Flight and Freedom in the Ancient Near East (Culture and History of the Ancient Near East)

CULTURE AND HISTORY OF THE ANCIENT NEAR EAST

FLIGHT AND FREEDOM IN THE ANCIENT NEAR EAS1

EDITED BY

B. HALPERN, M. H. E. WEIPPERT

BY

TH. PJ. VAN DEN HOUT, I. WINTER DANIEL C. SNELL VOLUME~

BRILL LEIDEN . BOSTON' KOLN 2001

This book is printed on acid-free paper.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Snell, Daniel C. Flight and freedom in the ancient Near East / by Daniel C. Snell. p. cm.-(Culture and history of the ancient Near East, ISSN 1566-2055 ; v. 8) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 9004120106 (alk. paper) 1. Liberty-History. 2. Human rights-Middle East-History. 3. Forced laborMiddle East-History. 4. Government, Resistance to-Middle East-History. 5. Middle East-History-To 622. I. Title. II. Series ]C599.M53 S65 2001 323.44'0939'4--dc21

00-066729 CIP

Die Deutsche Bibliothek - CIP-Einheitsaufnalune Snell, Daniel C.: Flight and freedom in the ancient Near East / by Daniel C. Snell. Leiden ; Boston; Koln : Brill, 2001 (Culture and history or the ancient Ncar East; Vol. 8) ISBN 90-04-120I0-6

)e 50,'

. ti:;35C?s ~o,

ISSN 1566-2055 ISBN 900412010 6

©Copyright 2001 by Koninklijke BrillNV, Leiden, The Netherlands All rights reserved. No part qf thispublication may bereproduced, translated, stored in a retrieval system, ortransmitted in anyform orby any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording orotherwise, without prior written permission from the publisher. Authorization tophotocopy items fir internal orpersonal use isgranted by Koninklijke Brill provided thatthe appropriate.fees are paid directly to The Copyright Clearance Center, 222 Rosewood Drive, Suite 910, Danvers MA 01923, USA. Fees are subject to change. PRINTED IN THE NETHERLANDS

For James and Abigail

May the basic assumption be freedom.

CONTENTS Contents Acknowledgments Introduction Chapter 1 The History ofFreedom and Getting Away Words for Freedom in the Ancient Near East.. A. Edicts B. Privileges C. Manumissions D. Rowdily Behaving Groups Chapter 2 The Reality ofFlight... 1. The Nature ofArchival Texts 2. Comparative Absenteeism 3. Runaway Slaves in Classical Times 4. Runaway Slaves in the Americas 5. Early Mesopotamian Escape 6. Ur III Escape 7. OidBabylonianEscape 8. Middle Babylonian Escape 9. Neo-BabylonianEscape Chapter 3 The Ideology ofFlight and Freedom 1. Edicts 2. Legal Collections 3. Treaties Chapter 4 Flight in Literature and Story 1.Non-Narrative Texts 2. Flight Narratives 3. Conclusions Chapter 5 Fr eedom in Israel... 1.Terminology 2. Practice in Narratives 3. Legal Collections Chapter 6 Freedom Beyond Mesopotamians and Greeks 1. Are Traditions a Unity? 2. Descent Among Jews

vii ix 1 11 19 21 24 26 27 31 33 37 38 .40 .46 48 55 .58 60 63 63 74 86 99 99 104 115 117 122 126 129 137 138 140

viii

CONTENTS

3.DescentAmong Greeks and Christians 4. Descent Among Muslims 5. TowardADefinition '6. WhatIsthe West? 7. Freedom and the Non-West...

144 146 148 152 154

Appendix I Selected Archival Texts on Escape Appendix II Transliterations of Selected Legal, Treaty, and Canonical Texts on Freedom and Escape Bibliography Index AncientNear Eastern Texts Cited Biblical Texts Cited

157 171 179 193 199 200

List of Tables Ur III Months ofEscape Ur III Gender ofEscapees Laws on Runaways Treatment ofFugitives in Hittite Diplomatic Texts

53 53 85 93

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS This study grew out of my work on Life in the Ancient Near East, a social and economic history, and the institutions that supported me in that endeavor must be thanked also in this one, particularly the University of Oklahoma in its Senior Faculty Summer Fellowship program, now discontinued, and its sabbatical leave program. A National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Seminar in 1993 under Prof. Philip Curtin at Johns Hopkins University stimulated my thinking on this topic, and to Prof. Curtin and my colleagues in the seminar lowe a debt ofgratitude for bibliography and encouragement. In particular Rosemary Brana-Shute ofthe College ofCharleston was helpful in asking invigorating questions. The Oregon Humanities Center at the University of Oregon in Eugene awarded me a summer fellowship in the summer of 1996 which proved extremely helpful in my delving into bibliography and in beginning to write. The Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities at the University ofEdinburgh offered me a non-stipendiary fellowship for part of the summer of 1997 which allowed me to complete the preliminary draft. The staff of Otterbein College was very helpful to me in the final stages ofthe work. Professors Benjamin Foster, David Geggus, Alan Kimball, Mario Liverani, Richard Lowitt, Helga Madland, Paul Minnis, Robert Nye, and Jamil Ragep gave me helpful references and technical advice. My graduate student Lance Allred read the manuscript and gave me several valuable suggestions. We cannot blame him for errors, though, can we? My family has been supportive of my work and my wanderings, preferring when possible to come along, and the adventures they have had are their own reward. In particular Dr. Katie Barwick-Snell slogged through all this with me. But because of the implications of the study for the future that they will inherit, I dedicate the work to my children, James and Abigail, and to the children of the world. -DCS

Was mag der Staat auch bei den Assyrem, Babyloniem, Persem usw. Alles getan haben, urn das Aufkommen des Individuellen zu verhindem, welches damals fur soviel als das Bose gegolten haben wird? Der hochsten Wahrscheinlichkeit nach hat es an allen Enden, bald da, bald dort, emporkommen wollen und ist den burgerlichen und religiosen Schranken, Kasteneinrichtungen usw. erlegen, ohne eine Spur hinterlassen zu konnen. --Jacob Burckhardt, Weltgeschichtliche Betrachtungen. New York: Amo, 1979,65.

What could the state have done also among the Assyrians, Babylonians, Persians, and so forth, to hinder the individual's rise, which then counted for the same thing as evil? In all likelihood after all the individual wished to arise, now here, now there, but was killed by civil and religious barriers, caste regulations and so forth, without being able to leave a trace behind.

INTRODUCTION The symbol ofthe city ofAleppo, the ancient northern cultural center in Syria, is the Citadel, a medieval fort with a fancy moated entrance. On the top ofthat entrance the government in the 1980s displayed in neon lights the governing party's motto-unity, socialism, and freedom. In Syria the meanings ofthese terms have evolved somewhat over time, but everyone would agree that in the popular mind the least clearly defined ofthe three is freedom. Since Syria was in the past a Soviet client, freedom has not always included economic freedom as it is understood in the United States and Western Europe, though recently that has increasingly become an aspect of it. Freedom probably does imply for Syrians freedom from want and freedom from unwarranted official interference-though practice has not always measured up to ideals, in Syria as elsewhere. The Citadel at night was illuminated, and it was quite a sight with its neon motto. One can imagine a more historically accurate way of highlighting the structure, but the government had its reasons, and freedom had its sway. Forme this sight underlines the problem offreedom in the modem world. The appeal of freedom obviously extends beyond those countries which regard themselves now as part of the West, those countries that have devised their political traditions from a century and more of liberalism, which one might define as the devotion to freedom. The study ofthe history of freedom has become identified with a certain political stance in Western politics, one that celebrates Western understandings of freedom and condemns, for example, Communist understandings that might be closer to that ofthe Syrian government's. Students of the history of freedom have tended to search for the roots of Western freedom in the ancient history of

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GreeceandRome andhave arguedthat Greecegavebirth to a unique set ofattitudes that led to and, to a great extent,were identicalto our own.Thispedigree, however, cannotexplainthephenomenaof1989, in which not only the CommunistEast European world fell apart in a devotionto a more recognizably Western-styled freedom, but also China and Burma, culturesmore lightlytouchedby Western values, saw movementsarisethat affirmeda populardedicationto freedom.' Is this phenomenonto be explained by the diffusion of Western values in centuries of contact? Or is it to be understood as the welling up of autochthonous notions about human freedom? Naturally the answers to these questions in the cases of China and Burma must be given by specialists in the modern history of those areas. And those answersmay not comefor many years,until,as one hopes, eventually archives are opened and scholarship on sensitive questions can be pursued. In the meantime I believe an important parallel question is posed in ancient history, which, luckily, we are quite free to investigate without modernpolitical interference. If freedom in the Western sense arose only once, in Classical Greece, it would be part ofthe so-called Greek miracle, which some scholars see as the unprecedented development of art, philosophy, drama, and poetry leading more or less directly to us. Martin Bernal's work seeking the background to these developments in Egypt and WesternAsia does not call into questionthe existence of the miracle; it merelychangesthe acceptedpedigree, and Classicists seem open to this adjustment, even though they mostly reject the

detailsofBernal's claims aboutthe authenticity ofthe ancientGreek understanding of the culturalborrowings? MaterialfromancientMesopotamia, ancientsouthernIraq, allows one to suggestsomethingmore radical, that the Greek understanding of freedom was not a unique and miraculous phenomenon, but one that can be paralleledelsewhere. I am not preparedto survey every known cultureand languagegroup,nor do I think that such an effort would be helpful. Rather I wish to pursue a test case in some detail because a great deal is known about Mesopotamia. The material we have from Mesopotamia that bears on the problem is of two sorts. On the one hand is an abundantrecord of state-sponsored labor,perhapsusuallya tax on laborthat we identify with the corvee, the obligation to work several days a month on government-organized projects.' In that record flight from work is recorded, and this appears to indicate that the state system was not able to retain all the laborers it wanted to control. Inadvertently the governmental scribes recorded their own failure, but they also showed that some illiterate individuals, calledupon to participate in the state-labor system, resistedat least by running away. Modernhistorians nowadaysseek to givevoice to the previously voicelessas they try to uncoverwomen's history and the historiesof minority groups in America and elsewhere. The flight of Mesopotamian workersproves to be a fruitful topic of investigation that edges us toward an understanding of a devotion to freedom among the illiterate and oppressed. The best evidence comes from the Dr III period (2112 to 2004 RC.E.), but there is important information from other periods too.

! As an example of Greek-centeredness in such studies, see Susan Ford Wiltshire, Greece and Rome and the Bill of Rights, (Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 1992),9, who writes, "The earliest origins ofthe Bill of Rights lie in Classical Athens, for it was the ancient Greeks who invented the revolutionary idea that human beings are capable of governing themselves through laws of their own making." She does not examine the Ancient Near East at all. By focusing on Syria I do not mean to imply that Turkey or Saudi Arabia, or the United States, always manage to adhere to international standards in fostering freedom.

2 Martin Bernal, Black Athena, 1, (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1987), and the symposium in Arethusa 1989. I have benefitted from discussions on Bernal's attitudes with my colleague Prof. Jamil Ragep. Mario Liverani, "The Bathwater and the Baby," in Black Athena Revisited, edited by Mary R. Lefkowitz and Guy M. Rogers, 421-427, (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996), points out also that for Bernal the Greek Miracle is not incompatible with Ex Oriente Lux, both of which are Eurocentric. 3 It is ofinterest that English now uses a French word for this, from Latin corrogiire "to requisition"; see Oxford English Dictionary C: 1028.

INTRODUCTION

INTRODUCTION

One aspect of these texts must be stressed at the outset: they were composedby bureaucrats forbureaucrats. Theyhave no propaganda value and are preserved only to make sure that the rations for the absent workers were properly allocated, or not allocated. The goal was inventory control, not condemnation or restoration of escapees, though both of these matters were probably on the minds of the scribes. The second sort of Mesopotamian material is that deriving from kings' propaganda machines and foundusuallyin the form ofroyal inscriptions. These obviously were composed with a view to influencing publicopinion, thoughit remainsa questionhow widely theyreallywerediffused, andwhowouldhaveheardthem read,or if anyone did. Perhaps in some periods they constituted merely a touchstone of the party line with which government supporters would be expected to be familiar. And yet as suchthey are valuable windows onto the intellectual landscape of some of the Mesopotamian elite. These royal inscriptions speak of freedom as something establishedby kings for the general benefitoftheir subjects. As we shall see, what exactly this means is a vexed question that is not easily answered. But at very least we can see that some Mesopotamians were concerned with words that can be translated as freedom. We have then information from two sortsoftexts and not always from the same periods of Mesopotamian cultural life. There was writingin Mesopotamia as earlyas 3100RC.E., and the last datable text comes from 74 of our era. Over this vast time conditions and attitudes changed, and ideas about freedom were probably not everywhere uniform. Such stability is unlikely fromwhat we know ofhow societies change. One aspectof Mesopotamian culture thatoughtto be emphasized at the outsetandthatwillmakeourtaskmoredifficult and the results more ambiguous thanwe mightlike is that Mesopotamians disliked generalizing. Whythisshouldbe isnotknown, but thecontrast to the Greeks is obvious. The great example of the Mesopotamians' not generalizing is their mastery of the so-called Pythagorean theorem, thatthe squareof the sidesof arighttriangle is the sameas the square

of its hypotenuse. Mesopotamian scribesknew that fact in the Old Babylonianperiod, amillennium beforePythagoras. Buttheydidnot state it as I have just done, as a general rule. Instead they demonstrated through numerous examples of individual instances how it worked. This habit of mind may seem alien, but it leads directlyto thescience ofmakinglistsofphenomena sotypicalofMesopotamian thinking and akin to our desire for encyclopedias of each area of endeavor. The listsof omenswereprobablythemostpopularamong Mesopotamian scribes themselves, but thelaw"codes"andthelexical texts too must be understood as lists of examples from which the students mightdrawconclusions. It maybethatin theMesopotamian oral tradition therewas a customof generalization in order to make short-cuts for the students, but it may also be that the lists were thought of as courses in various aspects of knowledge, andthe strong students would not expect any handy, and necessarily superficial, generalization." Like the Greeks, our own tendency is to attempt to verbalize regularities. BrunoSnell in a famous example arguedthatthe power ofGreekthought derived to a largeextent from their abilityto put a definite article in front of anything, and thus to have a noun about which they couldgeneralize, for example 'to wv ''the (phenomenon of) being."? We may now doubt if grammar alone defines such a cultural style, but we are the heirs of Herodotus, who sought to generalize abouteverything thathe saw. Aswe attempttounderstand Mesopotamian sources, we must also forego the desire for essays

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4 Discussions in the summer of 1996 with Prof. Robert Nye of Oregon State University were helpful in clarifying the interest in this matter for my study. Compare Wolfram Von Soden, Leistung und Grenze sumerischer und babylonischer Wissenschaft, (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1965), and his The Ancient Orient, (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 1994), 145-148. 5 Bruno Snell, The Discovery ofthe Mind, (New York: Harper and Row, 1960), 227-230. Compare G.E.R. Lloyd, The Revolutions of Wisdom. Studies in the Claims and Practice ofAncient Greek Science, (Berkeley, Los Angeles, London: University of California Press, 1987),58, admitting Snell must be treated with reserve but asserting a rise of egotism among Greeks, and "a certain gulf," presumably in intellectual style, between Athens on the one hand and Babylonia and Egypt on the other, 102.

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INTRODUCTION

frompersonal experience suchasHerodotus'fellows sometimes gave us. Theproblems with suchGreektextsareas acuteas thosewith the Mesopotamian texts,but different, sincein the Greekmodewe have lots ofgeneralizations but no easyway to check their veracity. And intheMesopotamian we havelotsofdatabut no easyway to seehow they may have been interpreted by the culture, or even by its literate members. Even within the Western tradition, of course, there may be traditions that approach the Mesopotamian morethanthe contemporary American does in its approach to generalization. I remember being told while studying Russian that one should expect that the mode of argument would be that Sovietthinkers would tend to pile up many relevant examples and only at the end of an essay would they state the conclusion to which they had been arguing all along. Tothe American thatapproach seemedlikestacking thedeckwithout explaining whereone was going. We are frequently too farremoved from Mesopotamian issuesto see wherethe argument was going, if it was going in one direction. And yet the Mesopotamians were sometimes lavishwiththeirindividual instances, andwe generalizers will want to spin a tale from them as we can. In the courseofthis studywewillalsobe usingtheHebrewBible, the Christian OldTestament, andthoughit is morefamiliar to us than Mesopotamian texts, we oughtto bear in mind one aspectof it that will be especially important for our understanding of escaping laborers and attitudes toward freedom. The Mesopotamian texts come for the most part fromroyaloffices and reflectthe ideasofthe rulers and the ruling classes. Rarely do we hear of rebellion or disruption that would reflect ill on those classes. The exception is runningawaysincetherewereeconomic implications to the absence of workers, and responsibility had to be allotted, not for letting the workersescapebut for the foodtheywouldhaveconsumedhad they been on the job as they should have been. The Bible, in contrast, comes mostly from peoplewho did not work for kings but still had accessto literacy. To an extent this difference may derive from the fact that the Bible was writtenon ephemeral things, mostly parchment, and not on long-lasting claytablets or otherpermanent media.

In Mesopotamia too it is possible thattherewas a literature ofdissent thatsomescribes produced on perishable materials. But in Israelthis literature became something treasured in dissident groups, and becauseofthe fallof theIsraelite polities, thosegroupswerethe only ones who survived antiquity. Theirwrittentraditions come downto usbecausetheywerecopiedontootherperishable material whenthey began to fall apart," This means that the Hebrew Bible approach to problemsof runaways is likely to be moresympathetic andnuanced than the Mesopotamian sources. These differences in approach between the Hebrew Bible and Mesopotamian texts ought not to force us to take sides and declare the superiority of the Biblein humaneness or some other aspectthat we might admire now. Inevitably we are goingto feel morekinship for the Hebrew Bible viewjust because it has been part of our own culture. But rather we must seek to evaluate evidence from each cultureon itsownmerits, realizing in Israelthattheremusthavebeen a relatively cogentroyalorrulingclassviewaswell as otherdissident views that did not make it into the written tradition that has come downto us. Wemustrealize too thatMesopotamia may haveknown variousdissident traditions, mostprobably usuallyoral,whichwould have had a verydifferent takeon the matters we will discuss thanthe royallysponsored texts. Neitherculturewas monolithic, and taking them together may give us a richness of understanding of the phenomena which otherwise would be unavailable; still, it is important not to assume that we can read in Israel's record exactly what lower-class Mesopotamians thought or that we can read in Mesopotamia's the exactideasofIsrael's rulers. My epigraph from Burckhardt raises questions that ought to remain open,but Burckhardt, for all his subtlety, assumed a monolithic Oriental despotism we can no longerclaimto find in the texts. He assumed that persons more or less like the nineteenth-century individuals he knew were occasionally attempting to assert them-

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6 On the entire process see Morton Smith, Palestinian Parties and Politics That Shaped the Old Testament, (New York: Columbia, 197I).

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INTRODUCTION

selves against states that resembled those he knew. Now we are inclined to keep open the definitions of both of these concepts, the individual and the state. In studying ideas about freedom we may be directly addressing that relationship between the individual and the state or community and seeing how the individual did sometimes assert herselfand how the state sometimes asserted itselfand made its representatives act according to policy. We may not succeed at a redefinition of either individual or state, but perhaps we will alert others to the problems of definitions in the ancient and the modem worlds. There is no question but that Greek-centered historians are still happy to endorse Burckhardt's idea, that the states arising in the Ancient Near East sought to suppress the freedom ofthe individual. But is this view tenable? We shall see. Much of what we discuss here is well known to students of the Ancient Near East, although they have not tried to tease out the implications ofit for the history of freedom. Still, I belie~e that they will see avenues for further research opened up by the questions I pose, and they may see their work in a different light as a result of this study. I have heard it said that some ofus choose these byways of scholarship because we do not want to confront issues that might be relevant to current policies, and certainly there is much important work to be done that has less obvious modem implications. It appears, for example, that in some periods ofMesopotamian history only a bit more than 50% of the texts that probably were produced have been found and studied.' And there probably are more texts in the Mesopotamian languages that no one has read since they were written than for any other literature except Arabic. Much basic work remains to be done, but we cannot imagine, in a time ofcontraction of support for pure scholarship in the Humanities and even in the Sciences, that an informed public will continue to support our work unless we step forward from time to time to put it in a broad and accessible context.

My purpose in ferreting out evidence about attitudes toward freedom is not to write a political history of a key term or to abstract an essence of Mesopotamian or Israelite attitudes. Rather I seek to fulfill three goals: First, to see exactly how eluding authority worked on the ground, including who was involved and what the bureaucratic response to it was; Second, to see what the elite understandings of freedom and escape were; And third, to see how the escapee experience might have affected the elite understanding, especially in the first millennium RCE. In the first chapter we will survey earlier views of the history of freedom and then turn to the vocabulary offreedom in the languages of the Ancient Near East. In the second chapter we will explore flight in Mesopotamia, highlighting suggestive texts. Then in the third chapter we will study the ideology offreedom among elites, and we will try in the fourth chapter to examine flight in literature and narrative. The fifth chaptertums to Israel's interesting and sometimes abnormal approach to the question offreedom. In the final chapter we shall return to the legacy of freedom in Western culture and the possibility that the kernels of freedom are very widespread. These goals may be difficult to achieve, and even if we achieve them, some may ask why we bothered. Those comfortable with the story of the Greek miracle would prefer not to know that it may be questioned. And those who doubt it may have easier fields to plough in other disciplines. But I believe the questions we raise here are central to how the West behaves in the modem world and the assumptions we Westerners bring to it. Are we the bearers of a uniquely humane culture that has much to teach the other cultures? Certainly in technology we have much to teach. But other great traditions question our monopoly on virtue, and I want to argue here that they are probably justified in so doing when it comes to the understanding of freedom.

7 SeeD. Snell, Ledgers andPrices, (NewHaven:YaleUniversity Press, 1982),103-

108.

CHAPTER ONE

THE mSTORY OF FREEDOM AND GETTING AWAY The interest in the history offreedom can be traced to Lord Acton's 1877 lecture "Freedom in Antiquity" in which he argued that a major legacy from the ancient world was the concern for liberty. He defined liberty as "the assurance that every man shall be protected in doing what he believes his duty against the influence ofauthority and majorities, custom and opinion." Acton seems to have assumed that before the rise ofthe state personal freedom had existed, but for him Solon's reforms in ancient Athens began the history of freedom, by giving the poor the power to elect magistrates, though those august persons were chosen only from the classes above them. In this vein Acton saw the Jews as enjoying freedom until their exile to Babylon in 586 B.C.E. He was careful to note that the first evidence of religious toleration comes from Asoka, the Buddhist ruler ofwhat we would now call India. And Acton did not find in ancient Greece some elements he prized in his own freedom, including "representative government, the emancipation of slaves, and liberty of conscience."! Clearly Acton admired his own tradition, but he did not make exclusive claims for it. And he was obviously open to the possibility that parallel concerns arose elsewhere and might inform non-

! John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton, The History ofFreedom and Other Essays, edited by John N. Figgis and Reginald V. Lawrence, (London: Macmillan, 1922),3, 4,6,25-26. On Asoka see Romila Thapar, A History ofIndia, I, (Baltimore: Penguin, 1966),73,86-87 (there spelled Ashoka), who reigned 268-231 B.C.E. See Roland Hill, Lord Acton, (New Haven and London: Yale, 2000). Acton was reflecting the Hegelian interest in the growth offreedom; for Hegel freedom was only attained in the Protestant Reformation, so naturally what predated 1517 would be of little interest. See Amo Baruzzi, Die Zukunft der Freiheit, (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1993),70-71,208-217.

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FREEDOM AND GETIING AWAY

Western political traditions. Lord Acton was far from chauvinistic about liberty, which came to be a key aspect of his thought. Subsequent students ofthe history of freedom have not been so broad-minded. Herbert J. Muller in 1964, for example, argued that Acton's idea that a major theme of human history had been the growth of freedom was wrong since "none of the great Eastern societies were basically free societies." He knew ofthe reform texts from Mesopotamia and of the edicts of kings, but he rejected the idea that they had any results, and he also rejected the idea that Israelite prophets were interested in freedom. He found Pericles' funeral oration the first statement on freedom's value, from 431 RC.E., and Euripides was the first to condemn slavery. His thesis can be summarized in the title ofhis Chapter Six, "The Uniqueness of Greece." Muller did not attempt to explain the origins of the concern for freedom beyond a vague allusion to Cretan art as displaying a spirit of freedom.' Orlando Patterson in his recent book has developed an elaborate and in many ways convincing argument about the centrality of freedom in Western thought. His argument is' that freedom as a social value emerged only in Classical Greece when the probability

that women would be enslaved as their husbands lost battles led elites to accept the striving for freedom as a basic goal.' Patterson argues that "A value emerges, is socially constructed, only when a critical mass ofpersons, or a powerful minority, shares it and, by persistently behaving in accordance with it, makes it normative." Though he admits that various aspects of freedom did appear in non-Western contexts, he denies that freedom ever became a value in that sense until Classical Greece." Patterson suggests that in Greece freedom as a value had three aspects, which he calls personal, sovereignal, and civic. By personal freedom he means the absence of coercion by governments or groups. By sovereignal freedom he means the power to act as one pleases, without regard to what others want. Civic freedom for him is the ability of adults to participate in community life and governance. And he argues that in the history ofthe West these freedoms have appeared in various combinations, in various chords, as he puts it, sometimes with one aspect emphasized and sometimes another. But Patterson is sure that in the West freedom as he understands it has shown enormous continuities, so that all of these aspects are found in each age since the Greeks.' Not everyone has agreed with his definition of freedom; Doug Bandow, reviewing the book, objected that "political equality and state imperialism" should not have been lumped together with personal freedom. Also it is of interest that Martin Ostwald, in his extremely useful essay closely argued from specific texts, assumes the uniqueness ofthe Greeks but emphasizes what Patterson would

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2 Herbert J. Muller, Freedom in the Ancient World, (New York: Bantam, 1964), xii, 37,41,139-140,191,205,155,88. For slavery in Euripides, stopping well short of abolitionism, see Heinrich Kuch, Kriegsgefangenschaft und Sklaverei bei Euripides, (Berlin: Akademie, 1974), 70-77. Note that Karl Morrison sees Euripides' special interest in women as the source ofmost ofOrlando Patterson's evidence for freedom as a value; see his review ofPatterson, Freedom I, American Historical Review 97 (I 992): 5 I 2-5 14, 513. Compare Max Pohlenz, Freedom in Greek Life and Thought. History of an Ideal, (Dordrecht, Holland: D. Reidel, 1966), tracing the rise of interest in freedom to the success in the Persian Wars, 14. A brief consideration which at least includes the Israelite material along with Sumerian "primitive democracy" is Donald W. Treadgold, Freedom, a History, (New York: New York University Press, 1990), I I-33, reference courtesy of Alan Kimball. Richard H. King suggests that after World War II the left in the United States allowed the right to hijack the idea of freedom; see his review of Patterson, Freedom 1., History and Theory 31 (1992): 326-335.

3 Freedom 1. Freedom in the Making ofWestern Culture, (New York: Basic, 1991). Compare also his summarizing article "Slavery, Alienation, and the Female Discovery of Personal Freedom," Social Research 58 (1991): 159-187, and his earlier statement in Slavery and Social Death. A Comparative Study, (Cambridge: Harvard, 1982),27: "In almost all non-Western slaveholding societies there was no such status in law as a 'free' persons. Indeed there was no word for freedom in most non-Western languages before contact with Western peoples." But he does not explain why a similar circumstance did not lead to the creation ofthe same value elsewhere.

4 Freedom, 41. 5

Ibid., 3-4, xii.

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CHAPTER ONE

call civic freedom as unique: "The Greek contribution to notions of freedom is unique in that it is the first to extend this notion from individuals to the community that is the state," by valuing not being ruled by a despot and not being under foreign domination. Ostwald has a valid point here, and talk ofthe freedom ofthe state becomes an essential element of our modem concepts. And yet the idea of city-based privileges, which clearly leads to the freedom ofthe state, is not alien to the Ancient Near East, as we shall see. That is, state freedom may not really have been an innovation among the Greeks. Ostwald asserts that the cherishing of personal or individual freedom is a universal; I believe that he is exactly right about that." But Patterson would not agree that the valuing of personal freedom is widespread. Patterson's learning is broad, and his command of a vast literature is impressive; his insights into how freedom was perceived in the West in ages later than the Classical Greek are frequently profound. And yet one must question whether he has set up his argument in a reasonable way and also whether the uniqueness he claims for the West is justified. The quest for a value is inherently a tricky thing. It may not even show up in vocabulary; that is, there may not immediately be any particular term for the quality valued, and yet over time one may find speakers of a language focusing on aspects of it. Clearly in Classical Greece Patterson has identified a concept that has a specific term associated with it. And our understanding of Greek values does place liberty high, although, as Patterson shows, Greece

6 Doug Bandow, review in The Freeman 42:9 (1992): 367-368. M. Ostwald, "Freedom and the Greeks," in The Origins ofModern Freedom in the West, edited by Richard W. Davis, 35-63, (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1995); the quotation is from 35. On the origins of Greek freedom see the wise view of J. B. Bury, A History ofFreedom of Thought, (London: Butterworth, 1913),22: "We do not know enough about the earliest history ofthe Greeks to explain how it was that they attained their free outlook upon the world and came to possess the will and courage to set no bounds to the range of their criticism and curiosity." Note also that Bury, 23, recognized that "the Greeks does not mean all the Greeks, but only those who count most in the history of civilization, especially the Ioniansand Athenians."

15

was a slave society that could not conceive of abolishing slavery, and so the value ofliberty could not be generalized in the way we tend to do.? Patterson may be trying to accomplish an impossible thing, to prove that non-Western societies did not hold a value. The mere lack of existence of specific vocabulary does not seem sufficient to establish that a quality was not valued. Values will be reflected only in writing, which until quite recently was always an elite activity. And so groups might hold values strongly and yet not necessarily have those values inscribed in direct ways accessible to us modems. But even if the difficulty of asserting that one knows the socially important values of any ancient group is admitted, one cannot help admiring Patterson's breadth. Is Patterson right, though, that freedom is never a value outside the West? Patterson addresses the question in his first section "The Stillbirth of Freedom in the Non8 Western World" and occasionally through the book. He admits that slaves everywhere always wanted to escape, but denies that this in itself defines a cultural value. For that, "there must be present the consent ofthe community." Patterson does not mean that slave-holding communities, as all Western communities were until fairly recently, consented to their slaves' escape, but rather, apparently, that some people within the elite had to be able to imagine becoming slaves and wanting to escape. It is of course hard to prove that this did not happen elsewhere, and Patterson does not attempt to do SO.9 Sovereignal freedom, the ability to lord over others, did emerge as a value outside the West, Patterson says, though he argues that it did not become an important value. He also admits that civic freedom in the sense of community participation was widespread,

7 The Greek word is eleuther ; but compare Socrates' use of enkrateia, pointed out by Virginia Guazzoni Foa, La Elberta nel Mondo Greco 2, (Genova: Istituto di Filologia, 1974), 14. 8 Patterson, Freedom, 7-44. 9 Ibid., 16.

16

CHAPTER ONE

FREEDOM AND GETTING AWAY

but not socially important. 10 He concentrates on anthropologically studied modem cultures which he takes as representative of nonWestern societies, the Tupinamba of Brazil, the Imbangala of Angola, and the Toradja ofthe Central Celebes in the Pacific. In all places he finds that slaves want freedom but that elites are not interested in it, and it did not become a cultural value. Interestingly he does not note that the two latter examples, which represent more complex societies, were both influenced by Islam, as is clear from terms he quotes (the Celebes term for manners is ada, from Arabic, and a freedman is called mavala in Angola, clearly the culturally loaded Arabic mawla, "client, freed slave." One can see that some of the ostensibly pristine cultures he adduces are not pristine. II

kingship, not something Akhnaton was inventing. An argument can be made that kingship, the exercise of sovereignal freedom, was a kind of explicit cultural value itself, one of the great gifts that the gods gave to humans at the beginning oftime. From an early period kingship appears to have included the power to dominate others. Critiques ofkings show that the bounds kings set for their acts were not always accepted by all their subjects." Civic freedom too can be acknowledged to exist as a value in very early times in Mesopotamia, and Patterson knows Thorkild Jacobsen's argument that there was "primitive democracy" in early Mesopotamia. Jacobsen was basing himselfon the behavior ofgods in later literary texts and extrapolating from the assembly of the gods to assemblies ofmen; this basis for argument seems slight, and yet intuitively it makes sense that in simpler societies communities were governed more democratically than in laterperiods in Mesopotamia. In recent study it appears that the documentable trend was actually the reverse. As empires grew bigger in the first millennium RC.E., city assemblies were able to gain more rights from the distant and busy king. Patterson argues, however, that this sort of freedom as a value disappeared because ofthe efforts ofcentralizing kings early in Mesopotamian history. 14

Patterson glances briefly at the Ancient Near East and asserts that Israel's history of escape from bondage in Egypt "has no special part in the history ofindividual freedom," though he does invoke it again at the end ofhis book. He knows that there was manumission and that slaves ran away, and so there was a desire for personal freedom, but he denies that this became "a value ofany importance" in society." One may view the present work as a response to Patterson's negative findings, and I want here briefly to examine Patterson's assertions about two aspects ofhis chord offreedom. On sovereignal freedom Patterson finds the Egyptian heretic-pharaoh Akhnaton an important figure because he rejected traditional religion while asserting his own right to rule, and yet Patterson sees that kings always wanted to rule, perhaps not abandoning norms in the way that Akhnaton wished to do. The assertion of sovereignal freedom to do in some spheres as one wishes seems to be intrinsic to

10

Ibid., 25.

II Ibid., 13-19,23-33. For ada see 30, for mavala, 26; compare 'ada "habit, wont, custom, usage, practice," Hans Wehr, A Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic (~iesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1971), 654, and maulan "master, lord, protector, patron: chent, charge, friend, companion, associate," 1101. 12

Patterson, Freedom 1,33,405; the quote is from 34-35 with his emphasis.

17

13 Ibid., 38-41; compare Eugene Cruz-Uribe, reviewing Patterson's earlier Slavery and Social Death, Journal of Near Eastern Studies 45:4 (1988): 308-311, from an Egyptological point of view, concluding, 311, "...Patterson did not have a sufficient grasp of Egyptian cultural matters to accurately relate them to his proposed scheme." Also compare on the theory that there was only ever one real king, which contradicted attested synchronisms, W.W. Hallo, "Royal Hymns and Mesopotamian Unity," Journal ofCuneiform Studies 17 (1963): 112-118. For some critiques of kings see D. Snell, "Intellectual Freedom in the Ancient Near East?" Intellectual Life ofthe Ancient Near East=Compte rendu de laXLIIIRencontre assyriologique internationale, edited by Jifi Prosecky, (Prague: Oriental Institute, 1998),359-363. 14 Patterson, Freedom, 36. And compare T. Jacobsen, "Primitive Democracy in Ancient Mesopotamia," Journal ofNear Eastern Studies 2 (1943): 159-172, and "Early Political Development in Mesopotamia," Zeitschriftfur Assyriologie 52 (1957): 91-170. On the growth of city privileges see Marc van de Mieroop, The Ancient Mesopotamian City, (Oxford: Clarendon, 1997), 133-139.

18

CHAPTER ONE

FREEDOM AND GETTING AWAY

One may, however, doubt that assertion. Patterson asks us to take kings' statements about their vast powers at face value but Ancient Near Eastern scholars have never done that. We know kings needed to make propaganda to assert their power and to appear to lord it over other institutions. They did have control over many aspects of temples at an early period, but control of the the city assembly may have eluded them. Kings did not discuss this lack of power because it did not redound to their glory, but the persistent, or perhaps just recurring, power ofthe assemblies shows that kings did have to deal with them. IS About assemblies in smaller communities we know less. It is not clear that the rural community is attested in politically interesting ways in later periods; certainly it did not loom very large in the eyes ofthe bureaucrats who had most access to writing. 16 . We ~ave only sketchy ideas on how communities were governed In practice, Self-governance may have been debated in the protodemocracies of Greece about the same time as in the Ancient Near East; one might take Herodotus' report on the Median discussion as more reflective of eastern conditions than his Persian discussion involving Darius. The Median story tells of a Median judge who o~ered himself as a leader to counter surrounding chaos; realizing his power, he went on strike as a judge, and his fellows made him king. The Persian story supposedly occurred after Cambyses's death as Persian notables examined whether to have a king at all. Darius argued that the best monarchy was better than the best oligarchy or . the best democracy. 17

Also in the Bible 1 Samuel8's concerns, where Samuel described the oppressive nature ofthe proposed Israelite king, may come from the time around the close of the sixth century, meaning that Greek ideas were similar to Ancient Near Eastern ones in the wake of the retreat of the Assyrian empire. Loyalty to cities endured much longer than any Mesopotamian state, even though the individual cities did not all last through all ofMesopotamian history. And the argument has been made for Israel at least that the community of elders competent to decide legal questions outlasted the monarchy and went on to provide leadership even in the rabbinic period and, in a sense, down to our own day." In short it appears that desire to dominate others and the desire to participate in meaningful ways in community life are widespread and may nearly be cultural universals. Patterson almost admits that is so in the first instance. So we are left with his assertion that devotion to personal freedom is a unique value in the West, and the rest ofthis work will be devoted to exploring this sort offreedom in Ancient Near Eastern contexts.

