Explanation of the terminology
The word for plan, ṭêmu, means the basis of partnership, that is, its terms. Here it was “share and share alike.” The phrase babtum, “merchandise,” includes all the material in which they traded, excluding the living agents. The phrase ša ḫarrânim, literally “on the road,” may well have denoted the merchandise not in warehouse, but in circulation. Whether ḫarrânu actually referred to a caravan may be doubtful. We often read of goods ša suḳi, “on the street,” in the same sense, “out on the market.” If the partners dealt in corn, and had a quantity lent out on interest, that was ša suḳi. Whether a distinction between ša ḫarrânim and ša suḳi was kept up is not clear. But if they invested their capital in merchandise which they sent to a distant market for sale, the former phrase would be more appropriate, while if they bought wool to manufacture into cloth or garments and to sell in the bazaars of their own town, ša suḳi would be more suitable. The gate of the city was a market, and money or goods ša bâbi, “at the gate,” was as we should say “on the market.” In contrast to these phrases, ina libbi alim, “in the midst of the town,” answers to our “in stock.” While the term mitḫariš literally means “altogether,” “without reservation,” it implies exact equality of share. The amâtu was the “word,” literally, but, applied to business, means the agreement as to their mutual transactions. The completion of that was reached when they took the profits and divided them. It might include the mutual reckoning of profit and loss. The phrase “from mouth to interest” is very idiomatic. The [pg 290] “mouth,” or verbal relationships, included all they said, the terms they agreed upon. The word “interest” here replaces the more usual “gold;” both mean the “profit,” or the balance due to each. Usually we have the words “is complete,” the idea being that no verbal stipulation has been overlooked, no money or profit left out of reckoning.
Evidence of long-established commercial customs
As will be remarked, such pregnant forms of expression evidently presuppose a long course of commercial activity. They can only have arisen as abbreviations of much longer sentences. Clear enough to the users of them, they do not admit of literal rendering, if they are to be intelligible to us. But they are eloquent witnesses of an advanced state of commerce.
In Assyrian literature
Traces of partnership are difficult to find in the Assyrian tablets which have reached us. We must not confuse with partnership the holding in common of property or lands, which may be due to heritage. Two or more brothers may sell their common property, for greater ease of division, but they are not exactly partners.
In later Babylonian times such evidence common
In the later Babylonian times, as is natural to expect with the larger number of private documents, there is much evidence regarding the many forms of association for business. We have such simple forms as the following:[754]
One mina which A and B have put together for common business. All that it makes is common property.
Or thus: