Calendars in Old Assyrian Sources
Résumé
The Old Assyrian private archives witness two different ways of measuring the time. The Old Assyrian
calendar, based on a solar year and lunar months is already well-known, but it is quite recently that
the beginning of the year has been fixed. In Aššur, years were name after eponyms (limum). Over the
last fifteen years, seven tablets containing lists of Aššur eponyms have been identified and published
as Kültepe Eponym Lists (KEL). They give the succession of the eponyms – except for a gap –,
covering the end of the 20th, the 19th and 18th centuries BC. An intercalary month (Zibibirum) was
added in some years to adjust the calendar to the agricultural cycle, or the last month of the year was
sometimes doubled without changing its name. A recent publication suggests a possible reconstruction
of the years which have contained an additional month. The Old Assyrian calendar has the peculiarity
of using the word hamuštum, which is usually translated as «week». However, the number of days
included in a hamuštum is still debated.
In Anatolia, loan contracts are not always dated according to the Old Assyrian calendar but can
use as dates important events linked to the local ruler or his family, religious festivals or agricultural
activities.
This contribution gives an up to date synthesis of both system of computing time attested in
the Old Assyrian sources.
Origine | Fichiers éditeurs autorisés sur une archive ouverte |
---|