15 Hayim Tadmor, "Monarchy and the Elite in Assyria and Babylonia: The Question ofRoyal ~ccountability," in The Origins andDiversity ofAxialAge Civilizations, edited by Si~' EIsenstadt, 2~3-224, (Alb~y: State University of New York Press, 1986). See the papers In the symposium La Communaute rurale, Recueils de la Societe Jean Bude 41 (1983). 17

See Herodotus I, 96-8 and III, 80-2, and M. Liverani, "Nelle Pieghe del Despotismo. Organismi rapprasentivi nell' Antico Oriente," Studi Storici 34 (1993): 733,25-6,29-30. See on the importance of this discussion for posing the question that was of interest to Herodotus in the rest of his work Donald Lateiner "Herodotean Historiographical Patterning: 'The Constitutional Debate'," Quadern; di Storia 20

19

WORDS FOR FREEDOM IN THE ANCIENT NEAR EAST

An initial approach to the question of where :freedom was valued can be made by looking at the relevant lexicons, though the existence ofwords themselves does not go far toward establishing that :freedomwas a cultural value. It is interesting, though, that both early and late, and clearly before the eventual Greek interaction with the Ancient Near Eastern region, there were words for concepts which we usually translate as :freedom,though they may not always

(1984): 257-284. This patterning tends ofcourse to undermine any historical value the story might have. IS See Hayim Tadrnor, "'The People' and the Kingship in Ancient Israel: The Role of Political Institutions in the Biblical Period," Cahiers d 'Histoire mondiale 11 (1968): 46-68, and Hayim Reviv, The Elders in Israel, (Jerusalem: Magnes, 1989).

CHAPTER ONE

FREEDOM AND GETTING AWAY

mean the same thing and there is not necessarily cultural continuity among them, as Patterson has asserted for the West. 19 In an article Patterson adduces Indo-European philological evidence on the Western words for freedom. The consensus of philologists is that eleuther, Greek for "free," derives from *leudhero, meaning "belonging to the people," and Latin tiber "free" may have the same origin. The idea is that the III and Irl are at base the same phoneme in Greek and Latin, and the Ith/ might correspond to the fbi, while the Greek's initial e- vowel could be seen as a helping vowel added secondarily." Naturally given our understanding of slaves as coming in most societies from alien peoples, it is seductive to see words for free as meaning somehow "from our people." Alternatively there is a possible connection between eleuther and the form eleusomai, the future of the verb erxomai "to go." If in fact this is the root sense, the free man in Greek might have been the one capable of going where he wanted." The Mesopotamian languages, Sumerian and Akkadian, were so long in close contact that it sometimes is hard to distinguish what might have been original to each in vocabulary, but they are very

different languages. Sumerian is unrelated to any other language and is marked by agglutination, the addition of elements in chains after or before key words, as in modem Turkish. The cuneiform writing system through which we know these languages may have been devised for it. But the system was very early applied to writing names and then texts in Akkadian, a Semitic language related to modem Arabic and Hebrew. As far as I am aware, no one has discussed the Mesopotamian terms for freedom in the context ofthe history offreedom except in the most casual way, but I do not see how they can be omitted. The relevant words appear in four spheres of activity: edicts, privileges, manumissions, and rowdily behaving groups.

20

19 Especially Freedom, xii.

20 Patterson, "Alienation," 165. See A. Walde, and 1.B. Hofmann, Lateinisches etymologisches Worterbuch, (Heidelberg: Winter, 1982, reprint of 3rd ed. of 1938), 1: 791, connecting fiber to words like Russian lyudi "people," and A. Emout and A. Meillet, Dictionnaire etymologique de la langue latine, (Paris: Klincksiek, 1985, 4th ed., 1959), 355a, say the etymological connection ofthe two words "is not excluded but does not impose itself." See also Hjalmar Frisk, Griechisches etymologisches Worterbuch, (Heildelberg: Winter, 1960), 491, and Emile Boisacq, Dictionnaire etymologiquede la langue grecque, (Heidelberg: Winter, 1950, 4rth ed.), 241-242. And note the dissent from Pierre Chantraine, Dictionnaire etymologique de la langue grecque, (Paris: Klincksiek, 1970), tome 2, 337a: "A connection of Latin tiber and Greek eleutheros with terms designating the people in Germanic and Balto-Slavic may be seductive, but it cannot be demonstrated..." 21 See Moshe Weinfeld, Social Justice in Ancient Israel and the Ancient Near East, (Jerusalem, Minneapolis: Magnes, Fortress, 1995),33. Compare Amo Baruzzi, Die Zukunft der Freiheit, 1: "Freiheit wird mit Bewegung zusammen gesehen; sie ist wesentlich Bewegungsfreiheit (Freedom is seen together with movement; it is essentially freedom of movement)," commenting on the popular understanding of the term today.

21

A. EDICTS

Mesopotamian kings for a time in the late third and early second millenniums B.C.E. occasionally invoked their concern for justice as demonstrated by their "setting freedom." This means establishing edicts of remission and freedom from some taxes and certain kinds of debts. We have several references to the practice and one actual edict and fragments of others. The "freedom" being set is called a mar g i in Sumerian; etymologically this means "returning to mother," and so one could imagine that the image is that of manumission ofa child-slave and return to the family. But freedom for slaves appears not always to have been part of the kings' envisioned practice. In fact edicts may have been issued in order to limit debt remission and slave release to a single year, the first ofan Old Babylonian king's reign. Scholars believe that the contents of the edicts differed with each king's reign, but the general term continued to be used."

22 Note the Liberty Classics' use of cuneiform signs for a mar g i, Sumerian for "freedom" on the end-flaps of its books, for example John Emerich Edward DalbergActon, Essays in the History ofLiberty, 1. Rufus Fears, editor, (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 1985). And see the Chicago Assyrian Dictionary, (Chicago and Gliickstadt: Oriental Institute and J. 1. Augustin, 1956- ), A 2: 115-117, ama.ar.gi = anduriiru. For the limiting of releases through edicts see W.W. Hallo, "Slave Release in the Biblical

22

CHAPTER ONE

FREEDOM AND GETTING AWAY

The Edict ofAmmisaduqa is a text produced in 1646 B.C.B. for an Old Babylonian king. Its 22 paragraphs deal with two kinds of material; some are presented as acts ofroyal grace which may have had a force only at the time of the promulgation of the edict and were unrelated to the usual law, and other acts remitted some debts for a period. The former are tagged with the explanation "because the king has invoked justice for the land." Only six of the 22 paragraphs mention the royal justice. The paragraphs usually involve something the king could control, including remission of back taxes in paragraphs 14, 15, and 16. Paragraph 19 affects the amount to be paid by a soldier who leases a field, but only "in the present year." Scholars do not understand the term for the loan in paragraph 4; it might in fact have been between private persons and thus not something the king could directly regulate. Most interesting is paragraph 20, which guaranteed that citizens ofcertain named areas and towns would be able to get wives or children out ofdebtservitude, although paragraph 21 makes it clear that mere slaves

who were not related to a citizen debtor were certainly not to be

World in Light of a New Text," in Solving Riddles and Untying Knots. Biblical, Epigraphic, and Semitic Studies in Honor of.Jonas C. Greenfield, edited by Ziony Zevit, Seymour Gitin and Michael Sokoloff, 79-93, (Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 1995). Moshe Weinfeld, '''Justice and Righteousness' in Ancient Israel Against the Background of' Social Reforms' in the Ancient Near East," in Mesopotamien und seine Nachbarn, edited by Hans J. Nissen and Johannes Renger, 491-519, (Berlin: Reimer, 1987), surveys these texts and related ones. He suggests a connection to New Kingdom Egyptian texts which also promised release of some slaves on the kings' coronation, 501-502. He concludes, ''The primary meaning of mspt, sdqh' and myinm) [usually justice, righteousness, and fairness] is freedom from oppression..." 511. Compare also his Social Justice in Israel and the Ancient Near East. The problem of the tension between a desire to return alienated property and a desire to maintain property rights is stressed by Eckart Otto, "Soziale Restitution und Vertragsrecht. Misaru(m), (an)duraru(m), kirenzi, para tarnumar, S"mitta und d"riir in Mesopotamien, Syrien, in der hebrliischen Bibel und die Frage des Rechtstransfers im alten Orient," Revue d'Assyriologie 92 (1998): 125-160. Note that the word for conditionally free man in Sumerian, a person still owing some obligations to the former master, dumu-gi-, or dumu-gi may be related to ama.ar.gi, perhaps meaning "a son returned"; see A. Falkenstein, Neusumerische Gerichtsurkunden, (Munich: Bayerische Akademie, 1957),3:103.

23

freed." Although a number of other Old Babylonian kings in royal inscriptions mentioned their having established justice or freedom, no other edicts have been preserved. It is speculative to guess whether kings promulgated similar acts to Ammisaduqa's whenever they mentioned such terms. The period covers three major dynasties and 400 years from 2004-1595 B.C.E. Ifthere were such edicts, now lost, then one might reasonably argue that the kings at least were very much engaged in supporting the various remissions of taxes and debts that may have been contained in them as expressions of a communal value of long standing during the Old Babylonian period. Of course all these kings were politicians, and it is clear that they mentioned their devotion to justice and freedom in order to solidify support for their other goals, and the motifmay be a literary topos of political discourse and not always or even usually a subject for administrative reform. Nonetheless the elite's dedication to the value is patent. 24 The Akkadian term for what the edicts establishedis andurdrum, which comes from words for turning and returning, though there is also a meaning for dariiru, a related verb, that is connected with the manumission ofslaves and running free, and thus means to become free. Scholars have discussed andurdrum at length, and recent opinion is that it is best understood as a return to earlier status. The kings were trying to adjust their unwieldy economies and to get

23 See F.R. Kraus, Kiinigliche Verfiigungen in altbabylonischer Zeit, (Leiden: Brill, 1984), 168-288, and the English translation by J.J. Finkelstein, in Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament, edited by James Pritchard, 526-528, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969). Samsuiluna's fragmentary edict, mentioning his year 8 (= 1741 B.C.E.), and another are in Kraus, 154-160; Samsuiluna's two legible paragraphs appear similarly to free people from tax liabilities and to assure that regular slaves are not to be freed.

24 For the many references, most ofthem laconic, see Kraus, Verfiigungen, 16-110. For reform as a literary topos see D.O. Edzard, "Soziale Reformen im Zweistromland bis 1600 v.Chr.: Realitiit oder Iiterarischen Topos?" Acta Antiqua 22 (1974): 145-156.

CHAPTER ONE

FREEDOM AND GETTING AWAY

some aspectsofthemback to normal, For individuals, however,the normal may be freedom from constraint. 25 A new bilingual text from Boghazkoy in Turkey presents an exotic instance of a freedom song. The term is kirenzi in Hurrian, equatedthere with para tarnuwar in Hittite. Elsewherethe Hittite means "handing over." The text speaks ofEbla in Syria, where the storm-god demanded a release of debts as a purification from sin. The city elders pledged help for the storm-god, but would not forgive debts, and the storm-godsaid he would destroy the city for this omission."

they were politically extremely important, especially in the later period." The term kidinnu began as a word for a standardor symbol of a god in Old BabylonianSusa, on the eastern edge ofMesopotamia, around 1800B.C.E. It cameto stand forthe objectand forthe god's protection. After around 1500 B.C.E. the word appeared in central Mesopotamiatoo, and it came to mean the politicalprerogativesof the oldest cities,though in later times it sometimesreferred only to religious prerogatives. An instruction for a Neo-Assyrian prince shows subarra might include exemptionfrom corvee labor." Freedomswerethe cause offrictions betweenkings who wished to curtailthem and the citizenswho wished to maintain them. One might argue that such liberties were not generalized into freedom, and yet it is clear that in those particular cities they were of very greatimportance. Thesewerenot exactlyPatterson's civic freedom since they did not concern an individual's right to participate in community actions--that is rather assumed than defended in the Mesopotamian cities--but rather these freedoms concern how the city will be ableto resist a centralauthority. Theseideas seem close to Ostwald's definition of the Greek ideal of the freedom of the

24

B. PRIVILEGES

The Mesopotamians used terms in the late second millennium and especially in the first that referred to special exemptions from taxationand corveelaborgrantedby kings to particularlyvenerable cities. These ancientlibertieswere called kidinnu and subarra, and

25 As Benjamin Foster has pointed out to me in personal communication, building on D. Charpin, "Les Decrets royaux l'Epoque paleobabylonienne," Archiv fir Orientforschung 34 (1987): 36-44, who argues a m a - a r - g i, meant "return to the original situation," 37. Charpin denies that there is a general idea of freedom: "The Babylonians did not know in fact that men are born free and equal" 38. But I doubt if he is right to push this view to claim "It is clear that one is here at the antipodes of any sentiment of 'social justice' or of 'a reformist ideology'" 39. Elites did not seek what we would see as real reform, but forced laborers did seek freedom from constraint. The Chicago Assyrian Dictionary, A 2: 115-117, translates anduriirum as "remission of (commercial) debts, cancelling of services (illegally imposed on free persons)," usages that the Dictionary emphasizes should be differentiated, or should we generalize? Compare D. Charpin, "L'anduriirum a Mari," MA.R.I. 6 (1990): 253-270, and especially F. R. Kraus, Verfiigungen. 26 See for the Hittite word Chicago Hittite Dictionary, edited by Hans G. Guterbock and Harry A. Hoffner, Jr., (Chicago: The Oriental Institute, 1995), P 2:125: "hand over, release." The text is in Harry A. Hoffner, Jr., "Hurrian Civilization from a Hittite Perspective," in Urkesh and the Hurrians. Studies in Honor ofLloyd Costen, edited by Giorgio Buccellati and Marilyn Kelly-Buccellati, 167-200, 180-183, (Malibu: Undena, 1998). The context is mythic, and the relation to administrative reality is not known; see Chapter Three below. For a Hittite edict dealing with release from debt see Raymond Westbrook and Roger D. Woodard, "The Edict of Tudhaliya IV," Journal 0/ the American Oriental Society 110 (1990): 641-659, also discussed in Chapter Three below.

25

a

27 Chicago Assyrian Dictionary, K 342-344 kidinnu "divine protection, divinely enforced security," and 344-345 kidinniau "privileged status (of city or temple personnel)"; S3: 169-170 subarrU "freedom from service obligations." Compare Walter Farber, Beschworungsrituale an Ihar und Dumuzi, (Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner, 1977), 96-97. And see Hayim Tadmor, "Monarchy and the Elite," 218-219, seeing subarrU as an archaic synonym for kidinnu. The cities that claimed these privileges were the oldest and most venerable, but newer cities sometimes did too; see van de Mieroop, The Mesopotamian City, 135, and Albert Schott, "Hohe Beamte und freie Stadte im Spiel der assyrischen Staatskunst," inAtti delXIXCongresso internazionale degli Orientalisti, (Rome: Senato, 1938),75-77, but his distinctions among the words appear not to hold; he suggested that zakiitu and andurtiru meant freedom from particular legal demands, kidinniitu meant corporate invulnerability, and subarU immunity, 75. 28 W. F. Leemans, "Kidinnu. Un Symbole de droit divin babylonien," in Symbolae ad jus et historiam antiquitatis pertinentes Julio Christiano van Oven Dedicatae, edited by M. David, B.A. van Groningen, and M. Meijers, 36-61, (Leiden: Brill, 1946),57-9; the use of subarrU in the princely instruction is in W. G. Lambert, Babylonian Wisdom Literature, (Oxford: Clarendon, 1960), 112-113, line 30.

CHAPTER ONE

FREEDOM AND GETTING AWAY

state, though the Mesopotamian cities had not been independent states for centuries before we see these terms used.

ted, and this implies that manumitted slaves were not uncommon. In the preserved court cases, however, no slave who claimed to have been freed actually was declared free." The cards clearly were usually stacked against persons in slavery.

26

C. MANUMISSIONS

The freeing ofslaves is attested in most periods. The actual numbers of slaves was never high in ancient Mesopotamia; the reason for this, we think, is that the Mesopotamians were never willing to invest the manpower necessary to patrol and restrain large groups of slaves, preferring to rely instead on peasants who could be coerced into giving up some days oflabor a month to the central authorities. But there always were slaves who probably had originated as foreigners captured in war or who had been brought in by slave traders." The terms for manumission are a m a - a r - g i,...g a r in Sumerian, literally "establishing the return to mother," and in Akkadian andurdrum issakan "freedom is established," and zukkii, literally "declaring pure." Other terms for becoming free include dariiru, mentioned above in connection with anduriiru, elelu and nuram/Samas amliru--all meaning just becoming free, the latter literally "to see the light/Sun-god." Elelu is connected to other words for purity." There are several court cases from after 2050 RC.E. where a slave attempted to prove that he or she actually had been manumit-

29 See I. J. Gelb, "Quantitative Estimates of Slavery and Serfdom," in Cuneiform Studies in Honor ofSamuel Noah Kramer, edited by Barry Eichler, 195-208, (Kevelaer, Neukirchen-Vluyn: Butzon & Bercker, Neukirchener, 1976). 30 For manumission in general see Emile Szlechter, "L'Affranchissement en droit sumero-akkadien," Archives d 'Histoire du droit oriental. Revue internationaldes droits de l'Antiqutte I (1952): 125-195; for the terms see 130, 132. The Sumerian Dictionary A 3:208-210, Chicago Assyrian Dictionary Z 29-31 zukkU "to free, release"; D 109 dardru "to become free (of a task), to move about freely, to run off'; E 80-83 elelu, especially u/lulu "to make free"; and A 2:21 niiram / Samas amdru. It is not usually possible to distinguish debt-slaves from others in manumissions, as noted by Gregory C. Chirichigno, Debt-Slavery in Israel and the Ancient Near East, (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1993),62-67,72-85, and for Israel, 182; there is no reason to believe persons who not enslaved for debt were not occasionally freed also.

27

D. ROWDILY BEHAVING GROUPS

Some ofthe terms attested in Akkadian for particular groups go on in other languages to become words for the free, at least in the sense of the manumitted slave. Probably the most important later is the term hurru, which may have begun its career as a term for an ethnic group that becomes increasingly important in Upper Mesopotamia, the Humans. It persisted as an ethnic term till Humans died out as a separate people around 1200 RC.E. It never meant "free" in general, but it is of interest that it came to mean ''noble'' in some sense in Biblical Hebrew and is perhaps the basis for the words for freedom in the modem languages of the region." The Hebrew references are in late texts, and the term does not seem to be an early word for leaders in the Bible. The reference to

31 A. Falkenstein, Die neusumerischen Gerichtsurkunden, 3 volumes, (Munich: Bayerische Akademie, 1956-1957), texts 30-42.

32 D.O. Edzard, "Hurriter, Hurritisch," Rea/lexikon der Assyriologie 4 (1975): 507514 and Gernot Wilhelm, Grundziige der Geschichte und Kultur der Hurriter, (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche BuchgeseIlschaft, 1982), and see the review of the translation, The Hurrians, by Michael Astour, Journal of Near Eastern Studies 53 (1994): 225-230. The connection is clear from Biblical Hebrew hor through Late Hebres /:terilt, to Arabic hurr, as noted in Ludwig Koehler and W. Baumgartner, The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon ofthe Old Testament, (Leiden: Brill, 1994), 1: 348. For meanings of the terms see below. Hurrum "Hurrian" has a harder gutteral sound than hor, but Biblical Hebrew lacks that harder phoneme, and the harder gutteral usuaIly shows up as the less hard one. See Sabatino Moscati, An Introduction to the Comparative Grammar ofthe Semitic Languages, (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1980), 39-40. Arabic has the distinction, but the word may have arrived in Arabic through a language that did not have the distinction. Probably unrelated is the Egyptian word /:twr for "peasant," and "miserable," E.A. Wallis Budge, An Egyptian Hieroglyphic Dictionary, (New York: Dover, 1978, first edition 1920), 472b, and Coptic hooure "to deprive," W.E. Crum, A Coptic Dictionary, (Oxford: Clarendon, 1939), 737b.

CHAPTER ONE

FREEDOM AND GETTING AWAY

the earliest story is in 1 Kings 21:8 and 11, where Jezebel wrote to the /:z6r'im to get them to condemn Naboth who owned a coveted vineyard. In Nehemiah they seem to have been a sort ofaristrocracy to whom the Persian-Jewish governor had to appeal." Because of the chronology oftexts it does not seem likely that there is a direct connection with the Horim, usually understood as meaning holedwellers, who appear in Deuteronomy's list of autochthonous dwellers in the land ofIsrael, who might in turn be connected to the Humans of the second millennium. Why an apparently ethnic term came to be associated with freedom is not clear, but one might speculate that in the perspective ofsome Israelites some Hurrians had fewer constraints and perhaps more effectively eluded centralizing administrations than they did, though most scholars would agree that the Bible has no clear memory of the presence of historical Hurrians. St. Jerome (d. 420 C.E.) noted the connection between the Hurrians and freedom, following a Jewish tradition. One might argue that this is just a popular etymology, though, linking an ethnic name with an idea without historical basis." How the term hurriyah, Arabic for freedom, developed in that language is not known, though the modem sense certainly derives from the liberal age ofthe last century. But it is probably from the same root as Hebrew hor. It would be instructive but far beyond the scope of this study to pursue the question of the word for free and freedom in other languages; it may be noted that the Arabic word shows up in Swahili, the language spoken on the East African coast as uhuru, u- being the prefix that indicates general qualities."

Another word with a long afterlife does not clearly start as an ethnic term. ljupsu apparently always meant free peasant, but sometimes referred to a person not paying proper respect to authority. It too was not generalized, but in Hebrew it came to be the term for freed slave." Manfried Dietrich in his survey of personal freedom has called attention in addition to the terms considered above to what he calls adverbial expressions used in Akkadian that show an interest in the desires of the individual, particularly as parties to contracts. They wrote ofthe satisfaction ofa party with the agreement, the bud /ibbi "satisfaction of the heart," and they used the terms for the self, ramdnu, and the head, qaqqadu, showing the person's own will had been fulfilled. Dietrich also notes that the term for freedom, andurdru is related to the verb naduriiru which describes both the running away ofslaves and the free running ofwater. To this image offreedom as the freedom to run where one wills one might add the Egyptian term that appears equivalent, wst/tn, which means "to stroll at one's ease." Dietrich suggests that the pursuit of personal freedom was not a great theme in Ancient Near Eastern literature, but that personal freedom was assumed as a part of an ordered universe."

28

33 See J. van der Ploeg, "Les chefs du peuple d'Israel et leurs titres," Revue Biblique 57 (1950): 40-61, 57-60, and "Les 'Nobles' israelites," Oudtestamentische Studien 9 (1951): 49-64. 34 See Roland de Vaux, "Les Hurrites de I'Historire et les Horites de la Bible," Revue Biblique 74 (1967): 481-503, 500-501 35 See the discussion of Franz Rosenthal, The Muslim Concept ofFreedom and of A. Hourani, Arabic Political Thought in the Liberal Age in Chapter Six below. On the u- prefix in Swahili see D.V. Perrott, Teach Yourself Swahili, (London: English

29

Universities Press, 1965), 21. 36 Chicago Assyrian Dictionary ij 241-242 "(a member ofone of the lower social orders)", and note the cliche tibiu fJupsim "revolt of the fJupsus." Compare L. Kohler and W. Baumgarter, Lexicon 1 241-342, and N. Lohfink, "/foPI" in Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament, edited by G. Johannes Botterweck and Helmer Ringgren, 5: 114-118, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1986), stating, 117, "Nowhere is the modern concept of 'freedom' attested" in the Hebrew Bible. 37 M. Dietrich, "Die Frage nach der personlichen Freiheit im Alten Orient," in Mesopotamica - Ugaritica - Biblica. Festschrift fiir Kurt Bergerhof, edtied by M. Dietrich and Oswald Loretz, 45-58, 47-48, 51, 57, (Kevelaer, Neukirchen-Vluyn: Butzon & Bercker, Neukirchener, 1993). For wstltn "to stride freely, to go unhindered" see Adolph Erman and Hermann Grapow, Worterbucb der Aegyptischen Sprache, (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1925-1963), I:367-368, known since the Middle Kingdom (20401786 RC.E.) Compare E.A.W. Budge, An Egyptian Hieroglyphic Dictionary, 184, and Aristide Theodorides, "Freiheit," Lexikon der .,rgyptologie 2 (1977): 297-304,298.

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CHAPTER ONE

Concerns for freedom may not be the same as modem concerns. But there is no question but that the terminology was extant with which one might discuss such matters. Next we will tum to the records of running away. One might question whether this directly impinges on the question of the existence offreedom as a value, but I believe that it is really the only way to get at the question of what the society as a whole thought about freedom. It is true that we are trying to penetrate the world of the illiterates, and we are compelled to do that by using the records of the literate bureaucrats. That is always a tricky tactic since inevitably such data blend the elite's reactions and views with those of the illiterate non-elite. To ignore it, though, in this context is to stifle the expressions of the illiterate, and in our age that is tantamount to suppressing evidence.

CHAPTER TWO

THE REALITY OF FLIGHT And many fled. In spite ofthe efforts of administrators to control the laborers whom they were hoping to make work for them, the bureaucrats admitted that they had failed to keep the workers at work, and that sometimes significant numbers of them had made good their escape. The terms used were z a b - b a "fled" in Sumerian, usually equated to halqu "missing" in Akkadian, and sometimes to other terms with the same general meaning. 1 Scholarship has not paid much attention to this phenomenon, even though it appears to be a prime example of a way into the world of the illiterate masses and their relation to labor management schemes ofthe elites. The understanding ofthe lexical terms involved is derived from the lexical lists compiled by native speakers of Akkadian and edited in a systematic way by Benno Landsberger, beginning in 1937. Texts about labor were published and analyzed with increasing sophistication in the twentieth century. Mendelsohn in his 1949 study of slavery devoted a section to flight. But the first person to draw attention to flight as an indicator of the attitudes ofthe persons who were supposed to be managed by Mesopotamian elites was A.I. Tiumenev in his monumental 1956 book. Tiumenev, a classical and Egyptian scholar by training, had become interested in the archival texts available from Ancient Mesopotamia and approached them with a synthesizing and generalizing eye; he was not concerned to construct archives based on the origins oftexts, and thus his work

1 See The Chicago Assyrian Dictionary, under balqu, abiitu, and niibutu. Compare Marc Bloch, Slavery and Serfdom in the Middle Ages, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975), 51: "It was always singularly difficult to stop a man from leaving."

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seems general. And yet he was the first to argue that flight itself was a significant phenomenon which showed normal peoples' reactions to the oppressive conditions ofMesopotamian life. The people who were running away were not slaves, but dependent workers who owed the governmental economy days of labor; Tiumenev, following the Soviet line, viewed such people as essentially slaves, but he was not doctrinaire in his treatment of them, and this approach may explain his delaying publication of his book, on which he had worked for many years, until after Stalin's death. Tiumenev noticed that the phenomenon became more prevalent in the well-documented Dr III period (2112-2004 B.C.E.), in which he also noted the rise in importance of hired labor.' Subsequently several labor organizations of the Dr III period especially were analyzed, and yet flight itself was not a focus of study. Even the extremely useful 1987 volume edited by Marvin Powell, which brought together experts on labor texts from various periods in the Ancient Near East, has few mentions of flight, and it was certainly not a focus of research there. In my edition ofthe massive but now lost labor text from the city of Umma, I commented on the prevalence of runaways and referred to studies noted above, but I did not attempt a thorough analysis of the phenomenon.' In other fields ofhistory a sophisticated literature on escape has arisen in the past thirty years. This literature invites the ancient historian to consider the issue also in the Ancient Near East, as shall attempt to do here.

1. THE NATURE OF ARCHlYAL TEXTS

2 Mendelsohn, Slavery in the Ancient Near East, (New York: Oxford, 1949),58-64; Tiumenev, Gosudarstvennoe Khoziaistvo Drevnego Shumera (Governmental Economy ofAncient Sumer), (Moscow: Nauka, 1956), esp. 367-68. 3 On organizations see especially Robert Englund, Organization und Verwaltung der Ur III-Fischerei, (Berlin: Reimer, 1990). M. Powell, editor, Labor in the Ancient Near East, (New Haven: American Oriental Society, 1987). The labor text is published as Snell and Lager, Yale Oriental Series 18:115 and edited in Snell, "The Lager Texts," Acta Sumerlogica 11 (1989):155-224, and is discussed below.

33

The texts which we can study to understand the behavior of laborers are in large part archival. That means that they were composed by bureaucrats only for the purpose ofreporting to their superiors about their use ofresources. These sorts oftexts do not usually enter the stream of tradition, that is, the things one might copy in school, although some phrases from them may appear among school texts since a major part ofthe time ofmost working scribes was taken up with such texts. The texts, composed and preserved on clay, usually come to us in one copy, andif parts of them are damaged, the information is lost forever. This disadvantage to the data is balanced by the fact that archival texts tended to be formulaic; they usually are lists ofmore or less similar things, and so the formulaic parts of them can usually be restored on the basis ofthe smallest traces in the clay, and frequently without any part ofthe formula's being preserved at all. The point ofcomposing the texts recording laborers was similar in most periods. The bureaucrats were keeping records for higher authorities and were presumably subject to a later audit in which their handling ofthe laborers might be questioned. The process of composition of the texts was a part of the audit. In other spheres of scribal work we know that the information in small tablets recording a small number of transactions was put together into larger tablets every six months or so, and this composition of larger "ledgers" might have been accompanied by oral queries about what happened to goods and persons mentioned in the smaller texts. Sometimes the larger texts record what happened more completely." The goal of Mesopotamian accounting, we assume, was reducing misuse, spoilage of goods, and pilfering. It was not, as far as we can see, the determination of profits and losses. This point has been made by G.E.M. de Ste. Croix for Greek and

4

Compare Snell, Ledgers and Prices, 65-75.

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REALITY OF FLIGHT

Roman accounting, and internal indications from Mesopotamian material shows that it probably obtained in Mesopotamia too.' Most labor texts that recorded runaways did so in the context oftheir allotments ofgrain and other rations. These served as the maintenance allowance ofpeople serving the elites' organizations, and they were standardized at a level that would maintain life for adult men. But women got half that amount, and children got less." These rates were standardized at an early period and continued apparently as an ideal through much ofMesopotamian history. These facts raise a number ofquestions for laborers. The first, perhaps only a modem question induced by our own love of variety, is how boring the ration must have been if one were getting only grain, as frequently happened. One must assume that it was usually possible to change the grain received into other forms of produce, in other words that the grain frequently could act as a money; this accords with what we know of the Mesopotamian economy," The other problem is the inadequacy ofthe ration for those who were not adult males. From the bureaucrats' point of view this

made sense because the kind ofwork being asked was physically demanding, and men could work harder at it than women. Usually the work had to do with canal maintenance and the preparation and weeding of fields. And yet the inadequacy of the lesser rations must have been obvious to all. An important group of texts records the rations ofgroups ofwomen who had been "dedicated" to temple-managed weaving establishments and shows that the women died off at an appalling rate; in these cases bureaucrats must have decided that since they were dealing with women and children whom no one else wanted in their households, it did not matter how long they lived. And the work being demanded of them, though important for the economy of the Mesopotamian state, was not so skilled that replacements for workers could not be easily found. Probably the bulk of weaving in Mesopotamia was done in non-official households, and bureaucrats were experimenting with mass workhouse projects involving women, and an important consideration may have been keeping the cost in terms of food very low." Women and children in other situations fared better. Women with husbands working could share their food. Also women connected to households would have their own garden plots from which more food could be grown; the "dedicated" women were in the organization because they did not have such connections, and the condition was not usual for women in Mesopotamia. When scribes recorded runaways, the focus of their concern was frequently the grain that they were thus not paying to the people who were not working. In a sense having runaways was a

5 "Greek and Roman Accounting," in Studies in the History ofAccounting, edited by AnaniasC. Littleton and Basil S. Yamey, (Homewood, Illinois: Irwin, 1956), 17-74; compare Ledgers, 32, showing no profits, but usually balances.

6 See on the Mesopotamian system I.J. Gelb, "The Ancient Mesopotamian Ration System," Journal ofNear Eastern Studies 24 (1965): 230-243, and Lucio Milano, "Le Razioni alimentari nel vicino oriente antico: per un'articolazione storica del sisteme," in II pane del re: Accumulo e distribuzione dei cerea/i nell 'oriente antico, edited by Rita Dolce and Carlo Zaccagnini, 65-100, (Bologna: CLEUB, 1989). On the calorie content see R. Ellison, "Diet in Mesopotamia: The Evidence of the Barley Ration Texts, c. 3000-1400 B.C.," Iraq 43 (1981): 35-45. Compare the unequal slave rations based on worker productivity, of about three pecks of corn meal weekly in the southern United States for men, while women and the old got one to two pecks; see Herbert Aptheker, American Negro Slave Revolts, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1943), 126-127. 7 See especially Maurice Lambert, "L'Usage de I'Argent-Metal aLagash au temps de la 3e Dynastie d'Ur," Revue d'Assyriologie 57 (1963): 79-92, 193-299, and my Life in the Ancient Near East, 41,57-58, and "Methods of Exchange and Coinage in Ancient Western Asia," in Civilizations ofthe Ancient Near East, edited by Jack M. Sasson, 3: 1487-1497, (New York: Scribner's, 1995).

35

8 The slighting of women as agricultural workers continues into our own time; compare Carol A. Bryant, Anita Courtney, Barbara A. Markesbery, and Kathleen M. DeWalt, The Cultural Feast. An Introduction to Food and Society, (St. Paul, Minnesota: West, 1985),311-313, showing developing societies do not reward or even give encouragement to women, who continue to produce the majority of crops consumed. One might argue that the Mesopotamian rations were proportional to body weight and to caloric needs. See I. 1. Gelb, "The Arua Institution," Revue d 'Assyriologie 66 (1972): 1-32, and Daniel Foxvog, "A Third Arua Summary from Ur III Lagash," Revue d'Assyriologie 80 (1986): 19-29.

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good thing for a bureaucrat; the absences guaranteed a surplus of grain for the operation, a surplus which could be returned at the end of the accounting period, or, since grain lasts for years when kept dry, the surplus could be saved for supporting workers in later accounting periods. Still, the work was not getting done, and there was doubtless some frustration in those recording the runaways. These people had been assigned by some higher authority to work under the bureaucrat, and they had been placed under his responsibility; resources, however nutritionally inadequate, had been allocated for their upkeep. And then they were gone. Though we do not have texts that talk about plots farmed by persons for their own use, it is very likely that most persons who showed up in labor texts had such plots. We know that most did not work full-time for the great organizations that had access to writing, and we can see from the nutritional inadequacy of the rations for many that they must have been getting food from elsewhere, beyond the reach ofthe bureaucracy. So it makes sense that they spent time producing fruits and vegetables at least on their own plots. And though we do not see bureaucrats referring to it, there doubtless was some sort of farming community to which such persons belonged, groups of people engaged in similar activities sharing information about crops and seasons even ifthey lived in cities or their environs. This community might have been a relic of earlier village structures, or in many cases it might have been something new that arose in imitation ofvillage structures in urban environments." The point for our consideration is that such communities may have given workers reasons to stay in their

current situations, however unpleasant the bureaucracy-sponsored labor they were called on to do might have been. Obviously most workers found their lives endurable and did not give the bureaucracy any trouble, and a large part of that ability to endure must have derived from membership in families and the communities that supported them.

36

9 Dj. Sharashenidze, Fonny ekspluatatsii rabochei sily v gosudarstvennom khoziaistve Shumera Il. pol. III tys. do n. e., (Tbilisi: Metsniereba, 1986),42, 117-118, 120 and n. 74. Compare the similar argument about slave communities in the southern United States; Eugene D. Genovese, Roll, Jordan, Roll. The World the Slaves Made, (New York: Vintage, 1976), and J. Blassingame, The Slave Community, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1979), stress its supportiveness, while others have stressed the ravages visited on the community through slavery and later vestigial racism, notably William Dusinberre, Them Dark Days. Slavery in the American Rice Swamps, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), 429-436, reference courtesy of Richard Lowitt.

