects a previous tension between Hattusili III and Kadasman-Ellil III'concerning the diplomatic contacts between Babylonia and Egypt, and that tension preceded the conclusion of the Egyptian-Hittite peace treaty. Consequently, according to von Beckerath, the enthronement of Kadas­man-Ellil III must still belong to the period when a state of enmity existed between the. Hittite empire and Egypt - i. e.,* before the 21st regnal year of Ra­messes II (von Beckerath, 1994, 26-27; von Beckerath, 1997, 66).

In contradistinction, Michael Rowton pointed out that the tension between Hattusili III and Kadasman-Ellil III concerning the latter's relations with Egypt was much less serious* than the conflict between Hattusili III and Ramesses II in the reign of Kadasman-Turgu. On the one hand, Kadasman-Turgu and Hattusili III discussed the possibility of a joint military campaign against Egypt; on the other hand, during the reign of Kadasman-Ellil III, Hattusili III may have been disappointed by the Babylonian king's rapprochement with Egypt, but the whole issue revolved around diplomatic contacts, and the prospect of war did not loom in the background; Consequently, according to Rowton, there is no reason to assume that KBo 1.10+ was written, or Kadasman-Ellil III was enthroned, be­fore the conclusion of the peace treaty between Hattusili III and Ramesses II (Rowton, 1966,247-248).

Alexander Nemirovsky, in a recent study, has followed Rowton's lead and used the probable identification of "my enemy," mentioned in KBo 1.10+, obv. 66-71, with Urhi-Tessub to argue that Kadasman-Ellil III ascended to the throne after the 'conclusion'of the'Egyptian-Hittite peace treaty (Nemirovsky, 2007). According to the Apology of Hattusili III, after deposing Urhi-Tessub, Hattusili III gave him in possession some cities in the land of Nuhasse, in northern Syria; and when Urhi-Tessub was suspected of plotting further political intrigues, Hat­tusili III banished him to some other locality on the shore of the Mediterra-neanv

92 Subsequently, and according to the view shared by most scholars, after the conclusion of the peace treaty between Hattusili III and Ramesses II, Urhi-

92 "I went back down to Urhitesub and brought him down like a prisoner. I gave him fortified cities in the country of Nuhasse and there he lived. When he plotted another plot against me, and wanted to ride to Babylon - when J heard the matter, I seized him and sent him alongside the sea" (van den Hout, 1997,203, §11).

Tessub made his way to Egypt (Houwink Ten Cate, 1994, 243, and the earlier studies cited there). Nemirovsky identified the "enemy" mentioned in KBo 1;10+, obv. 66-71, with Urhi-Tessub (as proposed already by Helck, 1963, 96). Then he argued that since the flight of the "enemy" to Egypt is related in KBo 1.10+ to the reign of Kadasman-Turgu,93 and since the flight took place probably after the conclusion of the Egyptian-Hittite peace treaty, it follows that Kadas­man-Ellil III ascended to the throne of Babylonia only after the conclusion of the peace treaty (Nemirovsky, 2007, 11-13).

However, it is still possible that Urhi-Tessub had come to Egypt already be­fore the conclusion of the peace treaty between Ramesses II and Hattusili III (Bryce, 2003, 216). Moreover, as observed recently by Michael Banyai, the in­terpretation of KBo 1.10+, obv. 66-71, depends to a large degree on the resto­ration of the broken parts of the lines, and one or more of those parts may have contained an indication that the conduct of Kadasman-Turgu in the affair was presented as hypothetical. That is, Hattusili III may have assured Kadasman-Ellil III that his father would side with the Hittite king in his dispute with Egypt if he had to choose sides, using the hypothetic fidelity of Kadasman-Turgu as a rhetorical contrast to the actual behavior of Kadasman-Ellil III. On this interpre­tation, the Babylonian king, in whose reign Urhi-Tessub had actually arrived to Egypt, was Kadasman-Ellil III (Banyai, 2010, 2-3).94

At the bottom line, it does not appear possible to deduce from the letter KBo 1.10+ whether the peace treaty between Hattusili III and Ramesses II was con­cluded during the reign of Kadasman-Turgu or Kadasman-Ellil III.

This interpretation is based on the collocation ana abika "to your father" at the end of KBo 1.10+, obv. 69 (see Nemirovsky, 2007, 5).

Banyai's proposal concerning the possible interpretation of the situation described in KBo 1.10+, obv. 66-71, as hypothetical retains its value regardless of the general frame­work, in which that proposal was made - i.e., in the framework of Banyai's argument that Urhi-Tessub should be identified with the king of Zulapa in northern Syria, whose daughter had been married to Ramesses II before the latter married a daughter of Hat­tusili III, according to the letter KUB 21.38 (Edel, 1994a, N5 105 [L2]), obv. 12'-14'. This argument (Banyai, 2010, 3-6) requires that the marriage of a daughter of Urhi-TeSSub to Ramesses II should have taken place either during the reign of Urhi-Tessub in Hatti, or after he had been deposed by Hattusili III and banished to Nuhasse in northerh Syria. The first possibility is inconceivable: during the reign of Urhi-Tes'sub in Hatti, a state of hostility that persisted between Egypt and the Hittite empire, and a marriage of Ramesses II to a daughter of Urhi-Tessub could not have taken place in such circum­stances. The second possibility is also very unlikely, since the land of Nuhas'se, where Urhi-Tessub was banished, stood under the control of the Hittite empire, and it is hardly possible that Hattusili III would allow the exiled Urhi-TeSsub to conduct a matrimonial alliance with the king of Egypt (of course, Urhi-TeSSub may have held secret negotia­tions with Ramesses II, but a royal marriage was not something that could be kept in secret). Thus, Banyai's identification of Urhi-Tessub with the king of Zulapa should be rejected.

80 Y. Bloch [UF42

Yet, one thing seems certain from the letter. The period of enmity between Hattusili III and the king of Egypt, during which the possibility of a joint cam­paign against Egypt was discussed by Hattusili III and Kadasman-Turgu (KBo 1.10+, obv. 59-65), must have coincided with the period when a state of war pertained between Egypt and the Hittite empire - i. e., with the period before the 2 if regnal .year of Ramesses II. This mdans that Kadasman-Turgu, who prom7

ised military-support to Hattusili III, must have reigned afleast some time before the 21st regnal year of Ramesses II.

Now, according to .Table 1 abbve, Kadasman-Turgu reigned in 1281-1264 B. C E . This means that 1281/1280 was his first regnal year, and he ascended to the throne in 1282/1281 B. C E . If Ramesses II were enthroned in 1304 B. C.E., the accession of Kadasman-Turgu would occur in his 23r regnal year. The evidence of KBo 1.10+ precludes this possibility.

IV.3 Synchronisms dating the end of the reign of Hattusili III,

and their implications for dating the reign of Ramesses II

Based on the chronology of the Assyrian kings of the 13th century B.C.E. es­tablished by the present author (Bloch, 2010b; Bloch, forthcoming), another line of evidence can now be used to exclude the possibility that the enthronement of Ramesses II took place in 1279 B.C.E.,'or on a later date. A key datum, on which this line of evidence 'rests, is the letter KUB 23.99, written in Hittite, which forms part of the Assyrian-Hittite royal correspondence (Mora/Giorgieri, 2004, N2 18). The opening lines of this letter were collated by Mora and Giorgi­eri, based on photographs, and the reading has been established as follows:

l[UM-M]A dVTV-SI ^Tu-ut-hd-li-ia LUGAL.[GAL LUGAL KUR mdf Ha-at-ti] Z[A-N]A LUGAL KUR maSILIM-SAG(UR) (eras.) SES-I4

QI-B[I-MA] "W-it LUGAL-iz-zi-ia-ah-ha-ha-at rnu-mu [...] 4rdnUTU-Sl-ma-at-taL°TE4-

rMir [...] [Thu]s (says) the Sun, Tudhaliya (IV), the [great] king, [king of the land Hatti.] Sa[y t]o Shalrnaneser (I), the king of the land (Assur), my brother! When I became king, me/to me [...] And My Sun to you a messenger [sent... ] (Mora/Giorgieri, 2004, Nfi 18, 1^1)

Very little of the following text of the letter is preserved, but its opening lines indicate clearly that Tudhaliya IV, the son and successor of Hattusili'III, became king of Hatti while "Shalrnaneser I still ruled Assyria.96 As established by the present author elsewhere, the last (30th) regnal year of Shalrnaneser I lasted from August 31, 1242 B. C.E., to August 18, 1241 B. C E . (Bloch, forthcoming, Ta-

95 See above, n. 80. 96 For the reading of the name and the titles of the addressee of KUB 23.99, see Mora/ Giorgieri, 2004, 177.

