Urra=hubullu explained

The Urra=hubullu (; or HAR-ra = ḫubullu,^[1] or Gegenstandslisten ("lists of objects")) is a major Babylonian glossary or "encyclopedia".^[2] It consists of Sumerian and Akkadian lexical lists ordered by topic.^[3] The canonical version extends to 24 tablets, and contains almost 10,000 words.^[4] The conventional title is the first gloss, ur₅-ra and ḫubullu meaning "interest-bearing debt" in Sumerian and Akkadian, respectively. One bilingual version from Ugarit [RS2.(23)+] is Sumerian/Hurrian rather than Sumerian/Akkadian.

A partial table of contents:

• Tablets 1-2: juridicial forms thought to be possibly part of the ana ittišu series^[5]
• Tablets 3-7: names of trees, parts of trees, products of trees, and wooden objects
• Tablet 4: naval vehicles
• Tablet 5: terrestrial vehicles
• Tablets 10-12: names of vessels, ovens, clay objects, hides, chemicals, and objects of bronze, copper, silver
• Tablets 12, 14 & 15: systematic enumeration of the names of domestic animals, terrestrial animals, birds (including bats)^[6] and parts of the body
• Tablet 16: stones
• Tablet 17: plants.^[7]
• Tablet 19: names of wool and vestments
• Tablets 21-22: names of towns, countries, mountains, a and rivers
• Tablets 22-23: provisions
• Tablet 24: list of men

The tablets form a series that had been arranged by time of the Sumarian Dynasty of Isin, with a bilingual tradition existing by the time the Kassites. The bulk of the collection was compiled in the Old Babylonian period (early 2nd millennium BC), with pre-canonical forerunner documents extending into the later 3rd millennium.^[8]

Like other canonical glossaries, the Urra=hubullu was often used for scribal practice. Other Babylonian glossaries include:

• Ea: a family of lists that give the simple signs of the cuneiform writing system with their pronunciation and Akkadian meanings. (MSL volume 14)
• "Table of Measures": conversion tables for grain, weights and surface measurements. Again, it is not clear how these tablets were used.
• Lú and Lú=ša, a list of professions (MSL volume 12)
• Izi, a list of compound words ordered by increasing complexity
• Diri "limited to compound logograms whose reading cannot be inferred from their individual components; it also includes marginal cases such as reduplications, presence or absence of determinatives, and the like." (MSL volume 14)
• Nigga, Erimhuš and other school texts
• Ana ittišu: a legal glossary.

Extant Tablets

Many copies of the series are known in collections such as the Louvre, British Museum and Ashmolean Museum. The original Akkadian texts were found during the Oxford-Field Museum Expedition to Kish, Iraq (1923-1933).^[9] The texts are collated and summarised by Meer (1939).

References

• Benno Landsberger The Series HAR-ra="hubullu", Materials for the Sumerian lexicon (MSL), 5. 6, 7, 9, 10 and 11, Rome: Pontificium Institutum Biblicum, 1957-
• A. Poebel, The Beginning of the Fourteenth Tablet of Harra Hubullu, The American Journal of Semitic Languages and Literatures, Vol. 52, No. 2 (Jan., 1936), pp. 111-114
• Soldt, W. H. van, "Babylonian Lexical, Religious and Literary Texts, and Scribal Education at Ugarit and its Implications for the Alphabetic Literary Texts," in: Ugarit: ein ostmediterranes Kulturzentrum in Alten Orient: Ergebnisse und Perspektiven der Forschung, Dietrich and Loretz eds., Abhandlungen zur Literatur Alt-Syrien-Palästinas, vol 7, Münster: Ugarit-Verlag, 1995, 171-212

External links

• How to Recognize a Scribal School
• The Kish tablets collection at the Ashmolean Library, Oxford; at the Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative

Notes and References

1. Meer . P. E. Van Der . 1939 . Tablets of the HAR-ra = ḫubullu Series in the Ashmolean Museum . Iraq . 6 . 2 . 144–179 . 10.2307/4241653 . 4241653 . 0021-0889.
2. Tarp . Sven . Gouws . Rufus H. . 2023 . A Necessary Redefinition of Lexicography in the Digital Age: Glossography, Dictionography and Implications for the Future . Lexikos . 33 . 10.5788/33-1-1826 . 2224-0039. free .
3. Azevedo . Isabel Cristina Michelan de . Piris . Eduardo Lopes . June 2018 . Tradition of foreign language teaching and learning: focusing on the Brazilian Portuguese as a Foreign Language textbook . Revista Brasileira de Linguística Aplicada . 18 . 2 . 417–443 . 10.1590/1984-6398201812044 . 1984-6398.
4. HOROWITZ . W . 1988 . An Assur Source for Urra 21: KAV 80 90 137 89 . An Assur Source for Urra 21: KAV 80 90 137 89 . 35 . 64–72.
5. Goetze . Albrecht . 1939 . Review of Die Serie ana ittišu . Journal of the American Oriental Society . 59 . 2 . 265–271 . 10.2307/594069 . 594069 . 0003-0279.
6. Kroonen . Guus . 2016-10-24 . Hittite kapart-/kapirt - 'small rodent' and Proto-Semitic *ˁkbr-t- 'mouse, jerboa' . Indogermanische Forschungen . 121 . 1 . 53–62 . 10.1515/if-2016-0003 . 171132035 . 1613-0405.
7. Heeßel . Nils P. . 2012-10-26 . Diagnosis, Mesopotamian . The Encyclopedia of Ancient History . 10.1002/9781444338386.wbeah21106. 978-1-4051-7935-5 .
8. Steele . Colin . October 2016 . You could look it up: the reference shelf from ancient Babylon to Wikipedia . The Australian Library Journal . 65 . 4 . 342–343 . 10.1080/00049670.2016.1242103 . 0004-9670.
9. Web site: Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, UK - Collections . 2024-10-25 . CDLI . en-US.