The Tell Amarna tablets

Front matter

GIFT OF

THE

After two years' study of the published texts of the tablets found at Tell Amarna, Major Conder has completed a translation of them, which the Committee of the Fund have undertaken to publish. In this, as in all their publications, the Committee beg it to be understood that the author alone is responsible for the opinions put forward.

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

PREFACE - - - - - - ix

I. INTRODUCTORY ----- i

Preface

The Tell Amarna Tablets were discovered in 1887 by a peasant woman of Egypt, amid the ruins of the palace of Amenophis IV., midway between Thebes and Memphis, at the site of the ancient Antinoe, about 180 miles by river south of Cairo. Those tablets under present consideration date about 1480 B.C., and are written to the King of Egypt and to certain of his officials by Amorites, Phoenicians, Philistines and others.

The names of Japhia, King of Gezer ; of Jabin, King of Hazor ; and, probably, of Adonizedek, King of Jerusalem — contemporaries of Joshua — occur among those of the writers. The events recorded include the conquest of Damascus by the Hittites> that of Phoenicia by the Amorites, and that of Judea by the Hebrews. The present translations, from the cuneiforrn characters, are based on the copies pubHshed by Dr. H. Winckler at Berlin, and Dr. C, Bezold of the British Museum, which include the whole of the letters now in Cairo, Berlin^and London.

In dealing with inscriptions the interpretation of which is acknowledged by scholars to present many difficulties, I do not presume to suppose that my translations are beyond criticism, or always final ; but I believe that such criticism, which will no doubt lead to improvements, must be confined to details,

X PREFACE

and will not affect the general result, or the historical value of these most important texts. I may at least claim that the language in which they are written is the mother-tongue of that Syrian dialect which became known to me by speaking it daily for seven years. In dialectic pronunciation, in idiom, and in the peculiar meaning of many expressions the common speech of the Palestine peasantry is perhaps one of the best possible guides to an understanding of the writings of their Canaanite ancestors.

The study of monumental inscriptions is often called a * by-path ' of Biblical knowledge. But in an age of destructive criticism it seems to me to present the most important weapon that can be placed in the hands of those who desire, without seeking to support any particular theory, to arrive at truth concerning the ancient history of Palestine and of the Hebrew people. In the present case we have become possessed of a mass of political correspondence dating about the time when, according to the Bible, the Hebrew invasion under Joshua took place, and which in bulk represents a literature equal to about half the length of the entire Pentateuch. That the Hebrews should be mentioned in such letters as conquering the south of Palestine, and driving out the Amorite kings, will appear natural to those who believe the narrative of the Book of Joshua to represent the history of the Hebrew conquest ; and that the date so determined does not agree with the now fashionable theory, which would place the conquest much later, in the time of Seti II., need not in any way disturb our minds. The date which is conjectured by some Egyptologists does not rest on any monumental evidence at all, for the simple reason that the Hebrews are not mentioned

PREFACE xi

in any Egyptian record as yet discovered, and appear for the first time in monumental history in the Tell Amarna letters. The speculation which would make their conquest so much later, while it ignores the Biblical data, is founded only on the libels of Manetho, who wrote at least twelve hundred years later, and who makes Amenophis succeed Rameses. I have never been able to understand on what grounds the date given in the Bible is so set aside, or to agree with the dictum of Dr. Brugsch, for which no evidence is brought forward from monuments, that * beyond all doubt ' Minephtah was the Pharaoh of the Exodus. We should rather, I think, agree with Josephus, the critic who exposed the ignorance of Manetho, in dismissing such opinions as 'incredible fables.'

C. R. C.

Southampton, Oct. 17, 1892.

X PREFACE

and will not affect the general result, or the historical value of these most important texts. I may at least claim that the language in which they are written is the mother-tongue of that Syrian dialect which became known to me by speaking it daily for seven years. In dialectic pronunciation, in idiom, and in the peculiar meaning of many expressions the common speech of the Palestine peasantry is perhaps one of the best possible guides to an understanding of the writings of their Canaanite ancestors.