2010] Setting the Dates !1

ble 4). This means that Hattusili III must have died before August 1241 B.C.E.97

Now, as argued above, Hattusili III was still occupying the Hittite throne in the 42nd regnal year of Ramesses II. If the enthronement of Ramesses II took place in 1279 B. C.E., as maintained at present by most scholars,98 then Hattusili III would be still alive in 1238/1237 B. C.E., which contradicts the evidence of KUB 23.99. Needless to say, the same consideration pertains if a date later than 1279 B. C E . is adopted for the enthronement of Ramesses II.99

Thus, the only valid possibility for the enthronement of Ramesses II remains 1290 B.C.E.

IV.4 The existence of the kingdom of Hanigalbat during the period of preparations for the first Hittite marriage of Ramesses II

In fact, there is additional evidence indicating that the date of 1279 B. C E . (or later) for the enthronement of Ramesses H is too late. That evidence appears in the letter KBo 7.11, which belongs to the group of the letters exchanged be­tween the courts of Ramesses II and Hattusili III during the negotiations that

7 Theo van den Hout proposed, based on oracular texts dated to the 13th century B.C.E. ahd dealing with the accession of a Hittite king, that a period of co-regency existed be­tween Hattusili III and Tudhaliya IV (van den Hout, 1991). This proposal has not been universally accepted (for a discussion, see Bryce, 2005, 295-297, 471-473, nn. 1, 10-12; Cammarosano, 2009, 198). In any event, according to the scenario envisioned by van den Hout, coregency did not mean that Hattusili III and Tudhaliya IV had both equal royal titles and prerogatives (van den Hout, 1991, 278, n. 12). The oracular texts dis­cussed by van den Hout speak of a situation, in which someone bearing the title "the Sun" (customary for the Hittite kings) had still not sat on the throne - e.g., n'[ku-i]t-ma-an-za-kdn dUTU-5/ LUGAL-iz-na-ni e-sa-r[i A-NA dUTU-SI-kdn7] 12'[LUG]AL-/z-mj-m a-sa-a'-tar ku-it za-lu-qa-nu-me-en "[Un]til the Sun sit[s] on the throne - concerning that we have postponed the en[thr]onement [for the Sun]" (KUB 18.36, 11'-12'; van den Hout, 1991, 279-280), and similar expressions in KUB 6.9+18.59, obv. ii? 12-15; KUB 49.73, 4'-7'; KUB 22.13, 4'-5'; KUB 16.20, 10'-12'; KBo 2.2, i 30-32; KBo 16.98, ii 11-13 (van den Hout, 1991, 282-293). The Hittite verbal construction LUGAL-iznani (*hassuiznanni) es- "to sit on the throne / be enthroned" (lit., "to sit reigning as a king") appears to be semantically equivalent to the verb LUGALT(w)/zz'a- (*hassuizziya-), which is used in KUB 23.99, 3 (van den Hout, 1991, 255). Thus, even if the oracles discussed by van den Hout refer to Tudhaliya IV, and if there was a period of coregency, during which Tudhaliya IV held the title "the Sun" but had not yet been fully enthroned in the sense expressed by the oracles, the letter KUB 23.99 must have been written after the full enthronement of Tudhaliya IV, i.e., after the death of Hattusili III. 98 See, e.g., Kitchen, 1992, 327; von Beckerath, 1997, 66-67; Klengel, 2002, ll;Bryce, 2005, 233. QQ

See above, n. 79.

82 Y. Bloch [UF42

preceded the first marriage of Ramesses II, in his 34 regnal year, to a daughter of the Hittite king. The total dossier of Egyptian-Hittite correspondence be­longing to the stage of negotiations and preparations before the first Hitite mar­riage of Ramesses II, as reconstructed by Edel, consists of thirty-five letters and letter fragments, and among those, KBo 7.11 (Edel, 1994a, N2 37 [E4]) belongs to a relatively early stage of negotiations (see Edel, 1994b, 144-147):

The letter, of which only a fragment is preserved, was written by Ramesses II to Hattusili III, apparently in-the wake of the agreement between the two sides that the daughter of the Hittite king would be afforded the status of the principal wife of the king of Egypt. The letter includes the following statement:

w URU] [um-ma-a a-na SES-z'a a-mur a-nu-ma LUGA]L KUR Ka-ra-an-SURU 12'r du-ni-ia-as LUGAL KUR ¥ - Ha-ni-ka[l-bat iS-pu-ru-ni] [um-ma-a