2. COMPARATIVE ABSENTEEISM

To get some perspective on those who did leave it is useful to look at the literature on absenteeism in modem industrial economies. Absenteeism may not be exactly similar to what the Mesopotamian workers were doing, in that there is no indication whether they usually intended to return to their jobs. Also, obviously, it is much harder completely to disappear from the bureaucratic record in modem developed countries, though every jurisdiction has its missing persons, most of whom are not the victims of skullduggery but are persons who simply want to be missing. It is hard for modem social scientists to study such persons and their motivations, but economic distress plays a major part in anecdotes about them, though other personal setbacks may be important factors in their decisions. Students of absenteeism are unable to agree on its definition and the reasons for it, though they are agreed that it has a major effect on the North American economy and is worth studying to determine how it might be minimized. And yet in spite of the numerous pulls on individual employees' time in the United States and the inevitable variation among industries and organizations with different conditions for workers, the overall rate of absence seems remarkably low. In 1978 the average rate of absence for all workers in the United States was from 2.9 to 3.5 % of the work force. More recent data indicate 4.7% of United States workers were absent on any given day, 4.8% of English, and 2.5% of

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Japanese. As we shall see. ancient runaways sometimes exceeded this rate. but frequently they did not. 10 Among the motivations for modem absenteeism are family crises with which the employee has to deal and job dissatisfaction. frequently deriving from lack of freedom to structure the work. Both of these factors may have motivated the ancients. It is certainly true that the Mesopotamian bureaucracy and its overseers were not interested in giving workers freedom to choose how to work. although it may be that individual supervisors allowed considerable variation in how jobs were actually conducted. and such variation will not appear in archival texts. though the results ofthat variation may in fact explain stability and instability in the work force. Family crisis is hard to document in modem society. and it is hard to see in the ancient archival record too. Now if a child goes to a hospital. our bureaucracy will have a record. but if she just has a bad cold. the employer may have to take the employee's word on it. and bad colds are much more frequent than trips to the hospital.

there was even a child's game called drapetinda "runaway slave" in which "It" covered the eyes and tried to catch the others. II In Egypt ofHellenistic through Roman times papyri reveal that slave flight was more frequent from households with many slaves than from smaller establishments. Usually it was the young people who fled. though not always. and women with young children were less likely to run off. There were more runaways attested under the Ptolemies than after the Romans came in. and this may be due to smaller numbers ofslaves but also to a rigorous system of slave identity cards. perhaps instituted under the Emporer Augustus. Masters knew what directions slaves were headed. and thus they may have had a fair chance of capturing

3. RUNAWA Y SLAVES IN CLASSICAL TIMES

Other societies with slaves have confronted the runaway. perhaps nowhere so sharply as in Classical Greece and Rome. where the percentage of slaves probably approached a third of the population. The phenomenon in Greece must have been a common one'

39

them." In Rome itself the demand for more workers may have encouraged slaves to flee. knowing they would be sure to find a place to work and free people to protect them. Three motives can be isolated in the Roman material: economic. religious. and political. Slaves wanted to change masters to get better treatment or more access to goods. or they sought liberation among fellow Christians. or they reacted to barbarian invasions or other insurrections which disrupted normal relations. 13 Other scholars have felt that the best thing for the runaway was to find a powerful protector who would harbor the escapee. The runaway might have had a hard time finding a new economic niche. and that may have

•

10 See Paul S. Goldman and Robert S. Atkin, eds., Absenteeism. New Approaches to Understanding, Measuring, and Managing Employee Absence, (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1984), ix, xi. Educational Research Service, Employee Absenteeism: A Summary ofResearch, (Arlington, Virginia: Educational Research Service, 1980), 140. Susan R. Rhodes and Richard M. Steens, Managing Employee Absenteeism, (Reading, Massachusetts: Addison-Wesley, 1990),2-3.

II There is no study of runaways in Classical Greece, though general studies of slavery refer to it. See Thomas Wiedemann, Greek and Roman Slavery, (Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1981),22, 84-86, 181, and 190, and Yvon Garlan, Slavery in Ancient Greece, (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1988), 193-197, and Norbert Brockmeyer, Antike Sklaverei, (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1979), 112, 125. For the game see Mark Golden, Children and Childhood in Classical Athens, (Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1990),55-56. 12 Ize Biezunska-Malowist, "Les Esclaves fugitifs dans l'Egypte greco-romaine," in Studi in onore di Edoardo Volterra, 6:75-90, 77-78, 83-84, (Milan: Giuffre, 1971). 13 Heinz Bellen, Studien zur Sklavenjlucht im romischen Kaiserreich, (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1971), 156-158.

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discouraged runaways." Demand for labor fluctuated, and that would affect the runaway's chances.

about the slave system were crystallizing in the south of the United States and in other parts of the Americas. Abolition movements in the north and in Britain in particular forced slaveowners to justify their institution, and the movements' publicity and reputation may have encouraged more slaves to try their luck. Thus in the nineteenth century one might expect to find more runaways than previously. One must contrast nineteenth-century conditions, however, with looser structures in earlier centuries, when the legal status of Africans was not yet clarified in many places and when the colonial cultures may have been less selfconsciously racist and were certainly less efficient at catching Africans trying to escape." Studies on runaway slaves in the American South suffer from the lack of systematic reporting of the phenomenon. There is a valuable register ofrunaways caught and imprisoned in Washington, D.C., for the years 1848-1863, showing that in the 1850s equal proportions of women and men fled and were caught, although broader studies indicate that the proportion ofrunaways in the United States was between 71% and 91% male. Most studies must rely on statistical analysis of advertisements in newspapers placed by owners for the return of runaways. Owners who advertised may not have been typical, and the cases of their slaves may not have been typical either. In one analysis of information from nineteenth-century Barbados males were found to be disproportionately represented, appearing in 90% of the advertisements. Skilled slaves there seemed more likely to escape than unskilled field hands. Many were said by their owners to be headed toward towns, and only a quarter were said to be going other places in the country, though females ran to such places more than males. Slack months in the agricultural cycle were the most popular to make an escape. Males were more likely to have

4. RUNAWAY SLA YES IN THE AMERICAS

Analogous to the ancient runaways in motivation were slaves in the Americas, although again conditions must have been very different in the Mesopotamian and the New World labor systems. The major difference is the rise ofrace as a distinguishing criterion for slavery which was operative in the Americas but seems to have been muted in Mesopotamia. Chattel slaves usually derived from foreigners captured in battle and thus might be assumed not to speak the Mesopotamian languages and may have appeared different. But Mesopotamia was always multicultural and thus can be expectedto have afforded opportunities to "pass" as'free and to disappear into farm and city communities. This difference means that it may have been more difficult for slaves in the Americans to conceive ofthemselves succeeding in escaping the grip ofwhiteimposed servitude, and it may have kept the numbers ofsuccessful attempts low. And yet the remarkable thing is that everywhere, regardless ofthe efficiency ofthe slave-holding system, slaves did escape. 15 Another important contrast to Mesopotamia is that we have the best information about escaping slaves from archives of the nineteenth century of our era, a time in which white opinions

14 FridoffKudlien, "Zur sozialen Situation des Fluchtigen Sklaven in der Antike," Hermes 116 (1988): 232-252,238,250. 15

Eugene D. Genovese, Roll, 648. In 1850 I,01 I escaped to freedom in the northern states, Canada, and Mexico, but repression reduced the number to 803 in 1860. Most were men between the ages of 16 and 35. This is not the place to defend continuity in slavery itself, but see David Brion Davis, "Looking at Slavery From Broader Perspectives," American Historical Review 105:2 (2000):452-466, 457: "The many metaphorical uses of 'slavery' and 'enslavement' point to the remarkable stability and continuity of the concept of total subordination, vulnerability, and animalization." (His emphasis).

41

16 On the racism see especially Winthrop Jordan, White Over Black, (Baltimore: Penguin, 1969), and also there the incoherent status of early slaves, 44-100, and in somewhat more detail Betty Wood, The Origins ofAmerican Slavery, (New York: Hill and Wang, 1997),40-67.

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been away for longer periods, and rejoining family was noted as the goal of many persons ofboth sexes.'? In pre-revolutionary Haiti, where one might expect a lot of runaways, a survey shows only 0.5% did flee. Guadaloupe in the 1780s had 1.5% fled, eighteenth-century rural Bahia in Brazil had 0.7%, and Domenica in 1813 had 2.3%.18 These figures are ofthe same order as modern absenteeism noted above. In a boast an overseer in the southern United States in 1828 wrote, "In ten years I have lost by absconding forty-seven days, out of nearly six hundred Negroes" by providing them garden plots to grow supplemental food. This does not lend itself to precise calculation, but the percentage ofwork missed is very low, on the order of 1.3%.19 Franklin has underlined the implications ofrunaway studies for the history of freedom. Franklin writes that "the happy slave syndrome" described by some scholars argues that most slaves were not interested in leaving their places and status. But he suggests, referring to manumission and the ability of some American slaves to hire out their own time as independent workers, that "To deny that such actions inspired slaves to want to be free is to deny them the essential humanity that others possessed.?" The incidence of running away shows that some certainly asserted this humanity, as understood in the terms ofthe society in which they worked.

The mechanism for guarding against runaways in the American South was the slave patrol, a group ofwhites usually consisting of a captain and three other whites who theoretically ranged over large areas at night to catch escapees. The whites were forced to serve and had to pay fines if they did not show up, and in most places the patrols "periodically lapsed into passivity." Though frequently incoherent, patrols did manage to strike fear into most slaves and thus to prevent more runaways than they caught. When we hear ofMesopotamian efforts to patrol, we should be cautioned not to assume that they were any more efficient." Jose Alipio Goulart quotes a provincial president in Brazil in 1860 as saying, "Flight is inherent to slavery. It is one of its natural correctives." Also Goulart notes that slaves sometimes escaped slavery by suicide, not just by flight. This extreme form of escape is not directly known in Mesopotamia, but not all the dead persons oftexts listing the fled and dead may be from natural

42

17 John Hope Franklin, "Runaway Slaves," American Visions 6: 1(1991): 30-31. For the higher proportion of males in the United States see John Hope Franklin and Loren Schweninger, Runaway Slaves, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 211-212. On Barbados see Gad Heuman, "Runaway Slaves in Nineteenth-Century Barbados," in Leonie J. Archer, ed., Slavery and Other Forms of Unfree Labor, 206-224, (New York: Routledge, 1988).

causes." Many things were different in Mesopotamia, and the mechanisms for spreading news and ideas were certainly much more rudimentary. We must ask whether conditions for escape, clearer in the American examples, can be understood to have applied in some Mesopotamian situations. The key variable is what direction the people were going, and perhaps we can assume that the escapees' heading toward family would have been very common, and that most families would have lived in the countryside. And if family groups escaped, they must have been usually heading either toward relatives or toward rural areas not controlled, or not closely controlled, by the governmental entities they were seeking to escape. In periods of political fragmentation, which were the norm in Mesopotamia, they may have sought to go to rural areas

18 See David Geggus, "On the Eve of the Haitian Revolution:

Slave Runaways in Saint Domingue in the Year 1790," in Out ofthe House ofBondage, edited by Gad Heuman, 112-128, 117, (London: F. Cass, 1986).

19 If slaves worked about 350 days a year--probably a high estimate. quoted in Eugene D. Genovese, Roll, 539. 20 Franklin, "Runaway," 30.

The boast is

21 See Eugene D. Genovese, Roll, 617-618. Compare lA. Brinkman, "Forced Labor in the Middle Babylonian Period," Journal ofCuneiform Studies 32 (1980): 17-22, 17. 22 Jose Alipio Goulart, Da Fuga ao Suicidio, Aspectos de rebeldia do escravas no Brasil, (Rio de Janeiro: Conquista, 1972),26, 123.

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nominally ruled by rival states, although the political information available to peasants may have been minimal. Was it easy to slip away? In most periods the answer is probably yes. Even if one could not easily find another agricultural niche, one could throughout the region slip off to join nomads who pastured on the fringes ofthe cultivated areas in the summer and retreated into the Syrian and Arabian Deserts in the wetter winter. We know that sedentary farmers who were not trying to escape did this when their agricultural luck ran out, and it makes sense that people trying to escape oppressive labor systems would too. There were prisons in some periods to hold persons arrested, but they were apparently only used to house people accused of crimes before trial. Running away may have been a crime, but punishments for convictions were usually not jail sentences but monetary or labor punishments.P . In the Americas a culmination ofthe runaway phenomenon was the maroon community, a village composed entirely ofpeople who had escaped from slavery. Such villages could survive, sometimes for years, against the concerted efforts of slave holders, if the villages were located in inaccessible swamps, forests, or mountains. The most famous maroon community, Palmares, constituted an independent state in Brazil and lasted from about 1650 to 1694 , when it was finally rooted out. 24 Are there traces of such communities in Mesopotamia? Perhaps the example ofnearby nomads would militate against the creation of such communities, and the riverine terrain at least in the most fertile regions would not encourage hiding. But we know

ofanother rather successful maroon state in southern Mesopotamia from a later period, that constituting the Zanj rebellion, which held out in the swamps of southern Mesopotamia from 868 to 882 against the armies of the Abbasid caliphate." Obviously the Zanj caught the attention ofthe rulers. But unless maroon communities create states or at least unless they take to destructive and successful raiding on the dominant society, that society is not likely to take notice ofthem, and that may be the case, even ifthey existed, in Mesopotamia. At this point, given the existence of a culture of escape, one should simply be aware ofthe phenomenon and try to be sensitive to its possible manifestations. The tortured etymology of the city of Girsu, and the very odd political history it had, might conceivably have had something to do with a foundation by prisoners or escapees." Jacobsen tried to explain the name as meaning "naked prisoners." The name might be connected to the fact that Girsu, though an old an important center, as we can see from preserved texts, was omitted from the Sumerian King List and not regarded by scribes in Nippur as a distinguished Mesopotamian city. But etymology is not a strong argument, and other places have idiosyncratic political histories. Who fled? We are interested in at least three social categories of persons, the nominally free, the clearly slave, and the debt

23 See for earlier references Miguel Civil, "On Mesopotamian Jails and Their Lady Wardens" in The Tablet and the Scroll. Near Eastern Studies in Honor ofWilliam W. Hallo, edited by Mark E. Cohen, Daniel Snell, and David Weisberg, 72-78, (Potomac, Maryland: CDL, 1993). 24

See R.K. Kent, "Palmares: An African State in Brazil," in Maroon Societies: Rebel Slave Communities in the Americas, edited by Richard Price 170-190 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1979). "

45

25 The primary source is The History ofal-Tabari; volume xxxvi, The Revolt ofthe Zan}, translated by David Waines, and volume xxxvii, The "Abbiisid Recovery, translated by Philip M. Fields, (Albany: State University of New York Press, 1992, 1987), and compare Alexander Popovic, The Revolt ofAfrican Slaves in Iraq in the 3rd/9th Century, (Princeton: Marcus Wiener, 1999). 26 T. Jacobsen, "Some Sumerian City Names," Journal ofCuneiform Studies 21 (1967): 101-103, suggesting Girsu means "naked prisoner" and began as a settlement of prisoners ofwar, 101, who were always closely connected to slavery, though not all were enslaved. But note that Chicago Assyrian Dictionary N 1:336, says the meaning is unknown for naqmii, which Jacobsen saw as "captivity." W. Von Soden, Akkadisches Handwiirterbuch, 744, sees the meaning as possibly Brenneisen, "firing iron," which would be irrelevantto Jacobsen's view. On Lagas-Girsu' s odd history see E. Sollberger, "The Rulers of Lagas," Journal ofCuneiform Studies 21 (1967): 279-286. It may not have been included in the King List because it, like Umma, was in territory belonging to the Old Babylonian kingdom of Larsa, a rival of Isin, where the List may have been composed.

46

REALITY OF FLIGHT

CHAPTER TWO

slave. It might be argued that there was a distinction between debt slaves and other slaves and that most manumissions, for example, concerned people who were serving to work off a debt and not people of possibly foreign extraction held for perpetual service. Hammurapi and the Hebrew Bible did legislate leniency for the debt slave and limited the years ofservice. In the Middle Assyrian Laws it is clear that a debt-slave could be sold as a permanent slave." The terminology does not distinguish how slaves became slaves, and for purposes of studying escape there seems to be no means to discern the distinction. The variety of forms of unfree labor in other societies argues that there have been more distinctions in social and legal practice than we can now define. But many people wanted to get away.

5. EARLY MESOPOTAMIAN ESCAPE

From the Early Dynastic period there are a few texts indicating that escapes had been made with success. We have from the city of Suruppak around 2500 B.C.E. texts listing as many as 108 persons fled." Here as elsewhere the motive for absence is unknown; it may have been a sort ofmass strike to avoid work, or it may have included personal reasons not obvious even to contemporary observers. Most interesting is the apparently legal text in Old Akkadian script, from about 2200 B.C.E. which reads: "Lugal-azida, the slave ofLugal-kigala, ran away from the city-governor. Then UrNigin's slave girl disclosed the place to which he had run away: 'He is in Maskan-sabra; let them bring him here...'" The interesting thing about the text is that when the slave girl speaks, it is in

27 Middle Assyrian Laws paragraph 7, Roth, Legal, 170; for the texts on leniency see Chapter Three, 86, note 43 below. 28 Raymond Jestin, Tablettes sumeriennes de Suruppak, (Paris: Boccard, 1937), 554,780, and Anton Deimel, Die Inschriften von Para, 3, Wirtschaftstexte aus Para, (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1924),99, with 19 men fled who were supposed to get flour rations.

47

Akkadian language, though the rest of the text is in Sumerian. Here we see that the slave community knew what had happened, and one oftheir numbers was willing to confess it. The slave had run, not to his family in the countryside, but to another city. The purpose ofthe document is not clear; perhaps it was to be used in a court case against the slave, but the chief witness is unnamed. The fact that the last line is broken keeps us from knowing if perhaps the text was an order for some official to pick up the errant slave. Certainly the text shows that running away was a ruling class concern, and sometimes the leaders could count on the cooperation of the oppressed in recovery of those who had escaped." The problem of escape was also noted at approximately contemporary Ebla in northern Syria. Though the text is broken, an interesting entry shows someone, perhaps a messenger himself, connected with the wife of the king escaping with supplies for messengers."

29 Dietz Otto Edzard, Sumerische Rechtsurkunden des Ill. Jahrtausends, (Munich: Bayerische Akademie, 1968), text 83, 137-8, reedited by Aage Westenholz, Early Cuneiform Texts in Jena, (Copenhagen: Munsgaard, 1975), text 50,36-37: [1] Lugal-a-zi-da ir ll Lugal-ki-gal-Ia ensi-da

in-da-zah 5. ki-zah-a-na geme Ur-nigin ba-du., in MaS-ga-niki-P[A].AL u-sa-ab li-ru? -u-nim ... Compare also listing the fled and dead workers, Piotr Steinkeller, Third Millennium Legal and Administrative Texts in the Iraq Museum, Baghdad, (Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 1992), text 45, 81-83. 30 Edmond Sollberger, Administrative Texts Chiefly Concerning Textiles = Archivi reali di Ebla Testi 8, (Rome: Missione archeologica italiania in Siria, 1986), 534: paragraph 48: [...Jije-sud, zab, in nig-kas.-kas.. On ije-sud's identity see ibid., 24.

48

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REALITY OF FLIGHT

6. UR III ESCAPE

in the broken text 21, or 2%, were fugitives, and 37, or 3%, were old. The runaways appear in the Plow Oxen Work Group and the City Governor's Work Group, but not in the other two groups. The jobs or characteristics of those who fled included: young males 3 workmen 12 smiths 3 policemen 3. It is of interest that young males fled since that is common in flight in other cultures, and also that some skilled smiths fled. These persons may have had skills to earn a livelihood outside the government service that this list presumably represents. On the other hand most who fled were simply workmen. The issue ofthe fleeing "policemen" raises the question of whether we are correctly defining the apparently military term a g a - us. In some other cultures enforcers ofnorms, ifthat is what these were, could be expected to keep their places and to support the system. The Athenian example, where the police were foreign slaves who initially at least spoke no Greek, cautions that that is not universally true, or perhaps we should simply say, as in nineteenthcentury Britain, "A policeman's lot is not a happy one.'?' One sort oftext indicates that there was some sort ofsystem for patrolling for runaways and for retrieving them. Texts like Sigrist, Syracuse 259, show that a porter had been returned (literally: "completed") by the guard or watch. Also several texts of the messenger type, which list rations for messengers for the royal establishment, note the goal of a particular messenger was "to go to seize the person who fled."32 These texts confirm that the bureaucracy would have liked to be able to return runaways.

The first thing that must strike one about the texts from the Ur III period (2112-2004 B.C.E.) is that there are so few of them. One would think that because forced labor was so widespread in the records, escape from it would have been quite common. The lack of mention might indicate that there was little escape, either because of a guard system or because of an ethic that laboring for the government brought intangible benefits that were worth the eff~rt. It is possible that such a work ethic existed; certainly scnbes would have been quick to advance it. But the major reason for labor record-keeping appears to be the assignment of rations usually in grain. Thus it may have been in the interest ofoverseers to appear to have a full contingent ofworkers even when they did not: It is a little l~ke voting in the city of Chicago in more corrupt penods of Amencan history; the dead could be voted, and the runaways. The Ur III supervisors' return was more concrete, in the form of grain not distributed. Some texts, however, do mention runaways. I certainly have not found all mentions ofescape, but I have found some intriguing texts. We must ask ourselves why these documents were composed when i~ may have been in the bureaucrats' interest to keep the matter quiet. It may take the reconstructing ofwhole archives ofw~~h the texts were a part to answer the question definitively, and It IS not my purpose in this study to attempt to do that. Still interesting insights are to be gained from a study of a selection of the texts.

L~ger 115 is a large text, now lost, probably undated, but certain from Ur III Umma, summarizing the status of three work grou~s .and part of a ~ourth, allocatin.g rations to persons by job and listing runaways. Ofthe approximately 1396 persons listed

30

See Snell, "The Lager Texts: Transliteration, Translation, and Notes," Acta

~umerol0i!ica 11 (I ~89): 155-224 to Snell and Carl Lager, Economic Textsfrom Sumer - Yale Oriental Series 18, (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1992).

49

3\ For Athens see Dwight MacDowell, The Law in Classical Athens, (Ithaca: Cornell, 1971), 83. On the a g a - Us see Debra A. Katz, "A Computerized Study of the AGA.US of the Ur III Period," M.A. thesis, University of Minnesota, 1979. 32 Compare Sigrist, Messenger, 41:2 and Hussey, Harvard Semitic Studies 4:82. For transliterations and translation of these and subsequently mentioned texts see Appendix I, which I hope will ease understanding for specialists.

r 50

CHAPTER TWO

Yoshikawa, Acta Sumerologica 9:307, shows a mill-worker who escaped from an official's guard. The official had to do menial work as punishment for his lapse; the escapee seems to have remained at large. Frequently in connection with runaways texts note their familial relations to other named persons. An example is Szlechter, Tablettes Juridiques et Administratives 40, which also indicates that the guard had retrieved persons, one of whom was called the brother of a city governor. This text raises the issue of the status of runaways; obviously not all of them were slaves or dependent persons. The bureaucracy might brand as a runaway someone who merely had deserted his post. A similar text is Nikol'skii, Dokumenty 436, where almost everyone was identified as a child of someone else. It is possible that this is the record of the escape ofchildren, but it seems as likely that the parents were held responsible for the truancy of adults involved, and the recording ofthe family connection would assure that things would go ill for the relatives. The issue of status also is not clear in the remarkable text Genouillac, Textes Cuneiformes du Louvre 2:5481, which chronicles the twofold flight of a woman and where she slept when she left the house. Before witnesses she then swore that she would not flee again. This unusual text may include as a witness ~he king's own wife, Sulgi-simti, if her name is abbreviated as Simti, so the milieu may be royal and exalted.33 The woman succeeded in escaping twice and in passing some time each time apparently in the homes oflocal worthies. It cannot have been too hard to do, if one were able to convince the worthies to protect

33 But the queen's name is usually written dSul-gi-si-im-tum. See Marcel Sigrist, Drehem, (Bethesda, Maryland: CDL, 1992), 222-246, for the woman and her establis~ent. ~ompare the case of a free woman escaping in the Middle Assyrian L~ws discussed In Chapter Three below. But the queen's name is usually written dSul_ gl-si-im-tum. See Marcel Sigrist, Drehem, (Bethesda, Maryland: CDL, 1992),222-246 for th~ woman an~ her establishment. Compare the case of a free woman escaping i~ the MIddle Assynan Laws discussed in Chapter Three below.

REALITY OF FLIGHT

51

one. A high status woman would find a warmer welcome than an ordinary runaway, and there may have been ambiguities ofspousal abuse and other community-dividing acts, which may have made the worthies think protecting the woman would not bring punishments. Gomi, Selected Texts 333, shows a two-fold escape by a group consisting of a mother, her son, and apparently another man. Another woman is noted as "an old escapee," and two other escapees are described only as children ofthe persons escaped but returned. This is not just a list since witnesses "confirmed the service status for the palace." There seems to have been some question about whether these persons were obligated to serve, and, though administrators had only a couple of them who had not made good their escape, they wanted to affirm their obligations." Myhrman, Babylonian Expedition 3:1, records an oath by a slave, and his mother and sisters were the guarantors that he would not flee. This may imply that the slave already had fled to be with his family, but, perhaps because he was enslaved for their debts, . they were forced to swear that he would not flee. <;ig and Kizilyay, Verwaltungsurkunden 1, have a slave who escaped and had his eye or eyes put out. He took an oath that ifhe fled again, he would be destroyed. The witnesses were not clearly related to him. The mutilation for escape finds a parallel in an Old Babylonian text noted below." ~

34 Compare too Adam Falkenstein, Die Neusumerischen Gerichtsurkunden, text 41, 2: 67-69, from Lagas, where the wife and daughters of an executed murderer, enslaved as part ofthe murderer's punishment, escaped, were caught, and judges reaffirmed their slave status.

35 Piotr Steinkeller, Sale Documents of the Ur-Ill-Period, (Stuttgart: F. Steiner, 1989),68-70, notes that warranty against slave flight was rare in cuneiform documents. His text 94 ** exempted a slave seller from responsibility if a slave disappeared or died, using Ii - g u ... d e= na 'butu from abiitu "to run away." Compare his text S3, 333-334, where a seller had to deliver another slave girl because the first one sold had escaped. 36 See Raymond Westbrook, "Slave and Master in Ancient Near Eastern Law," Chicago-Kent Law Review 70:4 (1995): 1631-1676, 1670.

52

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The status ofthe woman in Gomi, Selected Texts 125, is clearly slave, and her price is given. Fifteen days after an ordinary sale, the woman fled. 'Who assumed the responsibility for her is unclear. A child escaped in Gomi, Selected Texts 519, and there was some sort of administrative mix-up there. The city governor had an official look into it, but somehow the report was not put in order. The child must have remained free. As in later slave systems, persons might return to their posts, perhaps of their own volition, after having asserted their right to leave or otherwise define themselves. Keiser, Yale Oriental Series 4:190 shows a gardener returned and perhaps entered into his usual place. Another sort of text appears to address the problem of unallocated rations. Gomi, Acta Sumerologica 3:166, is among the "fled and dead" texts that try to show what quantities ofgrain have not been distributed because of mortality and flight over several months. The text dates from the year Amar-Suena 2, but the people were a - r u - a "dedicated" apparently by family members to serve in the administration or temple. In that text there were eight fled and eight dead over the period of eight months. King, Cuneiform Texts 10:28, is another "dead and fled" text, from the city of Lagas-Girsu. Escapes noted by month are as follows: iii vi vi-xi ix no month 3 2 Ill. We will see below that there is no clear periodicity in Dr III escape. Sigrist, Syracuse 36, refers to a big escape, somehow different from a simple escape in the same text. Perhaps there was a distinction between short-term escape and permanent or longerterm running away, as in the New World distinction between petit marronage and grand marronage." Legrain, Ur Excavation Texts 3:1018,seems to show rations for dependent women who had fled, and the grain and wool had

already been issued. Here the administration clearly had an interest in ascertaining who was really gone and in recovering losses. We have an unusually high volume ofdocumentation for labor practices and problems from the Dr III period. Because of the rarity ofmention ofescape we cannot correlate instances ofit with other events, such as economic downturns." But we can draw some general conclusions about it. It appears to occur or at least be recorded in the following months (numbers indicate instances of escape noted, not numbers of escapees):

37

See R. Price, Maroon Societies, 3.

Month: I Escapes: 2

U

111

IV

V

VI

VU

4

3 Month: ix Escapes: 2

53

x

Xl

3

Vlll

2

xu X111 1 2

The growing season began in the spring, as did the year, and the harvest would be in months v and vi. This spread seems to indicate that there was no seasonality to escape." There were instances all through the year. The following lists genders of escapees: Male Female children (no gender indicated)

70 1340 1

38 The downturns are not documented in the price series from the period, but it is clear in other texts late in the dynasty. See Snell, Ledgers, 196~20 I, and T. Gomi, "On the Critical Economic Situation at Ur Early in the Reign of Ibbi-Sin," Journal of Cuneiform Studies 36 (1984): 211-242, and K. Maekawa, "Rations, Wages and Economic Trends in the Ur III Period," Altorientalische Forschungen 16 (1989): 42-50. 39 Note there is also an escape in ezen SUlgi, which might be month vii if from Lagas or month x if from Umma, Gomi, British Museum 125. 40 But note restored Legrain, Ur Excavation Texts 3:1018, with 134 fled.

54

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The difference in the rate of escape by women makes good sense when we assume the close connection with child-rearing that women must have had; they were understandably reluctant to leave small children, no matter how unpleasant the work they were called upon to do. Professions indicated include mill-worker, slave, smith, silversmith, porter, and gardener; most ofthe rest must have been unskilled laborers. This finding is different from the situation in Barbados, where the skilled were more likely to escape, probably because they had better connections to the world ofwage employment than farm laborers." Escape was clearly tried by all sorts ofpersons, some perhaps not even in particularly oppressive situations. In the texts collected we do not see any clear indication ofgroup flight, but the emphasis in several texts on filial and even fraternal relationships ofthose who fled does imply that family played a large role in the administrations' views of what was going on. In the interesting case of the woman who had to swear after two escapes that she would not try it again, we see that she had fled to the houses of two men who were not obviously related to her. But our command ofUr III prosopography is not firm, and they may have been uncles or cousins. We may in general conclude that the administration tried to avoid discussing escape because it made the bureaucrats liable to return grain and other rations they could personally use. But the phenomenon was a persistent one that must derive from the lack ofacceptance by some members ofthe society ofthe idea that they should work for others.

REALITY OF FLIGHT

55

7. OLD BABYLONIAN ESCAPE

Johannes Renger in his 1972 study examines flight in the Old Babylonian period (2004-1595 B.C.E.).42 He finds the same kind of paranoid reaction to the possibility of flight as one finds in other slave-holding societies, notably in Cicero's late Republican Rome and in the Ante-Bellum South ofthe United States. Renger has one Old Babylonian text that lists those "fled and dead," with 3.2% fled, or 3 of93.43 Also he notes an interesting call in an Old Babylonian letter for a pass system to control flight, though perhaps only for a particular set of military personnel. The text reads as follows: To War'um-magir speak! This is what your lord says: Among the rakba, fugitives established themselves. I took counsel with myself as follows: this is what I thought: Yes! Fugitives have established themselves. (And yet) a rakbum who goes to his village--unless he obtains a document with my seal, he must not go! This (counsel) I took and I wrote you accordingly. From now on a rakbum who can show you a document with my seal may stay in his village and may enjoy his house and his field. And as long as he stays, the house is settled upon him. Before he leaves, let (a broken personal name) lead him to the palace and let him bring here the tablet with my seal for his identification. To him who does not have a tablet with my seal, and comes to you, you must not grant permission to stay (in his village)! Have him brought to me!

42 J. Renger, "Flucht als soziales Problem in der altbabylonischen Gesellschaft," in Gesellschaftsklassen des alten Zweistromlandes, edited by Diezt Otto Edzard, 167-182, (Munich: Bayerische Akademie, 1972). 43 41 Gad Heuman, "Runaway Slaves in Nineteenth-Century Barbados," 210.

Renger, "Flucht," 176-7 and n. 32 to H.H. Figulla, Altbabylonische Vertriige

= Vorderasiatische Schriftdenkmiiler 13:104, (Leipzig: J.J. Hinrichs, 19 I4), especially

the end of column 3 and middle of column 5.

56

57

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REALITY OF FLIGHT

The tablet is sealed by Ibalpiel, king of Esnunna, a city in central Iraq." This letter shows that such a pass system was not usual and could not be counted on to control the flight of other persons. Renger notes that except for slaves the Old Babylonian period lacks mention of attempts to catch runaways, and he says that in legal texts the actual consequences of flight seem small, as in Hammurapi paragraphs 30 and 31, where a free man who owed service to the state was gone a year without explanation and was reinstated. Renger admits that the government hardly controlled the marshlands, which must have been commonly used as hideouts. He also suggests two degrees of flight: 1) going home to one's village, and 2) trying to leave permanently, sometimes through semi- or full nomadism." Renger concludes that there was not a great deal of flight and suggests reasons for that paucity:" 1) Agricultural stability endured from the Pre-Sargonic period before 2334 B.C.E. into the first millennium; 2) New immigrants into Mesopotamia changed conditions and made old tensions seem obsolete, as when the Amorites arrived and replaced some of the inter-city tensions with inter-tribal and regional tensions; 3) The sources may avoid speaking of flight, feeling that discussion would only encourage it; 4) Ideology may militate against it, though Renger finds this hard to judge. The idea that peasants were serving divinely installed rulers was certainly one the rulers pushed, but did anyone else buy it? 5) The success of state controls, partly through guarantees of family members that the service would be done;"

6) Edicts and other social measures, though corvees were perhaps reduced in the Old Babylonian period under Lipit-Istar, thus diminishing the number ofpersons who might be tempted to flee.48

44 A. Goetze, "Fifty Old Babylonian Letters from Tell Harmal," Sumer 14 (1958): 3-78, number 5, 23-24. 45 Renger, "Flucht," 177, 178. 46

Ibid., 181.

47

Ibid., n. 53.

All ofthese factors appear important, with the possible exception of ideology. But the success of state control probably was intermittent; more likely it is that the state usually had low expectations which could be and were met. Recently Sophie Lafont published a very interesting text on escape from Mari on the Middle Euphrates in Syria. The text probably concerns a free servant of a bedouin leader who escaped with two slave girls to Subartu, a land in the north. The owner found the escapee and gouged out his eyes, but he then wanted to kill him as an example to others. The Mari letter was written because the owner needed royal approval to kill the man, and he asked his supervisor to request execution. As usual with letters, we do not know ifhe got permission to kill his servant. This is an amazing case not just because it appears to show that the Mari king reserved the death penalty to himself. It also shows that extreme brutality was possible, though the owner felt he had to explain that only his anger impelled him to gouge out the eyes."

48 Ibid., n. 54, and compare on Lipit-Istar, D.O. Edzard, Zweite Zwischenzeit Babyloniens, (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1957), 96-97, on the prologue to his legal collection, discussed in Chapter Three below. 49 Sophie Lafont, "Un 'Cas royal' l'epoque de Mari," Revue d'Assyriologie 91:2 (1997): 109-119. The text is as follows: a-na be-li-ia qi-bi-[m]a um-ma I-ba-al-pi-A[N] IR-ka-a-ma 1 UJ.TOR fJa-ar-di-im fJa-ni-im 5. 2 geme sa-wi-ti-su it-ru-ma a-na Su-bar-tim in-na--it u-ka-as-si-is-su-ma i-na Su-bar-tim ts-ba-ta-as-su i-na ap-pl-su 10. i-ni UJ.TOR-su

a

58

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REALITY OF FLIGHT

8. MIDDLE BABYLONIAN ESCAPE

extent. Subsequent refugees may have left the sedentary areas and turned to nomadism. 50 The causes of the phenomenon ofmass flight may have lain in the growing efficiency of kings to control peasant life and of creditors to press for payment of peasant loans. Peasants increasingly over the course of the period may have acted on their desire not to cooperate in these efforts by leaving and joining with brigands. Middle Babylonian kings seemed uninterested in the "justice and truth" that Old Babylonian kings upheld and first millennium kings supported. This insensitivity may be only apparent because we do not have extensive royal inscriptions from Middle Babylonian Syria especially. But the lack of reference to these values may also derive from a genuine lack of concern on the part ofruling classes for the downtrodden, who turned to flight to express their dissatisfaction. Ideas of social justice may have been kept alive in non-royal circles who came to the fore after the demographic crises around 1200 RC.B. 51 In spite of the lack ofreference to such issues in royal inscriptions from the period, archival texts do show that kings sometimes tried to impose an edict of freedom or remission of debts. We can tell because the archival texts try to avoid the edicts' consequences. Relevant texts come from Nuzi in central Iraq; they will be considered in Chapter Three below. Archival texts from Middle Babylonia have several instances of flight. Once an Blamite fled. Another text shows a long-term flight lasting about nine years of absence. Texts from contempo-

From central Mesopotamia we have references to patrols seeking escaped laborers, though we do not have a sense yet of the percentage oflaborers who fled. From Syria and Palestine we have frequent references to brigands who left their urban homes and afflicted the little kings of the region. These brigands, termed SA.GAZ "murderer" in Sumerian, read /Jiipiru in Akkadian, have been interpreted as refugees. These refugee groups may have supplanted nomads as pressure valves for the society, becoming over the period from 1500 to 1200 RC.B. a mass phenomenon. Treaties between states tried to check the outflow ofsuch persons as we shall see in Chapter Three and may have succeeded to an

u-ga-al-li-il Rev. a-na se-ri-ia il-li-kam-ma ki-a-am iq-be-e-em 15. um-ma-a-mi UJ sa-a-[t]u lu-du-uk-ma i-na gilga-si-si-im li-is-sa-ki-in-ma wa-ar-ku-um i-na qa-ti-su li-mu-ur an-ni-tam iq-be-e-em-ma 20. a-na-ku ki-a-am a-pu-ul-su um-ma a-na-ku-ma [b]a-lum be-li-ia mi-im-ma [u]-ul te-ep-pe-es a-na be-li-ia lu-us-pu-u[r]-ma ma-li be-li i-qa-ab-be-e-em lu-pu-us an-n[i-ta]m a-pu-ul-su an-ni-tam la an-ni-[tam b]e-Ii li-is-pu[ -ra]-am

Say to my lord: Thus speaks Ibal-pi-El, your servant. 4-5 A young man of Hardum the bedouin accompanied two slave-girls, friends of his, and he fled to Subartu. 7. Uardum rejoined him and seized him in Subartu. 9. In his anger he gouged the eyes ofhis young man. He came to find me and said, "I want to kill this man and he should be placed on a pole that everyone after learn from his example." 19. This is what he said, and I responded thus: "Without my lord, you cannot do anything. I will send to my lord, and I will do all that my lord says." Here is what I responded to him. May my lord write me what should happen.

