Archives and Libraries in the Ancient Near East 1500-300 B.C.

CASTEL, CORINNE

Archives and Libraries in the Ancient Near East 1500-300 B.C. By OLOF PEDERSEN. Bethesda, Md.: CDL PRESS, 1998. Pp. xxii + 291, maps. $42.

Olof Pedersen has dedicated several books to archives and libraries discovered in the city of Assur (compare his Archives and Libraries in the City of Assur: A Survey of the Material from the German Excavations I-II [Uppsala, 1985-86]). During recent years there has also been a large number of studies treating individual archives or parts of archives, but only a few studies dealing with libraries. Finally, we have seen a few analyses of archives or libraries in individual cities.

This new work is the first comprehensive overview presenting the main finds and reaching general conclusions about the occurrence and use of archives and libraries for the period 1500-300 B.c., including a few collections of texts that continued the cuneiform tradition into the following centuries. This study treats the entire ancient Near East--that is, Mesopotamia, Mitanni and Hatti, the Elamite and Persian regions, and the Western Alphabetic area. The Egyptian sphere is mentioned when the use of tablets with cuneiform writing is documented for the correspondence among the great powers of the time. The basic material has been taken from a large number of different publications. Recent references and discoveries are mentioned. The plans of cities and buildings where texts have been found have been produced on a uniform scale, oriented with north at the top, and supplied with indications of the findspots of the archives and libraries. For all these reasons this study is an extremely useful reference work tha t is easy to consult. With its general presentation of the various areas, periods, and sites it is intended for a broad audience of assyriologists and archaeologists, professionals as well as students.

This study focuses on collections of texts found in or near their original place of storage. Texts not known to have been found together but which have been grouped according to their contents into what have sometimes been called "archives" are, as a rule, not treated here. This choice seems wise: most examples of "archives" are considered apart from their context of discovery, which is, of course, essential for understanding what constituted an "archive" in the ancient Near East. This term must no longer be employed in its accepted meaning of a collection or repository of records no longer in use but preserved for their historical value and stored together. A few instances where such measures had been taken are indeed attested, but they were probably rare, as Klaas R. Veenhof explains in his introduction to Cuneiform Archives and Libraries: Papers Read at the [30.sup.e] Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, Leiden, 4-8 July 1983.

Many cuneiform archives were in use and kept on growing until the very moment they were closed, usually in consequence of some catastrophe. In most cases, such archives were abandoned and left on the spot when the buildings that housed them were destroyed. But we also know that old records no longer needed were thrown away in due time, recycled or put to secondary use. In view of such circumstances we may regret that Pedersen does not discuss more precisely the findspots of documents when the archaeological information is available. The buildings and the types of rooms in which archives and libraries were found are considered, and the disposition of these rooms within the buildings, as well as the possibility of the storage of texts on upper floors are examined. But the situation of the texts in the rooms themselves is neglected. An analysis of this information, however, is the only way to distinguish archives still in use from those discarded or put to secondary use, and to recognize the various means of st orage of clay tablets.

Information about the exact location of the texts in the room is often not published, but sometimes it is available: For example, Olivier Callot has recently published a new study of La Tranchee Ville-Sud in Ugarit (Paris, 1994). He proposes new dimensions for the "Maison aux tablettes" and shows that the tablets were discovered in several rooms in the northern part of the house and partly outside the building, at greatly varying depths. There are therefore certainly several collections of texts from this site: One is older than the house and was thrown away; another one kept on the first floor had probably been scattered when the house collapsed. Sometimes data about the exact location of tablets allows us to avoid a misinterpretation. Pedersen (p. 71) and many others refer to an "oven for baking clay tablets in courtyard V" at Ugarit, "filled with 156 clay tablets written in Ugaritic ready for baking just before the palace was destroyed." Jean Margueron has recently shown that this was not an oven, and tha t the tablets in question were discovered over a very large area in the courtyard and around it, having fallen from a second story (cf. J. Margueron, "Notes d'archeologie et d'architecture orientales: Feu le four aux tablettes de l'ex a [much less than] cour V [much greater than] du palais d'Ugarit," Syria 72 [1995]: 55-69).

This book also deals with libraries. That term "denotes a collection of texts normally with multiple copies for use in different places at different times, and includes, e.g., literary, religious, and scientific texts" (p. 3). In other words, libraries may be said to consist of texts belonging to the scribal tradition. Pedersen shows that some collections of texts, in particular those found in private houses, may be called both archives and libraries. The frequency and extent of such mixed collections are discussed at the end of the book.

After the introduction (chapter one) and a general presentation of known archives and libraries ordered according to the two main historical periods (1500-1000 B.C. and 1000-300 B.C.) and region (chapters two and three), chapter four presents a comparison and general analysis of the texts: their distribution, the buildings and rooms wherein collections were found, size, writing materials, scripts, languages, type of texts, chronology, and duration of use. The author also attempts to identify the owners of official and private archives and libraries. It is quite interesting to note in this regard that documents from official institutions may sometimes be found in the houses of officials, which mirrors the occasional discovery of private documents in official buildings. Finally, Pedersen summarizes the types of texts kept in the archives and libraries, and surveys the division of text collections into archives and libraries. The book closes with an index of personal names, usually those of the owners of archiv es and libraries; an index of the professions of these persons; and a final index of ancient city names and their modern equivalents.