URU, URU; DUMU.SAL, Sa LUGAL KUR URlJHa-at-ti-a-n]a LUGAL KUR UKUM-is-ri-i u-Se-bi-lu-mi u [LUGAL KUR URVMi-is-ri-i] n\ip-pu-uS-si SAL. LUGAL Sa KUR umi Mi-is-ri-i u at-t]a DUMU.SAL-ri i-na as-ri-Sa Su-ku-un-Si-mi [LUGAL.MES Sa'-a-su-nu] [a-kdn-na iS-pu-ru-ni u-ul a-ma-gur a-na na-da]-ni SAL.LUGAL-tu-ti-ma sa LUGAL VKaKa-ra-an-du-ni-ia-aS ha-as-hu^ I5 [a-na DUMU.SAL-iw DUMU.SAL "i-na aS-ri DUMU.SAL a-na s]a-ka-a-ni u-uT p[dr-su ...]

[Thus (say) to my brother. Behold, now the kin]g of Babylonia (and) the king of Haniga[lbat wrote to me, saying:] "They are going to bring [the daughter of the king of Hatti t]o the king of Egypt, and [the king of Egypt is going to make her the royal wife in the land of Egypt; but yo]u - put my daughter in her place!" [Thus those kings wrote to me, (but) I will not agree to giv]e the queenship, which the king of B[abylonia desires, to his daughter.] It is hot r[ight to p]lace [(one) daughter instead of (another) daughter ... ] (Edel, 1994a, N2 37,11*-15',) '00

A large part of the text in the above quotation has been restored by Edel, but nevertheless, the passage clearly mentions the kings of Babylonia (Karandunias) and Hanigalbat (of whose name enough is preserved to make the restoration certain).

Now, the historical kingdom of Hanigalbat (earlier known as Mittanni), cen­tered on the area of the Habur triangle and its immediate vicinity, was severely decimated by military campaigns of the Assyrian king Adad-nerarl I, and finally conquered and annexed to Assyria by his son, Shalrnaneser I (Munn-Rankin, 1975, 275-282 ;'Harrak, 1987, 61-205).101 The victory over the last known king

100 Transliteration follows Edel; English translation by the present author. 101 Heinhold-Krahmer, 1988, 98-99, argued that Hanigalbat continued to exist as a self-standing political entity even after the conquest of Shalrnaneser I. However, the letters from Tell Seh Hamad, most of which date'to the eponym year of Ina-Assur-sumT-asbat (the 18th regnal year of TukultT-Ninurta I), indicate that Assyria had exercised political control over what was earlier the heartland of Hanigalbat, i.e., the area-of the Habur

2010] Setting the Dates 83

of Hanigalbat, Sattuara II, is mentioned in a royal inscription of Shalrnaneser I, RIMA 1, A.0.77.1, whose earliest copy is dated to day 24 or 26 of the month Sa-sarrate (the eighth month of the Middle Assyrian calendar), the eponym year of Assur-nadin-sumate. That was the very year, in which Shalrnaneser I's conquest of Hanigalbat was accomplished (Bloch, 2008, 152-154).

According to the order of the eponyms in the reign of Shalrnaneser I, recon­structed by the present author (Bloch, 2008, 146-147), the eponym year of ASsur-nadin-sumate was the 8 regnal year of Shalrnaneser I. That year lasted from April 27, 1263 B.C.E., to April 15, 1262 B.C.E. (Bloch, forthcoming, Table 4). Month Sa-sarrate began in that year on November 20, 1263 B. CE. , and days 24 and 26 of that month fell on December 13 and 15, respectively. Thus, 1263 B. C E . is the latest year, in which Hanigalbat could be ruled by an independent king.