59

50 lA. Brinkman, "Forced Labor in the Middle Babylonian Period," Journal of Cuneiform Studies 32 (1980): .17-22. Mario Liverani, "Il Fuoruscitismo in Siria nella tarda eta del bronzo," Rivista Storica Italiana 77 (1965): 315-336,317,323-326,328329, and his "The Collapse of the Near Eastern Regional System at the End of the Bronze Age: The Case of Syria," in Centre and Periphery in the Ancient World, edited by Michael Rowlands et al., 66-73, 69, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987). See in general Jean Bottero, "Habiru," Reallexikon der Assyriologie 4 (1972-1975): 1427. 51 See in addition to the studies cited above M. Liverani, "~yaYK e MI~QP" in Studi in onore di Edoardo Volterra, 6: 55-74,63, (Milan: Giuffre, 1971).

60

CHAPTER TWO

REALITY OF FLIGHT

rary Ugarit promise that the slave-buyer will get the money for a debt-slave from a guarantor if the slave should flee. Also of interest are the texts in Nuzi where lUlpiru-brigands enter slavery presumably to pay off their debts." One can see in general that in spite of the comparative weakness of the states of the period, the phenomenon of flight became more important than before and even became, in the case of the biipiru, a mass phenomenon threatening the existence ofsome of the states.

In this period there were three kinds of slaves, at least as far as their legal status goes: slavesin private households, temple slaves, and royal slaves. We have little information about royal slaves, and the temple slaves were definitely a minority of all slaves. There were also dependent persons of various designations who may not have been so important in the labor force as in earlier periods. Free persons ofmoderate means might own three to five slaves, and the number of slaves was much larger than in earlier periods. The Books of Ezra and Nehemiah show that Jewish exiles returning from Babylon had slaves who constituted between a sixth and a fifth of their number." This ratio may be indicative of the percentages in the Babylonian population as a whole, although in Dandamaev's count there are about 45,000 persons attested in the texts of the period, and 1400 were slaves of one sort or another while 200 were other dependent persons, for a percentage of 3.5%, much lower than the returning Jews' 16 to 20%. In the Neo-Babylonian and Achaemenid Periods there were frequent references to runaways. One notorious runaway, BarikiiIi, confessed that he made two escape attempts; in the second he successfully posed as an official in the service of a free man. He remained abroad many days before he was found. Earlier when he was sold, it was for 23 sheqe1s of silver though most slaves fetched a whole mina, or 60 sheqels." Harborers continued to find it advantageous to take in runaway slaves. In earlier periods legal collections, which we will look at in Chapter Three below, demanded punishment for harborers; this appears not to have been the practice in later times. 56 The practice of branding some slaves continued, and owners wrote their own names on the slaves' hands. Not all slaves were

9. NEO-BABYLONIAN ESCAPE

Muhammad A. Dandamaev produced a massive study of slavery in Babylonia which looks at the institutions of slavery in the late period, from 626 to 331 B.C.E. Though he does not focus on runaways, he has numerous references to them and the responses of the bureaucracy of that time to the problem."

52 H.P.H. Petschow, Mittelbabylonische Rechts- und Verwaltungsurkunden der Hilprecht-SammlungJena, (Berlin: Akademie, 1974), text 8, 26-7, and 32-3, and text 20, 50. For Ugarit see texts in CAD A 1:46c. See in general M.1. Mirzoiev, "0 rabstve v kassiskoi Vavilonii," VestnikDrevnei Istorii 4 (1988): 109-131. For the Nuzi texts see Moshe Greenberg, The Ijablpiru, (New Haven, American Oriental Society, 1955),2329. Note the phenomenon was found in New Kingdom Egypt, as noted by Wolfgang Heick, "Sklaven," Lexikon der Agyptologie 5:7 (1984): 982-987, 984: "Wieder eingefangene fluchtige Sklaven wurden zum Tode verurteilt. Trotzdem durften sich in den entlegenen Gegenden wie den Oasen Banden gefluchteter Zwangsarbeiter (I;zsbw) wie auch von Sklaven gebildet haben, deren Bekampfung durch die Polizei belegt ist. (Runaway slaves recaptured were sentenced to death. In spite ofthis in regions hard of access like oases bands couldbe formed by escaped forced laborers and also slaves, and the struggles of the police against them are attested)." Thus runaways and maroon communities were known. 53 Slavery in Babylonia, (Dekalb, IlIinois: Northern IlIinois University Press, 1984), translating the 1974 Russian volume. The index to the English edition is quite inadequate on this issue under the topic Slaves, Temple, escapes of, 833, which has only two entries. In fact I found references to escapees, including a few free persons, on the following pages: 119, 129, 140, 153 n. 84,154-156, 159n. 90,161,163 n. 97,165-166, 184,215,217,220-228,235-237,272-3,296,330,382,386 n. 402, 392,421 n. 439a,

61

438-439,442-443,446,459 n. 498,490-499,505-507,509,511,513-514,533,537 n. 101,539,547,589-591,598-599,624,638-640,651, and 659. 54 Dandamaev, Slavery, 216-218. 55 Ibid., 221-222. 56

Ibid., 223, 227.

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labeled in that way, but some who had been sold frequently had the names of three owners on their hands. 57 Temple slaves were fewer in number, but they were worked in larger groups and were continually involved in escape attempts. Among the privately held slaves individual escapes predominated, but among temple slaves there were group attempts. 58 Slaves who were caught sometimes were put in chains and worked in special prison-like workhouses, run both by institutions and sometimes by rich individuals. Since most slaves were of local origin and most may not have been branded, it is easy to see that slipping away into the community might have been easy. 59 And clearly not everyone who was caught was thrown into a prison workhouse. Efforts to recapture slaves seem to have been haphazard. We can in general say that escape from work was a continuing phenomenon in the periods of Mesopotamian history that have been studied. Although it was not an overwhelming problem to the bureaucrats of any documented period, with the exception of the Syrian area in the late second millennium, where the bapiru roamed, it was certainly an undercurrent that appears to assert that at any time many Mesopotamians were unwilling to submit themselves to the discipline that made for civilization at one level but that also denied them rights and freedoms which they cherished. These were not philosophers or political theorists, of course, and it would be wrong to overinterpret their acts. To understand them more fully, we must now tum to the ideology as expressed by the literate elite.

57

Ibid., 229-231.

58

Ibid., 490, 496-497, 499, 651.

59

Ibid., 159-160,497,659, 103.

CHAPTER THREE

THE IDEOLOGY OF FLIGHT AND FREEDOM If some of the common people fled, to fates not perceivable with our available documentation, we must ask ourselves what the literate elite and their masters who set policy believed about flight and freedom. There is always the possibility that the written record does not display the real range of emotions connected with flight, and that there was more ambivalence of feeling, especially when high-status women and men fled. Here we will look at several genres of texts that were more or less officially sanctioned in which we find elites expressing themselves.'

I. EDICTS

We cannot be sure that royal or authoritative statements that seem similar to us would really have been seen as similar by the ancients. We are not even certain of how the material preserved in Sumerian may have affected material preserved in Akkadian. As we range to other languages and cultures, we are self-consciously collecting material that appears to us similar. But our goal is not to posit the existence of a coherent tradition of elite concern for freedom but rather to note the wide-ranging evidence that at various times and places rulers boasted of advancing freedom.

) In a sense Moshe Weinfeld's sprawling survey, Social Justice in Ancient Israel and the Ancient Near East, (Jerusalem, Minneapolis: Magnes, Fortress, 1995), expanding his 1985 Hebrew work, is an attempt to explore the ideology, but the range of terms in which he is interested is broader than here, although many of the texts he adduces are also of interest for us. Compare B.R. Foster, "Social Reform in Ancient Mesopotamia," in Social Justice in the Ancient World, edited by K.D. Irani and Morris Silver, 165-177, (Westport, Connecticut and London: Greenwood, 1995).

64

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An early example ofthe concern for freedom appears in a royal inscription from pre-Sargonic Lagas that may be dated around 2500 B.C.E. The ruler Enmetena boasted that he "canceled obligations for Lagas, having mother restored to child and child restored to mother. He canceled obligations regarding interestbearing loans." His language plays on the literal meaning of the term for the freedoms he was establishing in that he mentions restoring children, the etymological origin ofthe term for freedom or "canceled obligation." As in most royal inscriptions the point is to make the ruler look good in the eyes of his subjects and his gods. We have no archival texts from Enmetena's time that show how this decree might have been put into effect, if it was.' The Lagas ruler Uruinimgina used similar terminology in his reform texts around 2350 B.C.E. :

of their reigns, in special edicts, ofwhich parts ofthree have been preserved from the Old Babylonian period. The term "setting freedom" occurs more widely, though, in names given to years, and we believe that there may have been many more ofthese acts, even if they did not eventuate in written edicts that have come down to us. We mentioned the texts in the first chapter. The point to reiterate here is that the "freedoms" envisaged may have been very specific and limited, and perhaps of limited durations. From around 1646 B.C.E. in the Edict ofAmmisaduqa we see two kinds of material being ordered. On the one hand the text enjoins moral precepts that may be taken as representative of moral thought within the society. On the other hand the text speaks of specific kinds ofloans that would not be allowed, presumably for a defined period of time," The texts were obviously somewhat removed from practice since they came from kings in legal systems where most decisions were made by panels of elders who apparently did not feel bound by royal edicts but perhaps more by precedent. The exact function of the edicts in the legal system may have been ambiguous since there is evidence some aspects ofthis sort oflegislation did in fact parallel practice, while other aspects did not. 5 In what sense did the decrees and the sometimes associated law codes establish freedom? They limned out restrictions on official

He cleared and canceled obligations for those indentured families, citizens of Lagas living as debtors because of grain taxes, barley payments, theft or murder. We know something of the political contexts of these statements. The ruler was facing an increasingly desperate fight with a neighboring city-state and wanted to assure support for his regime from people previously downtrodden.' . The kings of Mesopotamia from the Dr III period on periodically mentioned "setting freedom," sometimes at the beginnings

2 See Jerrold S. Cooper, Presargonic Inscriptions, (New Haven: American Oriental Society, 1986),58, his La 5.4, 67 on the word play. The text, in Horst Steible, Die altsumerischen Bau- und Weihinschriften, (Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner, 1983), I: 268269, number79, runs a m a g i , Lagaskie-gar, ama dumu i-ni-gi 4 dum u a m a i - n i - g i 4, a m a - g i 4 S e - u rs - rae - gar. 3 Cooper, Presargonic, 73; Steible, Weihinschriften 1: 308-311 : 12 : 13- 22: dum u Lag a Ski, u r, - rat i -I a, g u r - g u b - b a, s e - s i - g a, n i g - z u b - a, sag - g i s - r a - a, e- bun - b i, e - I u b, a m a - g i 4 e - gar, following Cooper's suggestion to read e- bun, 74, n. 26. For the politics see Horst Klengel, et aI., Kulturgeschichte des alten Vorderasien, (Berlin: Akademie, 1989), 51-52, and Jerrold S. Cooper, ReconstructingHistoryfrom AncientInscriptions: the Lagash-Umma Border Conflict, (Malibu: Undena, 1983),33-36. v

4 The basic study is Fritz R. Kraus, Kiinigliche Verfiigungen in altbabylonischer Zeit, (Leiden: Brill, 1984). Compare Dominique Charpin, "L'anduriirum a Mari," MA.R.I. 6 (1990): 253-270, where he argues that though there are no such edicts from Mari, references in archival texts to events "after the anduriirum" show something similar was going on. On the relations of the edicts to each other see W.W. Hallo, "Slave Release in the BiblicalWorld in Light of a New Text," in Solving Riddles and Untying Knots. Biblical, Epigraphic, and Semitic Studies in Honor of Jonas C. Greenfield, edited by Ziony Zevit, Seymour Gitin, and Michael Sokoloff, 79-93, 79-81, (Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 1995). 5 Rivkah Harris, "The Naditu Laws of the Code of Hammurabi in Praxis," Orientalia Nova Series 39 (1961): 63-69, and Herbert Petschow, "Die [Paragraphen] 45 und 46 des Codex Harnmurapi. Ein Beitrag zum altbabylonischen Bodenpachtrecht und zum Problem: Was ist der Codex Harnmurapi?" Zeitschrijtfir Assyriologie 74 (1984): 181-212.

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intervention in the lives ofindividuals. They did not usually speak ofreforming previous abuses, but Uruinimgina had done just that earlier. So one could say that no general charters ofincreased civil liberties were envisaged, but the enactments did aim for improvement in economic life and in the lots of persons who had previously been oppressed. When the treatment of actual slaves was considered, edicts were not supportive of freedom for slaves. As noted in Chapter One, Samsuiluna's short and poorly preserved edict makes it clear that actual slaves were not to be freed by the edict, and Ammisaduqa' s paragraphs 20-21 state that though the king wanted to free persons who had been pawned for a loan, other slaves were not to be freed by the edict. Outside of central Mesopotamia, though we lack the edicts themselves, we can see that a similar kind ofremission must have been promulgated. Some Old Babylonian period Alalak:h texts from northern Syria are contracts that seek to protect the parties from interference in their agreements; the cliche is that "the silver shall not be reduced, or subject to a freedom edict.:" From somewhat later in the same period from Hana on the middle Euphrates we have in the context of real estate deals a similar phrase: This is a field "which cannot be reclaimed or (subject to) remission ofdebt." Also there is a year name promulgated by a king of Hana that announces that it was the year in which he set a remission in his land. Also a king of Hana with a Kassite name had a year name in which he established ''justice,'' me-se-ra, which may mean about the same thing; the same king in another year name proclaims he established ''justice'' a second time, meaning it had not worked too well the first time.'

In the Hittite area is an instance ofa king' s boasting of freedom that was manifestly incomplete. The Old Hittite King Hattusili I (1550s RC.E.) conquered a North Syrian area called Hahhu and claimed:

6 David J. Wiseman, TheAlalakh Tablets, (London: British Institute ofArchaeology

at Ankara, 1953),29:9-11 kaspum u-ul us-sa-ap u-ul it-ta-ra-ar, and among others 65:6-7, a slave woman shall not be freed, i-na an-da-ra-ri-im, u-ul i-na-an-da-ar. 7 See Kraus, Verfiigungen, 99-100, and the contract clauses in Olivier Rouault L 'Archive dePuzurum, (Malibu: Undena, 1984), 13:16-17,14: 19-20,16:21-22 19: 14~ 15. '

67

I, the great King Tabarna, have taken the grinding stones from the hands of the female slaves and the work from the hands of the male slaves, and I freed them from contributions and corvee. I have loosened their belts and given them to the Sun-goddess of Arinna, my lady.

The Akkadian version of the text adds: "Under the sky I have established their freedom." But rather obviously they were free only of their former labor, not of their bondage in general." The edict of the last significant Hittite King, Tudhaliya IV (1265-1240) implies a release ofdebts which was petitioned for by a group ofcitizens, the men ofHatti. 9 The actual decree ofrelease must have stood in the now broken section column I: 13-16. The next column addresses instances where releases would not be allowed including land that had been pledged (11:1-2) and blood ransom (II: 3-6). Punishments for theft were not to be affected by the edict (II:8-10). But a slave who had been punished for theft by blinding would be released to his master (11:11-15). Later passages related to royal granaries that had been unlawfully opened (III: 3-11). Naturally having only one such decree from this language area makes it hard to judge the reality of the measure. The other Hittite edict, that of Te1epinu (1525-1500 RC.E.) regulates administration and the rules ofroyal succession

8 Translations after Erich Neu, Das hurritische Epos der Freilassung I, (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 1996), 11-12. Does the Akkadian phrase mean to make the statement more general? See Fiorella Imparati, "L'Autobiografia di Hattusili I," Studi Classici e Orientali 14 (1965): 44-85,79,82.

9 See R. Westbrook and R. Woodard, "The Edict of Tudhaliya IV," Journal ofthe American Oriental Society 110 (1990): 641-659,642. Note Trevor Bryce, The Kingdom ofthe Hittites, (Oxford: Clarendon, 1998), dates the king 1237-1209.

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and does not deal with debt release. 10 Because Tudhaliya IV stood near the end of Hittite greatness, it is tempting to see his edict as atte~pti~g to stave off decline, but in fact there is little sign of a declme m state power under his reign, so a simplistic political answer for why the edict was created appears not to work. 11 . The Hittite-Hurrian bilingual referred to briefly above deals with the theme of remission of debt, but it is a song presumably ab.out a distant .time and the precedents set then. The setting is said to be Ebla In Syria, and the king ofEbla discusses remission with the wealthy citizens, who are opposed to it. They speak: Assuming that we release them, who will give us to eat? They are our cup-bearers...they are our cooks...they spin wool for us! If you want a debt-release, you must release your own male and female slaves!12 Apparently the Eblaite king, Meki, presented the idea as the will of the ~e~ther-god Tessu~, who had commanded it as "purifying from sm. An eloquent nch spokesman opposed the idea in the Eblaite assembly, and the assembly refused to authorize a general debt release: [If Tessub.] oppressed by debt(?), [as]ks(?) [for help], if Tessub is (e~er). [in d~]bt(?), then everyone [will give] to Tessub. Everyone wIlI.gIve [him] a half shekel [of gold], and we will [eachgive] silver t~ him. But if Tessub is (ever) hungry, then each of us will give to him one (measure)ofbarley....But ifTessub is (ever)naked, each of

10 S ' . 11 ee Westbrook and Woodard, 'Edict," 642, and Bryce, Kingdom, 114-118.

. See Bryce, Kingdom, 326-360 on the reign, 358-360 evaluating the king's achievements 12

Harry A Hoffner, Jr., "Hurrian Civilization from a Hittite Perspective," in Urkesh and the Hurrians. Studies in H.0nor ofLloyd Cotsen, (Malibu: Undena, 1998), 167-200, 1~2. See.a.lso Neu, l!~os, and his study, "Knechtschaft und Freiheit. Betrachtungen iiber em ~umtlsch-hethltlsches Textenensemble aus Hattusa," in Religionsgeschichtliche Beziehungen ~ischen Kleinasien, Nordsyrien und dem Alten Testament, edited by Bemd.!a~owskl, ~laus.Koch, and Gemot Wilhelm, 329-361, (Freiburg, Switzerland, and Gottmgen: Universitatsverlag and Vandenhoeck and Ruprecht, 1993).

IDEOLOGY

69

us will clothe him...with a garment. But if Tessub is ill(?), each of us will give him fine oiL.We will pour out a heap of grain for him and we will redeem(?) him...from dire need(?). We will save him, Tessub, from the creditor(?). But we will make no debt release.13 The idea seems to be that the wealthy would have been happy to come to the aid of either the mythological god or his temple establishment ifthey really were in trouble, but they saw no need to help out mere poor people, in spite of the king' s perception of the god's will for social justice to be done. In another part of the fragmentary text a god, probably the same one, demands the debt release: If [you make] a debt release in Ebla, [the city of the throne,] and if you [make] a debt [release], I will exalt your weapon[s...]. Your weapons will begin [to conquer]enemies. [Your] plowed land [will prosper] in glory. But if [you] do not make a debt release for Ebla, the city of the throne, in the space of seven days I will come upon you....I will destroy [the city of] Ebla, the city of the throne. I [will make] it like that never existed. I will break the surrounding wall ofEbla's [lower] city like a cup. I will flatten the surrounding wall ofthe upper (city and make the area) like a garbage dump.14 Although we do not understand in what context this text was preserved, and what it might have meant to Hittites or Hurrians, it seems obvious that the eventual fall ofthe ancient and magnificent city ofEbla in Syria was being attributed to the insensitivity ofthe rich toward the poor and their failure to agree to a debt release. We have notoriously few Hittite archival texts with which we might weigh the practical application of the idea of debt release, and this text is placed in what for the Hittites was ancient history, presumably around 2400 B.C.E. The Hurrian text may be the original and the Hittite a translation. This discussion seems to be

13 Ibid., 182. 14 Ibid., 182-183.

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suggestively similar to that among Jews under Nehemiah, which we wi11look at in Chapter Five below. From Nuzi in central Iraq in the Middle Babylonian period (1400-1200 B.C.E.) we have references in contracts written "after the proclamation of the remission." Many others speak more vaguely of agreements "after the new edict." As before the idea was to guarantee that the contract would not be abrogated by an order, probably by the king, that enforced his remission ofdebts. 15 Further afield is the New Kingdom Egyptian decree of Seti I (1318-1304 RC.E.) found in Nubia. 16 There the point seems to have been to limit depredations by Egyptian officials on dependent laborers working for organizations in the Egyptian town of Abydos, and the edict was probably not to be applied to the entire population. The goal was "to prevent wrong being done to any person belonging to the Foundation..." or Egyptian organization. Cattle and women were not to be taken arbitrarily, but ordinary corvee duty was still permitted. Enactments may have had a direct effect, but were limited to particular cities under particular rulers. For example, when Nabonidus, the last Babylonian king ofBabylon, who ruled from 555 to 539 RC.E., installed his daughter as a priestess in Dr, he exempted the temple from all demands for corvee labor.'?

Herodotus briefly mentions an edict issued after the Persian king Cambyses' death in 522 RC.E. by a pretender to the throne:

70

Forno soonerdidhe come to the thronethan forthwithhe sentround to everynation under his rule, and grantedthem freedom from warservice and from taxes for a space ofthree years.18 Another Persian decree about which little is known is referred to in the Biblical book of Esther, 2:18, referring to Xerxes, around 480 RC.E.: Thenthe king gave a great banquetto all his princes and servants; it was Esther's banquet. He also granted a remission of taxes to the provinces, and gave gifts with royal liberality. 19 In the Greek tradition we have reflections on the work of Solon, the Athenian lawgiver ruling 594/3 RC.E., in the composition known as "The Constitution ofAthens," by a student ofAristotle, after 322: 20

18 Herodotus III, 67: freedom or exemption from war-service is !X't€A€lTJV <J'tpa'tTJlTJ<;; taxes are tribute, <j>opo<;. 19 iln\!J):) nN )~1::l}l) )~1'U"J:::>? ?n::l nn\!J):) 1?):)n \!J}l~)

):)n 1':::> nN\!J):) )n') n\!JY m)'1):)? rrom 1nON 15 Texts are quoted

sadatu "edict," CAD

in CAD A 2:1166 under andurdru; others are adduced under

S 3:195. See in general Barry Eichler, Indenture at Nuzi, (New

Haven and London: Yale UniversityPress, 1973),32-34. 16 William F. Edgerton, "The Nauri Decree of Seti I. A Translation and Analysis of the Legal Portion," Journal ofNear Eastern Studies 6 (1947): 219-230, quotation from 221, I.A.2. See also Kenneth A. Kitchen, "Nauridekret," Lexikon der Agyptologie 4:3 (1980): 361-362and HelmutBrunner, "Immunitat," ibid. 3 (1971): 151-152,noting there are other tax exemption decrees from the Old Kingdom, but the Nauri decree is more detailed. For a fictionalreflectionofthe decree compareChristianJacq, Ramses. The Son ofLight, (London: Simon & Schuster, 1997),301: "Seti published his decree all over the country, even as far as Nauri in the Nubian desert, where it was strikingly carved on a stone twice as tall as a man." 17 SeeM. A. Dandamaev,Slavery in Babylonia. 45 andn. 2: su-bar-ra-su-nu as-kunu "I establishedtheir freedom."

The Septuagint omits the last phrase and translates the one before it Kat ii€<Jtv E1tol!1<J€V "and he made a release." 20 On the doubts aboutthe author see Peter J. Rhodes, "Athenaion politeia," in The Oxford Classical Dictionary, edited by Simon Hornblower and Antony Spawforth, (Oxford:OxfordUniversityPress, 1996,3rd edition),203. On the problemsof seeingthe work of the historical Solon in these materials see Claude Mosse, "Comment s'elabore un mythe politique: Solon, 'Pere fondateur' de la democratie athenienne," Annales Economies Societes Civilisations 34:3 (1979):425-437, most ofthe materials probably coming from the fourth, not the sixth century, 436. Note that later traditionheld that Solon and other lawgivershad been influenced by Egyptians;see Diodorus Siculus (d. 30 RC.E.), I, 79, 98, translatedin Edwin Murphy, The Antiquities ofEgypt, (New Brunswick, London: Transaction, 1990), 99-100, 126128,and Anne Burton, Diodorus Siculus. Book I. A Commentary, (Leiden:Brill, 1972), 194, equating Diodorus's B01<XOpt<; with Bakenrenef (720?-715 RC.E.), a 241h Dynasty king of Egypt, about whom "Very little is known...apart from the evidence of the Classical authors."

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CHAPTER THREE

As soon as Solon had been entrusted with full powers to act, he liberated the people by prohibiting loans on the person ofthe debtor, both for the present and for the future. He made laws and enacted a cancellation of debts both private and public, a measure which is commonly called seisachtheia (the shaking offofburdens), since in this way they shook off their burdens. In regard to this measure, some people try to discredit him. For it happened that when Solon was about to enact the seisachtheia, he informed some of his acquaintances of his plans, and when he did so, according to the version ofthe adherents ofthe popular party, he was outmaneuvered by his friends; but, according to those who wish to slander him, he himself shared in the gain. For these people borrowed money and bought a great extent ofland; and a short time afterwards, when the cancellation of debts was put through, they became very rich. It is said that this was the origin ofthose who later were considered to be ofancient wealth. However, the version ofthe friends ofthe people appears much more trustworthy."

The controversial nature of Solon's freeing is clear in the discussion, but the close connection to Ancient Near Eastern rhetoric about it is more obvious in a composition attributed to Solon, quoted in the same source: My best witness before the tribunal of posterity will be the great mother of the Olympian Gods, black Earth. For I removed the markstones of'bondage" which had been fastened upon her everywhere; and she who had then been a slave is now free. I brought home to Athens, to their fatherland, many Athenians who, lawfully or unlawfully, had been sold abroad, and others who, having fled their country under dire constraint of debts, no longer spoke the Attic tongue-so wide had been their wanderings.

I also restored to freedom those who here at home had been subjected to shameful servitude, and trembled before their masters."

And a little later in the same composition Solon says: I enacted laws for the noble and the vile alike, setting up a straight rule ofjustice for everybody."

Plutarch, who lived till after 120 C.B., in his life ofSolon used the same poem to show Solon's achievement, but noted that "some, as Androtion [died 340 B.C.E.], affirm that the debts were not canceled, but the interest only lessened," though Plutarch doubted that. 25 The Rosetta Stone, the key to the decipherment of Egyptian after it was discovered in 1799 C.E., records decrees in the reign of Ptolemy V Epiphanes in 196 B.C.E., loosening some governmental burdens: ...and of the revenues and tax-collections existing in Egypt he entirely remitted some and others he has lightened, in order that the native people and all others might be in a state of serenity during his reign, and the royal debts, which both those in Egypt and those in the rest of his kingdom owed and which were many in number, he remitted, and those who had been led off to prisons and those who were since long ago under accusation he freed from their charges. 26

Another Graeco-Egyptian ruler Ptolemy VIII Euergetes II and his sister and wife proclaimed an amnesty in 118 B.C.E. apparently at

Ibid., 79. Ibid., 80. 25 Plutarch, Life of Solon 15f., in The Lives ofthe Noble Grecians and Romans, translated by John Dryden, (New York: Modem Library, n.d.), 106. 26 Roger S. Bagnall and Peter Derow, Greek Historical Documents:The Hellinistic 23

24

21 Kurt von Fritz and Ernst Kapp, Aristotle's Constitution ojAthens and Related Texts, (New York, London: Hafner, Co1lier-Macmillan 1950 1974) 73. 22 ' , , These were stones set up on the lands offarmers who had mortgaged their land.

73

Period, (Chico, California: Scholars, 1981),226-230,227.

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the conclusion of a civil war between the king and his sister. Among the elements they proclaimed is the following:

motivation for the composition ofthe texts, but that was probably a literary topos or cliche. The kings wished to be seen doing something effective in the face of economic crises, but there were no mechanisms for determining if an actual economic crisis existed, and there is little indication that kings were sophisticated in their economic thought. Still, it is significant that the assumption was always that the government ought to have some sort of response to a perceived economic crisis." Let us look at two of the prologues that discuss freedom. Around 2050 RC.E. a king in the so-called Ur-Nammu Code writes,

And they remit to everyone the arrears of the corvee-tax." Also officials were not to "impress any of the inhabitants of the country for private services...nor compel them to work without payment on any pretext whatever." The royal family also legislated against enslavement for debt: And they have decreed that collectors of foreign debts shall not on any pretext whatever attach the persons ofthe cultivators of Crown land or those who work for state interests or the others whom the previouslyissued decrees forbidto be broughtup for accusation,but the exactionoftheir debts shallbe made from their property in so far as it is not exempted in the present decree. It is not clear that this is a general exemption, and we do not know what exactly a foreign debt is. 28 There were several other Ptolemaic edicts of remission that have not been so well preserved. Rostovzeff speculated that they must have been a genre that was traditional in Egypt which the Greek rulers accepted, calling the genre 1:& 7t<X "acts of kindness to people." 29

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I freed the Akkadians and foreigners (?) in the lands of Sumer and Akkad, for those conductingforeign maritime trade (free from) the sea-captains, for the herdsmen (free from) those who appropriate oxen, sheep, and donkeys. At that time, by the might of Nanna, my lord, I established the freedom of Aksak, Marad, Girkal, Kazallu, and their settlements, and for Usarum, whatever (territories) were under the subjugation of Ansan." The term used here is the same for manumission of slaves, and the image is one offreeing up commerce from governmental interference. From about 1930 RC.E. in the prologue to Lipit-Istar's legal collection the king boasts:

2. LEGAL COLLECTIONS

In Mesopotamian law codes, a related genre of texts, economic distress appears in the few texts with preambles as the major

27 A.S. Hunt and C.C. Edgar, Select Papryi 2, (Cambridge, London: Harvard and Heinemann, 1934, 1964), item 120, 60-61: arears of the corvee-tax is O€lAO/lEVOU A€l1:0UPYlKOU. Compare Bagnall and Derow, Documents, 80-85. 28 Ibid., 72-73. "Foreign debt" is 'T:OUe; 'T:~V ~€VlK~V 1tpaK'T:Opae;. 29 Michael Rostovzeff, The Social and Economic History ofthe Hellenistic World, (Oxford: Clarendon, 1941), 2:878-882.

At that time I undid the slavery and established the freedom of the sons and daughtersof the city of Nippur, the sons and daughters of the city ofUr, the sons and daughtersofthe city ofIsin, the sons and

30 Dietz Otto Edzard, "Soziale Reformen im Zweistromland bis 1600 v. Chr.: Realitat oder literarischen Topos?" Acta Antiqua 22 (1974): 145-156. 31 Martha T. Roth, Law Collections from Mesopotamia and Asia Minor, (Atlanta: Scholars, 1995), 15-16. For transliteration of this and subsequent texts see Appendix II.

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daughters of the lands of Sumer and Akkad, who were subjugated [by the yoke?] and I restored them to their place."

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repaid with another slave's labor, perhaps just for a month. The monetary equivalent is attested occasionally as a low price for an Old Babylonian male slave in texts from about the same era as Lipit-Istar; it would seem a punitively high amount to pay for the use of a slave for a month." From somewhat later in the same period comes the collection of legal instances in Akkadian language found at Esnunna in the Diyala region of northem Iraq. A relevant passage is:

The language is ofgeneral freedom, but the reference might be to the special privileges and exemptions that people in the two cities mentioned ought to enjoy, as well as to a more general freedom for all of Sumer and Akkad. When the subject ofrefugees arises in the legal texts, one finds predictably that the powers that be were not sympathetic to flight. And people who knowingly harbored such slaves were subject to penalties as, presumably, the slaves were." The earliest relevant text is from Lipit-Istar, king ofIsin:

Esnunna 50 If the governor, the river commissioner or another official, whoever it may be, seizes a lost slave, a lost slave-girl, a lost ox, a lost donkey belonging to the palace or a muskenum and does not surrender it to Esnunna but keeps it in his house, allowing more than a month to pass, the palace shallprosecute him for theft.35

Lipit-Istar 12Ifa slave-girlor slave ofa man has fled within the city and it has been confirmed that he (or she) dwelt in the house of (another) man for one month, he shall give slave for slave. 13 Ifhe has no slave, he shall pay fifteen shekels of silver.

Again the issue here is that a member of the ruling class failed to surrender an escapee, or any other kind of animate property, including animals. The exact punishment is not stated, but the government felt an obligation to intervene, though note that the culprit was a government official, not a simple harborer ofescaped property. In the next paragraph the law-givers deal with the problem of slave movement:

Here the householder encouraged or harbored the runaway for a considerable period; the reason he might do so was his need for additional labor. This was a breach in ruling-class ethics, but the short-term advantage to the harborermust have been more obvious to many than the advantages of ruling-class solidarity. The idea of the punishment seems to be that the slave's labor would be

Esnunna 51 A slave or a slave-girl of Esnunna who bears fetters, 32

shackles, or a slave hairlock shall not leave the gate of Esnunna without his owner's permission.

Ibid., 25.

33 Raymond Westbrook, "Slave and Master," 1670-1673, surveys these texts on flight. Compare W.G. Clarence-Smith, "Runaway Slaves and Social Banditry in Southern Angola," in Out of the House of Bondage. Runaways, Resistance and Marronage in Africa and the New World, edited by Gad Heuman, 23-33, (London: Frank Cass, 1986),27: "When labour was scarce, masters did all they could to entice slaves away from their owners." And see Thomas D. Morris, Southern Slavery and the Law, 1619-1860, (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1996),334-335, noting that harboring was seen to be related to "inveigling," which was getting someone else's slave to work for you; at first such conduct was only "ungentlemanly," but increasingly it was seen as a crime. Still, whites did take in runaways, sometimes for altruistic motives if they felt them cruelly treated by others, and sometimes for selfish motives to increase their own labor force; see Eugene D. Genovese, Roll, Jordan, Roll, (New York: Vintage, 1976), 42, 644.

Here the issue was prevention of escape, and the hope was apparently that all slaves would have some such mark indicating their status. This stipulation seems within the purview ofthe city

34 On Mesopotamian slave prices, see Howard Farber, "An Examination of Long Term Fluctuations in Prices and Wages for Northern Babylonia During the Old Babylonian Period," M.A. Thesis, Northern Illinois University, Dekalb, 1974,24. 35 Roth, Law Collections, 66-67. A muSkenum was probably a simple citizen; see Martin Stol, "Muskenum," Reallexikon der Assyriologie 8 (1997): 492-493.

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government to regulate access through the city gate. Each of the signs of servitude was, however, easily removable, though one might look funny after a haircut to remove a top-knot. It is easy to see that the regulation was not sufficient to stop escape. The opposite case is also treated:

From about 1760 B.C.E. the much larger collection made under Hammurapi deals with escaped slaves in two places, paragraphs 15-20 and 226-227:

Esnunna 52 A slave or a slave-girl who has entered the gate of -Esnunna in the custody of the (foreign) envoy shall bear fetters, shackles, or a slave hairlock but remains in the custody of his master.

Here the authorities wished to assure that the removable signs of slavery were maintained at least within the city even if foreigners were involved. This appears to indicate that the authorities could not rely on custom elsewhere in their cultural sphere to guarantee that there would be a physical manifestation of slave status, and they saw that this fact complicated their administering of the regulations about slaves, and it kept them from preventing the escape of slaves. Esnunna 30 also is concerned with the ostensibly free person who leaves: If a man repudiates his city and his master and then flees, and someone else then married his wife, whenever he returns he will have no claim on his wife."

The possible penalty besides the loss ofhis wife is not discussed, and what the relation to the master might be is also passed over. Flight clearly could be attractive to persons of several statuses.

36 Note the parallel with Hammurapiparagraph 136 without a master but with the same judgment, Roth, Law Collections, 107: If a man deserts his city and flees, and after his departure his wife enters another's house--ifthat man then should return and seize his wife, because he repudiatedhis city and fled, the wife of the deserter (munabtim) will not return to her husband.

Hammurapi 15 Ifa man has helped either a male slave ofthe palace or a female slave ofthe palace or a male slave ofa private citizen or a female slave ofa private citizen to escape through the city-gate, he shall be put to death.

Again the first problem tackled is the member of the ruling class who actually helps a slave escape; beyond the city-gate lay fields and then the steppe, where a slave could disappear. The harshness of this stipulation is in contrast to the earlier collections dealing with a similar situation and is typical of Hammurapi's codification. It may be argued that Hammurapi was trying not to impose a desert toughness on the city-dwellers but to assure that legal decisions were applied consistently, even ifthe culprit were rich and could buy his way out ofthe punishment under other conceptions of law." Next the harborer is considered: Hammurapi 16 If a man has harbored in his house either a fugitive male or female slave belonging to the state or to a private citizen and has not brought him forth at the public proclamation of the herald, that householder shall be put to death.

