39 BIBLIOTHECA ORIENTALIS LXXVIII N° 1-2, januari-april 2021 40 TWO NEW FRAGMENTS BELONGING TO THE 16 th TABLET OF THE OMEN SERIES ŠUMMA ĀLU András BÁCSKAY and Zoltán NIEDERREITER 1. Introduction The fragment of clay tablet MFA 1981.156, kept in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, since 1983, 1 ) contains lines 1–14 of the 16 th tablet of the omen series Šumma ālu on the obverse and a colophon known from Ashurbanipal’s library tablets (Asb. Type b) on the reverse. We also provide an elaboration of fragment Sm 1565, a duplicate of MFA 1981.156. Publishing both texts together is of prime impor- tance, since previous research has identified Sm 1565 as the 123 rd tablet of the Namburbi series. Of the section (lines 1–15) of Šumma ālu 16, this paper presents a Partitur which has five sources according to our present knowledge: Ms. A: MFA 1981.156; Ms. B: Sm 1565; Ms. C: K 5204; Ms. D: BM 30431; and Ms. E: K 14025. 2. The fragment MFA 1981.156 (Ms. A) MFA 1981.156 is a fragment (right upper corner) that probably belonged to a single-column tablet. Fourteen lines are preserved on its obverse: an apotropaic ritual related to a malevolent omen and the enumeration of the occurrence of the same omen in different months. On the reverse, ten lines are preserved: a summary of the total number of lines, the catchline, the tablet number, and finally, the colophon (Asb. Type b). The text was written in Neo-Assyrian ductus. Based on the colophon, we can state that our fragment belongs to a tablet from the Ashurbanipal’s library. The structure of the tablet is as follows: Obverse 1–2 Incipit of the omen (“If a man daily considers building a tomb …”) and its related Namburbi ritual, which dispels the malevolent omen; 3–[15] Omens related to the 13 Babylonian months; 2 ) Remaining part is broken. <bacskay.andras@btk.ppke.hu>; <zniederreiter@gmail.com> 1 ) The tablet was donated by the John Gardner Greene Trust, Boston, on 13 May 1981. We would like to express our sincere thanks to Lawrence M. Berman (Norma Jean Calderwood Senior Curator of Ancient Egyptian, Nubian, and Near Eastern Art), who allowed us to publish MFA 1981.156 (Ms. A). The presented drawing (Fig. 1) is by Z. Niederreiter who was able to examine the cuneiform tablet at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, in May 2017. The “ANR-FWF, Material Culture of Babylonia during the 1st millennium BC” Research Project funded the work of Z. Niederreiter on the present manuscript in the Maison René-Ginouvès (Paris 10: Nanterre). A. Bácskay collated Sm 1565 (Ms. B) and K 5204 (Ms. C) at the British Museum in October 2018. His research was supported by the Central Funds Program of the Pázmány Péter Catholic University. Furthermore, we are indebted to Jonathan Taylor who sent us the digital image of BM 30431 (Ms. D). We are grateful to Wiebke Meinhold who drew our attention to K 14025 (Ms. E) and to Sally Freedman and Catherine Mittermayer (head of the Šumma ālu project of the University of Geneva) for their comments and linguistic suggestions. All remaining errors are our own. 2 ) Line 15, dealing with the 13 th month, is broken. Reverse 1’ Total number of the lines; 2’ Catchline; 3’ Tablet number of the series; 4’–10’ Colophon (Asb. Type b). The omen “If a man daily considers building a tomb in the month of …” as a portent mentioned in relation to various Babylonian months is attested in the following two texts from the first millennium B.C.: the menological text Iqqur īpuš (§41 lines 1–13), 3 ) and the terrestrial omen series Šumma ālu (tablet 16 lines 3–15). 4 ) In both series, the enu- meration of omens related to 13 months was followed by a listing of 30 days in view of the same omen: Iqqur īpuš (§41’ lines 1–33) 5 ) and Šumma ālu (tablet 16 lines 16–45), 6 ) therefore, we suggest that the same text appears in the broken part of MFA 1981.156. However, our text (line 2: ana NU TE-e ina Ì N[U ? …]) provides a reference to a Namburbi ritual which occurs only in Šumma ālu and is omitted in Iqqur īpuš. The question emerges whether our fragmentary text belongs to Šumma ālu 16 or whether it is part of Nam- burbi 123 (following the numeration of R. Caplice in Or. NS 34 (1965) 105 ff., etc.). 7 ) In the following, based on the colophon, we argue that our text is part of Šumma ālu 16. The preserved text on the reverse of MFA 1981.156 (Ms. A) contains the following structure: 1’: PAP […]), 2’: catchline, 3’: tablet number of the series (the number is bro- ken), and 4’–10’: colophon Asb. Type b. 8 ) Contrary to this, all known serialised tablets of Namburbi 9 ) contain the fol- lowing three structural elements: – catchline; – tablet number of the series; – Asb. Type c colophon. As a consequence, the following differences are evident for us: there is no summary of the lines of the text in the case of the serialised tablets of Namburbi; and the Namburbi texts contain a different colophon type compared to MFA 1981.156. In order to prove that our tablet provides the beginning of Šumma ālu 16, we present the three tablets (see Mss. B–D of the Partitur below) which are connected to our text. Among them, Sm 1565 (Ms. B), known in previous research as a fragment of Namburbi 123, has a primary role in this issue. 3 ) Labat 1965, 104–105. 4 ) Freedman 1998, 240–241. 5 ) Labat 1965, 106–109. 6 ) Freedman 1998, 240–243. Concerning the omen studied here, the correlation between the two series has been discussed by Maul (1994, 217 n. 450) and Freedman (1998, 11). 7 ) Concerning the correlation between the first omen section written on Šumma ālu 16 and the similar section in Namburbi 123, there is no refer- ence in Freedman’s monograph (Freedman 1998, 12–13). 8 ) Hunger 1968, 97 no. 318. 9 ) K 2587 (Ebeling 1955, 40–41 no. 20; Maul 1994, 217 no. Tf. 4[?]); K 6313 + K 11935 (Maul 1994, 133: Text B line 72); K 6052 (Ebeling 1955, 35 no. 17; Maul 1994, 217 no. Tf. 122); K 2553 + K 10140 (Maul 1994, 217 no. Tf. 123 and 456 Text B lines 14–19); K 3464 + N 3554 (Maul 1994, 218 no. Tf. 135); K 9404 (Maul 1994, 280–281 Text C rev. 1–10); BM 121037 (Maul 1994, 219 no. Taf. b and 459 lines 26’ and rev. 12–13); Rm 99 (Caplice 1970, 142 Text 41 rev. and Tab. V; Maul 1994, 220 Taf. d); Rm 258 (Maul 1994, 220 no. Taf. c and 259 manuscript E lines 17’–20’).