If Ramesses II ascended to the throne in 1290 B. C.E., then the Egyptian-Hittite peace treaty was concluded in 1270/1269 B. CE. , and negotiations for a marriage of Ramesses II to a daughter of Hattusili III must have begun soon thereafter. This leaves a room of a few years for the king of Hanigalbat (Sattuara II) to propose his daughter in marriage to Ramesses II, perhaps in a desperate attempt to secure for himself support of Egypt in the face of the looming Assyr­ian threat. However, if Ramesses II ascended to the throne in 1279 B.C.E., the Egyptian-Hittite peace treaty would be concluded in 1259/1258 B. C.E., and the negotiations concerning Ramesses IPs first Hittite marriage would take place somewhat later, at a point when there was already no king of Hanigalbat to pro­pose his daughter in marriage to Ramesses II (as required by KBo 7.11).102

Consequently, Ramesses II must have ascended to the throne in 1290 B.C.E., and died in his 67th regnal year, which was 1224 B.C.E.103 Then,

triangle and the adjacent territories, even though the exercise of the Assyrian power in that region was often disturbed by hostile actions of some groups of population (Cancik-Kirschbaum, 1996, 32-38). There is no indication that the hostile groups were directed by some orderly political power, and their actions appear to reflect nothing more than social unrest among the conquered native populations of former Hanigalbat. The cam­paign of TukultT-Ninurta I to Hanigalbat early in his 22nd regnal year, mentioned in MARVll 17, 110-111 (see above, n. 40), was probably intended to quench that social unrest. 102 Klengel, 2002, 121, suggested that the reference to "king of Hanigalbat" in KBo 7.11 is actually a designation of the king of Assyria (Shalrnaneser I), who had conquered and annexed Hanigalbat. However, no Middle Assyrian king bore the title "king of Hanigal­bat," and in the second half of the 13th century B.C.E. that title was used by the Assyrian Grand Viziers, who occupied the second rank in the administrative hierarchy of Assyria after the king (Jakob, 2003a, 59-65). It is not likely that either the king of Assyria him­self would be called by a title reserved for his second-in-command, or an Assyrian Grand Vizier would be allowed to conclude matrimonial alliances with kings of foreign super­powers such as Egypt. 103 For the duration of the reign of Ramesses II, see von Beckerath, 1994, 68-69; von

84 Y. Bloch [UF42

Hattusili III must have deposed Urhi-Tessub and seized the throne between 1278 and 1271 B. C E . (i. e., between the 13th and the 20th regnal years of Ramesses II), and must have died between 1249 B. C E . (the 420d regnal year of Ramesses II) and 1241 B.C.E. (the year of the death of Shalrnaneser I, when Tudhaliya IV was already the king of Hatti). Our conclusion accords with that of Nemirovsky, 2007, and the precise dating of the reigns of the Assyrian and the Babylonian kings of the 13th century B. C.E., established by the present author, has yielded crucial evidence substantiating the chronology established by Nemirovsky.

V Historical implications of the chronology of Hattusili III

and Ramesses II: the motivation for the Egyptian-Hittite

peace treaty

The establishment of precise regnal dates for Ramesses II, and of relatively pre­cise regnal dates for Hattusili III (with a margin of error amounting to 7-8 years), has immediate implications for the understanding of wider historical questions pertaining to the reigns of these kings.

An example of such implications is the question of the motivation of the two kings to establish peace between them after a decade and a half of conflict be­tween Egyjbt and the Hittite empire. The royal inscriptions of Ramesses II are laudatory in'their presentation1 of the Egyptian king's accomplishments in the battle of Qade§,104 but it is accepted by most scholars that the battle was effec­tively lost by the Egyptian army, whose only success consisted in maintaining sufficient defence to prevent its annihilation in the face of a Hittite surprise at­tack (Kitchen, 1982, 53-62; Kitchen, 1999a, 42-^18; Mayer/Mayer-Opificius, 1994; Klengel, 1999,216-217; Bryce, 2005, 234-241; Desroches-Noblecourt, 2007, 64-85).

An indication of the success of the Hittite army in the battle of Qades can be found in the historical preamble of an edict issued by Hattusili III, the brother of Muwattalli II, when he took possession of the Hittite throne about a decade after the battle (KUB 21.17):

[l4[SBS-IA-ma Km(A-mur-r)]i-id

KUR, 15 r

™*Mi-iz-ri KUR<

'NIR.(GA)]L ku-it LUGAL ^Mi-iz-ri "[LUGAL la-ah-hi-ia-at [ma-ah-(ha-an-m)]a-za LUGAL

A>-mur-ri-ia [tar-a(h-ta nu EGI)]R-pa A-ba pa-it l\ma:a(h-ha-an-ma-z)]a mNIR.GAL SBS-IA KVKA-ba tar-ah-ta 19[(nw-kdn)] INA KUR ^Ha-at-ti 20[EGIR-/?a pa-i]t am-mu-uk-ma-kdn SA KURA-ba2][e-su-un] Because [my brother Muw,at]talli waged war against the king of Egypt and [the king ofJ-Amurru;. [wh]en he .[defeased the king(s) of Egypt and Amurru, he (viz., the king of Egypt) went back to the land Aba (Upe).