The harboring is "hiding." The punishment is the same, but the instance is different in that the slave had not escaped the city. The herald had yelled abroad the fact of the escape, and the culprit ignored the news. Again the culprit probably hoped to increase his own labor force. The administrationbelieved that local authorities would be organized enough to have a herald walk around yelling

See J.J. Finkelstein, "Arnmisaduqa's Edict and the Babylonian 'Law Codes,", Journal ofCuneiform Studies 15 (1961): 91-104,98. 37

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this news. This is certainly a basic element of a system to detect escaped slaves, but it may not have been widespread. The next paragraph proceeds to the reward due one who returns a runaway:

kept or retained the slave, who might otherwise have wished to leave, even to return to the rightful master, but this paragraph is clearly a continuation of 17 and 18, where the slave had been caught outside. Again, ruling class solidarity was broken, and a harsh punishment was meted out. Lawmakers then examined the possibility of escape:

Hammurapi 17Ifaman caught a fugitivemale or female slave in the open and has taken him to his owner, the owner of the slave shall pay him two shekels of silver. A reward is envisioned for a free man's doing his duty to the slave society. The "open" is the steppe, the uncultivated area between city-administered farmland. Two shekels was a substantial amount, although a fraction of the value of the slave. The case was then elaborated: Hammurapi 18 If that slave has not named his owner, he shall take him to the palace in order that his circumstances may be investigated, and they shall return him to his owner. The slave did not have to cooperate in his own capture. The supposition was that local knowledge obtainable by the administrators would be sufficient to elucidate what the slave would rather have hidden. It is not clear what might happen if the slave were unknown, or, indeed, how one would know that the slave was a slave, especially if he or she denied it. Paragraph 18 underlines the basic assumption of a slave-holding society, that the government especially should concern itselfwith making sure the servile were in their places. The person who succeeded in the clandestine harboring was considered next: Hammurapi 19 Ifhe has kept that slave in his house (and) later the slave has been found in his possession, that man shall be put to death. This instance seems to be the same as paragraph 16, though different verbs were used iirtaqima versus iktaliisu). In 19 he had

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Hammurapi 20 Ifthe slave has escaped from the hand ofhis captor, that man shall so affirmby god to the owner ofthe slave and he shall then go free. The person who was trying, but failed, to do his duty to the slave society would suffer in that it would be unpleasant to have to take an oath, but the legal text held that he ought not to be punished because he had once caught the wily escaping slave. In later paragraphs Hammurapi' s compilers were concerned with the manipulation of the slave haircut: Hammurapi226 Ifa barber cut off the slavehaircut of a slavenot his own without the consent of the owner ofthe slave, they shall cut off the hand of that barber. The context is that ofworkers who were not careful in their work, and here the barber was in collusion with the escaping slave. Also, though, the owner could allow the removal ofthe mark, but we do not know why one would do so except at the time of manumission. The next section deals with a free person's having a barber remove a slave's slave haircut: Hammurapi227 Ifa man deceiveda barber so that he has cut off the slave haircut of a slavenot his own, they shall put that man to death and immurehim at his gate; the barber shall swear,"I did not cut (it) off knowingly," and then he shall go free. A free third party was the one to suffer if he passed as the master and allowed the slave haircut to come off. Then, reasonably, the

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barber was not liable, and the man suffered a horrible fate at his own gate. From a later time and less clearly connected to the Mesopotamian tradition we have the Hittite Laws. The Hittite compilation may have been made over several generations, starting perhaps as early as 1650 RC.E. and culminating around 1200 B.C.E., from Asia Minor, now Turkey. Its relevant passages include: Hittite 22 If a male slave runs away and someone brings him back, ifhe seizes him nearby, his owner shall give shoes to the finder; if he seizes him near this side of the river, he shall pay 2 shekels of silver; if on the other side of the river, he shall pay 3 shekels of silver." This section addresses the rewards to come to the one who returned a runaway, in increasing amounts depending on the distance over which the returned had to bring the slave; it is amusing that shoes were used as a cheap money for this purpose. Hittite 23 Ifa male slave runs away and goes to the land ofLuwiya, his owner shall pay 6 shekels of silver to whoeverbrings him back. If a male slave runs away and goes into an enemy country, whoever brings him back shall keep the slave for himself. Luwiya was distant from the Hittite capital, but it seems to have had political connections with Hatti so that Hittite legal claims might be enforceable there." The tariff of rewards increases, culminating in the reward ofthe slave himself, who must have cost more than six shekels.

38 Roth, Law Collections, 220. 39 See Harry A. Hoffner, Jr., The Laws ofthe Hittites, (Leiden: Brill, 1997), 101, and E. Laroche, "Luwier, Luwisch, Lu(w)iya," Reallexikon der Assyriologie 7 (1988): 181-184.

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Hittite 24 If a male or female slave runs away, the one at whose hearth the slave-owner finds him or her shall pay one month's wages: 12 shekels of silver for a man, and six shekels of silver for a woman." The principle here as elsewhere is that the harborer must pay for the work that the slave presumably did for him. The version reproduced here implies that the slave was away only a short time, while the New Hittite version foresees a year's absence before discovery. The stipulation clearly shows that some people did harbor slaves, and among the punishments for harboring, this one is a light one. . Finally in the Hittite collection is an obscure stipulation that may relate to a runaway: Hittite 173bIfa slave declareshimself free from his owner, he shall go into a clay jar. The punishment is quite obscure. Some suggest that the slave was to sit in a cistern and think about misdeeds as a punishment or perhaps that he should submit to an ordeal that would determine guilt. The verb implies physical assault on the master, and in the New Hittite context the punishment probably led to death; obviously this rebellion was abad thing." The Middle Assyrian laws from before 1070 B.C.E. did not concern themselves with this sort of question, but we learn obliquely of attitudes when lawgivers dealt with wives who deserted their husbands:

40 The Old Hittite manuscript from around 1700 B.C.E. reads thus; the New Hittite manuscript from around 1200 reads "shall pay one year's wages: 100 shekels of silver for a man 50 shekels of silver for a woman." See H. Hoffner in Roth, Law Collections, 238 n. 15';the transliteration in Appendix II gives the New Hittite reading. 41 Roth, Law Collections, 234, and see H. Hoffner's note, ibid, 240, n. 56. Hoffner, Laws, 139 and n. 476 and 219-220. Compare Fiorella Imparati, Le Leggi lttite, (Rome: Ateneo, 1964): "he will be punished with an ignominious capital punishment, the character of which still remains obscure" 305 and n. 2.

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Middle Assyrian 24 If a man's wife, having deserted her husband, has entered the house of another Assyrian, either in the same city or in some neighboring city, where he set her up in a house, residing with the mistress of the house, staying the night three or four nights, without the master ofthe house knowing that the man's wife was residing in his house, and later that woman has been caught, the master of the house whose wife deserted him shall cut off (the ears of) his wife and (not) take her back; they shall cut off the ears ofthe man's wife with whom his wife resided; ifhe pleases, her husband may pay three talents thirty minas (12,600 shekels) of lead as her value, or if he wishes, he may take his wife back. However, if the master of the house knew that the man's wife was residing in the house with his wife, he shall pay triple. However, ifhe has denied it by declaring, "I did not know," they shall go to the river for the water ordeal. However, if the man in whose house the other man's wife was residing has turned back from the river, he shall pay triple; if the man whose wife deserted him has turned back from the river, he is clear since he shall bear the expenses for the river ordeal. However, if the man whose wife deserted him does not cut off (the ears of) his wife and takes her back, there is no punishment at all." The principle is the same as for the harborer of slaves in earlier compilations. Punishments were monetary for the harborer, but the runaway wife suffered physical mutilation, as did her friend. The cases show that one might assume female solidarity, as the female friend harbored the runaway from a possibly abusive situation. And the focus ofthe section is on whether the husband ofthe friend knew the runaway was present. The Middle Assyrian Laws concern themselves especially with female behavior, and these instances are directly connected to the assertion of male power over females, but the lawgivers recognized that the men were not always fully informed, even about who was in the house. The river ordeal was used, as the oath was earlier, as a way of invoking the gods' assurance that justice was served.

42 Roth,

Law Collections, 161-162.

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The following chart presents a scheme of what is discussed in laws: Laws on Runaways Collection: Lipit-Istar Esnunna Hammurapi Hittite Middle Assyrian Date

1930B.C.E. 1900

1760

slave punished

1200

1077

ttl

harborer punished ttl

ttl

ttl

slave haircut

ttl

ttl

ttl

The interesting thing about the legal material is that it did not usually deal with the punishment ofthe escaping slaves. Although they might be punished privately by their owners, very little is said about this issue. Instead the slave appears to be a non-person around whom free persons commit acts that may be punishable. The harborer, who must have been a common figure to judge from the laws, was punished for stealing the labor ofthe runaway slave. One gets from the Middle Assyrian case the image of a sprawling household in which the master might not even know if his wife were harboring a runaway. From the legal material one cannot confidently deduce what actually happened in particular instances of flight. It is clear that slave flight was a preoccupation of the ruling classes, and it was uniformly condemned. The fact that free persons aided slaves implies that the class solidarity some of the rulers would have liked to foster was not universal, and, more concretely, that free persons had clear consciences about appropriating other people's slaves ifthey happened to run away. We do not know from legal material how the successful runaway was regarded. It is probable that the runaway who did not attain his own village might suffer in a limbo ofstatus, where a harborer might treat him like a slave,

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but others might not know ofhis former servitude. He might have been held hostage by the new master because ofhis former status, and that might have been almost as bad as being a slave.

3. TREATIES

Another source for ideological information is the international treaty. There, however, the question is acutely posed of whether the runaways envisioned were of slave status. It does not appear that they frequently were. Erich Ebeling suggested that there was an ancient distinction between the flight ofthe free and that ofthe unfree. While it is conceivable that he was right, it does not appear that there was any difference in the vocabulary of flight; that is, the same terms were used to describe escape, regardless of the person's status." It is well to remember why the two categories ofrunaways, free and slave, would be of concern to the authorities. Free runaways . were a worry because of their potential political power. As in the case of the exiled Syrian prince Idrimi, which we will examine below, a free exile, ifhe were well-connected, could raise an army among his foreign hosts and eventually return to rule in the place ofthose who had made his life unpleasant. Thus rulers would try to require the return ofexiled free persons who were revolutionaries. Slaves and other laborers appeared to be less of a threat to the well-being of rulers in that they rarely could raise armies abroad, and probably it would not have occurred to most of them to try. 43 "Fluchtling," Reallexikon der Assyriologie 3 (1957): 88-90. It might also be argued that there was a distinction between debt -slaves and other slaves. Hammurapi' s collection (paragraph 117) and the Hebrew Bible (Exodus 21:2-11 and Deuteronomy 15: 12-18) legislated leniency for the debt-slave and limited the years ofservice to three and six, respectively. The reason for the three-year term may derive from the idea that a loan should be considered paid offwhen the equivalent ofthe principal had been paid, and agricultural loans were usually at 33 1/3% annual interest, as suggested by Michael Hudson, "How Interest Rates Were Set, 2500 BC-l 000 AD," Journal ofthe Economic and Social History ofthe Orient 43,2 (2000): 132-161, 158.

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Persons of low status, they probably mostly hoped simply to get away from their oppressive situations, and usually they had no conception of returning to free others. Even the much later and better documented Roman slave revolts showed little concern for establishing the freedom of others; instead Spartacus and his fellows wished to make themselves masters of other slaves. One might argue that in societies in which the work of slaves was essential, slave escape would be just as important as the escape of non-slaves in the view of the state, but it is fairly clear that the rulers did not see the situation in that light. They did not conceive that the gradual decay of their stock of slaves would eventuate in a total depletion ofslaves, which might affect their economic wellbeing. We believe that usually the number ofslaves in Mesopotamia was not high anyway, and thus the escape of even all slaves might be seen as economically meaningless. Even in later societies that were much more dependent on slaves, it appears that owners frequently tolerated runaways and did not bother to search for them because it was too much trouble, and the absenteeism usually did not lead to successfullong-tenn flight." International treaties date from the third millennium, and their number grows in the second and first millennia, and a common element is the agreement to return each other's refugees. It appears that what was envisioned was political self-exiles who had run afoul of the home regime; it was expected that the friendly foreign regime would make it its business to return such disaffected people to their homelands and to their home governments, where their fates could be decided. Such treaties, ifput into effect, would mean that, ifthe regimes controlled neighboring areas, the borders in those directions would be closed to flight by the

44 See the survey by Wolfgang Rubinsohn, Die grossen Sklavenaufstande der Antike, (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1993), and Keith R. Bradley, Slavery and Rebellion in the Roman World, (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1989), and Heinz Bellen, Studien zur Sklavenjlucht im romischen Keiserreich, (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1971). Compare William Dusinberre, Them Dark Times. Slavery in the American Rice Swamps, (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996), reference courtesy of Richard Lowitt.

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disaffected. And yet, given the mountainous terrain between Mesopotamia and the east, and the desert to the west and south, there must still have been ample spaces to which to escape, if return to one's farming community were out of the question for . political reasons. It does not seem likely that until deportations in the first millennium B.C.E. there were very many politically motivated refugees. The refugees from cities discussed above ~n the la~e second millennium in Syria might be a large exception to this generalization." . The earliest treaty reference is a broken one from the thirdmillennium agreement between Elam in what is now Iran and Naram-Sin, the king ofAkkad, ruler ofMesopotamia around 229?, B.C.E. The king pledged, "I shall not take for myself a refugee, meaning, presumably, he would not take in people fleeing from Elam to his COurt.46 A concern for the return ofrunaways dominates the short treaty found at Alalakh in northern Syria (now Turkey) between Idrimi 47 and Pilliya, dating to around 1500 B.C.E.: ...they will always return their respective ~gitive~, ~that is,) ~fI~i~i seizes a fugitive ofPilliya, he will return him to Pilliya, and if'Pilliya seizes a fugitive ofIdrimi, he will return him to Idrimi. Anyone who seizes a fugitive and returns him to his master, (the owner) will pay as prize of capture 500 (shekels of) copper if it is ~ man,. ~ne thousand as prize of capture ifit is a woman. However, If a fugitive from Pilliya enters the land ofIdrimi and nobody seizes him, but his own master seizes him, he need not pay a prize ofcapture to anyone.

45 On borders see Steven Grosby, "Borders, Territory and Nationality in the Ancient Near East and Arrnenia," Journal ofthe Economic and Social History ofthe Orient 40: 1 (1997): 1-29, though one may be skeptical about how clear ancient self-definitions of the state were. 46 Walther Hinz "Elams Vertrag mit Nararn-Sin von Akkade," Zeitschriji fUr Assyriologie 58 (1967): 66-96, 91-93, iv 15-16: "Einen Fliichtling werde ich nicht bei mir aufnehmen," restoring [pu-ti-]ik-ra in Elamite, explained, 76. 47

Erica Reiner in Pritchard, Ancient Near Eastern Texts, 532.

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In whatever city (it is suspected that) they conceal a fugitive, the mayor and five elders will make a declaration under oath. From the very day on which Barattarna [another prince] has sworn this oath by the gods together with Idrimi, from that day on it is decreed that fugitives have to be returned.

Here actual slaves with masters were apparently envisioned, not political refugees as in some other treaties. The really interesting thing is the vast difference in the prizes offered for women over men, indicating in this circumstance that women were more highly valued as slaves than men, though it was thought possible that either might escape." A treaty between Tudhaliya II ofthe Hittites and Sunassura of Kizzuwatna from about 1450 B.C.E. has the following suggestive passage: Ifa fugitive from Hatti goes to [Kizzuwatna], Sunassura shall seize him and give him back to His Majesty. But if someone hides a fugitive, and he is discovered in his house, he must pay twelve unfree persons. Ifhe cannot come up with twelve unfree persons, he himself [must be killed]. Ifa slave hides a fugitive, and ifhis master will not make restitution on his behalf, will not pay the twelve unfree persons, ifhis master does not make restitution on his behalf, he must forfeit the slave himself. And the provision for Sunassura is the same."

48 See in general Mario Liverani, "L'Estradizione dei refugiati in AT 2," Rivista degli Studi Orientali 39 (1964): 111-115. This vast difference in assumed price derives from the value of women as concubines and wives and implies a slave system for this period at least more like systems in Islamic lands than those in the New World, where heavy manual labor was needed most, and men were more valuable. See in general Murray Gordon, Slavery in the Arab World, (New York: New Amsterdam, 1989), 79104. In Southern Mesopotamian legal collections children offemale slaves fathered by the master were free, as one may deduce from Harnmurapi 170-171 (Roth, Legal, 113114), where if a free father acknowledges children, they divide inheritance equally with children of a free mother; ifthe father does not acknowledge them, they and the mother are still said to be free. 49 Gary Beckman, Hittite Diplomatic Texts, (Atlanta: Scholars, 1996),2:5-7, 21-22. Kizzuwatna was in southeast Asia Minor; see H.M. Kummel, "Kizzuwatna," Reallexikon der Assyriologie 5 (1976-1980): 627-631.

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This penalty for harboring seems extreme, and it is odd that it is to be paid in unfree persons. One gets the impression that harboring was frequent and, since it usually was an upper-class crime, was usually overlooked. Note that the slave himselfmight have the opportunity to harbor others and would be punished with the same fine of twelve persons. In the slave's case, it would be his owner who suffered for the slave's crime. But then it was probably the free owner who benefitted from the harboring anyway. In an edict probably functioning as a treaty found at the north Syrian city ofUgarit the Hittite king Suppiluliuma (1380-1346 RC.E.) declared: Thus he said: If in later days refugees of Nuhas or Mukis, or other countries, going forth from their countries to Ugarit enter into the service of the king of Ugarit, no other king of another country will take them back from the hands ofNiqmadu, king ofUgarit, or from the hands of his sons or the sons of his sons, forever. My Sun, the great king, made an agreement thus. The Hittite king here rewarded the loyal king of Ugarit with the right to receive refugees from an enemy or former enemy king-

dom." The Egyptian treaty of 1280 RC.E. between Ramses II and the Hittites is also relevant:" [If a great man flees from the land of Egypt and comes to] the Great Prince of Hatti, or a town belonging to the lands of Ramses Meri-

50 Jean Nougayrol, Le Palais royal d'Ugarit 4, (Paris: Imprimerie nationale, Klincksiek, 1956),52, text 17.369 A. Mukis was a kingdom to the north ofUgarit which eventually fell into the Hittite sphere of influence but for a time was an enemy. See H. Klengel, "Mukis," Reallexikon der Assyriologie 8 (1995): 410-412. Related is text 17.132, 40-43,36-37 on soldiers from Mukis, and 17.334, 11-15, 54-55, in connection with the kingdom ofNuhasse. 51 Albrecht Goetze in Pritchard, Ancient Near Eastern Texts, 200-201; the Hittite version, ibid., 203, and Beckman, Diplomatic, 90-95; these are paragraphs 12 and 15. These treaties have not been transliterated in Appendix II.

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Amon, the great ruler of Egypt, and they come to the Great Prince ofHatti, the Great Prince ofHatti shall not receive them. The Great Prince of Hatti shall cause them to be brought to User-maat-Re Setep-en-Re, the great ruler of Egypt, their lord, [because] of it. Or if a man or two men--no matter who--flee, and they come to the land of Hatti to be servants of someone else, they shall not be left in the land ofHatti; they shall be brought to Ramses Meri-Arnon,the great ruler of Egypt. [Next paragraph: same for Hatti.] If a man flees from the land of Egypt--or two or three--and they come to the Great Prince ofHatti, the Great Prince ofHatti shall lay hold ofthem, and he shall cause that they be brought back to Usermaat-Re Setep-en-Re, the great ruler of Egypt. But, as for the man who shall be brought to Ramses Meri-Amon, the great ruler of Egypt, do not cause that his crime be raised against him; do not cause that his house or his wives or his children be destroyed; [do not cause that] he be [slain]; do not cause that injury be done to his eyes, to his ears, to his mouth, or to his legs; do not let any [crime be raised] against him. [Next paragraph: same for Hatti.] The treaty depicted here did not envision large numbers of political refugees, and it is not clear how the case of the "great man" was distinguished from the latter case. It may be that a really important person would suffer punishment for his flight. But the less important persons appear to be promised safe conduct and amnesty back to their home realms ifthe foreign king went to the trouble of returning them. Whether this stipulation would be put into effect is doubtful, but it was certainly in the treaty to assuage the conscience ofrulers faced with fearful foreign political

refugees." Perhaps more usual is the treaty between the Hittite king Mursili II and Tuppi-Tessub of Amurru, in central western Syria, around 1250 RC.E.: 53 52 M arlo . L'rveram, . P restige . and I.nterest, (Padua: Sargon, 1990), 109, suggests in general that commoners would lose their freedom ifretumed but high status political refugees would probably be killed. 53 Goetze in Pritchard, Ancient Near Eastern Texts, 204-205; Beckman, Diplomatic, 54-59.

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Paragraph 13 Ifanyone ofthe deportees from the Nuhasse land or of the deportees from the country of Kinza whom my father removed and myselfremoved escapes and comes to you (if) you do not seize him and turn him back to the king of the Hatti land, and even tell him as follows: "Go! Where you are going to, I do not want to know," you act in disregard of your oath.

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Treatment of Fugitives in Hittite Diplomatic Texts Beckman # Allied Country Treatment Approximate Date 1 Kizzuwatna Return Hittite fugitives. 15th cent. RC.E. 2 Kizzuwatna Return Hittite fugitives; harborer pays 12 unfree or is killed; 1450 B.C.E. slave harborer pays too. 4 Ugarit Nuhassi, Mukis fugitives may 1350 RC.E. stay with king ofUgarit 5 Amurru Return Hittite fugitives; if 1350 B.C.E. noble or slave fled, king may return them. If one escapes to Aziru, he must return him; king will not return fugitives. 6A Mittani Return Hittite fugitives; king 1350 RC.E. of Mittani will not return fugitives. 7 Nuhassi Return Hittite fugitives; may 1350 RC.E. seek noble or slave fled, and king may return him. 8 Amurru Return fleeing captives from 1330 RC.E. Nuhassi; help fugitives to Hatti; return Hittite fugitives. 9 Ugarit Return fleeing captives from 1330 RC.E. Nuhassi; may seek noble or slave, and king may return them; return Hittite fugitives. 10 Hapalla Return Hittite fugitives; I will 1330 RC.E. not return fugitives from Hapalla, but will return craftsman who does not deliver his work. 11 MiraReturn Hittite fugitives; 1330 RC.E. Kuwaliya I will not return fugitives from Mira-Kuwaliya, but will return craftsman who does not deliver his work. 12 SehaRiver Return fugitives fleeing

Paragraph 15 Ifa population or a fugitive takes to the road and while betaking themselves to the Hatti land pass through your territory, put them on the right way, show them the way to the Hatti land and speak friendly words to them! Do not send them to anyone else! If you do not put them on the right way, (if) you do not guide them on the right way to the Hatti land, but direct them into the mountains or speak unfriendly words before them, you act in disregard ofthe oath. Paragraph 17 Furthermore, ifa fugitive comes to your country, seize him!... In these stipulations the rights of the king of the Hittites were

uppermost; his friends had to be treated as the king of Amurru's friends, and his enemies as his enemies. Other texts illustrate the more usual situation where the Ugaritic king had to return Hatti's own refugees: If, outside of Hatti a refugee flees, may Niqmepa capture him and [send him] to the king ofHatti; [ifnot, you transgress your] oath. If a refugee out ofUgarit [flees and] goes Ito Hatti] the king of Hatti will not [retain him"]."

These and other Hittite treaties are summarized in the following table:

54 Jean Nougayrol, Le Palais royal d'Ugarit 417.79+374,98; for transliteration see Appendix II. Compare also 17.238, 108; 18.114, 108, and 18.04, 241.

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1330B.C.E 13

Wi1usa

1300B.C.E.

15

Egypt

1270B.C.E. 19

Ugarit

1350B.C.E. 20 1330B.C.E. 27 1430B.C.E.

Ugarit W. Anatolia

Hittites, Hittite fugitives. I will not return fugitives, but will return craftsman who does not deliver his work; return Hittite fugitives. Return Hittite noble fugitive, also if only one, two, or three; return Egyptian fugitives. If'Nuhassi, or Mukis troops enter, you may keep them. If Nuhassi troops come as fugitives, you may keep them. Return Hittite fugitives, even craftsmen.

Summary of Mentions Return Hittite fugitives Hittites to return foreign fugitives Hittites refuse to return foreign fugitives Hittites to return craftsmen Slaves discussed

13 4 4 4 4

One can see from the summary that the major concern was the return of presumably free refugees to the great Hittite king. Harboring was only discussed in the single text reviewed above. Actual slaves are only rarely mentioned, and as an afterthought in Numbers 5, 7, and 9, with the slave harborer in Number 2. Also relevant is the Tawagalawa letter sent by Hattusili III (1275-1250 B.C.E.) to the king ofAhhiyawa, presumably a Greekspeaking part of Ionia. Hattusili attempted to get the king on his side, and he reproached him with harboring the political dissident Piyamaradu. The relevant passage is column iii 55-iv 5: According to this rumor, during the time when he leaves behind his wife, children and household in my brother's land (the land of the king of Ahhiyawa), your land is affording him protection. But he is continually raiding my land; whenever I have prevented him in that,

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he comes back into your territory. Are you now, my brother, favorably disposed to this conduct? Now, my brother, write at least this to him: "Rise up, go forth into the Land of Hatti. Your lord has settled his account with you? Otherwise come into the Land of Ahhiyawa, and in whatever place I settle you [stay there]. Rise up with your prisoners, your wives and children, and settle down in another place. So long as you are at enmity with the king of Hatti, exercise your hostility from another country. From my country you shall not conduct hostilities.t'"

While this is not a treaty, it does show that the problem of well placed political refugees was an international issue of continuing concern for the Hittites, if not for the Ionians, since we do not know ifthere was a response to this plea." In the treaty between Niqmepa ofAlalakh in northern Syria and Ir-Tessub of Tunip around 1200 B.C.E., actual fugitive slaves were discussed: Paragraph 5 Ifa fugitive, a male or female slave, ofmy land flees to your land, you must seize and return him to me, (or) if someone else seizes him and takes him to you, [you must keep him] in your prison, and whenever his owner comes forward, you must hand him over to [him]. If (the slave) is not to be found, you must give (the owner) an escort, and he may seize him in whatever town (the slave) is found; (in any town where) he is not found, the mayor and five elders will declare under oath: "Your slave does not live among us and we do not conceal him"?--if they are unwilling to take the oath, but (eventually) return the slave, [they go free], but ifthey take the oath and later he discovers his slave [among them], they are

55 Bryce, Kingdom of the Hittites, 323, and Ferdinand Sommer, Die AhhiyawaUrkunden, (Munich: Bayerische Akademie, 1932), 14-17. 56 The letter is unique in that it foresees giving options to the refugee, ifhe did not conduct hostile activities against Hatti, as noted by Liverani, Prestige and Interest, 110. 57 The text is actually in the second person: "my slave lives among you and you hide him."

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considered thieves and their hands are cut off, (moreover) they will pay 6,000 (shekels of) copper to the palace." This passage is extremely suggestive since it shows that the escaping slave had a good chance of disappearing into a nearby community, in spite of the efforts of the authorities. A length of time was assumed to have passed between the city fathers' refusing the oath and their giving up the slave; obviously a lot of political jockeying was happening within the community, and these stipulations cannot be seen as more than pious wishes. But they are also images ofwhat some in the power structure thought ought to happen under ideal circumstances. The text next addresses the harborer: Paragraph 6 If a man, woman, ox, donkey, or horse [is found] in the house of somebody (and the owner) identifies it, but (the man in whose possession it was found) declares: "I have bought it," if he can produce the merchant (from whom he bought it), he goes free, but ifhe cannot produce the merchant, he who has identified it,...he will declare under oath ["It is my..."], but ifhe is unwilling to take the oath, [he is considered a thief and his hands are cut off.] The lost slave was exactly like the lost animal, as in the Esnunna legal collection paragraph 50 discussed above, and the slave's own views of the matter were irrelevant. The buyer would have to document the slave, and the flight of the slave might make the merchant then liable to being proved a thief of the first owner's property. The next paragraph considers the harborer who claimed he was not harboring a runaway: Paragraph 7 If you hold a man in custody, he may do (forced) labor with a...man, (but) if (the latter) [takesoff] his fetters, shaves offhis slave mark,...and they catch him, he is considered a thief. If he

58

Erica Reiner in Pritchard, Ancient Near Eastern Texts, 53 I.

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declares: [The man is mine], he will declare under oath as follows: [(I swear) that the man is mine]; ifhe is unwilling to take the oath, [he is a th]ief.... If the criminal, man, woman, or boy, does (forced) labor in his house, and (the owner?) seizes him, he is considered a thief, and (the criminal's) master will have him declare under oath: I have captured him in the open country personally... This means that someone who has been captured as a runaway might work for the man holding him, but that person could not alter his slave status. The person holding him was free from blame ifhe were willing to say that he captured the runaway in the country, where other witnesses would be absent. From Syria in the Aramaic language around 750 B.C.E. the treaty found at Sefire envisions that a lesser king would return those who fled from a greater king: Ifone of my officials or one of my brothers or one of my eunuchs or one of the people under my control flees from me and becomes a fugitive and goes to Aleppo, you must not pro[vide f]ood for them, andyou must not say to them: Staypeacefully in your place, andyou must not cause them to be disdainful ofme. You must placate them and return them to me. Ifnot, they shall [remain] in your land to be quiet there until I come and placate them. If you cause them to be disdainful of me and provide food for them and say to them: Stay where you are and pay no attention to him, you will have betrayed this treaty.59 Again there seemed to be real fear of a politically well-connected fugitive who got the cooperation of a lesser king. One can see that in the treaties so far recovered from the Ancient Near East which deal with this matter the major concern was returning refugees, who were usually assumed to have been free and politically active individuals, arriving in small groups. Presumably we are looking at the very highest levels of societies and their interaction with counterparts at the tops of other societ-

59

Franz Rosenthal in Pritchard, Ancient Near Eastern Texts, 660.

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ies. The issue of harboring remained, and in fact was the major issue even ifnot explicitly discussed since not returning fugitives would be by definition harboring. The ideology of flight and freedom as revealed in edict, law, and treaty was that refugees must be returned. BU~ law ~as addressed to the free and in general did not concern Itself with slave punishments for escape. And treaties mostly addressed even more exalted audiences who may have dealt with free and politically influential refugees as well as the occasional slave. The ideology was to conserve property rights, but the texts reveal that everyone knew that free persons did violate property rights by exploiting runaways whenever possible.

CHAPTER FOUR

FLIGHT IN LITERATURE AND STORY We classify the written material from the ancient world that has come down to us in three broad categories. Archival texts were composed to record information needed by a bureaucracy; we studied how flight and freedom were found in such texts in Chapter Two. Monumental texts were written to commemorate greatness and to be treasured forever. In Chapter Three we looked at flight and freedom in such official texts. Here we will look at the issues in literary texts. Such texts were composed with various purposes in mind, but all ended up as part of a curriculum used by people training to be scribes. They come to us because these scribes in training and their teachers copied them over. They thus are less official than either archival or monumental texts and may approach our modem ideas ofliterature, though sometimes they may not. Some have called these kinds of texts canonical in that they were supposed to be copied in a more or less fixed form over time.' 1. NON-NARRATIVE TEXTS

In the materials studied by scribes and copied by them are references to a series of texts to be studied by priests specializing in exorcisms. They were to use these texts to accomplish practical ends through magic, in one case the returning of a slave who had fled. The first millennium copy we have is from the Assyrian capital of Assur, but apparently it was included in the

) On the three categories see William W. Hallo and William Kelly Simpson, The Ancient Near East:A History, second edition, (Fort Worth: Harcourt, Brace, 1998), 154157.

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earlier Babylonian curriculum of the incantation priest. 2 Having made a clay doll to represent the fled slave, the exorcism priest was to address the door, saying the following seven times before the sun-god:

century RC.E., there is a set of phrases scribes needed to know that deal with runaways. They are as follows: He ran away from the house of his lord. When he ran away, someone returned him. He put a foot-wood on him. He placed a copper chain on him. He passed a pestle. Your one who runs away is caught. His eyes he gouged out. He strengthenedhis servitude.'

o door of the bedroom, you who are so firm, I have firmed up your support with oil and wine. Just as you swing out from your position, but tu[rn back] the other way to where you were, (So) may so-and-so, a runaway slave, swing out But turn back the other way to his master's house. A broken line indicates you may do the ritual in the tenth and eleventh months, that is, winter and very early spring (line 17). Additional interesting lines include: If a slave has fled, his flight having been heard of, or not heard of, (before) that man has come back, you should sieve in the night? (a pattern) like the feet ofthe fled one, [to the ashes with a sieve on the threshold] of the main door and speak thus: Night, veiled bride, So-and-so, the runaway, will come back, and his feet will [stay?] or he will not return and say "I will stay far away"... The so-and-so was to be replaced in actual use by the name ofthe slave. The concern of the text to try to control what was not controllable is clear. The incantation priest was paid for his troubles, and so his voice was unlikely to reflect anything but the concern ofthe rich to have a valuable investment return. As part ofthe Mesopotamian dictionary-making tradition, seen in bilingual Sumerian and Akkadian texts in Assyria in the seventh

2 Erich Ebeling, "Eine assyrische Beschworung, urn einen enflohenen Sklaven zuriickzubringen," Orientalia Nova Series 23 (1954): 52-62; translation of the most coherent part is from Benjamin R. Foster, Before the Muses, (Bethesda, Maryland: COL, 1993),2: 897; lines 5-11 are after Ebeling.

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These increasingly oppressive phrases show the scribe looked forward to the runaway's return and punishment which was thought of as being increasingly painful. In such a laconic list there is no room to say who would be punished in what way, but mutilation was contemplated, as in the Old Babylonian example discussed in Chapter Three. Perhaps the passing of the pestle, usually a sign that a deal has been struck, implies in this context that the escapee was to be sold. The same slave-holder attitude is to be seen in the Sayings of Ahiqar, an Aramaic composition probably originating around 500 RC.E. and studied in Egypt and the rest of the Near East for hundreds of years afterwards, showing up in several different languages. The composition was apprently intended to teach ethics and wisdom to literate slave-holders. The relevant section IS:

3 Benno Landsberger, Materialien zum sumerischen Lexikon I, (Rome: Pontificial Biblical Institute, 1937),28-9; Tablet 2 iv 7'-15'. Compare also the language from an Old Babylonian collection oflegal phrases giving a guarantee, presumably by a debtor giving up a family member as a pledge to a creditor: "If she dies, flees, disappears, or falls ill, he shall compensate in full for her assigned work." [t] u k u m - b i [ b a u g7] [b a - an -] za b- a [ti] - g u b a - an - d e u t u - r a b a - an - t u a- g isgar - r a - n i - s e b i - i b - s i - s i - g e. See Martha Roth, "Scholastic Tradition and Mesopotamian Law: A Study of FLP 1287, A Prism in the Collection of the Free Library of Philadelphia," Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 1979,48, to column viii 3-10.

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He who acquires a runaway slave or a thievish maid [does evil and ruins?] the reputation of his father and his progeny by his own corrupt reputation.' The saying underlines the stupidity ofbuying a slave that is known as a habitual runaway, and the perspective is that of the rich person's attempting to minimize losses. Among canonical texts about the dynasty ofAkkad (2334-2193 RC.E.) two note that Sargon, the dynasty's founder, had liberated a city and struck offthe citizens' bonds. His grandson narrated the story of a revolt against himself as follows: In his days my father Sargon conquered the city of Uruk and established [fre]edom for the Kishite [people], and had their [slavemarks] sheared off and their shackles [smas]hed...5 The point here was to emphasize the ingratitude of the rebellious peoples and the kindness ofthe founder of the dynasty. In Egypt a letter used as a model to instruct scribes of the thirteenth century RC.E. runs: I was sent forth from the broad halls of the palace...in the third month ofthe third season, day 9 [about May], at the time ofevening, following after these two slaves....When my letter reaches you, write to me about all that has happened to [them.] Who found their tracks? Which watch found their tracks? What people are after them? Write

4 James M. Lindenberger, The Aramaic Proverbs of Ahiqar, (Baltimore and London: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1983),55-56 Saying 6; see transliteration in Appendix II. The Syriac translation reads, more simply: "Do not get a slave that is a runaway," "bd' "rwq'. 5 This is the version from Mari; See Joan Goodnick Westenholz, Legends ofthe Kings of Akkade, (Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 1997), 233-235, lines 5-8; similar is the Geneva version, 243-244, lines 18-20.