The study of monumental inscriptions is often called a * by-path ' of Biblical knowledge. But in an age of destructive criticism it seems to me to present the most important weapon that can be placed in the hands of those who desire, without seeking to support any particular theory, to arrive at truth concerning the ancient history of Palestine and of the Hebrew people. In the present case we have become possessed of a mass of political correspondence dating about the time when, according to the Bible, the Hebrew invasion under Joshua took place, and which in bulk represents a literature equal to about half the length of the entire Pentateuch. That the Hebrews should be mentioned in such letters as conquering the south of Palestine, and driving out the Amorite kings, will appear natural to those who believe the narrative of the Book of Joshua to represent the history of the Hebrew conquest ; and that the date so determined does not agree with the now fashionable theory, which would place the conquest much later, in the time of Seti II., need not in any way disturb our minds. The date which is conjectured by some Egyptologists does not rest on any monumental evidence at all, for the simple reason that the Hebrews are not mentioned

PREFACE xi

in any Egyptian record as yet discovered, and appear for the first time in monumental history in the Tell Amarna letters. The speculation which would make their conquest so much later, while it ignores the Biblical data, is founded only on the libels of Manetho, who wrote at least twelve hundred years later, and who makes Amenophis succeed Rameses. I have never been able to understand on what grounds the date given in the Bible is so set aside, or to agree with the dictum of Dr. Brugsch, for which no evidence is brought forward from monuments, that * beyond all doubt ' Minephtah was the Pharaoh of the Exodus. We should rather, I think, agree with Josephus, the critic who exposed the ignorance of Manetho, in dismissing such opinions as 'incredible fables.'

C. R. C.

Southampton, OcL 17, 1892.

Preface To Second Edition

The interest taken in the Tell Amarna letters leads to the preparation of a Second Edition of this work within the year of publication. I have carefully revised the whole, and have now added translations of the royal letters which, though not written in Palestine, still cast light on the history of the great rebellion. The total of two hundred and twenty letters represents all that the collection contains, the rest being broken fragments from which no consecutive readings are possible.

In almost every letter occur passages of great difficulty ; and concerning these the various translators— Delattre, Zimmern, Sayce, Bezold, Halevy, and others — who have published selections out of the correspondence, are much at variance. In the present work, which continues to be the only one yet published treating of the letters as a whole, care has been taken to warn the reader of these doubtful passages, by means of queries and notes. It will not, however, be found that, as a rule, these passages have great historic importance. They are generally found in argumentative or supplicating sentences, or in personal explanations.

The difficulties in translation are due to gaps in the text and to crabbed writing ; to unusual emxiv PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION

blems and peculiarities of style in writing, which mark the work of the less careful scribes ; to occasional doubts as to the division of words, and as to the proper sounds ; and, finally, to doubts as to the meaning of words.

On the other hand great care has usually been taken by the scribes to make the meaning clear. The signs preceding the names of persons, cities, countries, etc., are of great value ; and the very complete grammar renders it easy to distinguish the syntax. The noun has two genders and three cases ; the plural is always marked ; the verb (masculine and feminine) has all the voices and tenses of the Assyrian, which are more numerous than in Hebrew. The letters, as a rule, were read over and corrected, words being added between the lines and mistakes blurred out on the clay before it was baked. From these circumstances certainty is obtained as to the general meaning, the persons and the places noticed ; and the historical passages become clearly intelligible.

In revising the former translations, by the light of further study, I have taken advantage of the recent translations of the Rev. J. A. Delattre, S.J., in the * Proceedings of the Society of Biblical Archaeology' for 1893, especially as regards the letters from Aziru and from Tyre. In some cases, however, I find difficulty in accepting his conclusions. As regards the A biri, or Hebrews, I have learned that this identification has been proposed by Dr. H. Zimmern in Germany ; and this corroboration will be regarded as important. I have not had the advantage of seeing any of his papers dating from

PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION xv

i8go to i8gi. My suggestion was first published (in the * Palestine Exploration Fund Quarterly Statement ') under date June, 1891, and it appears that the identification is likely to be generally accepted.

