Characteristics of each group
The documents of each group have marked characteristics in form of script, in orthography, in language. So great are the differences that a slight acquaintance with these characteristics will suffice to fix the epoch of a given document. For the most part, however, these characteristics are not such as can appear in translation. They will be pointed out as far as possible in the opening sections dealing with each group. The aim will be to select characteristic specimens of each group for translation and to append a summary of what can be obtained by a study of the group.
The thousands of documents dealt with under these groups would, if translated, require a library of volumes. In the case of the contracts the repetition of scores of examples of the same sort would be wearisome. In the case of the letters, the translation alone would be almost as obscure as the original, without copious comment on the relationships, customs, and events referred to. In both cases it must be noted that many of the most interesting examples are incomplete and unavailable as specimens. The object of this work is to show what are the most important laws or legal documents of each period and to point out the chief subjects of information to be gained from them. For the letters no such summary of information can be given, partly because they are so many and varied, partly because so few are yet available.
First period: the early Babylonian
The first epoch is to be considered as one period only because its contribution to the subject is as yet small and chronologically precedes the first great group. It ranges from the earliest beginnings of history to somewhere about b.c. 2300. The dates are largely conjectural, but for the most part the sequence of the events is known. It is the period covered by Dr. H. Radau's Early Babylonian History.
Some very ancient documents fall under this period. The early tablets which show the nearest approach to the original picture-writing[16] are transfers of property. As a rule, however, such votive inscriptions do not come under the head of contracts. One of the earliest of our monuments, the Stele of Manistusu, King of Kish, records the sale of land. Another very early monument of similar style[17] deals with the sale of plots of land. Others will be found in the Mémoires de la Délégation en Perse.
But by far the greatest number of inscriptions belong to the finds of Telloh, made by De Sarzec in his explorations for the French Government. His greatest find, some thirty thousand tablets which were in the archives there, was dispersed by the Arabs, and has found its way into various museums. They have been sold in Europe, as coming from different localities. It is certain that other finds of the same period and same general character have been made elsewhere, so that it is often difficult now to determine their place of discovery.
A very large number of these tablets, from the collection of T. Simon, now in the Berlin museums, were copied and edited by G. Reisner, as Tempelurkunden aus Telloh.[18] The admirable abstracts of the contents there given[19] will furnish all the information that anyone but a specialist will need. They consist of lists of all sorts of natural products, harvests from fields, seed and other expenses allowed for cultivating fields, lists of the fields with their cultivators, numerous receipts for loans or grants, accounts of sheep and cattle, stipends or allowances for certain people; but only one, number 125, is doubtfully said to concern a sale of some slaves.
Dr. H. Radau, in his Early Babylonian History, gives the texts of a large number of similar tablets.[20] He also classified, transliterated, and tentatively translated most of them. The kind of information to be obtained is well brought out in his notes and comments.[21] They contain receipts, accounts of all sorts, lists of animals, skins, wool, oil, wine, grain, pitch, and honey; but none relate to the usual subjects treated in contract-tablets.
M. Thureau-Dangin edited and discussed a number of tablets of the same character in the Revue d'Assyriologie.[22] Especially valuable is his memoir, L'accomptabilité agricole en Chaldée,[23] where many interesting facts are collected and published.