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to me about all that has happened to them and how many people you send out after them.6 The junior scribe apparently needed to know the vocabulary of slave pursuit, but the imagined pursuit did not actually capture the slaves; perhaps real pursuits also rarely did. In contrast to such attitudes in the Mesopotamian collection of incantations called Surpu "burning" are two passages that indicate the cherishing of freedom as a value. The texts are Neo-Assyrian, from around 700 RC.E. One is the complaint ofsomeone afflicted with misfortune, and the incantation priests are to confess he was a sinner: Who estranged companion from companion, who did not free a captive, did not release a man in bonds, who did not let the prisoner see the light (of day), who said to the captive: "Leave him captive!" to the man in bonds: "Bind him tighter!" He does not know what is a crime against god, he does not know what is a sin against the goddess. 7 The sinner did not know these acts were sinful, but the society did. Naturally not much precision is possible aboutthe imagined social context, but probably the sinner was felt to be a man of authority who did not attempt to reduce the affliction ofpeople under him, and releasing the captive had been in his purview, and he ought to have done it. A positive reflection ofthe same values is seen in a later tablet:

6 John A. Wilson in Pritchard, Ancient Near Eastern Texts, 259. Slaves were only prominent in Egypt in the New Kingdom Period, from which this text comes. See on Egyptian slavery Antonio Loprieno, "Slaves," in The Egyptians, edited by Sergio Donadoni, 185-219, (Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press, 1997; first in Italian: 1990),200-212 on the New Kingdom.

7 Tablet ii 28-32, Erica Reiner, Surpu, (Graz: Archiv fur Orientforschung Beiheft 11,1958), 13.

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It rests with you, divine Marduk, to keep safe and sound ... to set free the prisoner, to show (him) daylight, him who has been taken (captive), to rescue (him)... Him whose city is distant, whose road is far away, (Let him) go safely to [h]is [city] to return the prisoner of war and the captive to his people (That he may) see (or be seen?) in the presence of his people."

This value is an extension of the Code of Hammurapi's goal of having the rich and powerful not oppress the weak, but the focus on freeing from restraint and encouraging the freedom of movement is decisive is revealing freedom as a value, at least for the patrons of these texts. Mesopotamians sometimes attributed freedom from particular obligations to the gods, and this shows their high estimation of it.9

2. FLIGHT NARRATIVES

There are several texts that reflect stories of flight. Not all are canonical or what might be seen as literature; one is actually on a monument. They are not, however, explicitly about the escape of slaves or dependent persons. The reason for this is probably that the audience envisioned for them was first the literate scribes and then the members of a free ruling class. Such persons might be attracted to stories of persons like themselves in sorry states, but they would not usually care about slaves. Even if the free and the slave runaways cannot be assumed to have had the same experiences, we ought to examine the material conveying stories about flight because we have it and it is analogous to slave flight. It may, further, help define ideas of

8

Ibid., tablet iv 2 and 31-36, 25-26.

9

See G. Ries, "Lastenfreiheit," Reallexikon der Assyriologie 6 (1980-1983): 508-

511.

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freedom, regardless of how oppressive the conditions being escaped really were. My guess is that in any case escape allowed a new self-definition, at base economic in that the escapee had to seek new ways to feed herself. But the new self-definition could also be social, political, and even psychological, as the runaway saw himself in a different light merely because of the different geographical place to which he fled. In justifying examination of the texts about free or ostensibly free runaways, we may fall back upon a purely practical reason. In the Ancient Near East we lack slave narratives such as came to be written in the Americas. That literature was apparently directly tied to the growth of the sentiment for abolitionism in Western and particularly in British and American culture in the last century, and thus in a sense it is suspect in that it is written to play to the assumptions of white non-slave readers who expected a certain kind of suffering to be depicted. 10 We must assume that the experience of flight may have been similar in general for persons of different statuses, and though we can never be sure about that in any given instance, I believe we must look at the relevant material, especially since the status of slavery and dependent labor may not have been uniformly defined and uniformly understood anyway. Many Ancient Near Eastern languages in polite speech used the term "slave" to refer to the speaker, but a distinction was always made between that usage and real servitude. Still, other stories appear to indicate the assumption that escape from slavery and escape from political dilemmas were similar. In societies where travel was difficult and rare, flight by people who were not supposed to travel was frequently seen as an act of

10 S . Gates, Jr., ed., The Classic Slave Narratives, (New ee 'In genera 1Henry LoUIS York: Penguin, 1987), p. ix: "In the long history of human bondage, it was only the black slaves in the United States who--once secure and free in the North, and with the ~enerous encouragement and assistance of northern abolitionists-created a genre of hterature that at once testified against their captors and bore witness to the urge ofevery black sla~e to be free and literate." Given the paucity of direct slave testimony in any other penod, we should be thankful for, and utilize fully, what we have from analogous free individuals.

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rebellion, meant to undermine the social order. The ultimate rebellious flight may be suicide, but that seems not an important act in the Ancient Near East. II There were some famous stories about individual political fugitives. The Tale of Sinuhe was popular in Egypt of the late second millennium; it concerned a courtier who was somehow upset about the transition from the rule of Amenemhet I in 1962 B.C.E. to that of his son, Senusret 1. 12 The story might be fictional, but it reflected Egyptian attitudes and was copied frequently in later times. Sinuhe snuck from the Western Desert, where he had been with the army, through Egypt and the Eastern Desert into Syria-Palestine, where he established himselfas a sort of Egyptian consul and advisor to local princes. He very much missed Egypt, though, and took the first opportunity to return and be reconciled with the king, though this opportunity came many years after his flight. In the meantime it is clear that he gloried in his ability to make a life in the alien world, and though one might have to stretch the evidence to speak ofcharacter development, it does appear that Sinuhe grew in stature in the foreign environ-

ment. When he returned, though, it was as a courtier, and the royal children, who remembered him, were influential in bringing him back. His main sentiment seems to have been gratitude to the king for bringing about his return, though he had once feared him. The tale was cherished in later generations because Egypt continued to be interested in Western Asia. The tale also underlines how important Egyptians thought proper burial within Egypt itselfwas to a successful death. The political issues that prompted Sinuhe to flee were not examined within the tale, and the flight seems to be an unfortunate aberration in his exemplary career. This cannot be the way successfully escaping slaves felt about their flight, but it is almost certainly the way the elite would have liked to believe they felt about it. Unusually in the ancient world, Sinuhe depicted the actual moment of flight, as word came of the king's death and of the immediate departure from the army of the crown prince, now the new king:

II See Cristiano Grottanelli, "Archaic Forms of Rebellion and their Religious Background," in Religion, Rebellion, Revolution edited by B. Lincoln, 15-45, (New York: S1. Martin's, 1985), reference courtesy of David Geggus; Grottanelli discusses Sinuhe, the Egyptian Story of the Two Brothers, Moses, David, Elijah, Elisha, and Samson. He writes, 20, "In all these texts, flight is presented not just as a way to escape some specific oppression or punishment, but as a rebellious act, signifying refusal ofthe whole social setup." Although all these stories have travel as an element, the Two Brothers, Elijah, Elisha, and Samson do not have quick escapes as major enduring motifs in the same way as the stories we shall consider here. For the Two Brothers see Miriam Lichtheim,Ancient Egyptian Literature, volume 2, (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1976), 203-211; the younger brother flees to the Valley ofthe Pine, presumably Lebanon or Syria. For Elijah see I Kings 19:3, off to hear the still small voice; for Elisha 2 Kings 9:3, telling the anonymous anointing prophet to flee the scene of the anointing, and for Samson see Judges 14-16, which ends with his suicide.

John A. Wilson, "The Tale ofSinuhe," in Ancient Near Eastern Texts, edited by James Pritchard, 18-22, and compare Miriam Lichtheim, Ancient Egyptian Literature, 1: 222-235 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975). For recent interpretations see Anthony Spalinger, "Orientations on Sinuhe." Studien zur altiigyptischen Kultur 25 (1998): 311-339. 12

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Now the royal children who had been following him [the prince] in this army had been sent for, and one ofthem was summoned. While I was standing (nearby) I heard his voice as he was speaking and I was a little way off. My heart was distraught, my arms spread out (in dismay), trembling fell upon all my limbs. I removed myselfby leaps and bounds to seek a hiding place for myself. I placed myself between two bushes, in order to 'cut (myself) off from the road and its travel. 13

Years later Sinuhe justified himselfto the king after he had invited him to return home:

13 Wilson, "Sinuhe," 18-19. Spalinger writes, "Sinuhe expected violent trouble in the royal residence..., a grave situation that might involve his own death; hence, he leaves. The man is therefore a coward, and if the recognition of that behavior is challenged, the text describes this in few words," "Sinuhe" 328. He was in Spanlinger's view not involved himselfin any plot; later in confronting an enemy and not fleeing, he overcame his fears and became worthy of restoration, 339.

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Now this flight which the servant made, it was not planned, it was not in my heart, I had not worried about it. I do not know what severed me from (my) place. It was after the manner of a dream... There was fear of civil unrest as Sinuhe fled, but he gave no clear reason for flight. Perhaps he was simply insecure about his official position and feared a chaotic transition between reigns, even though we regard this as a successful instance ofco-regency, where an old king in his lifetime had his heir installed as co-regent to ease the transition at his death." The story of Moses in the Bible seems to be of a similar structure to Sinuhe's, and yet the undatable but supposedly early text involves the hero leaving Egypt because of a crime he committed, then returning to champion his people, whom he then led out of the country and back to their collective homeland. There is no reflection on the moment of flight. 15 Noteworthy are the pair of political tales from Syria in the middle of the second and early first millennium. About 1500 a young man, the Syrian prince Idrimi, found himself forced to flee into exile, and his laconic monumental inscription on a rather ugly statue of himself recounts his adventures, which allowed him to collect a force of warriors and eventually to recapture the capital city of his fathers, Alalakh in Syria, now in Turkey, where his inscription was found. He wrote that he lived in Canaan, a region south of his home city, for seven years and became the leader of other exiles from Alalakh, who acknowledged him because ofhis

Wilson, "Sinuhe," 21, 19. On co-regency see William W. Hallo and William Kelly Simpson, The Ancient Near East: A History, 243 and n. 12. 14

IS See Martin Noth, Exodus, (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1962), 30. After committing murder, Moses learned there were witnesses: "Then Moses was afraid and thought, 'Surely the thing is known '" (Exodus 2: 14b). But he did not flee then: "When Pharaoh heard of it, he sought to kill Moses. But Moses fled from Pharaoh ..." (Exodus 2:15a).

FLIGHT IN STORY

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royal birth. 16 The relevant portion ofthe inscription reads as follows: An evil deed happened in Aleppo, the seat ofmy family, and we fled to the people ofEmar, brothers ofmy mother, and we lived (then) in Emar. My brothers, who were older than I, stayed with me but none of them had the plans I had. I (said to) myself: "Whoever is in the house of his family is the great son of a prince, (while) who is with the people of Emar is a slave!" (So) I took with me my horse, my chariot, and my groom, went away and crossed over the desert country and even entered into the region of the Sutian warriors. I stayed with them (once) overnight before the throne of Zakkar, but the next day I moved on and went to the land of Canaan. I stayed in Ammia in the land of Canaan; in Ammia lived (also) natives of Aleppo, of the country Mukis, of the country Ni' and also warriors from the country Ama' e. They discovered that I was the son oftheir overlord and gathered around me. I became chief; I had command. For seven years I lived among theijiipiru-people. (Then) I released birds (to observe their flight) and looked into (the entrails of) lambs (and found) that after seven years Adad/Tessub had become favorable to me. So I built boats, made Nulla soldiers board them, approached the country Mukis via the sea and reached shore below Mt. Casius. I went ashore and when my country heard of me they brought me cattle and sheep. And in one day, and as one man, the countries Ni', Ama' e, Mukis and my city Alalakh turned to me. My allies heard (about this) and they came into my presence. As soon as they had concluded a treaty with me, I protected my allies. Idrimi studied bird omens and animal sacrifices, and he saw favorable omens from Adad or Tessub, the storm god who made rainfall agriculture possible. His attack on the Alalakh region was successful because people supported him who were related to the

16 A. Leo Oppenheim, in Ancient Near Eastern Texts, edited by James Pritchard, 557-558 with corrections suggested in the discussions by Edward L. Greenstein and David Marcus, "The Akkadian Inscription of Idrimi," Journal of the Ancient Near Eastern Society 8 (1976): 59-96, and by Manfried Dietrich and Oswald Loretz, "Die Inschrift der Statue des Konigs Idrimi von Alalah," Ugaritforschungen 13 (1981): 201269. For Idrimi see Horst Klengel, "Idrimi," Reallexikon der Assyriologie 5 (1976):3233. See the transliteration in Appendix II.

110

exiles who had befriended him, and he toppled the usurping regime apparently without a battle. For Idrimi the escape was an unfortunate interlude, but one in which he obviously learned political skills that allowed his eventual triumphant return. It may be that some slaves escaped when the situation in the household changed for the worse, and they too would have welcomed a chance, rather unlikely for them, to return as lord ofthe very same household, as Idrimi was able to do. This prince was the same person who entered into the treaty with Pilliya discussed above in Chapter Three; that text. shows both princes promising to return each other's fugitives. So Idrimi's experience as a fugitive himselfseems not to have colored his later thought or made him more sympathetic to fugitives. These two texts give us a rare insight into ruling class attitudes and show that class considerations in this case overcame any possible effect ofexperience. The reestablished king did not recall his own life of exile in ways that affected the treaty into which he entered. Or perhaps he did in that he had seen how effective and dangerous an unreturned exile could be, and he wanted to avoid allowing exiles to organize as he had once done. The other tale with a similar plot is the story of David in Israel around 1000 RC.E. 17 David had risen according to the biblical book of 1 Samuel from being a court musician or common soldier to being a military leader under King Saul, but Saul was envious of the popular acclaim David's military successes brought him, and eventually he sought to undermine David's position and even to kill him. With the collusion ofSaul's son David made good his escape to the desert fringes of Judah, where he made a safe haven for his family and began to attract and to organize guerrilla fighters from the disaffected in his society. He made his living marauding in the desert and collecting protection money and promising not to raid landholders and shepherds. At sheepshearing time in the spring he is said to have approached one large

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sheep-owner, named Nabal (literally "Fool"), for a contribution to his men. Nabal answered, "Who is David and who is Jesse? Today the slaves are many who have broken away, each one from his lord" (1 Samuel 25:10). David ended up getting his goods, but Nabal resented David's escape and his status. Nabal's rejection of David underlines the notion that the experiences of a free refugee and an escaped slave may in such cases have been similar." Also as one reads 1 Samuel with a view to the flight involved, it seems not unlikely that the great dithering that David did before actually escaping parallels the experience ofsome other escapees. Sinuhe left on impulse, but most successful escapees probably planned ahead. David believed he needed to sound out his political master, Saul, about the likelihood of a productive future in his court, and Saul was of two minds. Sometimes he was consumed by envy ("an evil spirit from God rushed upon Saul" 1 Samuel 18:10), and other times not, so that right up till the moment of escape David was unsure what he would do. He was also retained by ties of affection to Saul's household; he left a wife there, and much was made in the stories about his affection for Jonathan, Saul's heir, and Jonathan's for him (1 Samuel 18-20). Therewere ofcourse later dynastic reasons for playing up these relations since they tended to legitimate David's eventual claim to the throne, and yet they make sense as a restraining factor to any runaway. For some time David appeared to stay in the vicinity, and this too may not have been uncommon among runaways. He enlisted the help, though not the political support ofpriests at Nob, and an official of Saul was present to observe this aid, which the king interpreted as treasonous help to a runaway (1 Samuel 21).19 It is hard to make sense ofthe early story ofDavid's encounter with the Philistine king (1 Samuel 21:10-15), where the king sent

18 1 Samuel 25: 10

~'N O'~'~l1Y.lil O'1:J.}l ):J.,

orn

'~'1:J. 'Y.l1 1)1 'Y.l 1')12'1.

17 Giorgio Buccellati, "La 'camera' di David e quella di Idrimi, re di Alalac," Bibbia e Oriente 4 (1962): 95-99.

')~Y.l

Hebrew quotations are from the Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia 4th edition, 1990. 19 On the politics of this incident see P. Kyle McCarter, I Samuel, (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, 1980), 365-367.

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him away because he seemed mad; he did end up with the Philistines, but the earlier story may reflect David's uncertainty about what political role to try to play now that he was no longer part of the Israelite power structure. The role he perfected was that of a peripheral figure, available for opposition to Saul, but also to support the Philistines when such support did not alienate his base back in his home area ofJudah. 1 Samuel 22: 1-2 sketches his base in politics and how it grew:

Saul spent some time and money seeking the fugitive, but without success. David's friend Jonathan even contacted him in one of his haunts and reaffirmed his support for him (1 Samuel 23: 16-18). There were good dynastic reasons for preserving this speech in which Jonathan seems to envision David's becoming king, but the fact of continued contact in spite of flight makes sense from later analogous situations. The wild story of David's creeping into Saul's camp and cutting offhis skirt to taunt him (1 Samuel 24) led to another dynastic promise (:20-22; and compare 1 Samuel 26:25 with the stealing of a spear and water bottle). After this period of Saul's active but fruitless pursuit, David determined to flee further, again to the Philistines (1 Samuel 27: 14), and the added distance did keep the master from seeking the servant any more. David parlayed his good behavior into a grant ofa village from the Philistines after a year and a third (1 Samuel 27:5-7). He began his regime ofraiding, mostly against traditional enemies of the Judahites, and he lied to his Philistine master, making him think David was raiding Israelites too. This vassal-like position in another, foreign, and for David's purposes looser, political system allowed him to build up his local political support. Because ofthe Philistine distrust ofhim he avoided fighting on the Philistine side in the battle in which Saul died, and when he returned to his village and found it raided, he avenged himself on the raiders, being sure to send some of the spoil "to his friends, the elders of Judah" (1 Samuel 30:26), and this may have been his earlier practice too. Like escaping slaves, David returned to a different role from the one he left, and his ability to do so derived from his very successful escape. It was political chance, and the religious would say divine will, that allowed David to build a power base in that alternative community. It might well have turned out differently if Saul's son had more vigorously attempted to succeed him and if he had outlived his father. In that regard the experience of slaves might have been similar in that they fled when the master's attitude toward them changed for the worse, and the attitude ofthe

David departedfromthere (Philistine Gath) and escaped to the cave of Adullam; and when his brothersand all his father's house heard it, they went down there to him. (2) And every one who was in distress, and every one who was in debt, and every one who was discontented, gathered to him; and he became captain over them. And there were with him about four hundred men.20 David's followers may be seen as a kind of mobile maroon community in that they were all trying to escape something, although runaway slaves were not explicitly mentioned. Such communities are well-known in other ages, especially as nomads on the desert fringes of the Near East. Not all nomads derived from such former sedentaries, at least as far as their memory goes, but some must have, in any period."

20 ))J.N n)J."'::n ))nN )Yr.:l'lJ)) D?1Y mYr.:l"'N \??r.:l') D'lJr.:l1)11?') (I)

ilr.:l'lJ )'?N rri» 'lJ'N"':J) N'lJ) )?,'lJN 'lJ)N"':J) P)::::lr.:l 'lJ'N"':J )'?N )::::lJ.pn')(2) 'lJ'N mNr.:l YJ.1N:J my )'il') 1'lJ? Dil'?Y 'il') 'lJ!))'r.:l

Compare the 1816 description of maroon activity by the governor of South Carolina, quoted in Herbert Aptheker, American Negro Slave Revolts, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1943),258: A few runaway negroes, concealing themselves in the swamps and marshes continguous...,not having been interrupted in their petty plunderings for a long time, formed the nucleus round which all the ill-disposed and audacious near them gathered until at length their robberies became too serious to be suffered with impunity. 21 For the fluidity between the nomad and the sedentary see Fredrik Barth, Nomads ofSouth Persia, (Boston: Little, Brown, 1961).

113

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master's heir toward them would determine whether they wished to stay away after the master's death. Because ofthe all-important fact that David did become king, it was hard for later observers dispassionately to look back at his pre-royal days, and certainly the preservation of the stories owes much to the importance offirming up the flimsy relations between the legitimacy ofthe family ofSaul and the new dynasty ofDavid. But the outlines of his flight do make a certain sense. As with other Israelite stories, there are such shameful elements present that a narrator uninterested in anything besides the glory of the dynasty would have omitted them, as the Chronicler did, writing several hundred years after the Samuel-Kings narrators." David had chosen flight and in so doing had tried on a new identity, as an independent political and military chief. He had made new connections, with old enemies mainly, but he also was careful to secure his home base, and, when circumstances conspired to deprive Israel of its ruler, he was ready. The contemporary slave would not have succeeded as well, even in the best of circumstances. But one may imagine that the successful runaway would have liked to maintain some contact with the home community from which she had fled, if possible bringing family members along, or, as in David's case, being joined by them later. And though a new identity was forged in freedom, some elements of the old were preserved. In David's case one may say that he became dependent on a new set of professional behaviors in that he became a full-time raider or pirate. Some might say that his function for Saul's government had been similar; only the targets were different. The escaped slave might also have been exchanging one farming plot for another, so that the rhythms of life would remain similar in freedom. And yet something had changed. David was no longer the servant of another, and he could wend his way, with his new

community of what looks to us to be multinational supporters, onto a new stage.23

22 Contrast the truncated 1 Chronicles 10-11. See J. Botterweck, "Zur Eigenart der chronistischen Davidgeschichte," in Festschriftfur V. Christian, edited by K. Schubert, 12-31, (Vienna: Notring der wissenschiiftlichen Verbiinde Osterreichs, 1956).

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3. CONCLUSIONS

The ideology ofthe literate about flight and freedom was ambivalent. On the one hand the public order was felt to be broken by the escapes through the permeable membrane ofslavery and dependent labor, and this was a very bad thing. Free persons ought, under that ideology, to cooperate to return runaways. And states too, insofar as they had the strength and political will, ought to exchange runaways, though the persons frequently envisioned were politically powerful and potentially revolutionary to their home states. The ideologists saw that in fact the ideal system did not obtain, and that free persons did harbor runaways. Those persons obviously were to be punished, but the systems of thought provided a tariffofwrongs, where simple harboring would be less bad than transporting a runaway. The stories of characters who escaped show moreover that intellectuals could see that escape was a chance for restructuring one's identity, and that sometimes such an option was unavoidable, even by the most faithful and historically portentous figure like David. Escape provided a way ofimproving prospects and changing fortunes, and the geography of the Near East, with nearby deserts, mountains, and marshes, meant that escape was always an option. Nomads melted into the desert each autumn, the mountaineers retreated to their mountain fastnesses each summer, and no one could track the marshdwellers. One could follow in their footsteps and become, if one

23 The supporters are multinational as we see them in 2 Samuel 23, where some are neither Judahite or Israelite. See my "The Structure ofPolitics in the Age ofDavid," in the Luigi Cagni Memorial Volume, (Naples: in press), Table I, where I count 3 foreigners, 1 Trans-Jordanian, and 5 of unknown origin among his "mighty men." But the whole idea of nationality is one that arose probably as a result of David's dynasty and almost certainly would have been meaningless in his own time.

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were lucky, free ofold encumbrances, and ifone were very lucky, one might end up even better off than that.

CHAPTER FIVE

FREEDOM IN ISRAEL It is important to look at the legacy of Israel separately on this issue because it allows us to gain another perspective, and one that proved central in the later development of the idea of freedom in the early modem West. As noted before, the key thing to remember when we try to understand the stories of the Bible, which are our only real source for Israelite history, is that they come to us in a very different way from the ways other Ancient Near Eastern texts have reached us. Whatever the original purpose of a Mesopotamian text, it is physically extant and can be studied as a physical object before us. That is not true ofBiblical texts, which we have only in later copies, copies that may have been open in some periods to elaboration, addition, and deletion, though it is clear that at some point, probably late in the first millennium B.C.E., the people who copied them came to feel that they ought not to be altered, and they took great pains to assure that the texts were accurately copied. Biblical texts are canonical in the sense noted above in that they come to us as part of a self-renewing tradition of copying. Biblical texts are of interest because they come from people who were not well represented among authors in other Ancient Near Eastern societies. Almost everything we have from the rest of the Ancient Near East is from kings and people paid by kings, and consequently the texts display a bias toward institutions kings supported. There are some important and interesting exceptions, but there are not many of them. In Israel in contrast one can see that kings did not dominate the surviving literature. The attitude of the literature toward kings was sometimes positive and sometimes negative, but always at a distance from the royal center. To simplify one might say that the Hebrew Bible was composed by people more sympathetic to

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prophets, the religious visionaries who were frequently critical of leaders, and most ofwhom may have been personally unknown to kings. Of the prophets who left books only Isaiah seems to have had any direct interaction with a king of Israel or Judah. So to contemporaries the compositors of the Bible may have been obscure intellectuals not in touch with the great political decisions of the day and not always in sympathy with the people making them. We believe that literacy was not a royal monopoly in Israel, and it probably was not in some periods of Mesopotamian history either, but dissenting literature did not get studied much in Mesopotamian educational traditions; in Israel it did. The reason for this difference in ideological situation may be a simple and external one. Much ofthe work ofthe Bible's writers criticizes power structures and predicts on the basis of the experience of other small states in the region that the structures would crumble before the Assyrian Empire and later the Babylonian Empire. These predictions proved correct, and the people who preserved the words of prophets and others may have done so because the opponents to kings wanted to guard against the rise of other similar politicians, and they wanted to inculcate the values that they held and their view ofthe God ofIsrael as a single worldruling entity. This must have seemed a quixotic idea to outsiders, but to the intellectuals and their successors, it made perfect sense, and world history as it was then understood was incorporated into divine history. What this means for the study of flight and freedom is that the intellectuals might take positions that were not predictable on the basis of their being part of the ruling class, even though they probably mostly were of a high social status. They may not have been involved directly in administration ofsystems to keep people in slavery and servitude, and so they felt free to criticize the people that were in charge. The intellectual tradition long outlasted, indeed outlasts, the political, and when Judaean independence was put to an end in 587 RC.E., the prophets and their friends did not stop being critical of what was going on.

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It will be remembered that Patterson was categorical in his rejection ofIsrael's having any important contribution to Western ideas of freedom. He writes, "[Israel's] epic history, in which its Egyptian sojourn was retrospectively reinterpreted as slavery, has no special part in the history of individual freedom." Patterson does not elaborate on his refusal to examine Israel; one can only speculate that the refusal is based on his admiration for the elaborateness ofthe Greek discussions which he does examine. It could be that Patterson would follow Martin Ostwald's later formulation that "Hebrew 'redemption' is not a progress from domination by a tyrant or occupation by an alien power to independence and freedom, but rather an escape from slavery to Pharaoh to service (=slavery) to God."' This understanding is a possible one, and yet it seems to be based on a superficial reading oftexts like Exodus 10:26, where Moses commands the people, "and also your cattle shall go with us; there shall not.remain a hoof, for from it we will take to serve the Lord our God, and we will not know with what we will serve the Lord until our coming there." They were to escape to the wilderness to serve the Lord, but that service was not just servitude; it involved religious sacrifice and ceremony, as one sees in the parallel expression Exodus 5: I, where the Lord speaks through Moses to the Egyptian king, "send my people so they may have a festival for me in the wilderness.'? Thus the "service" to which Moses called the Israelites to escape was not slavish obedience to God or a new priestly power

I O. Patterson, Freedom I. Freedom in the making ofWestern Culture. (New York: Basic, 1991), 33. Compare also 405, where he concedes, "The vision of Israel emerged from the bondage of Egypt," and culminated in the story of Jesus, "the ultimate veneration ofchoice," 406. Martin Ostwald, "Freedom and the Greeks," in The Origins ofModern Freedom in the West, edited by Richard W. Davis, 35-63, 43. Richard H. King notes that Patterson has "a puzzling blind spot" on the importance of the Exodus story for liberation, perhaps because this story refers to collective freedom, which nonetheless is part of freedom; see his review of Patterson, Freedom I, History and Theory 31 (1992): 326-335, 333-334. 2

1::lY'J npi UY.lY.l 'J iltl1£l1N'lln N'J ))Y.ly 1'J' mpzrn» Exodus 10:26.

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structure but rather the worship due an ancestral deity. Eventually, of course, religious thinkers would occasionally advocate a theocracy or rather a hierarchy, where priests ruled, but others were not sure the priests were really good enough to deserve a share in God's authority.' At some point in the development ofIsraelite thought a concern for the individual's freedom to interpret scripture and God's will became a prominent feature. But it may be that the clearest texts about this are late and might arguably be under Greek influence, ifonly indirectly. It is nonetheless obvious that many and perhaps most Western thinkers have not seen the escape to the wilderness as an escape from one tyranny to another, but something quite different that does have direct implications for later thought about human freedom." A sustained argument in that direction comes from Michael Walzer in Exodus and Revolution. Walzer points out that the word for redemption in Hebrew as in English came from a legal term meaning to buy the freedom of a slave. He argues that Jewish religion can be understood as a theology offreedom. Some in each generation certainly saw Jewish religion as emphasizing freedom, and the stories talk of rebellion in the wilderness by Israelites against their leaders and of murmuring, the criticism of leaders. Such stories were probably preserved in order to discourage that

behavior, and yet the memory of dissent, even wrongheaded dissent, is of importance in the later tradition. 5 As Ostwald saw, the word for service and for servitude were the same in Biblical Hebrew, but Walzer writes, "The difference is this: slavery is begun and sustained by coercion, while service is begun and sustained by covenant." That is, the people had agreed to serve the Lord, and thus they had given up some oftheir freedoms for a greater liberation from political oppression in Egypt. The date when a covenant was invoked for the first time is an open question, and many would associate its advent with Deuteronomy and the fall of the northern kingdom in 722 RC.E. Still, even if it was later, it must have been based on some sort of earlier tradition, and it seems in retrospect to be compatible with ideas of individual liberty," Walzer traces the anti-monarchic strain in Israelite thought, especially in the stories of Judges. Here it seems that the sovereignal freedom was claimed by individuals who were not themselves kings. Walzer goes on to argue that the idea of revolution against established authority is a Western idea that starts in Exodus, and that Exodus shows the beginning of a long

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3 See the critique of priests in Exodus 32, where Levites were favored. Those

. lower-status cultic practitioners might sometimes have been lumped together with priests, and all priests were supposed to be from Levitic families, as Moses had been. But such stories show that the conception of who should lead was not monolithic. See on the problems of the passage Brevard S. Childs, The Book ofExodus, (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1974),561-562. 4 The tension even in the Biblical era between the authority ofthe text and the need to interpret it for current needs is stressed by Michael Fishbane, Biblical Interpretation in Ancient Israel, (Oxford: Clarendon, 1985), 542-543. He says, .....the texts and traditions, the received traditum of ancient Israel, were not simply copied, studied, transmitted, or recited. They were also, and by these means, subject to redaction, elucidation, reformulation, and outright transformation. Accordingly, our received traditions are complex blends of traditum [content oftransmission] and traditio [process of transmission] in dynamic interaction, dynamic interpretation, and dynamic interdependence."

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5 (New York: Basic, 1985), esp. 24-25. He attacks directly views like Ostwald's above: "The Exodus, after all, would look very different had the people simply transferred their slavish obedience from Pharaoh to God," 73. Compare David Daube, The Exodus Pattern in the Bible, (Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood, 1963),45: "That, paradoxically, this change of master follows from a.rescue into liberty is already an element in the original scheme: a captive bought back becomes his ransomer's bondman, ..." Among the profound echoes of Exodus note that Denmark Vesey, the 1822 leader in Charleston, South Carolina, of the most developed American slave conspiracy, read to his followers "how the children ofIsrael were delivered out ofEgypt from bondage," quoted by Herbert Aptheker, American Negro Slave Revolts, (New York: Columbia University Press, 1943),269, with his emphasis. See David Robertson, Denmark Vesey, (New York: Knopf, 1999), 138-139.

6 Walzer, Exodus, 74. On the problem of dating covenants see George Mendenhall and Gary Herion, "Covenant" in Anchor Bible Dictionary, edited by David N. Freedman, I: 1179-1202, 1183, (New York: Doubleday, 1992).

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struggle which was not quickly or easily brought to fruition in a specific free society but is an ongoing mission." Walzer writes in the heat of the 1960s even though his book was published later, and the interest in Latin America in liberation theology based on the Exodus story is in the background of his thought. One can argue that it is not only the Exodus story itself that speaks of liberation in a way that is sympathetic to escaping slaves. But before exploring freedom beyond Exodus, let us consider the words used.

although one must be careful to admit that classes in the modem sense might not exist. 8 Job 3: 19 shows that death was perceived as dissolving human bonds, and was a place where "the slave isfree from his master." The Lord in Job 39:5 has also "let the wild ass go free," implying that the term is more than a technical term in slave-holding and approaches the general meaning oifree in English. Isaiah 58:6b has the Lord choosing to "set oppressed onesfree," again arguing for a broad understanding, while Jeremiah 34:9-16 used the same term "set free," literally "send free," in the context of actual manumissions of slaves." Another word in the Bible is sometimes translated remission of debts, and is usually linked with a year in which that was to happen. All references are apparently from during the exile to Babylon, and it is conceivable that the term, d'ror, cognate to Akkadian andurdrum, is influenced by it if not directly derived from it. But, as noted above, the practice of setting freedom in edicts had apparently died out with the Old Babylonian period, around 1595 B.C.E., though reference to such "freedoms" continues into the Middle Babylonian period. But the term might not be likely to have made a strong impression on exiled Jews years later. Still, its use is vague and its contexts seem to imply that the remission had a place in the ideal vision of behavior

122

I. TERMINOLOGY

Israel had a somewhat different vocabulary of freedom, but one that may at several places be connected to the Sumero-Akkadian discussed above. The simplest to explain is hofsi; "free," a reflex of Akkadian bupsu noted above. Most uses of 1}.ofti are almost certainly relatively late in the course of Israelite history. References always refer to freedom from slavery or constraint, except for the enigmatic 1 Samuel 17:25, which is in a passage that the Septuagint omits and therefore may be a late addition to an earlier text; David was being told what Saul planned to do for the soldier who killed Goliath:

123

...the king will make him rich with great riches and he will give him his house, and the house of his father he will make free in Israel.

It is not clear what exactly this might mean, though commentators have usually suggested that it implied exemption from taxation. Sometimes 1}.ofti means "freedman," and the existence of a term for freedman means that there was a recognized class offreedmen,

7 Compare the anti-monarchic texts Judges 8:23: "The Lord shall rule over you,"

O:::l:l ?'lIY.)~ mil" as Gideon rejects the kingship, and Hosea 8:4 "They have set up kings, but not by me [the Lord]," ~mY.) N?l l:::l'?Y.)il Oil. See Walzer, Exodus, 128-129,

133,149.

8 I Samuel 17:25b

l~:lN n~:l nNl l?ln~ m:l-nNl ?n) 1'l1Y l?y')il U1'l1Y~ ?N1'l1~:l ~'lI!)n il'llY~

9 Job 3: 19 1~)1Ny')

~'lI!)n 1:lYl Nlil O'll ?11)1 rap "The small and the big are there, and the slave is free from his master." Job 39: 5 nns ~Y.) 1ny n11Um ~'lI!)n N1!) n?'lI"")Y.) "Who sent the wild ass free, and who opened the bonds of the savage ass?" Isaiah 58:6c iprun il\?m-'.J:::ll o~\!J!)n O~~1~1 n?'lIl "And send the oppressed ones free, and break off every yoke." Jeremiah 34: lOb 'n?:l? O''lI!)n mn!)\!JJlN 'lI'N n:ly-nN 'lI'N n?'lI 1W orny "...to send each one his servant and each his maidservant free without working them any more ..."

CHAPTER FIVE

FREEDOM IN ISRAEL

among religious intellectuals and may not have had much reflection in social reality.'? Leviticus 25:10 looks forward to an ideal time and commands,

In light oflater developments in Hebrew and in other languages of the region it may be of interest too to note that the Hebrew Bible uses a term which is usually translated "noble" which later will become the standard term for free, hor, perhaps related to the ethnic term burru noted above in Akkadian contexts. The term in the Hebrew Bible is always plural and usually paralleled to words for "princes," "elders," or "officers" and denotes people of responsibility and wealth, though a hereditary nobility in Israel at any period seems very unlikely. The references are the textually problematic Isaiah 34:12, a prediction of doom; Jeremiah 27:20, referring to the king and the important people taken into exile; 1 Kings 21:8, referring to the people to whom Jezebeel wrote in order to get Naboth out ofthe way; Ecclesiastes 10:17, where the sage praised a land whose king is a son of a "noble" (Revised Standard Version: "free man"), contrasting to a land ruled by a child (:16); and Nehemiah 2:16,4:8, 13,5:7,6:17,7:5, 13:17, where contemporary leaders and opponents were called "noble.?" In later Hebrew the term for freedom is /Jeriit, derived from hor, "noble," and the term /Jofti continues too. Sometimes these are technical terms referring to manumission from slavery, but at others a more general sense may be implied."

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Andyou shallsanctify the year of fifty years, and call a remission in the land for all its inhabitants; it will be a jubilee for you, and you will return each to his possession of land and each to his family. The idealism of the command is clear in what follows since you are not to sow or harvest in that year, trusting to God's beneficence. Leviticus may presuppose the events of the Jeremiah and even the Isaiah passages discussed below. Ezekiel 46: 17 foresaw a gift from a leader reverting in the year of the remission. Isaiah 61: 1 also foresaw a blessed year for the remission, and the people immediately affected were "captured ones," not necessarily debtors, as one might think. This development implies that the term remission was not limited to debt. II

10 F. Stanley Jones, "Freedom" in Anchor Bible Dictionary, edited by David N. Freedman, 2:855-859, (New York: Doubleday, 1992). See M. Liverani, ":EY./lYK E MI:EQP,"inStudi in onorediEdoardo Volterra, 6:55-74, 61, 63 (Milan: Giuffre, 1971). II Leviticus 25: 1Ob 1111Omnp) illV O'Vnnil 1l)VnN OnV1pl.

