The Nimrud Letters, 1952: Part II

Abstract

The twelve letters here published have been selected on a geographical basis, the common feature being that they all appear to be concerned with the regions west of Assyria. The evidence is against all the letters of this group relating to the events of the same campaign, or even of the same reign, although it is possible to show correlations between certain letters of the group.To only two letters can a precise date be certainly assigned. For some others, internal evidence supplies good ground for a closely approximate dating, whilst for the remainder direct internal evidence as to the date appears to be lacking, and an approximate dating can only be assigned after consideration of the evidence concerning the Nimrud Letters as a whole. This evidence, insofar as it has yet been studied, is that nothing has appeared which necessitates postulating a date after the reign of Sargon, whereas about twenty letters have already been noted containing allusions on the basis of which they can be placed either in the latter part of the reign of Tiglath-Pileser III or in the first half of the reign of Sargon. There is thus a prima facie case for dating the collection as a whole between about 740 and a few years before 705 B.C., the precise terminus being probably the year in which Sargon transferred his capital from Calah to Dur-šarrukin.

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