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Religious Chronicle (ABC 17)
  The Religious Chronicle (ABC 17) is a historiographical texts from ancient Babylonia. It deals with omens and events during the reign of several kings in the instable period between 1033 and 943: Nabû-šumu-libur, Simbar-šipak, Eulmaš-šakin-šumi, and Nabû-mukin-apli. The tablet was written in the Seleucid age. The first of this chronicle's four columns can be found here.

Translation of Column 2

1 The king [1] arrived on the elevent day of the month Ajaru.
2 He slaughtered but did not [...] the lambs for the procession of Bêl.
3 The sacrifices and table prepared for the god which they had received up to the day of the Akitu festival
4 they offered for four days in Esagila and the other temples as in normal times.
5 Until the day of the sacrifices the king did not make a libation nor did the šešgallû-priest make a libation but he did inspect the temple.
6 In the month Du'ûzu a wolf was lurking in the west and he was killed.
7 In the month Âbu physicians saw[8] a badger in the Uraš gate at the door of the šatammu's residence.
9 On the twenty-fifth of the month Tašrîtu a live panther
10 floated down the Euphrates and was killed[11] behind Egidrikalamasuma.
11 It was carried on to dry land.
12 On the sixteenth day of the month Abû, in the seventh year, two deer
13 entered Babylon and were killed.
14 On the twenty-sixth of the month Simanu, in the seventh year, day turned to night and there was a fire in the sky.
15 In the month Ulûlu, in the eleventh year, water flowed within the wall of the lower forecourt.
16 In the thirteenth year, the fourteenth year, and the fifteenth year, for three years in succession,
17 the chariot of Bêl did not come out from the third day of the month Addaru until the month Nisannu.
18 In the month Nisannu, in the fifteenth year, Bêl did not come out.
19 On the fourteenth day of the month Ajaru, in the seventeenth year, the outer wall of the Uraš gate
20 was seen to move. On the fifteenth day of the month Simanu, in the eighteenth year,
21 when a wave[?] of water[23] came down from the Ištar gate to the Euphrates
22 and entered Babylon in the west and
23 two soldiers were killed. The cultic pedestal near the door of E[...]
24 the panels of the door below the [...]-gate [...]
25 and when it fell into the pit it was killed [...]
26 [...] in the fourteenth year [...] [2]
27 [...] the goddesses, troops [...]
28 [...] they gave [...]
29 [...]
Lacuna

Note 1:
It is likely that Simbar-šipak (1025-1008) is meant, the first king of the Second Dynasty of the Sealand.

Note 2:
We are now in the reign of another ruler, Eulmaš-šakin-šumi (1044-988), the first king of the Bazi dynasty.
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Online 2006
Latest revision: 1 April 2006
 
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