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'(1N:l il':lV'?:J'J See. R. North, "D'ror," in Theological Dictionary ofthe Old Testament, edited by G. Johannes Botterweck and Helmer Ringgren, 3:265-269, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1978). This verse is the source for the quotation on the American Liberty Bell: "Proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof," there mistranslated as in the King James Version. Contrast the Revised Standard Version: "proclaim liberty throughout the land to all its inhabitants." Note that the Liberty Bell only became a symbol of freedom in the course of the Abolitionist agitation in the 1830's; see Eric Foner, The Story ofAmerican Freedom, (New York: Norton, 1998),89. Compare David Kimball, Vernerable Relic: The Story ofthe Liberty Bell, (Philadelphia: Eastern National Park and Monument Association, 1989),38,44,55-60; it was "the Old State House Bell" before then. Ezekiel 46: 17 1l)V'Y )'J nmm )'1:lyn 1nN'J m'Jnm runn )n'""':J

nmn Oil'J

)'):1

rnpnpa O'11ON'J)

m'Jm IN N'V)'J n:lV) 1111il

"And when he gives a gift from his inheritance to one of his slaves, it will be his until the year of remission, and then it shall stay with the prince; but his inheritance will be for his sons." Isaiah 61:1 'nN mil' nvn )Y' ''JY mil' ')1N n11

:l'J""'1:lV)'J V:ln'J ')n'Jv omy 1V:l'J

j I

I

1111 O'):lV'J N1P'J

"The spirit of the Lord God is upon me because the Lord has anointed me; he has sent me to announce good news to the humble, to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to captives, release to those in prison." 12 See 1. Van der Ploeg, "Les chefs du peuple d'Israel et leurs titres," Revue Biblique 57 (1950): 40-61, and his "Les 'Nobles' israelites," Oudtestamentische Studien 9 (1951): 49-64. 13 See /Jifyrut "freedom" in Morris Jastrow, A Dictionary of the Targumim, the TalmudBabli and Yerushalmi, and the Midrashic Literature, (Brooklyn: Shalom, 1967), 1:460. See also the discussion of terms in Chapter One above.

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2. PRACTICE IN NARRATIVES

terms; he was not threatening the king or kingdom. It was assumed that the owner had the right to pursue the slaves. It is of interest that the court of Achish in Gath was also the goalof David when he decided to run far away from Saul (1 Samuel 21 :11 [English :10D, where he feigned madness, and again in 27:2 with his guerrilla band." It is possible that Shimei's slaves, like David, were aware of the political tensions between the states of Israel and Gath and so surmised that they might be less likely to be retrieved from there. The political situation must have changed in Israel's favor between the times of the two stories, and so Achish and his officials were more inclined to inform an Israelite that his escaped slaves had sought refuge in Gath. There are several other instances ofescape, and the assumption seems to be always that this is an illegitimate effort. Hagar was the only person obviously a slave who escaped in Hebrew Bible stories. She fled when she successfully bore Abraham a child but then incurred the wrath ofher mistress Sarah, who had suggested that she serve as a surrogate mother for her. An Egyptian, she fled in the direction ofEgypt along the way of Shur, when the messenger of Yahweh found her near a well and asked where she was going. Instead of explaining where she was headed, she said she was fleeing from before her mistress; the messenger ordered her back to Sarah with the promise that her son would found a great people, but she would have to submit herself to her lady. Later when Sarah had herself successfully borne Abraham an heir, she insisted on Hagar's explusion with her son, and the two ended up in roughly the same southern wilderness again. This time they were not clearly heading for Egypt but were wandering near Bersheba. Again Yahweh intervened to protect them. The son lived in the desert of Paran, in the same general area, and Hagar

While David was an exile trying to avenge a raid on his own village, he came upon an Egyptian slave who had been left behind by his Amelekite owner because he was sick. The Egyptian admitted his status, and David asked him to show him the camp of the raiders; he agreed, if David would swear not to kill him and not to give him over to the hand of his owner. David apparently agreed. 14 This story does not concern a runaway as such, but David, for his own strategic reasons was willing to feed and support the man because he could tell him something he needed to know. David in the text did not assert any general principle, but the narrator apparently found his behavior reasonable. Probably a more typical story, which is not sympathetic to escape, is one casually told at the-end of the David stories in the time of Solomon his son. A notable named Shiinei who was related to Saul had publicly ridiculed David when he was in distress, blaming Saul's death on him (2 Samuel 16:5-13). Solomon announced to him that he would have to stay in Jerusalem, having built a house there; ifhe ever left the city, he would be killed. But Shimei forgot the duty to remain under city arrest: 1 Kings 2:39-40 And it happened after three years that two of Shimei's slaves fled to Achish son of Maacah, king of Gath, and people told Shimeisaying, Look, your slavesare in Gath. So he got up and saddledhis donkey andwentto Gathto Achishto requesthis slaves, and Shimei went and returned the slaves from Gath." Naturally this lapse gave Solomon the chance to have him killed although Shimei's act seems to be perfectly innocent in political

14 I Samuel 30: 15: ')IN''J. ')1)tln-oN) 'm'y'ln - DN; the story is in I Samuel 30:11-16. 15

'vn'lJ? D'1J.}I""')'lJ m1J.) D')'lJ 'lJ?'lJ ~jJn 'il') I Kings 2:39 rm l'1J.V mil 1nN? 'vn'lJ? 11')') m l?n il:lVnlJ. 'lJ':lN7N 'lJ':lN7N nm 1?') nnn-nN 'lJJ.n') 'vn'lJ DjJ') 40 mn )'1J.VJ1N NJ.') 'vn'lJ 1?') )'1J.VJ1N 'lJjJJ.?

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16 Note that the differences in the fathers' names may indicate two different kings were meant, though the similarity of the names may argue against that view: I Samuel 27:2 Maok (lwn) versus I Kings 2:39 Maaka (il:lvn). See Duane L. Christensen, "Achish," in Anchor Bible Dictionary, edited by David N. Freedman, 1:55-56, (New York: Doubleday, 1992).

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his mother managed to arrange for a woman from her homeland of Egypt as a wife for him. Like many other runaways, Hagar was heading home, and when expelled from her household, the traditions hold that she managed to use her ties to the homeland, just as the other branch of the patriarchal family attempted to do in getting brides for Isaac and for Jacob. 17 Other princelings and would-be princelings besides David fled unpleasant courts. In 1 Kings 11:17, :23, and :40 the Aramaean prince Hadad fled to Egypt, Rezon of Damascus fled from before his lord and then returned to oust him from Damascus, and Jereboam fled to Egypt to avoid Solomon's wrath. 18 The case of the prophet Jonah, called on to confront the legendarily evil Ninevites, may be a play on the situation of the escaped slave. Certainly he had great trouble eluding his lord and eventually had to carry out the distasteful duty ofpreaching to the Ninevites. The prophet argued that his flight derived from his knowledge that the Lord would forgive the evil people (Jonah 4:2). Since he did not agree with forgiveness for such as they, flight was the only option, although Jonah was aware of God's great power and ability to find even fleeing prophets."

3. LEGAL COLLECTIONS

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Some legal texts deal with escape and freedom, and they are not likely to have been put into effect in a slave-holding society, even if the numbers of actual slaves were small and their work of negligible value. Thus it is of great interest to try to understand how these admonitions might have been included in the Israelite legal material. The texts stress a tradition in Israelite thought that was SYmpathetic to the downtrodden, especially because the Israelite intellectuals remembered that they had been slaves in Egypt. Deuteronomy 23: 16-17 (English 15-16) may derive from Northern intellectuals before 722 B.C.E.; what it exhorts is quite revolutionary in light ofother Ancient Near Eastern traditions and Biblical practice as seen at least in the 1 Kings 2 story: Do not give up a slave to his masters who saves himself from his masters to you. (17) With you he shall live in your midst in the place which he shall choose in one of your gates in a place that seems good to him; do not oppress him. 20

20

1~)lN DYY.:ll~?N ?~)~"'\!JN 1~)1N-'JN l:lY .,~mn-N? (16) unn N? 1? :l)\?:ll~"Y\!J lmo{ .,n:l~"'\!JN mpY.:l:lp"p:l :l\!J~ lY.:lY (17)

17 The storyofthe flight is in Genesis 16:1-16; expulsion is in Genesis 21:8-21. For the Road of Shur see David A. Dorsey, The Roads and Highways ofAncient Israel, (Baltimore and London: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1991), 120. For Paran see Jeffries M. Hamilton, "Paran," in The Anchor Bible Dictionary, edited by David N. Freedman, 5:162, (New York: Doubleday, 1992).

18 Of the 67 occurrences ofthe verbal root n.,:l "to flee" only one other might be seen as alluding to slavery, Isaiah 48:20, where the Second Isaiah exhorted the exiled Israelites to return to the Land of Israel from Babylonia: Go out from Babylon; flee from Chaldeans; D~l\!):>Y.:l 1n.,:l ?:l:lY.:l 1N~ in a voice ofjoy speak; let this be heard. m-n ))l~Y.:l\!Jn 11~)n m., ?1P:l They have taken her out to the end ofthe earth. '{.,Nn n~j71Y mN~~)i1 Say: The Lord has redeemed his slave Jacob. :lpy~ )1:lY mi1~ ?Nl 1.,Y.:lN But ifone looks closely at this, it does not fit in with observed realities and remains only an image since the former owner has bought back the slave, who is now exhorted to flee to the land of the lord (and Lord). 19 See Robert J. Ratner, "Jonah, The Runaway Servant," MAARA V 5-6 (1990): 281-305, who has briefly surveyed Ancient Near Eastern references to runaways.

Gerhard von Rad, Deuteronomy, (philadelphia: Westminster, 1966), 147, suggests that the last verb is a legal term meaning to reduce to slavery, not just general oppression. Note that he misses the contrast with the Ancient Near East, referring to the Alalakh treaty discussed in Chapter Three. This misapprehension derives from the mistake ofthe first editor of the Alalakh treaty in not translating the strong oaths as negatives, as corrected by M. Liverani, "L'Estradizione dei refugiate in AT 2," Rivista degli Studi Orientali 39 (1964):111-116, 111-112. Other treaty writers also would find Deuteronomy's solicitude for the welfare of the slave incomprehensible. See Moshe Weinfeld, Deuteronomy and the Deuteronomic School, (Oxford: Clarendon, 1972), and his "The Origins ofHumanism in Deuteronomy," Journal ofBiblical Literature 80 (1961): 241247. Gerhard Von Rad, Deuteronomy, 147. See in general David Brion Davis, The Problem of Slavery in Western Culture, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1966). Raymond Westbrook, "Slave and Master," 1673, suggests that this must refer to an international context between nations: "It makes perfect sense, however, when applied to the international sphere, where no right of recovery existed unless expressly authorized by treaty. The passage can therefore be seen as a polemic against such treaty provisions, and a prohibition on the authorities in Israel against ever including an extradition clause in their treaties with neighboring states." He argues that since the slave got to choose his place ofresidence, he was by definition not an Israelite; I am not

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There is no particular context to this statement, and the basis for thinking that this concern for the escaping slave did derive from Israelite experience is other statements in Deuteronomy, which may not be closely related to these verses. Commentators have guessed that the slave envisioned was not one escaping from an Israelite owner but from a foreign land who for some reason showed up in Israel, and yet that is not explicitly stated. If this stipulation had been put into effect consistently and included Israelites enslaved in Israel, slavery could not have lasted in Israel, as it obviously did. We may conclude that this remained a moral admonition on which few, if any, were tempted to act. But it is remarkable that it was put forward at all. We can attribute this fact to the origins of Deuteronomy among critics of the status quo who were willing to extend their humanistic vision to include some slaves who had managed to escape their masters. This passage shows clearly and explicitly that there were Israelite thinkers who actually empathized with slaves and valued even the slaves' freedom; this empathy is more explicit than anything adduced from Classical Greek literature." In this same vein is the rule against "stealing men" which did not mention slavery but which appeared to condemn the practice by which many were enslaved. Exodus 21:16 reads, "Whoever steals a man, whether he sells him or is found in possession of him, shall be put to death. "22 If such stipulations were actually to

be enforced, the institution of slavery would have been stamped out. Since it clearly was not, we may assume again that this is an egalitarian wish that could not be put into effect. The same distance from reality may inhere in the Jubilee legislation, which is part of the latest large collection of laws in the Bible, the Holiness Code, apparently connected with priests. The idea seems to be that in the fiftieth year the society should return any land alienated in the last 49 years (Leviticus 25:10). In that context the legislators envisioned a temporary abolition of debt slavery among Hebrews:

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sure the context was international since it was not explicitly defined, and the Deuteronomic humanism may have been more powerful than practice. 21 David Brion Davis, The Problem, 71, summarizes Euripides' feelings: "...while Euripides raised no protest against the injustice of slavery, he sensed that its origins were filled with dramatic pathos." Stoics viewed slavery as part ofthe imperfections of the world to be borne by the truly free person, ibid., 76. Compare the several passages adduced in Patterson, Freedom I, 88-132. 22 nY.n) m» )1):1 N~n)) n:JY.n\!J)N :1In Compare the somewhat more explicit Deuteronomy 24:7, which seems to expand the Exodus verse: "If a man is found to have stolen a soul from his brothers from the children oflsrael and has entered into commerce with him and sold him, then that thief is a dead man, and you must bum out the evil from your midst." "N1\!J' '):1n )'nNn \!J£l) :1)) \!J'N N~n)"):J

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Leviticus 25:39 And if your brother becomes poor beside you, and sells himself to you, you shall not make him serve as a slave. (40) He shall be with you as a hired servant and as a sojourner. He shall serve with you until the year of the jubilee; (41) then he shall go out from you, he and his children with him, and go back to his own family, and return to the possession of his fathers.

The motivation is explicitly that the Israelites were slaves in Egypt (Leviticus 25:42). This legislation is not tantamount to abolition of slavery, but it does edge closer to abolition than other legal proposals from the ancient world." A temporary servitude was envisioned in the passages that speak of slavery for seven years for Hebrew slaves only; other slaves presumably served in perpetuity. The oldest stipulation is probably the one at the very beginning of the oldest extensive collection oflaws, the Covenant Code, Exodus 21:2: "When you buy a Hebrew slave six years he shall serve, and in the seventh he shall go out free (or as a freedman) for nothing." Slaves who did

l:l1pn Y1il n1Y:1)xmn ann nrn n:JY.n n-,nynm 1:1Y nny n 1:1yn-N" 1"-':J):») 1ny TnN 1m'''):J) (39) 1ny ny' ":1'il m\!J-'y 1ny il'il' :1\!Jm:J 1':J'lJ:J (40) :1)\!J' )'n:1N mnN7N) mn£l\!JY.l7N :1\!J) my )'):1) N1il1nyY.l N~')(41) David Brion Davis, The Problem, 62-90. The Stoics in the Hellenistic period opposed slavery in principle, but it was only until Quakers in the eighteenth century began to question their earlier involvement in slave trading that there arose an organized movement for abolition, 72-78, 291-332. 23

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not wish to go free but wished to remain with the families whom the masters had provided could so declare and have their ears bored as a sign of their permanent slave status, and they could serve forever (:6).24 Females were to be dealt with differently, unless they had been made wives of owners or owners' sons and had not been treated properly with regard to food, clothes, and marital duty; if neglected, then they might "go out for nothing; there is no money" (Exodus 21:7).25 The reason for the difference in treatment apparently lay in the different roles envisioned for men and women. The women could look forward to being honored wives, and if they did not get their due, they could go free. But the men were seen as potential heads of households who would value freedom and might even choose it over adherence to their slave families. It is perhaps ironic in light ofPatterson's arguments that freedom was first perceived as a value because of the experience of females that they were not more favored with access to freedom in Exodus. In the parallel sections of Deuteronomy freedom for women definitely moved to the fore. Deuteronomy 15:12 is explicit that the seven-year rule should apply to women as well as men. The terminology is a bit different, since "you are to send them forth free," while Exodus had the man merely "going forth." The role of the manumitter was paramount, and this is in line with Deuteronomy's purpose as an admonition to those who had power over others to treat them more justly. Not only were they both to go free; they were also to get gifts of sheep, grain, and wine to start them off in their new lives of freedom (:13-14). And the motive for such magnanimity was historic: "And you will remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the Lord your God ransomed you; because ofthat I order you to do this thing today." The sermonizers realized that this endowment and especially the

manumission itselfmight be hard for slave-owners to accept, but they rationalized that the slave served six years for "halfthe wage of a hired laborer," and thus that the slave owner was getting a great deal. 26 In the dark days after the initial Babylonian conquest in 597 RC.E. and the exile of some of the opinion leaders Jeremiah 34: 8-17 shows how the remission was supposed to work but did not actually work. Jeremiah related that the Judahite king Zedekiah had made a covenant and called a remission for the Judahites "to send forth each one his Hebrew slave and slave girl," and the people did so but then captured them and reimposed slavery. So the prophet reproached the slave-holders with the Lord's threat and used the term remission ironically:

24 om ~'lJ!)n? N.::l~ nVJ.'lJ:n 1J.V~ 0~)'lJ 'lJ'lJ ~1J.V 1J.V mpn ~:l Exodus 21:2 25 'lo:l )'N. mn ilN.::l~)

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34: 17 So thus says the Lord. You did not hear me to call a remission each for his brother and each for his fellow; here I am calling a remission for you--the speech of the Lord--for a sword and plague and famine, and I'll turn you into a terror to all the kingdoms of the

earth."

26 Deuteronomy 15:12: lY.lVY.l ~'lJ!)n ))n?'lJn vs. Exodus 21:2: mn ~'lJ!)n? N.::l~. Deuteronomy 15:18: 1~:l\!J 1:l\!J m'lJY.l "half the wage of a hired laborer." This raises the question of how much slaves cost and what the wage of a hired laborer was. We cannot say from texts contemporary to Deuteronomy in Israel, but there are slave prices preserved in Genesis 37:28, where the Ishmaelites paid 20 (shekels) of silver for Joseph, and Hosea 3:2, where he paid 15 (shekels) of silver and a homer and a measure of barley (about 120 liters) for an adulteress. We have the following wages attested in the Bible: Judges 17:10 10 (shekels) for a priest along with his apparel and living; 2 Chronicles 25:6 3 (shekels) for a mercenary for the duration of a campaign; Nehemiah 5:15 40 shekels for the salary of governors in the past; Zechariah ll: 12 30 (shekels) for a shepherd. These are not all twice the attested slave prices, but they are of the same order of magnitude. On the measures see Marvin A. Powell, "Weights and Measures," in Anchor Bible Dictionary, edited by David N. Freedman, 6:897-908, 903, (New York: Doubleday, 1992). 27 mV1? 'lJ~N.) )mN.? 'lJ~N. 1n1 N.1jJ? ~?N. onvY.l'lJ-N.? OnN. mm 1Y.lN.i1:l P? J.V1il?N.) 1J.1il?N. J.1nil-?N. mil~-oN.) 1)11 O:l? N.1jJ »m 'l1N.il m:l?Y.lY.l ?:l? ilvn? O:lnN. ~nm

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The prophet referred to the idea that Hebrew slaves should serve only seven years, and admitted that earlier generations had not obeyed that rule (Jeremiah 34:14). So the prophet predicted that God's wrath, in the form of the Babylonians, would decimate Judah (:22). Obviously Jeremiah's complaint refers to neglect and then abuse ofthe provisions for seven-year slavery. It is not clear that the freeing of slaves was conceived as a normal part of the jubilee year procedures, but it seems a logical extension from a lesser to a greater proposition. If it was required to free Hebrew slaves in the seventh year of their service, then naturally such a liberation would be included in the general liberty of the land." But it does not seem likely that in a society that continued to regard slave-holding as necessary such mass manumissions would ever have been anything but a step taken in an acute crisis. The chronological problems of whether Jeremiah may have been reacting to the Holiness Code are not easily resolved, and for our purposes they are not particularly important. It is sufficient to note that in the middle of the first millennium B.C.E. some thinkers in the southern kingdom believed that God's will required that slavery among their fellow-countrymen ought to be curtailed, its duration limited, and the condition ofthe freedmen ameliorated through the endowment of start-up supplies for a life of freedom. After the return from exile we hear ofNehemiah's reforms, and though he did not use terms for freedom and release, he was concerned to curtail debt-slavery by making rich persons provide credit for the poor. The downtrodden complained to him, " ...we are forcing our sons and our daughters to be slaves, and some of .our daughters have already been enslaved..." in order to pay taxes (Nehemiah 5:5). Nehemiah's answer was to accuse the nobles (~orim!) of exacting interest and to shame them into lending

money and grain without interest (Nehemiah 5:6-13). Nehemiah must have thought that this measure would free up credit for the poor and allow them to avoid slavery." This again shows that Nehemiah must have seen freedom as a community value for which he encouraged sacrifice. Later practice certainly lagged behind these thinkers, if in fact any slave-holders paid attention to them at all. But it is not a far step from such humanity toward slaves, maybe initially only toward Hebrew slaves, to humanity toward any slaves. It is, however, not necessarily a quick or easy step to make. Champions of the Greek miracle will be happy to point out that the same feeling, that fellow-Greeks really ought not to be enslaved, was current among intellectuals at Athens a hundred years or so later. 30 One may thus argue that what we have found in Israel is not unique in the ancient world, and I would agree. But what one finds in Greece also is not unique. The legacy of how those two traditions interacted is a complex one that cannot be fully followed here. I think nonetheless we have shown that the seeds oflove of liberty were present in both cultures, but the manifestation ofhow those seeds developed is not likely to have been similar in both places simply because ofthe different historical experiences ofthe bearers of the traditions. It does not seem likely to me that the ideas ofmodem liberty have persisted unchanged from these early times, but certain elements that constitute important hallmarks within modem liberty were found in the ancient world.

28 See Christopher J. H. Wright, "Jubilee, Year of," in Anchor Bible Dictionary, 3: 1025-1030, and compare Ezekiel 46: 17, where the Jubilee year is called the year of the d'r6r "freedom." The practice of the Jubilee year had fallen into neglect at least as early as the first century of our era; compare George Foot Moore, Judaism in the First Centuries ofthe Christian Era, (New York: Schocken, 1971),2: 135-138, and 340 n. 1.

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29 See in general Eberhard Klingenberg, Das israelitische Zinsverbot in Torah, Misnah. und Talmud. (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1977). 30 See the references in Yvon Garlan, Slavery in Ancient Greece, (Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press, 1988),47-53,50-51.

CHAPTER SIX

FREEDOM BEYOND MESOPOTAMIANS AND GREEKS We have seen that the terminology.for flight and freedom existed in the Ancient Near Eastern languages, and there is no question but what underlings in various states ofunfreedom fled. When we tum to the goals expressed in the Introduction, we can say that some have been met. First, on eluding authority on the ground, we can say that because of the laconic nature of the administrative documents from which such information comes, we usually cannot say much about why people fled, but we have seen some interesting things about how they did so. Group escape was rare, in contrast to other traditions of escape. On the second goal of assaying what elite understandings were offlight and freedom, we have examined the ideology offlight and freedom, what intellectuals wrote about it, and we know that kings and movers and shakers took a dim view of flight, even if some of them might acknowledge that flight had a role at least in their own educations ifnot in letting offsteam in socially constraining situations. But citizens of old cities and of upstart cities prized freedom, conceived as old liberties secured for particular cities, and sometimes as curtailment of some kinds of debts. Intellectuals, some not connected to the royal courts, went further and proposed a freedom that might rearrange oppressive economic conditions, at least periodically. Their distance from power, though, usually kept such ideas from being put into practice, especially in first-millennium Israel.'

! We cannot claim to have studied here running away as a phenomenon in anyone community or time; this is a desideratum which could produce new insights into the complexity oflabor, as suggested for the New World by Michael Naragon, "Communities in Motion: Drapetomania, Work and the Development of African-American Slave Cultures," Slavery andAbolition 15:3 (1994): 62-87, especially 83: "Only by examining drapetomania [the desire to run away] within its larger communal context can historians grasp its root causes and significance..."

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Our third goal of trying to see how escape experience might have affected these elite understandings finds some data in the Idrimi and the David stories. With Idrimi the feedback was negative. A prince who came to power from his exile still entered into a treaty promising return of refugees. The case of David is less clear in that he did not legislate or make preserved treaties on these issues. The tradition of the Hebrew Exodus did however serve as a continuing motive for kind treatment of slaves and might be connected with the extraordinary stipulations that restricted return ofslaves and stealing ofpersons. These traditions may be independent of David's stories, of course.

I. ARE TRADITIONS A UNITY?

The first and most basic question about the material we have reviewed is whether the Ancient Near Eastern traditions about flight and freedom constitute a unity in any sense. Certainly there are continuities in both areas, and yet it must be underlined that we do not really know how ideas flowed in the Ancient Near East and how specific formulations might pass from one place to another.' Probably the most famous of the cultural contacts, which has little to do with flight and freedom, is the case of the goring ox, which occurs both in the Code of Hammurapi and in the Bible. There one might posit the existence of some sort of orally passed down common law which elders in various communities employed to solve recurring problems. Or one might look to the tradition of literacy itself where scribes in one culture were exposed to the writings of another and transposed them into their

2 La Circulation des biens. des personnes et des idees dans le Proche-Orient ancien,

edited by D. Charpin, I-M. Durand, (Paris: Recherche sur les civilisations, 1992), has a number of stimulating studies, but it constitutes only a starting place for such questions as these. Trade shows that there was contact, and occasionallyin intellectual affairswe can meet the Babylonian visitingprofessors, for example,at the Hittite court, studied by Gary Beckman,"Mesopotamians and MesopotamianLearning at Hattusa," Journal ofCuneiform Studies 35 (1983): 97-114.

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own milieus. It is not possible given our state of knowledge to decide in any individual case between these alternatives. But it seems quite likely that each of them operated in some situations, and that variants on them operated in many others. Ifwe ask only if the Ancient Near Eastern tradition as a whole was a unity, we must unequivocally answer that it was not, that it was a cluster of cultures and language groups that shared some ideas but differed in many others in different places and periods.' Probably all we should concretely claim for flight and freedom is to say that we have shown that several Ancient Near Eastern societies confronted something like the issue of freedom in that they legislated, even if they did not enforce, stipulations about exemptions from some taxes and some kinds of debt. Viewed from outside the societies and from two and more millennia later, the societies seem to the interested observer to share a general idea, which might well be universal, that governments ought occasionally to intervene in social and economic affairs to assure that justice was done, and the calling for freedom was one usually cheap way for governments to be seen to be doing that. And yet, ifan individual Hebrew speaker had been accosted and asked how his institutions differed from those.of an individual, and earlier, Sumerian speaker, in most periods he would be quick to point out the vast differences and not the commonalities. Since we are asking a manifestly ahistorical question, that is, how does our own view of freedom compare to those of earlier groups, we may be permitted to be struck by the differences. Perhaps it would strengthen the case to emphasize continuities, as Patterson did in connection with the Greeks, and it is true that there are continuities. But candor calls us to admit ignorance both

3 The goring ox is in Hammurapiparagraphs250-252 and Exodus21:28-32;seethe studies by J.J. Finkelstein, The Ox That Gored, (Philadelphia: AmericanPhilosophical Society, 1981) = Transactions 71:2, and "The Goring Ox," Temple Law Quarterly 46 (1973): 169-290.The case of the EgyptianInstructionsof Amenemopeand the Biblical book of Proverbs 22:17-24:34is the most striking case of extended literaryborrowing in the Ancient Near East; see on this R.N. Whybray, The Book ofProverbs, (Leiden: Brill, 1995), 78-84.

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of how ideas passed on and of whether, all told, the institution called in Akkadian anduriirum really was to be seen, except lexicographically, in the Biblical cfror. 4 The future ofthis question may be clarified as we find more Ancient Near Eastern texts that may be seen as missing links between earlier and later traditions, but now the question must remain a matter of conjecture. One might consequently argue that one ought to refrain from speculation on other questions about the history of freedom, but I personally believe that Assyriologists in particular have too frequently failed to tease out the implications of their studies for the contemporary broader culture, and I do not intend to make that mistake in this case.

2. DESCENT AMONG JEWS

It would be ofinterest to know how exactly the views about flight and freedom that appeared in Israelite tradition descended to Judaism in late antiquity. A great deal of study has gone into the question ofdescent in general, though not, so far as I am aware, in detail about flight and freedom. In Jesus son ofSirach's wisdom book, which must have been composed around 180 B.C.E. in Palestine and as Ecclesiasticus became a secondarily canonical part ofthe Bible, we find advice to the slave-holders:

33:24 (Greek :25) Fodder and a stick and burdens for an ass; bread and discipline and work for a servant. 25 Set your slave to work, and you will find rest; leave his hands idle, and he will seek liberty. 26 Yoke and thong will bow the neck,

4 M. Liverani, Prestige and Interest, 295, notes too that there may have been varieties ofattitudes in the lower classes: "The presumption that peasantry was wherever alike would mean to grant a monopoly of culture to the ruling elites. The diversities were perhaps not less marked in the 'silent majority,' but these did not leave letters nor display inscriptions."

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and for a wicked servant there are racks and tortures. 27 Put him to work, that he may not be idle. For idleness teachesmuch evil. 28 Set him to work, as is fitting for him, and ifhe does not obey, make his fetters heavy. 29 Do not act immoderately toward anybody, and do nothing without discretion. 30. If you have a servant, let him be as yourself, because you have bought him with blood. 31. If you have a servant,treat him as a brother, for as your own soul you will need him. If you ill-treat him, and he leaves and runs away, which way will you go to seek him?' The slave-holders were admonished to be kind to slaves so that they would not run away, but also to keep them busy so they did not seek freedom because they had nothing better to do. Certainly Sirach had no thought that runaway slaves ought not to be returned to their masters. It is clear that the later Jewish tradition in practice valued freedom ofthought very highly, though probably not for all Jews, just for those qualified through their training to have an opinion on religious matters. When the elites that had run Judaea were swallowed in the Jewish Wars of 70 and 135 C.E., only the Pharisaic religious leaders continued to be a recognized group, and their opinions were those that give us rabbinic Judaism, from which all later Judaisms either derive or to which they arose in opposition. One ofthe beliefs ofthe group was that there was an oral law that showed God's will alongside and in elaboration of the written law which the Hebrew Bible conveyed, and this law was seen to be flexible in that responsible opinion in any age could conceivably revise it. In practice the Jewish scholars became attached to their understandings, and not many basic questions were open to dispute. But the idea that some questions were open

5

"Servant" in this passage is oilee-tTle; "house slave"; "slave" is nate; "child."

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and that God would manifest His will in the discussion was a basic one that persists to this day. Perhaps the most striking illustration of this valuing of intellectual freedom is the story in the Babylonian Talmud about whether a portable oven that had been made ritually unclean had to be disassembled in order to have its purity restored. Disputants proposed various solutions to this problem, and then a consensus developed. But the Talmud says God spoke from heaven saying that His view lay with the minority, but he would accept the superior arguments ofthe majority. "My sons have defeated Me," He is said to have laughed." This treasuring of freedom of thought did not extend to behavioral norms. Most rabbis in the early centuries of our era probably despised the untutored and illiterate masses, the "people of the land," who might be Jewish in descent, but in religious matters were seen as doubtful practitioners because of their ignorance and thus were not qualified for the intellectual freedom the rabbis prized. Also even rabbis continued to hold slaves, though Biblical injunctions against having permanent Hebrew slaves might have been taken seriously in some communities. 7 Some communities may have been concerned about the jubilee, and jubilees may have been imposed in the limited way communities under alien rule might have been able to do so.

6 Baba Metziah 59b, The Babylonian Talmud, edited by Israel Epstein, (London: Soncino: 1935),353: Said Rabbi Jeremiah, That the Law had already been given at Sinai. We pay no attention to a Heavenly Voice because Thou hast long since written in the Law at Mt. Sinai, After a majority one must incline (Exodus 23:2). Rabbi Nathan met Elijah and asked him what did the Holy One, Blessed be He, do in that hour. He laughed and he replied, saying, My sons have defeated Me, My sons have defeated Me.

7 See Salo W. Baron, A Social and Religious History of the Jews, (New York, Philadelphia: Columbia University Press, Jewish Publication Society, 1952),2:258-259; on slavery in one community see S.D. Goitein, A Mediterranean Society, I. Economic Foundations, (Berkeley, Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1967), 130-147, and note 143: "A touchstone for the treatment of slaves is the frequency of reports or discussions about their running away from their masters." Such reports are rare in the Cairo Geniza documents which Goitein studies.

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The Talmudic references to Deuternomy 23: 16-17 with its stipulation ofnot returning the runaway include one where Rabbi Judah the Patriarch, who flourished in the Land of Israel around 192-235 C.E., said the stipulation was limited to the case ofaman who bought a slave on condition that he free him. Another reference has Rabbi Hisda, a Babylonian of the late third century C.E., arguing, "That refers to a slave who escapes from abroad to Eretz Israe1." That is, all references agree that the stipulation was not of general application and thus did not really undermine slavery." In contrast Benjamin al-Nahawandi, a Karaite, or anti-Rabbinic teacher of the ninth century C.E., forbad the surrendering of any fugitive slaves, Jew or Gentile. This is perfectly in line with a Karaite's devotion to a literal understanding of the Biblical text, but it is not clear that it made much difference to slave-holding practices among Karaites. Elsewhere, though, Benjamin did allow the sons of deceased debtors to be sold as slaves, basing himself on 2 Kings 4's Elisha story, in which the prophet performed a miracle creating olive oil that allowed a widow to avoid having her sons sold into slavery; Benjamin argued that the prophet thereby condoned slavery. 9 One can say in general that the great themes of Exodus, of liberation from bondage, continued to reverberate in the hearts of Jews. And yet, except in intellectual inquiry in theory, everyday life among Jewish communities may not have manifested freedom as a value any more than contemporary Greek-speaking communities or others without an Ancient Near Eastern background.

8 Yebamot 93a-b, The Babylonian Talmud, 634, essentially the same tradition as in Kiddushin 62b-63a, 315. For the slave supposedly bought abroad see Gitlin 45a, 196.

9 For the Karaite see Leon Nemoy, Karaite Anthology, (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1952), 335, 21, and H.H. Ben-Sasson, A History ofthe Jewish People, (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1976), 448.

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Another question of interest is how exactly the Greek tradition descended. Although Alexander valued the Greek tradition, it was not its philosophy that was of great importance to him, and politically it must be admitted that his successors and their states did not allow real civic freedoms or personal ones. The Stoic school of philosophy, which became important in the last few centuries B.C.E., did take important elements from the Classical tradition about freedom and asserted, as the Jewish philosopher Philo wrote, that every upright man is in fact free. The meaning of this was that the pious human being, or rather man, was felt to be able to control his desires and appetites and to direct his thoughts wherever he wished, regardless of what his body could be forced to do. This freedom was certainly valued by Stoics, but it may not have been very general in the Greek-speaking world. 10 The Stoics did come the closest ofany ancient group to advocating the abolition of slavery, feeling that it demeaned both the master and slave to pervert the real freedom that the mind exercised. But these sentiments did not become a social movement for abolition III any sense. Another stairway ofdescent ofideas offreedom is Christianity. In particular the Apostle Paul dwelled on the freedom he had in Christ and commended that freedom to his addressees. Though

10 From Philo see his "That Every Just Man Is Free," in Philo, F.H. Colson, editor, (Cambridge, London: Harvard University Press, Heinemann, 1967),9:1-101, esp. 79, lauding the Jewish Essene sect for, among other things, supposedly refusing to hold slaves. In fact the Damascus Document, which is related to the Dead Sea Scrolls reputed to come from Essenes or people like Essenes, implies that sect members rna; have owned slaves; see Geza Vermes, The Dead Sea Scrolls, (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1981), 128. On other Stoics and freedom see David Brion Davis, The Problem, 72-78. Amaldo Momigliano showed the Classical Greek interest was in what Patterson would call sovereignal freedom, that is, not being subservient to others, but he also makes clear that Herodotus demonstrated that the Persians were inimical to tyrants too and tolerated democratic freedoms; see Momigliano, "Persian Empire and Greek Freedom," in The Idea ofFreedom. Essays in Honor ofIsaiah Berlin, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1979),139-151, 141, 148.

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some have formulated his thought as advocating freedom from the Jewish law, from sin, and from death, recent study indicates that Paul saw freedom in a Stoic light and asserted that one would have more freedom, that is, freedom to do as one wanted, if one accepted Christ. II He had apparently no coherent idea about how the law might be overcome and in fact advocated modest obedience to community norms, It is hard to see how Paul can be said to be handing down the Classical value of freedom except that he used the same Greek word. When it came to actual slavery, Paul was supportive of kind treatment to runaway slaves, but he certainly did not see the freedom of slaves as a value. In the Letter to Philemon he sent back a Christian runaway, imploring that the Christian master treat the returnee as a brother as well as a slave. 12 Later, when Gospels came to be written, in Luke's understanding ofJesus his first sermon at Nazareth focused on the proclamation of freedom. Jesus in Luke 4:18 read Isaiah 61:1-2 in the synagogue: The spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor; He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord.