Beckerath, 1997,104. 104 For the most recent English translation of these inscriptions, see Kitchen, 1996, 2-26.

2010] Setting the Dates 85

[Wh]en Muwattalli, my brother, defeated the land Aba, [he return]ed to the Hatti-land, but I [was] in the land Aba. (KUB 21.17,114-21) 105

The edict in question deals with allocation of the property of Arma-Tarhunta - a high Hittite official who had plotted intrigues against Hattusili III during the reign of Muwattalli II - to the temple of Istar of Samuha. The passage concern­ing the war between Muwattalli II and the king of Egypt (doubtless a reference to tne battle of Qades) appears in the text only to indicate the reason for the tem­poral absence of Hattusili III, then still a prince, from Anatolia, where Arma-Tarhunta was plotting against him. There is no obvious propagandistic intent in this passage, nor would glorification of Muwattalli II be in place in the historical preamble of the edict, which is basically an accusation of Hattusili HI against Arma-Tarhunta. Thus, there is a good reason to accept the testimony of KUB 21.17 to the effect that after the battle of Qades, Ramesses II retreated south through the land of Aba (Upe) - apparently through part of the Biqa* valley in Lebanon adjacent to the oasis of Damascus - and then the land of Upe was con­quered by the Hittite army marching in pursuit of the retreating Egyptians.106

105 Transliteration follows the edition of final, 1974, 20-21; parts of the text given in transliteration in parentheses (within restorations indicated by square brackets) are at­tested in the small fragment KUB 31.27, which is a duplicate of the same text. Two key questions pertaining to historical interpretation of the passage are the meaning of the word KVRAmurri(=)ya in 31. 15-16 and the identity of the subject of the clause nu appa

K T 1R If T TR (EGTR-pd) Aba pait in 1. 17. Concerning the word Amurri^ya, the final sylla­ble -ya may be understood as the enclitic conjunction =ya "and" (thus final, 1974, 21), or as part of the Late Hittite dative-locative ending -iya of /-stem nouns (thus Lebrun, 1974, 144, 147, who understands KURAmurri(=)ya as specification of the location of the war, and hence refrains from restoring [LUGAL] before KVRAmurri(=)ya at the begin­ning of I. 15). Theoretically, both options are possible, but it should be noted that the name of the land Amurru is always spelled in Hittite sources as KVRiX!RUiA-mur-ri or

R^A-mur-ra, and is not declined with the regular Hittite nominal case endings (Kiihne and Often, 1971, 25-26; del Monte and Tischler, 1978, 14-15). Hence, it ap­pears Jhat in the spellings [KUR(A-mur-r)]i-ia I KUR<A>-mur-ri-ia in KUB 21.17, i 15-16, the final syllable -ya is the conjunction "and" rather than part of a case ending; then, in the collocation LUGAL KURMizri KlJK<A>murri=ya "the king(s) of Egypt and Amurru," the logogram LUGAL (without explicit indication of plurality) must be employed as a collective singular. As for the collocation nu appa (EGlR-pa) KUE Aba pait (KUB 21.17, i 17), the Hittite verbal construction appapai- means normally "to go back" (CHD P, 28b-29a, s.v. pai- A, 1 j 5'). Hence, it appears that in this case also, the reference is to some­one who "went back" to the region of Aba/Upe (the oasis of-Damascus and the adjacent part of the Biqa' valley) after the battle of Qades, i.e., to someone who had already passed through Upe on his way to the battle - and this can be only Ramesses II. 106 According to the letter KBo 1.15+ (Edel, 1994a, Ne 24 [D5]), obv. 38', in which Ra­messes II recounted to Hattusili III his version of the battle of Qades, the Egyptian king appears to have retreated to Sidon after the battle (Edel, 1994b, 101, 114; Kitchen,

