Book Specifications
col. 547-838 pp.
softcover
2016 | BiOr Volume 73 5/6 ISSN: 0006-1913
Malgré son peu d’intérêt pour l’art égyptien, Léopold II, roi des Belges (1865-1909), était en possession d’une collection d’antiquités égyptiennes accumulée lorsqu’il était prince héritier et Duc de Brabant. Principalement pour des raisons médicales, il effectua deux séjours en Égypte durant les hivers 1854-5 et 1862-3, ce dernier bénéficiant d’une Relation de voyage publiée en 1865 par le Dr. Stacquez qui l’avait accompagné. La dernière étude menée sur cette collection égyptienne remonte à 1980 : son auteur Baudouin van de Walle l’avait tout naturellement liée aux deux séjours égyptiens et avait proposé quelques identifications en guise d’hypothèses sur base de la Relation publiée. Si on excepte quelques études ponctuelles sur l’une ou l’autre pièce, le problème de l’acquisition de la collection restait entier. C’est alors qu’intervint la découverte inespérée des archives confidentielles du roi, contenant entre autres ses Notes de voyages, cachées dans une cave murée. L’accès qui m’a été accordé aux papiers de Léopold II à partir de 1994 (Archives du Palais royal, Fonds Goffinet) m’a permis de modifier ici le tableau tracé par van de Walle notamment en brisant le lien en apparence évident entre les séjours égyptiens et les acquisitions d’antiquités, en confrontant le manuscrit des Notes du voyage en Égypte en 1862-3, tenu journellement par le Duc de Brabant, à la Relation publiée, et en identifiant certains donateurs d’objets au futur souverain belge. Cette collection, qui comporte des pièces importantes, voire uniques, se trouve aujourd’hui aux Musées royaux d’Art et d’Histoire (Bruxelles).
This article publishes three Old Babylonian texts from the De Liagre Böhl Collection kept at the Netherlands Institute for the Near East (NINO) in Leiden. In addition, a text from the Los Angeles County Museum is published by K.R. Veenhof as an appendix. All four texts were probably found at a site now called Tell Abu Antiq (ancient name: Pī-Kasî) in Middle Iraq. They deal with the administration of a multicultural military colony under the Old Babylonian king Samsu-iluna (1749-1712 BCE). The texts refer to this colony as the province of “Yaḫrūrum šaplûm”. In this colony, many non-Babylonian mercenaries (Kassites, Turukkeans, Elamites, and people from Malgium, Uruk, and Ešnunna) received houses, fields and/or date palm orchards from the Babylonian state in return for their military service, corvée duty, and payment of taxes. The four texts published in this contribution deal with corvée obligations and tax payments by mercenaries originally from Uruk and Malgium.
In this study, I examine several cases of ambiguity in Ludlul bēl nēmeqi that force one to probe the nature and character of Marduk and the cause of human sin and suffering. When understood within the context of a profession that promoted secrecy and that hermeneutically exploited textual ambiguity to ascertain divine secrets, the cases of ambiguity demonstrate theological principles associated with the Marduk cult, including the incomprehensibility of his godhead and his subsumption of gods, demons, and the powers of sorcerers. The essay concludes by looking at the poem’s ambiguities as representative of the divinatory institution’s critical inquiry into the cult’s syncretistic theology and the dilemmas it naturally poses concerning the ultimate cause of sin and suffering.
Das hebr. Wort, das als nomen regens (im Plural) in der zitierten Constructus-Verbindung fungiert, ist in der Hebräischen Bibel ein hapax legomenon. Seine Bedeutung wird, zumal die Etymologie strittig ist, üblicherweise aufgrund des Kontextes bestimmt, wobei man auf einen eventuellen Zusammenhang mit צִנּוֹר „(?)Schacht; Röhre; Wasserkanal“ (2Sam 5,8; Ps 42,8) hinweist. Das betreffende hapax scheint kein Kognat in den anderen semitischen Sprachen zu haben, da das aram. ṣntryn in manchen Handschriften vom Targum Scheni zu Ester wahrscheinlich als abhängig von צַנְתְּרוֹת selbst, zu erklären ist. Der vorliegende Aufsatz schlägt eine andere Etymologie vor und bietet dementsprechend eine neue Deutung.
In addition to the Temple compound, which is described extensively and in detail (I Kings, 6, 7), Solomon’s construction projects in Jerusalem included the palace compound, whose area was much greater than that of the Temple, but whose components – five buildings and two courtyards – are devoted a mere eleven verses in the biblical text (I Kings 7:2-12).This extensive study examines the possibility that the buildings of Solomon’s palace were modelled after Egyptian equivalents.
According to I Kings 7: 2-12, the palace comprised two pillared halls. A thorough examination of ancient palaces uncovered in the ancient Near East reveals that this type of palace existed only in Egypt from the beginning of the New Kingdom (ca. 1550 BCE) to the late Ptolomaic period (first century BCE). Typically, the first of these halls was large, and the second one smaller – as is the case here. The dimension figures provided by the biblical text of the two buildings – known as ‘The House of the Forest of Lebanon’ and ‘The Hall of Pillars’ – also suggest a design based on sacred Egyptian mathematics. The biblical description of Solomon’s political marriage to an Egyptian princess is further evidence that the author’s primary point of reference was Egypt rather than one of the kingdoms to the north.
Faraonisch Egypte, Grieks-Romeins Egypte, Christelijk Egypte, Soedanees Nubië, Assyriologie, Iranica, Hettitologie, Semitica, Oude Testament, Archeologie, Arabica, Islam, Varia
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