Mesopotamia by Gwendolyn Leick

Author:Gwendolyn Leick
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
ISBN: 9780140265743
Publisher: Penguin
Published: 2001-01-02T00:00:00+00:00

OLD BABYLONIAN SIPPAR

The major published source about Old Babylonian Sippar, simply called Ancient Sippar, was written by the American scholar Rivkah Harris,20 who made use of the abundant administrative and legal documents and was particularly interested in how the city functioned economically, and how the workers were organized, from farm hands to bureaucrats and temple personnel. Unfortunately the great majority of these tablets came from one particular institution, the ‘cloister’ or ‘enclosure’ (gagum), which gave a rather skewed perspective on the city as a whole.21 Even so, because the gagum was so closely involved in a whole array of economic activities, it was possible to make general assumptions about the working of the city.22 Some additional material has come to light, such as letters and legal contracts, but we do not have the archives of the temple itself, nor of the central administration. Neither do we have the records of Sippar's apparently well-established merchant community. Harris's conclusions about the social context of the gagum texts are therefore highly speculative. Furthermore, basic questions, such as what the population of the city may have been, estimated by Scheil as a modest 5,000, remain unanswered.

The texts do illustrate, however, how Sippar came increasingly under direct control by the central Babylonian government. Hammurabi installed a garrison in the city and the main institutions came under royal authority, while government representatives kept the king informed through correspondence. On the other hand, the city benefited from royal investments, particularly in defences and the upkeep of its waterways, as well as in temple building. The city had formerly been governed by a council of ‘elders’ headed by a lord mayor, but by the time of Hammurabi's successor, Samsu-iluna (1749–1712), the government body of Sippar was composed of representatives of the Harbour, as the merchants’ quarter was called, and a royally appointed official. During the early periods covered by the archives, these bodies were responsible to the citizens, but in later years they came to be answerable to central government. This tightened supervision was put into effect by personnel directly in the service of the crown. The military presence established by Hammurabi was always under the king's direct command and the officer in charge was never a native of Sippar. Legal affairs were decided by local judges, though litigants could ask for a royal verdict if they were unsatisfied with an outcome.

As was often the case during periods of strong centralization, the government attempted to gain control over the temples. In Sippar this could be seen to have occurred in the middle of Hammurabi's reign. From then onwards temple officials refer to themselves as ‘servant of the king’ rather than ‘servant of the Ebabbar’ (or the god). Through appointments to leading positions in these administrative institutions, the king could thus consolidate his influence over the city. The main issue was the collection of taxes, of which there were all kinds. Professionals, such as scribes, physicians, tavern keepers or judges, often paid their tax in silver, but more commonly the agricultural field tax was submitted in kind, primarily in barley but also animals.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.