86 Y. Bloch [UF42

The edict KUB 21.17 lists the king of Amurru as an ally of the king of Egypt and an enemy of Muwattalli II in the battle of Qades. This joins the evidence of other Hittite documents (KBo 9.96, a vow of Muwattalli II concerning war against Amurru, and KUB 23.1+ / KUB 8.82+, the treaty of Tudhaliya IV of Hatti with Sausgamuwa of Amurru),107 according to which the kingdom of Amurru, located on the 'Akkar plain on the Mediterranean coast to the west of Qades, sided with Ramesses II against Muwattalli II (Klengel, 1999, 204, 207, 215). After the battle of Qades, Muwattalli regained control of Amurru and de­posed the local king,nBentesina, who was exiled to Anatolia and later reinstated on his'throne 'by Hattusili III (Singer, 1991, 164-168; Klengel, 1999, 217; Bryce, 2005, 240). Upe and Amurru are two clear instances of Hittite territorial gainsin Syria following the battle of Qades, and there may have been more such gains.

In the subsequent years, Ramesses II had certainly attempted to reconquer the lands in Syria lost after the battle of Qades. In the case of Upe, his attempts appear to have been successful, but hardly any major gain beyond that was at­tained by Ramesses II in the long run (Kitchen, 1999a, 55-60).108 The kingdom of Amurru remained under Hittite domination until the end of the Hittite empire. Thus, on the eve of the conclusion of the peace treaty between Ramesses II and Hattusili III, the Hittite empire appears to have been strategically in a more ad­vantageous position than Egypt.

Why, then, did Hattusili III find it worthy to conclude a peace treaty with

1999a, 20-21). The territory of Aba/Upe certainly included the oasis of Damascus, but a detour from Qades through Damascus to Sidon would be strange in geographical terms, and it appears that the part of the land of Upe, through which Ramesses II retreated to Sidon, lay in the Biqa' in the vicinity of Kumidi, modern Kamid el-Loz (Kitchen, 1999a, 20). 107 For the full publication of the Sausgamuwa treaty, see Kuhne/Otten, 1971; for an English translation, see Beckman, 1999, 103-107. 108 The success of Ramesses II to restore his power in Upe for the remainder of his reign can be deduced from two pieces of evidence. The first is the letter KUB 3.57 (Edel, 1994a, Ns 55 [E22]), rev. 1-7, in which Ramesses II announced to Puduhepa that he en­trusted Suta, the governor of Upe, with receiving the Hittite princess that was to be sent to figypt as the royal bride; this letter belongs to the Egyptian-Hittite correspondence exchanged during the preparations for the first Hittite marriage' of Ramesses II (Edel, 1994b, 217-218, 227-229). The second piece of evidence is the stele discovered in, 1994 in Keswe, 25 km south of Damascus, which is dated to the 56th regnal year'of Rame'sses II and includes a series of laudatory epithets of the king (Taraqji, 1999,'40-43; Yoyotte, 1999).,Both the letter KUB 3.57 and the Keswe stele date considerably later than the Egyptian-Hittite peace treaty. However, it is unlikely that the land of Upe was^restored to Ramesses II in the framework of the treaty, since the treaty "made no reference to ter­ritorial matters and thus by implication confirmed the status quo" dividing Syria into territories dominated by Egypt and Hatti by the-21s" regnal, yfear of Ramesses'II (Bryce, 2005, 277). Hence, Ramesses II had most likely regained control over Upe before the conclusion of the peace treaty.

2010] Setting the Dates 87

Ramesses II? Most scholars saw the conquest and final annexation of Hanigalbat by Shalrnaneser I as the immediate cause for the decision of Hattusili III to seek peace with Egypt. According to this line of reasoning, when the aggressive As­syrian power had annexed Hanigalbat and reached the borders of Hittite terri­tory, Hattusili III would have found it expedient to prevent the possibility of further hostilities against Egypt in faraway central and southern Syria in order to be able to defend his country against the more immediate Assyrian threat.109

Yet, a dissenting opinion has been voiced by Trevor Bryce:

". . . the 'Assyrian factor' has probably been over-emphasized. Rather, Hattusili was motivated much more by personal considerations in initiat­ing the steps which led to the conclusion of a treaty with Ramesses. The treaty would in effect provide him with formal recognition from the phar-aoh of the legitimacy of his rule. Such recognition would serve to strengthen his credibility amongst other foreign rulers, as well as his own subjects." (Bryce, 2005,275-276)n o

Now, since we have established, in the preceding section of the present article, that the peace treaty between Ramesses II and Hattusili III was concluded in 1270/1269 B.C.E., and the final conquest and annexation of Hanigalbat by Shalrnaneser I took place in 1263 B. CE. , it is clear that the Assyrian annexa­tion of Hanigalbat could not have been a motivating factor behind the decision of Hattusili III to seek peace with Egypt.111 Consequently, the need of legitima­tion for his rule, which must have been very relevant for Hattusili III (given that he had usurped the throne by deposing his nephew Urhi-Tessub), appears to be the most reasonable candidate for such a motivating factor.