Many statements have been put forward respecting these letters, to which no reference is here made, because they appear to have no foundation in the texts. The view that the letters were written by Egyptian officials seems, for instance, to be invalid, because in that case they would probably have been written in the Egyptian language and characters used by the scribes who wrote dockets in ink on the tablets in Egypt. Many proposed translations also rest on the Hebrew value of words instead of the Aramaic. The language is not Hebrew, but much closer to Assyrian ; and the Aramaic is therefore the safer guide. Thus the word tsurukhy which means in Hebrew * to rise,' has puzzled translators, who overlook the fact that in Aramaic it means *to prepare.' The dates given for Egyptian kings are based on an astronomical calculation which agrees with the results obtained by Dr. Brugsch, and no notice has been taken of the apparently impossible dates of Mahler. The geography of the book has not been studied in detail by any of the scholars who have treated selected letters, and appears to me to be of primary importance to the subject.

The royal letters are of great importance for the general history of Western Asia, showing the wide influence of peaceful relations between Egypt, Syria, Asia Minor, Armenia, Assyria, and Babylonia ; and xvi PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION

the interruption of these relations by the revolts in Palestine. Incidentally a favourite theory, which represents Amenophis IV. as a * heretic king,' and Queen Thi as the founder of a new religion in Egypt, is overthrown by the letters from Dusratta. We now know that the kings of the eighteenth Egyptian dynasty married Asiatic wives long before Queen Thi wedded Amenophis III.; and that her son, like his father, was a worshipper of Amen. Tell Amarna — the central capital placed between Memphis and Thebes — seems probably to have been the seat of government before the time of Amenophis IV., and continued to be occupied by his successor Horus. The mythological tablets show us that the religion of Chaldea was well known in Egypt in the fifteenth century B.C., but there is no monumental notice of any later religious revolution, like that which is recorded to have occurred under the Hyksos King Apepi, who adored Set, the Hittite sun god.

As regards the name Tell Amarna^ to which many scholars object as less correct than Tel el Amarna^ I have only to add that Tel is an impossible spelling for a word coming from the root Talal, and that Amarna is not a word of Arabic form, so that it appears very doubtful whether the Arabic article el should be prefixed.

C. R. CONDER.

Dec. I, 1893.

y. THE

INTRODUCTORY,

The following translations will show the great importance of the letters found in 1887 in Upper Egypt for the right understanding of the history and geography of Palestine. They result from two years' study of the texts as published,^ and in the majority of cases the letters have, I believe, not been previously translated by anyone. The language is Aramaic, resembling Assyrian. The writers are Phoenicians, Amorites and Philistines, but in no instance Hittites, though Hittites are mentioned. Hence the Hittite language is not used in those letters under consideration, though it is in others of

^ ' Thontafelfund von el Amaraa,' H. Winckler, 1890 (referred to as B.) ; and 'The Tell el Amarna Tablets in the British Museum,' 1892 (cited as B. M.). These contain the transcripts of all the letters, amounting to 320.

the collection.^ The date is about 1480 B.C., and the course of events, though they lasted over at least five years, is at most confined to about ten or twenty, with exception, perhaps, of some letters from the South.^

The general result confirms what I have already published as to the area of Egyptian conquests in Palestine and Syria. Thothmes IIL (about 1600 B.C.) conquered the shore plains and Lower Galilee, overran Bashan to Damascus, which he took, and marched up to the Taurus. Rameses 11. (about 1330 B.C.) held the maritime plains and Lower Galilee and Syria : the conquests of the former had, as we now see, been lost by his descendants, and Rameses IL had to recapture Ascalon, which is under the Egyptians in the present correspondence. Seti I. fought in the Beersheba plains. Rameses III. (who was attacked by the people of Asia Minor in Egypt itself) went as far east, on the south, as

1 Dusratta's great letter of 512 lines of syllabic writing in the Hittite language I have translated and published in the journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, October, 1892. There is a short letter (10 B.) by the Hittite Prince of Rezeph in a dialect of the same language. This is much more difficult to read in some passages. It refers to a number of presents sent to Egypt (see Appendix). These letters appear tome to place the question of the character of the Hittite language beyond dispute. The proper names of Hittites in the letters here given are also, like the above, Mongolia.

2 The southern letters begin in the time of Labaya, and go oh to the time of his sons. Probably Dr. Bezold's view is the right one, that the war began in the time of Amenophis III., and continued to that of Amenophis IV., which would mean some ten or twelve years.

INTRODUCTORt ', ' , .,3 ;

Beersheba ; but none of these kings entered the mountains of Judah or Samaria, or ever mention taking cities in Moab or Gilead. The reason, as I have before suggested, was a very simple one : the chariots, which formed the basis of Egyptian power, were not capable of being driven over the mountains. We have an instance (' Travels of an Egyptian ') of a chariot being broken in crossing even the low hills south of Mount Carmel. The Egyptians held the main road along the sea-coast, as far as the Eleutherus, where it turned inland and went along the Orontes to Aleppo. They had also cross lines to Damascus b}/ Hermon on the north, and through Bashan on the south.^

The language of the letters is very like the Aramaic of the Talmud (see Buxtorff's great lexicon), and is like Arabic in many particulars rather than like Hebrew. It is the same language in an archaic condition which is now spoken by the peasantry of Palestine. The recovery of some 130 towns mentioned in the letters, not only makes the topography clear, but enables us to fix approximately the historical order of the letters. It settles the sites of several important places, such as Gath, Makkedah, Baal Gad, Enam, Lachish, etc.; and it illustrates very fully the Bible geography. The personal names are very interesting, being Semitic, except in the case of Hittite names, which are Mongolic. Egyptian words occur wherever

1 See Judges i. 19, when at a later period the Canaanites still held the lowlands, 'because they had chariots of iron.'

4. . : ., • TH^MTELL AMARNA TABLETS

reference is made to Egyptian officials (which has not, I believe, been previously recognised), and Akkadian terms also occur in the north. The names of the gods are those found in the Bible, including Baal, Baalath, Rimmon, Shamash, Nebo, Dagon and Addu, who, as Gesenius has shown, was Adonis. The word Elohim occurs frequently. The civilization of the times is abundantly shown, and various kinds of cities are specified, such as * capital cities,' 'provincial cities,' 'fortresses,' 'towns' and 'villages,' with 'camps,' and Hazors (or enclosures) ; while irrigation of gardens is also noticed, and the papyrus grown at Gebal ; as well as copper, tin, gold, silver, agate, money (not, of course, coins) and precious objects of many kinds ; mulberries, olives, corn, ships and chariots.

But the most interesting letters are from the south, and these refer with great clearness to the conquest of the country between Mount Seir on the east, Ajalon, Lachish, Ascalon and Gezer on the west, and Shiloh and Rimmon on the north. The name of one of the kings killed by Joshua (Japhia, Josh. X. 3) is found in the south, and in all probability that of Adonizedek of Jerusalem also ; and in the north the name of the King of Hazor is probably to be read as Jabin, which was the namie of the King of Hazor whom Joshua attacked (Josh. xi. i). The Hebrews {'Abiri) are said to have come from the desert, and from Mount Seir.

The date of the letters is exactly that which is to be derived from the Bible (i Kings vi. i) for the

INTRODUCTORY 5

Hebrew invasion, according to the Hebrew and Vulgate text (the Septuagint makes it forty years later), and it agrees with the fact that the Egyptian conquests made by the i8th dynasty (1700 to 1600 B.C.) had been lost when the igth dynasty acceded. The letters state that the Egyptian troops had been withdrawn in the year in which the Hebrews came from the desert. In the north the Kings of Armenia, Nii (on Euphrates) and Shinar, with the Hittites of Merash and Kadesh, leagued against Egypt, and Damascus fell. They were joined by the Amorites, who conquered all Phoenicia and besieged Tyre. But there is no evidence of further advance ; while, on the other hand, the Ahiri are never mentioned in letters written in Syria or Northern Palestine, and are distinctly said to come from Edom. The date, which some Egyptologists suggest for the Exodus^ (a century later than the time of these letters) is purely speculative, because no reference to the Hebrews has been found in any Egyptian texts. The Egyptians never held the mountains of Judah and Ephraim (though they had a garrison in Jerusalem, which was withdrawn before Joshua came), and therefore they did not come in contact with the Hebrews, who only raided into the lowlands, which the Amorites and Philistines held till Solomon's time (see especially Judges i.). The date proposed by Brugsch for the Exodus ignores entirely the chronology of the Book of Kings, and rests on no ^ See Appendix as to the date of the Exodus.

:6-.-. ..'•••; TH'E. T]£LL AMARNA TABLETS

monumental basis at all. The oppression of Israel in Galilee by Jabin II., King of Hazor, corresponds with the time when Rameses II. reconquered this region, after taking Ascalon,^ which in these letters is found to have submitted to the Hebrews. But none of the Egyptian records speak of the Egyptians as entering the mountains of Judah either in the times of the i8th or of the 19th dynasties : nor were their chariots ever seen in Gilead, Moab, or Mount Seir.

It will be clear, therefore, that these letters are the most important historical records ever found in connection with the Bible, and that they most fully confirm the historical statements of the Book of Joshua, and prove the antiquity of civilization in Syria and in Palestine.

The letters, as is well known, are on brick tablets,^ and written in an ancient form of the cuneiform script. The translations are from the original characters in all cases.

The condition of the country before the wars is well shown in the credentials of a Babylonian envoy to Egypt, sealed with a Babylonian seal, and reading as follows :

^ The name of Sisera, captain of Jabin's host, may very probably be Egyptian, Ses-Ra^ or ' servant of Ra.'

2 The clay from different parts of the country differs, and gives various colours and surfaces to the tablets, so that it has been found possible by the clay alone to decide with some certainty the derivation of a few of the tablets when the name of the writer is lost. This has an interesting bearing on the question of the date of the various letters from the King of Jerusalem.

INTRODUCTORY 7

B. M. 58. — ' To the kings of the land of Canaan, servants of my brother, thus says the great King. Now Ahiya is my messenger to the presence of the King of Egypt, my brother. I send him to be respected by all. Let none delay his march at all; despatch him carefully to the Land of Egypt ; and as for him, he conducts natives of the land of Egypt. With a speedy message they proceed to go forth ; and do ye nothing against him.'

The following letter appears also to be of early date :

B. 144. — *To the King my Lord and my Sun by letter thus (says) Muduzukhi thy servant, the dust of thy feet, who crawls to the protection of the King my Lord. At the feet of the King my Lord seven times seven times I bow. The King my Lord has sent by Khai, to speak of the roads of the land of Khani Rabbet This our explanation we have despatched. Who am I that I should explain our roads to the King my Lord .... to the land of Khani Rabbe, and to the land of Karadunias. Let the King command our road. I will convey on it, as far as it goes.' At this time an embassy was probably about to be sent to Dusratta, the King of the Minyans, by his friend Amenophis IIL

1 The land of Khani Rabbe was Southern Armenia, west of Lake Van ; otherwise called Mitani, and the 'land of the Minyan race.' The title seems to mean 'land of the great Khan,' from the Mongol word for a ' prince,' still in use. The population (see B. 27) was mainly Mongolic, and akin to the liittites.

The road became familiar later to Egyptian envoys.

Another letter from Tunip^ refers to the commencement of the war, and is valuable as giving the approximate date ;

B. M. 41. — * To the King of Egypt our Lord thus (say) the sons of the city Tunip, and the chief your servant : Peace be before thee, and I bow at the feet of my Lord. My Lord, thus the city Tunip causes the chief to say. Who was it saved the city Tunip formerly ? Was it not Manakhbiria^ who saved the abode of this people ? His Gods and his rule our region chose ; exalting the Gods of the King of the land of Egypt our Lord, they dwelt in the city of Tunip; and let our Lord ask the ancients of the region of this people ; and lo ! we have kept the peace of our Lord the King of Egypt. And behold for twenty years our messengers have been sent to the King our Lord. With the King our Lord they have dwelt, and now behold our Lord adores (Rimmon ?) :^ to the King our Lord He has given rest from the foe ; and may he establish our Lord.