Concerning Ramesses II, the motives that moved him to establish peace with Hattusili III can only be guessed at. Perhaps, as suggested by Bryce, Ramesses II

See the studies cited above, n.7. 110 The same idea is expressed in Bryce, 2006, 4-9, albeit with a greater weight allowed to the Assyrian threat as a motivating factor for Hattusili III to seek peace with Egypt (but see the following note).

"'•" The father of Shalrnaneser I, Adad-nerarT I (1301-1271 B.C.E.), had also carried out two campaigns of conquest against Hanigalbat, and after the second campaign he appears to have established Assyrian governors at least in a part of the territory that he conquered (Munn-Rankin, 1975, 278; Wilhelm, 1982, 55-56; Harrak, 1987, 129-131). However, it appears that at the end of the reign of Adad-nerarT I, the Assyrian control over Hanigal­bat- was lost to a considerable degree, .even though some places must have remained under Assyrian administration (see Bloch, 2008, 154-155, n. 40). The peace treaty be­tween Hattusili III and Ramesses II was concluded in 1270/1269 B.C.E., a year after the death of Adad-nerarT I (see Bloch, forthcoming, Table 4), and at that point of time, with Assyrian control over Hanigalbat largely lost, Assyria would hardly be perceived as an immediate threat to the Hittite empire.

Y. Bloch [UF42

came to the conclusion that he would not be able to regain domination of. those Syrian territories, which he had lost in the aftermath of the battle of Qades and had not reconquered in the subsequent years, so that he found establishment of peace with Hatti to be more profitable than continuation of war (Bryce, 2005, 276-277). Moreover, conclusion of a peace treaty would present an ample op­portunity for the royal propaganda of Ramesses II, whose scribes could present the treaty as an act of submission by the Hittite king to the power of the phar-aoh. But perhaps the relations of Egypt with other powers of the Ancient Near East (e. g., Assyria and Babylonia) had also played some role in the decision to make peace with the Hittites.

The chronological reconstruction carried out in the present study will also, in all likelihood, have implications for additional topics Dertaining to the history of the Ancient Near East in the 13 century B. CE. , with regard to Mesopotamia as well as the Hittite empire and Egypt.113 Investigation of those topics should be left for future studies, and there is always the possibility that such studies will bring to light new evidence undermining the present author's chronological re­construction. But at least at present, the reconstruction offered here appears to account best for all the available evidence. We hope that it will withstand the test of time.

112 However, the Egyptian monumental inscriptions bearing the text of the treaty con­cluded between Ramesses II and Hattusili III, with an introductory section describing the arrival of Hittie royal envoys to the Egyptian court, do not develop the theme of sub­mission when speaking of the Hittite king (see Kitchen, 1996, 79-80). Rhetorical expres­sions stressing the submission of Hattusili III to the power of Ramesses II appear only in the inscriptions that narrate the first Hittite marriage of Ramesses II, which took place in his 34th regnal year, i.e., thirteen years after the conclusion of.the peace treaty (Kitchen, 1996, 93-94, 98-99; Kitchen, 1999a, 153-154). 1" Although not an issue where a detailed chronological reconstruction can significantly affect the study of wider historical questions, it should .be observed that the chronology established in the present-study allows precise dating of the first mention of Israel as'a distinct population in the triumph-hymn stele of Merneptah, the son and.successor of Ra­messes II (for the most recent translation of the stele; see Kitchen, 2003/ 10-15). Mer­neptah ruled for 10 years beginning with the death of Ramesses II (von Beckerath, 1994, 70; von Beckerath, 1997,104). According to the chronological reconstruction carried out in the present article, Ramesses II reigned in 1290-1224 B.C.E., and consequently, Mer­neptah must have reigned in 1224—1215 B.C.E. His fifth regnal year, and the date of the earliest attestation of Israel as a distinct population, is then 1220/1219 B.C.E. (rather than 1209/1208 B.C.E., as specified, e.g., by Kitchen, 1998,100-101).

2010] Setting the Dates 89

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