1 Tunip, now Te;im'd, was close to Arpad, north-west of Aleppo. It was identified by Noldeke.

^ Manakhbiiria, as Dr. Bezold points out, stands for Men- Kheperji-ra^ the title of Thothmes IV. As Amenophis III. succeeded him about 1500 B.C., the date cannot be later than about 1480 B.C., in the latter part of the reign of the latter king.

^ The god's name might also be rendered Adonis {Addu). The sign means ' God of the air,' and is equivalent to the Egyptian Shu^ God of air, wind and sky.

INTRODUCTORY 9

And our Lord adoring (Rimmon ?) He hath estab- Hshed as King of Egypt ; and why should our Lord the King turn from his former way ? And lo ! Azirv}- is thy servant : to thy governors he hstens attentively ; and because of the land of the Hittites, which is arrayed, he hath come to them. And behold his soldiers and his chariots followed. And as for us, to Aziru they have done as they did to the city Ni.^ Thus as for us we have not avenged ; but the King of Egypt will avenge this, because of these messages as to what they are doing. Let Aziru rule who is powerful with our Lord. And behold Aziru will strive with the city Zumura^ to make Ihem subject to him in the power of the King our Lord ; and because of messages that they have gone out he avenges this. And now the city of Tunip is thy city ; it laments, and they are afraid that they will burn, and warring for him their power has been brought to nought ; as for us for twenty years we sent (messages) to the King our Lord, the King of Egypt ; and not one message of our Lord to us have we put to shame.'*

1 Son of Abdasherah, chief of the Amorites, as appears later.

2 Nt, often mentioned in Egyptian texts and in these letters, is supposed to h^Ninus Vefus, on the Euphrates, east of Tunip. Its chief was afterwards allied with the Hittites.

3 Zumura is the Zemar of the Bible (Gen. x. 18), the later Simyra of Strabo, now SumraJi, on the north side of the Eleutherus river, commanding the pass from Tripoli to the inland plains of Kadesh and Hamath on the way to the north.

* In this connection B. M. 2 is important. It is from lo THE TELL AMARNA TABLETS

This letter explains the relations which led to the whole of the war between the Amorites and Phoenicians, as further detailed in the letters of Aziru and Ribadda.

Burnaburias of Babylon to Amenophis IV. shoitly after his accession, and would therefore be about 1460 B.C. He here speaks of the Canaanite revolt as occurring in the time of his father — that is, in the reign of Amenophis III. (see Appendix).

II. The Hittite Invasion Of Damascus

36 B. M. — ' To King AnnumuYia}- (Amenophis III.) Son of the Sun my Lord thus (says) this thy servant A kizzir" Seven times at the feet of my Lord I bow. My Lord in these my lands I am afraid. Mayst thou protect one who is thy servant under the yoke of my Lord. From the yoke of my Lord I do not rebel. Lo ! there is fear of my foes. The people of this thy servant are under thy yoke : this country is among thy lands : the city Katnd^ is thy city : I am on the side of my Lord's rule (yoke). Lo ! the soldiers and the chariots of my Lord's government have received corn and drink, oxen and beasts (oil and honey ?), meeting the soldiers and the chariots of my Lord's dominion (coming ?) to me. And now

1 This name, frequently found in the letters is the Egyptian Neb-mat-ra^ or Amenophis III. It agrees with the date already deduced from the preceding letter.

2 As the Amorite z or s' seems sometimes to represent the Hebrew sh^ this name might be compared with the Philistine Achish.

3 Katna is the present Katanah^ on the south of Hermon, west of Damascus.

let my Lord ask the great men of his dominion. My Lord, all lands tremble before thy soldiers and thy chariots. If these lands are under the dominion of my Lord's land, and they are seizing them, let him order his soldiers and his chariots this year, and let him take the land of Marhasse} the whole of it, to the yoke of my Lord, when — my Lord — the soldiers of the slaves^ are^ .... For six days ago he went out into the land of Hu{ba), and truly Aziru is sending them, and if in this year my Lord does not send out the soldiers and the chariots of his government .... to meet Aziru (and) make