And Jesus ends by saying, "Today this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing" (:21). Other traditions of Jesus did not stress the aspect of freedom, but this is a significant link between a central Hebrew Bible text on freedom and Jesus. 13

11 See F. Stanley Jones, "Freedom," in The Anchor Bible Dictionary, edited by David N. Freedman, 2: 855-859, (New York: Doubleday, 1992). 12 See LA.H. Combes, The Metaphor of Slavery in the Writings of the Early Church, (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 1998),59-63. 13 Luke diverges from the Septuagint which follows the Masoretic Text here; Luke subtracts one phrase (iaua.u8cn 'toi>~ uuv't€'tptJJJJevou~'tfl Ka.pti(~, "to heal those broken in heart") and adds another (anou't€iAa.t 't€8pa.uuJJevou~ tv aeu€t "to send

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The later Christian tradition was not noted for its attachment to personal freedom. Indeed in the crises that wracked the early church, one finds leaders quite willing to deny personal freedom to opponents. The practice of excommunication, which might deprive a person of such freedom, is attested even in the New Testament itself apparently in 1 Timothy 1:19-20. But of course it would be cavalier to say that the entire tradition rejected freedom. There certainly were monks copying the Classical texts, having the leisure and freedom to do so. And the freedom of the church was the rallying cry for the eleventh-century reform movement associated with Pope Gregory VII. 14

4. DESCENT AMONG MUSLIMS

Another strand ofdescent ofthe idea offreedom as a value may be found in the Islamic world. There we find much study of the Classical tradition, though with a bent toward the translation of practical texts like medical ones." In spite of the Western view that Islamic states continued a sort ofOriental despotism wherever possible, the legal traditions in Islam were united in their seeing the individual's freedom as a value. As reflected in my dedication at the beginning of this study the basic assumption in cases of doubt about the slave status of a person was to be for the free status. The jurists asserted, ''the basic principle for all children of

away those shattered in a release"), which appears to emphasize the connection to freedom or "release." Greek.ddieotv translates Hebrew deror, "release" or "freedom." The New Testament text is from The Greek New Testament, edited by Kurt Aland et aI., (Stuttgart: United Bible Societies, 1968). 14 S ' H . Pope, "E xcommunication, . . " .m 11 The Interpreter T eeM arvm 's Dictionary ofthe

Bible, edited by George Buttrick, 2:183-185, (Nashville, New York: Abingdon, 1962). See Harold 1. Berman, Law and Revolution. The Formation of the Western Legal Tradition, (Cambridge, Massachusetts, and London: Harvard University Press, 1983), 85-119, on Gregory's work. 15 See in general Franz Rosenthal's compendium, The Classical Heritage in Islam, (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1967).

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Adam...is freedom." Manumission was seen as an especially virtuous act, and in fact freed slaves had important roles down to modem times in the army and the administration of several Muslim-dominated states. 16 Franz Rosenthal studied the Muslim views of freedom in a small and provocative book that assumes that the Greeks had expanded the understanding of freedom and that this concept has come to be the decisive one in world history. Rosenthal wrote during the Cold War, and freedom's importance may actually have grown since 1960. He notes that the Arabic word for free, hurr, means not just free but ofoutstanding value, and suggests that the term did not mean "freedom" in modem senses until modem times. But the Muslims ignored Aristotle's argument that there were persons who were slaves by nature, and legal traditions even said the master should not call a slave his slave, but one should refer to "my boy, my maid," because all humans were actually slaves only ofGod. Although imprisonment was not primarily for punishment, there were prisons, which were used to hold persons before their innocence had been established; officials could not use jailor torture to force confessions. Forced labor, an every-present way of exploiting labor that did not lead to enslavement, had no basis in Islamic law and was abhorred, though frequently imposed. The story was preserved that Alexander had been told by Aristotle that he would find it difficult to beat the Khurasanians because of their "great love of freedom." This might refer either to personal or civic freedom, but the phrase certainly denotes that the Khurasanians of Iran reputedly held freedom as a value. But of course the story was presumably first told in Greek. Note too that

16 See Robert Brunschvig, "cAbd," in The Encyclopaedia ofIslam, edited by A.R. Gibb et aI., (Leiden, London: Brill, Luzac, 1960), 1:24b-40a, and Patricia Crone, Slaves on Horses, (London, New York: Cambridge University Press, 1980),74-81, for the military roles of slaves in early Islam. Franz Rosenthal, The Muslim Concept of Freedom Prior to the 19th Century, (Leiden: Brill, 1960),32 and n. 76.

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since the love of independence of the bedouin was "entirely unreflective," it was ignored by Rosenthal. 17 Rosenthal admits the Greek miracle, but he does argue that freedom of thought and movement had a "tremendous emotional impact" on "the average Muslim." But the idea ofcivic liberty was not strong; a commitment to human liberty was nonetheless clear. 18 One may question if such facts constitute the valuing of freedom as a societal value, but it seems to me that Islamic civilization can be said to have held that value at least as much as Christian civilization did into the Early Modem Era. The more recent development ofideas ofpoliticaI freedom appears to derive from European influence, as in the 1840 call by Lebanese to oppose Ibrahim Pasha's Egyptian occupation, perhaps reflecting the language of a British resident. Earlier uses are in contexts of contacts with Europeans; a 1774 Russo-Ottoman treaty speaks of the Tatars ofCrimea as "free and independent," though they were not, and freedom appears as a political term in Arabic first in a 1798 declaration by Napoleon Bonaparte.'? The Syrian understanding of freedom with which we began this study probably owes more to later Western thought than to the Islamic tradition itself, though the word used derives directly from Muslim usage.

5. TOWARD A DEFINITION

The study of the ancient world opens the question of how we define personal freedom. Freedom of movement would seem to be important, and it was that freedom that ancient runaways were

17

Franz Rosenthal, Muslim Concept, 9-11, 30, 46-47,77-79, 101,104 n. 327.

18 Ibid., 120-121. 19 See Albert Hourani,Arabic Thought in the LiberalAge, 1798-1939, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983),61-62; compare also for later thinkers, ibid., 90, 100, 173, 176. And for the Ottomans and Bonaparte see Bernard Lewis, The Political Language ofIslam, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988), 109 and 111.

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seizing, and yet there may be other elements that are important to us now that have developed only gradually and would not be likely to show up long ago, as Lord Acton himself saw. Freedom ofthought is now part ofpersonal freedom, and perhaps that only became an issue when governments attempted to punish people for not thinking a certain way; before such times, it does not appear likely that it would have occurred to anyone to assert freedom of thought since it had not been restricted. Village atheists probably lived and died without having much impact on the written record, especially in societies with very low rates of literacy by modem standards. Some new aspects of freedom such as freedom of the press may not have ancient analogues, and yet we seem to have at least some hints that some people in the ancient past believed that freedom of thought was important. 20 It is well to remember that nowadays even under dictatorial regimes most people have freedom ofmovement, though they may not be able to choose where they live or the sorts ofjobs they will have. The limits offreedom in dictatorial settings are clearer than in other systems, and ancient totalitarianisms may have strived toward the ideal now attained in such states. But it does not appear that ancient states were capable of the organization and efficiency that has been required to attain high levels of control. Systems of identity cards and in some parts of the world even the requirement that people have family names are only recent innovations; the Old Babylonian lord discussed in Chapter Two who thought of a pass system for one category ofworkers was far

20 See my "Intellectual Freedom in the Ancient Near East?" in Intellectual Life of the Ancient Near East = Comptes rendus de la 43eme Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, edited by Jin Prosecky, (Prague: Oriental Institute, 1998),359-363. I argued that criticisms ofkings, implicit in the Gilgamesh story and elsewhere, show that the literate did not always accept the royal party line. Modem calls for freedom are inevitably enmeshed in their political contexts, which mayor may not be conducive to a valuing of personal freedom. November 21, 1996, I heard by radio a rebel leader in Eastern Zaire shout, "Uhuru, uhuru, liberte, liberte!" using the old Swahili word for freedom along with the French. Obviously he touched a nerve in his auditors, but one cannot be sure that his government was more solicitous of individual freedom than the one it replaced.

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ahead ofhis time. So the more interesting point becomes why the leaders of ancient polities would have attempted the control they did. The answer must lie in the economic and social advantages that they found in the potential ability to control the movements of at least some of the persons who were dependent on them. We are left with Aristotle's formulation that freedom was the ability to do what one wants. Modems emphasize especially the freedom to go where one wants. Naturally in all societies there will have been and will always be some limits on that ability regardless of whether freedom can be shown to be a cultural value." We may not soon be able to define more precisely what we as a culture mean by personal freedom, and if we cannot do so, it is possible that all studies like this that try to examine the pedigree of this idea or bundle of ideas are doomed to frustration." But it is important to overcome the stereotype ofthe ancient world, and

21 Aristotle, Politics, 131Oa28 and 1317a40, both times reporting the opinion that freedom means doing what one likes, though in his view salvation comes by living according to rule; see Stephen Everson, editor, The Politics, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1988), 129, 144; in each case the Greek is we; ~OUAE'tlXt, "as one wishes." Arno Baruzzi, Die Zukunji der Freiheit, (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1993), 145, writes, "Eine gute Definition von Freiheit heiBt: sich frei bewegen konnen, frei iiber einen Platz gehen konnen, (A good definition offreedom is to be able to move freely, to be able to go freely across a place)." Note the discussion in Chapter One above about the etymology ofthe Akkadian anduriiru connected with flowing and running where one wills and also connecting Greek eleuther with the verb to go. Compare Marc Bloch on the limits to his own freedom in a modem free society, Slavery and Serfdom in the Middle Ages, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1975),67: "I consider myselfto be a free man, but as a university professor, while I am 'free' for example vis-a-vis the state to use my vacation as I please, I am not free to fail in my teaching during the school year." 22 Compare Felix E. Oppenheim, "Freedom," International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, edited by David L. Sills, 5:554-559, (New York: Macmillan and the Free Press, 1968), especially 557: "There is no such thing as freedom in general; every organized society consists of an intricate network of specific relations of both freedom and unfreedom." See also Isaiah Berlin, Four Essays on Liberty, (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1969), 172: "...the very desire for guarantees that our values are eternal and secure in some objective heaven is perhaps only a craving for the certainties of childhood or the absolute values of our primitive past."

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particularly the Ancient Near Eastern world, as unchanging and entirely oppressive, dominated by totalitarian governments of great efficiency, which managed to suppress their peoples most of the time. Such was certainly not the case, and there are indications, as we have seen, of a variety in attitudes toward aspects of freedom. To return to Burckhardt's view of the individual and the state in our epigraph, we may question his lumping those Assyrians, Babylonians, and Persians together. They shared some aspects of political culture, but not so far as to include all means of oppression. Burckhardt's casual "and so forth" indicates he was generalizing and not particularly from situations actually known to him in detail. Did the individual equate to evil? Not in many aspects of Ancient Near Eastern culture, especially where the individual's responsibility for wrongdoing was stressed, as in the flood stories." In what sense the individual arose here and there cannot be gauged through self-conscious and self-reflective essays since that was not yet a genre save perhaps in wisdom collections." The wild individualism Burckhardt himself documented in Renaissance Italy is not attested early." But the idea of the individual against the group is sometimes seen in monumental and canonical writings. Idrimi stands out from among his timid brothers, and David killed his ten thousands. These individuals were not like us, but they were persons who made and wanted to

23 Gilgamesh xi 181-182: "Charge the violation to the violator, charge the offense to the offender," as in M.G. Kovacs, The Epic of Gilgamesh, (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1989), 103, and compare the Old Babylonian Atra-Hasis III vi 25, in W.G. Lambert and A.R. Millard, Atra-ljasis, (Oxford: Clarendon, 1969), 100-101. 24 See Bendt Alster, The Instructions of Suruppak, (Copenhagen: Akademisk, 1974), W.G. Lambert, Babylonian WisdomLiterature, (Oxford: Clarendon, 1960), and Miriam Lichtheim,AncientEgyptian Literature, 3 volumes, (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1973-1980). 25 Jacob Burckhardt, The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy, (New York: Modem Library, 1954, first 1860), especially his "The Development ofthe Individual," 100-127. For a recent view of the issue see John Hale, The Civilization ofEurope in the Renaissance, (New York, Toronto: Atheneum, Maxwell, and MacMillan, 1999), 420463.

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If there is a legacy, it is a question to whom it nowadays devolves. We might assert that the legacy comes down to the West. We could assume that cultures that drew inspiration in some way at various times from Greece and Rome ought to be included in the West today. Some would have us still assert that there is a clear ethic in the West that drives to capitalism, perhaps, or to democratic government, and to personal freedom. In the past Oswald Spengler, and in the English-speaking world Arnold Toynbee, have argued that civilizations are clearly definable separate entities with particular styles ofthought and language and with life spans in which they are born, thrive, and die. Spengler assumed the discreteness of civilizations, and Toynbee argued that he could find such entities in the past. 26 Anyone who studies history must admit that there are frequent records of interaction between members of what may be seen as different civilizations. Some of those interactions are disastrous, such as the Columbian exchange, where the Old World got

tomatoes and tobacco and the New World got decimating diseases and imperial dominations. But many interactions appear not to have been negative, as when the cultivation ofrice worked its way from Southeast Asia to India and the Near East. Also, each ofthe major literate civilizations turns out on close analysis not to be a unity at least in regard to the origins ofthe people that constituted it, and usually not in language and custom either. In the West especially in the Modem Era we are inclined to see the West as a changing set of cultural chords, to use Patterson's word, to which there is a certain continuity, but also an openness to new music, both literally and figuratively. One might argue that the West is unique in that aspect ofadapting and assimilating new elements, and it is easy to remember the Corinthians' characterization of the Athenians as always seeking out the new. 27 But that very statement raises interesting questions for the problem ofthe unity of the West. Does it imply that the Spartans were not Western, or did not want to be? Even the Greek world was multicultural and held various views on the value of innovation and offreedom. We may wish to stress one inheritance there, and yet the ancient diversity argues against the idea that freedom arose as a cultural value only in one place. One can also see that especially the aggressive civilizations of the past were good at drawing new people in and assimilating them to their ideals, nonetheless allowing those ideals to be altered by the new inductees, but only gradually, after several generations. In our own day we are perhaps witnesses to the transformation ofthe West into something much more self-consciously multicultural. Some will resist elements that might lead in that direction, and hence we see the emphasis on English as the official language

26 Oswald Spengler, The Decline ofthe West, (London: George Allen and Unwyn, 1980), 1: 31: "Every Culture is its own Civilization." He goes on to discuss what one is, 31-36. Arnold J. Toynbee, A Study ofHistory, abridged by D.C. Somervell, (New York: Dell, 1965), 1: 15-52, describes what he means by civilization and catalogues the ones in which he is interested. See also in this vein, Samuel P. Huntington, The Clash ofCivilizations and the Remaking of World Order, (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1996),40-48, arguing they are "cultural, not political entities," 44.

27 Thucydides 1.70 "The Athenians are addicted to innovation, and their designs are characterized by swiftness alike in conception and execution;..." in Richard Crawley's translation, reprinted in Robert B. Strassler, editor, The Landmark Thucydides, (New York: Free Press, 1996),40; the Greek for "addicted to innovation" is: ot !lev yE VEW'tEp01tOWl...., or "doing new things." Recall lB. Bury's remark, A History of Freedom ofThought, (London: Butterworth, 1913), 23, that his concern was not with all Greeks but only Ionians and Athenians.

make an impression. Civil and religious barriers may have enforced a uniformity of thought, and castes too in the sense of professional and family groups with specific expectations. There may have been little trace left of the individual, but if there were less, there would be no grounds for speculation. Burckhardt, uninformed, thought there were no such texts, but the monolithic despotism Burckhardt imagined did not elimate the self-assertion of persons.

6. WHAT IS THE WEST?

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ofindividual states in the United States. But we should remember that the interaction of cultures has occurred many times before without necessarily leading to the eradication of either culture. 28

7. FREEDOM AND THE NON-WEST

Decolonialized people now face the question of how to relate to the West, but much more basically of how to relate to freedom. The ways we in the West react to their decisions may be determined by events over which neither they nor we have much control. But it is sensible to see what our studies have shown in regard to the question of whether the roots of freedom as now understood in the West go back beyond Greece. Traces ofsuch freedom can be found in many societies, perhaps most coherently in the Ancient Near East. Naturally the Ancient Near East through the Bible has had a long-lasting influence on the Judaeo-Christian West and on Islam. But by the principle of Occam's razor it seems simpler to assume that comparative study of other groups will show that the desire for personal freedom is in fact a universal value in all human societies." To make such an assumption is simpler than to attempt to show in detail the descent and diffusion ofthe value in one particular society and its putative descendants. The descent will never be absolutely clear,

28 This is the thrust of Eric Foner, The Story ofAmerican Freedom, (New York: Norton, 1998), to be tempered by the fact that the United States has usually exceeded almost all other nations in the number ofpersons in prison, as noted by Scott Christianson, With Liberty for Some. 500 Years of Imprisonment in America, (Boston: Northeastern University Press, 1998), ix. 29 The columnist A.M. Rosenthal, writing in The New York Times February 28, 1997, A35, proclaimed "Freedom is Asian" in his headline and argued, "For more than 50 years, in country after country, Asians have shown passion for political liberty and, if it comes to that, readiness to fight for it." He writes contemplating the transfer of Hong Kong from the British to the Chinese and does not address the question oforigin, but he does question the statements of current dictators like those of the colonial officials of the past that concern for freedom is not an Asian value. Rosenthal's examples could be multiplied.

BEYOND MESOPOTAMIANS AND GREEKS

155

and the problem of elites versus popular values can only be addressed in unusual cases and in modem times when literacy spreads more broadly than ever before. But if the desire for personal freedom is a universal, then the present calls for freedom in many different contexts are not imitations of European norms, as many conservatives in developing countries argue, but something else, something understandably human. United States President William Clinton, on his 1998 China trip, said in a speech at Beijing University, "I believe that everywhere, people aspire to be treated with dignity, to give voice to their opinions, to choose their own leaders, to associate with whom they wish, to worship how, when, and where they want. These are not American rights or European rights or developed world rights. They are the birthrights of people everywhere ..."30 Our analysis tends to support his views. To conclude in this way does not deny the dynamism of the West, however we might want to understand it. In the Englishspeaking world especially resistance to government has led to a particularly fecund formulation that has led to the spread of political and economic freedoms, stemming from the Petition of Right in 1628.31 But very frequently the advent of Westerners led not to freedom but the sword, and only over the very long run might one argue, say, that exposure to British values may have been beneficial to the peoples of India. Even then, one could admit that similar values might have been arrived at without British intervention. 30 Quoted in The New York Times June 29, 1998, A8 column 5. Note David Levering Lewis, "Ghana, 1963. A Memoir," The American Scholar 68: 1 (1999): 39-60, 53, wrote, "Individual liberty was a concept too luxurious in the short term for African regimes [in the views of American expatriates and the rulers] whose survival depended in the long term, it was asserted, on devising etatiste strategies to skip over as many of the West's stages of capital formation and technological breakthrough as possible." That was the common argument ofthe 1960's; Levering Lewis clearly distances himself from it now. 31 See Douglass C. North, "The Paradox of the West," in The Origins ofModern Freedom, edited by R. Davis, (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1995),7-34, esp. 34, and the epilogue by Davis, 313-319.

156

CHAPTER SIX

When my wife and I were living in Baltimore in the summer of 1993 as I was working on the ideas for this book, we frequently rode the excellent bus system there. At the time we had two rather small children, aged two and three years, and we found that when we boarded a crowded bus with them in tow, we were offered seats for ourselves and the children. The ridership was predominately African-American, and we are not, and we found this welcome graciousness unexpected, especially from people who might be envious of our relative, if modest, affluence and our white race. In the course ofthe summer I came across the fact that Baltimore before the Civil War had been the home to a higher percentage of free blacks than any other city in the country, and I came to feel that the self-confidence individual bus-riders felt , their compassion and sensitivity, might in some way be connected to the long history of their ancestors in freedom. Naturally there is no way to test this perception, but I continue to think that freedom changes people and probably makes them more humane. In Baltimore I thought I felt it. 32 Does the response of those contemporary Americans really descend in any sense from the Ancient Near East? I believe that it does not come down directly nor essentially, but rather that human beings are always seeking to flee to freedom, however they may conceive it. 33

Freedom's Port: The African-American Community ofBaltimore, J 790- J860, (Urbana and Chicago: University ofIllinois Press 1997). ' 32 See in general Christopher Phillips,

1. May in July, 1831, quoted in Herbert Aptheker, American Negro Slave Revolts, 49: "The slaves are men. They have within them that inextinguishable thirst for freedom, which is born in man." Also note the statement offormer slave Margrett Nullin ofTexas, quoted in Eugene D. Genovese, Roll, Jordan, Roll, 128: "In slavery I owns nothin and never owns nothing. In freedom I's own de home and raise de family. All dat cause me worryment and in slavery I has no worryment. But I takes de freedom." 33 Compare the observation of the Rev. Samuel

APPENDIX I

SELECTED ARCHlYAL TEXTS ON ESCAPE Texts are presented here in alphabetical order by person and then place ofpublication. PN here means personal name.

<;lg and Kizilyay,

Neusumerische Rechts- und Verwaltungsurkunden aus Nippur 1, 1. Nippur Amar-Suena 1 Gu-u-gu ir Ur-c1Nun-gal!-ka ba-an-da-zah mu-dabs 5. igi-ni in-gar mu lugal U4-a gin-a-ka i-za.g-de-na ga-hul bi-in-du., 1 Lugal-a-zi-] ] 10. 1 A-ba-dEn-[ ] 1 I-ti-[ ] di-kuj-bi-me dumu Nibru" mu dAmar-Suena lugal

PN, slave ofPN ran away from him and was taken; he put out his eye. Oath of the king-when going? I shall in the future run away, let me be destroyed-he said. (Witnesses:) 3 PNs

They are its judges, sons of Nippur. Year: (Amar-Suena 1)

Genouillac, Textes Cuneiformes du Louvre 2:5481 Puzris-Dagan Ibbi-Sin 2 U4 Geme-Ba-u-ke, e i-sub ba-zah a-ra-l-kam 5. e A-da-a-ka i-na-am

When Geme-Bau left the house, fled the first time she slept in the house of Ada

158

iti ezen-dSul-gi mu dI-bi-dSin lugal a-ra-Z-kam-ma-as

1 Geme-Ba-u-ke,

10. e i-sub ba-zlah] rev. e I-sar-ba-da[n] i-na-am iti sul-ku-ku U4 2[5] 15. Igi dSu-dSin-i-li ra-gaba

lu-na, Igi Da-ku-a asgab Igi Mi-im-mi Igi Ma-a-ma u Si-im-ti dam-se igi Bi-bi-se nu zan-e-da-a mu lugal-bi in-pad sa Puzris-Da-gan" 25. mu en dInanna Unug[ki] mas-e i-pad

APPENDIX 1

month (viii) year (Ibbi-Sin 1) for the second time Geme-Bau left the house, fled, in the house of PN she slept, month: ?, day 25. Before Su-Sin-ili, the messenger, the stone man? Before Dakua, the leatherworker Before Mimmi Before Mama and Simti, the wife beforePN not to flee she swore by the name of their king in Puzris-Dagan Year: (Ibbi-Sin 2)

Gomi, Acta Sumerologica 3:166 Sulgi 48/Amar-Suena 2 months ix-xii Fled and Dead 30 sila se lugal zag.Nin-a-zu 30 royal quarts of grain for escaped PN a-ru-a Ur-~ilga dedicated by Ur-Gilga zan 30 sila dBa-u-ib-gu-ul escaped 30 quarts for PN a-ru-a Ur-dBa-u ku-dim dedicated by PN, the silversmith 5. zan 30 sila Nin-hi-sag-sa, escaped 30 quarts for PN a-ru-a La-la sipa dedicated by PN, the shepherd ug 6 30 sila dBa-u-ib-gu-ul dead 30 quarts for PN a-ru-a Ur-ra-ka-ni dedicated by PN zan 30 sila Nin-ku-zu escaped 30 quarts for PN

ARCHIVAL TEXTS

159

10. zah 30 sila Nin-u.-a-ni escaped 30 quarts for PN a-ru-aLu-dGis-bar-e dumu DR.AN dedicated by PN, son ofPN zah 30 sila eNinav-zi escaped 30 quarts for PN a-~-a Ib-la-a-SI.BUL.BUL dedicated by PN zan 30 sila Nin-a-zu escaped 30 quarts for PN 15. a-ru-a Lugal-ezen dedicated by PN zan 30 sila dBa-u-ta-lu escaped 30 quarts for PN dedicated by PN, merchant a-ru-a A-tu dam-gar iti gan-mas-ta from month (i) zan 30 sila dBa-u-lu-ti escaped 30 quarts for PN 20. [a]-ru-a Ur-dBa-u e-zu? dedicated by PN the ... Rev. [ ]20 sila Nin-en-kiis [escaped] 20 quarts for PN dedicated by PN, the ... a-ru-a Ka-a-ni KU [iti] ezen dDumu-zi-ta from month (vi) zan 30 sila dBa-u-ki-sa-ra escaped 30 quarts for PN 25. a-ru-a Ur-gar dumu Be-ni[] dedicated by PN, son ofPN iti ezen dBa-u-ta from month (viii) ug, 30 sila Nin-Iu-sa--sa, dead 30 sila for PN 30. a-ru-a A-kal-la dumu Ku-li dedicated by PN son ofPN zah 30 sila Nin-en-kus escaped 30 quarts for PN a-~-a Lu-URUxGANA-tem2ki ra-gaba dedicated by PN, the messenger escaped 30 quarts for PN zan 30 sila Nin-T.ama-mu escaped 30 quarts for PN zan 30 sila Ne-sag-i-s~ dedicated by PN a-ru-a Ab-ba-gi I8 escaped 30 quarts for PN zan 30 sila Ku-dBa-u month (xii) 35. iti se-il-la su-nigin 12 geme 30 sila-ta total: 12 female workers at 30 quarts each from month (i) iti gan-mas-ta Total: 1 female worker at 30 su-nigin 1 geme 30 sila quarts Total: 1 child at 20 quarts su-nigin 1 dumu 20 sila 40. iti ezen dDumu-zi-ta from month (vi)

160

APPENDIX I

su-nigin 1 geme 30 sila iti ezen dBa-u-ta Total: 1 female worker at 30 quarts from month (viii) su-nigin 5 geme 30 sila-ta Total: 5 female workers at 30 quarts each iti se-Il-la month (xii) se-bi 12 gur 260 sila + 50 sila gur Their grain: (3910 quarts) 45. ka, a-ru geme us-bar in the granary dedicated? female weavers 20 sila Ur-si-gar 20 quarts for PN gir Lugal-ki-gal-Ia viaPN Ba-zi dumu Ses-ses PN, the son ofPN uUr-e-es andPN 30. mu ur-bi-lum" ba-hul year: (Sulgi 48/Amar-Suen 2) Summary of Gomi, Acta Sumerologica 3:166 fled dead

8

8

Gomi, Selected Texts from the British Museum 125 Su-Sin 1

1 sag-genie 2 2/3 gin ku-babbar

sam-ma-ni Ur-~in-tu-ke4

5. Ur-dSuen U Nin-dub-sar dam-ni-se

in-ne-si-sa, rev. mu geme ba-za.g-se geme Duda dam dub-sar 3. mu lugal-bi in-pa iti ezen dSulgi-ta u4-15-am

1 head of a slave woman 2 2/3 shekel silver her price Ur-Nintu from Ur Suen and Nin-dubsar, his wife bought for the sake of a slave woman (who) escaped the slave women of Duda wife of the scribe swore by the name of their king month: festival of Sulgi day: 15th

ARCHIVAL TEXTS

ba-ra-zal ba-zah x.x.x ur.-ri nu-kirig-se x e-is-ta-se igi? Lugal-nig-LAGAR.e.-se 10. igi Ur-e-mah-se side: mu Su-Sin lugal

161

having passed she fled [before ]the gardener [before] .. before? PN before PN Year: (Su-Sin 1)

Gomi, Selected Texts from the British Museum 333 Amar-Suena 2 month xi 1 Geme-dSara PN 1 Ses-kal-Ia dumu-ni PN her son 1 Ur-gi~gigir PN dumu A-an-na-bi ba-ug, son of PN died 5. za.ga-ni 2-a-kam fled the second time PN 1 Geme-Lis-si, za.g-a libir an old escapee dumu A-an-na-bi tur (and) a daughter ofPN, the younger, dumu sag Nin-e-zu-ka-ma (and the) principal daughter ofPN za.g-a ba-al-Ia escapee returned 10. ki Ur-Iugal ses from PN brother of saggana-ka-ta the military governor igi Su-dSin dumu before PN son of Geme-e-an-na-ka-se PN igi En-um-sadad before PN dumu Da-ba-an-da-ra-ah-se son ofPN igi ~anna-sigs before PN rev. dumu Sa-da Mar-tu son ofPN the Amorite lu-kin-gi.-a lugal-se messenger of the king nam-geme-ir., e-gal-se the service status for the palace ba-gi-ne-es they confirmed iti pa.-u-e month (xi) mu Ur-bi-i-lum ba-hul year (Amar-Suena 2)

162

ARCHIVAL TEXTS

APPENDIX I

Gomi, Selected Textsfrom the British Museum 519 Umma Su-Sin 7 month iii 1 dumu-munus Da-x-x-nu za-ha-am ensi-ke, I7-pa-e en in-na-an-tar i-za-ha in-na-an-du., 5. ki-bi-ta nu-BULI mu-DU ensi-ra du.j-ga-ni si nu-un-na-an-sa iti se-kar-ra gaI-la mu Su-dSuen...ma-da Za-[ab-sa-li]

I female child PN escaped. The governor had Ipa'e look into it. She has escaped, he told him. from their place she has not...1t is delivered: For the governor his statement he did not put in order. Month: (Umma iii) Year: (Su-Sin 7)

Hussey, Harvard Semitic Series 4:82 reverse 1 month vi

10. 5 sila kas 5 sila zi 1 a-gam i A-bu-ma dumu nu-banda rev. su-ha zan Nin-ur.-urjde gin-na...

5 quarts beer, 5 quarts flour, 1 measure oil for Ahuma, son of the sergeant to go for the fled fisherman PN

Keiser, Yale Oriental Series 4: 190 Umma Amar-Suena 2 month xi 1 Ur-dSara nu-kiri, zan-ta ba-al-la

Ur-Sara, a gardener returned from running away

ki A-tu-ta 5. kisib Da-da-a iti pa.-u-e mu Ur-bi-lum" ba-hul

163

fromPN sealofPN month: (xi) year: (Amar-Suena 2)

King, Cuneiform Texts 10: 28 Amar-Suena 2 Fled and Dead zan 40 sila se lugal escaped 40 royal quarts of grain Lu-dNinna for PN zan 50 sila Ku-li escaped 50 quarts for PN 5. zan 30 sila Lugal-zi-sa-gal escaped 30 quarts for PN se-bi 120 their grain: 120 quarts iti ezen dLi9-si4-ta from month (iii) zan 60 Lu-Sirara, escaped 60 quarts for PN 10. zan 60 dNin-Kimar-ka escaped 60 quarts for PN se-bi 120 their grain: 120 quarts iti ezen dDumu-zi-ta from month (vi) us 30 sila Ka.-a su-gi, dead 30 quarts PN an old man 15. us 40 sila Ur-dSul-pa-e dead 40 quarts PN us 50 sila En-hi-li-se dead 50 quarts PN ba-ns -me they are dead se-bi 120 their grain: 120 quarts iti ezen dBa-u-ta from month (viii) 20. zan 60 Ir ll dumu Ku-ga-da escaped 60 quarts for PN, son of PN iti ezen dDumu-zi-ta from month (vi) iti amar-a-a diri-se to month (xi) their grain: 300 quarts se-bi 1 gur escaped 60 quarts for PN 25. zan 60 Lu-Trumu-zi month (ix) iti mu-su-duus 30 sila En-hi-li nar lugal dead 30 quarts PN singer of the king month (ix) ii. iti mu-su-du, sa Ninaki in Nina dead 20 quarts for PN son of us 20 sila Lu-ba dumu

164

APPENDIX I

Ur-dIstaran 5. iti ezen 'Ba-u-ta sa LagaSaki su-nigfn 13 gur 40 sila nu-kiri., gis-gal-gal-me 20 sila Lu-liNin-subur 10. dumu Ur-Dumu-zi 15 sila Lti-bar-ku-ga dumu Lu-bala-sa.-ga 15 sila Lugal-Nina" dumu Ka.-a 15. 15 sila Ezen-an-ne-zu dumu Ur-d Sa-u-sa 15 sila Sa-gi-ba-dulO dumu Nig-ii-rum 20 sila Lu-dNina 20. dumu Lugal-nigin, . dumu u-il-me 15 sila E-kur-he-gaI dumu Sa-ba-n;-gar a-ga-am 20 sila A-da-na gir 25. 15 sila Lu-Dumu-zi dumu Lugal-dab, i-dug-me iii. 15 sila Lugal-du., dumu Ur-bara-si-ga lu-gu-ne-sag 120+40+5? 5. gir-se-ga e liNanse-me V

20 sila Ab-ta-ma-sa-ga dumuAma-mu 15 sila U-da dumu Ur-dNin-su 10. e-amar-ra-me

PN from month (viii) in Lagas Total: 3940 quarts gardeners of the great trees 20 quarts for PN sonofPN 15 quarts for PN son of PN 15 quarts for PN sonofPN 15 quarts for PN sonofPN 15 quarts for PN son ofPN 20 quarts for PN sonofPN they are children of menials 15 quarts for PN son ofPN, the ... 20 quarts for PN, the ... 15 quarts for PN son of PN; they are doorkeepers 15 quarts for PN sonofPN people collecting harvest? = 165 quarts they are menials of the house of Nanse 20 quarts for PN sonofPN 15 quarts for PN son of PN they are of the house of young animals

ARCHlYAL TEXTS

10 sila Lu-dingir-ra dumu Ba-an-tuk i-du, e-gal se-bi 180+40 amar-ku, Nibruv-se 15. iti ezen-rBa-u-ta iti se-il-la-se se-bi 3 gur 180+20 iti 5 us 60 sila Lu-bala-sa, 20. u-il us 60 sila A-lJu lu-KAS

se-bi 120 iti mu-su-du.-ta iti se-ll-la-se 25. se-bi 1 gur 180 iti 4-kam sa Nina" 20 sila Ur-mes dumu Gir-ni-i-sa, amar-ku.-se 30. zellJ 30 sila Igi-nin-se us 30 sila Nin-he-du, iv. [n]ig-sag-me , , dG'''''. gir-se-ga a-LUm-dtug-me se-bi 60+20 sila 5. iti ezen dBa-u-ta iti se-ll-la-se se-bi 1 gur 60+40 iti-5-kam sa Lagasa" 10. su-nigin 17 gur 60+40 se-ba gur-e uri-a sa Lagasa"

165

10 quarts for PN son of PN, doorkeeper of the palace their grain: 220 quarts castrated young animals for Nippur from the month (viii) to the month (xii) their grain: 1100 quarts Months: 5 dead 60 quarts for PN the bearer dead 60 quarts for PN, the runner? their grain: 120 quarts from the month (ix) to the month (xii) their grain 480 quarts four months within Nina 20 quarts for PN son of PN for castrated young animals escaped 30 quarts for PN dead 30 quarts for PN they are the heads? they are the menials of the divine Gatumdug their grain: 80 quarts from the month (viii) to the month (xii) their grain: 400 quarts 5 months within Lagas total: 5200 quarts grain ration collected at the granary within Lagas

166

u sa Ninaki

ARCHIVAL TEXTS

APPENDIX I

gir Lu-bi-mu 15. dumu Ur-vlg-alim iti ezen dLi9-si4-ta iti se-ll-la-se iti 10-kam

and within Nina viaPN sonofPN from the month (iii) to the month (xii) 10 months

mu Ur-bi-lum" ba-hul

year: (Sulgi 45/Amar-Suena 2)

Legrain, Ur Excavations, Texts 3:1018 Sulgi 38 months xii-v

167

aus der Umwelt des Alten Testaments, edited by Diethelm Conrad et aI., 1:201 Nippur Su-Sin 5 xii 1 Pu-ka Puka ir!! A-Ia-Ia-kam being the slave of Alala , A-Ia-Ia igi-ni i-pad before Alala he appeared 5. mu lugal U 4 ba-zah-de-na-ga and said, Oath of the king, on the day I flee let it be a sin nir-da ue-a bi-in-du., PN, his mother Za-am-me-li ama-ni 10. Geme-iSuen nins-na-ni and PN, his sister, were guarantors su-tu nu-zah-da that he would notflee ma-an-gub-se PN 1 Lugal-nigin PN 15. 1 Nam-ha-ni PN 1 Ur-ga-gis-a PN 1 Ses-kal-la PN 1 Ur-e-ba-duPN 1 Ur-da-ni PN 1 Kur-ni-mu are witnesses lu inim-ma-bi-me Month: (xii) . iti se-gurw-kus mu-us-sa bad Mar-tu ba-du Year: (Su-Sin 5)

u

...female workers at 30 quarts each work allotment of female a geme zaJ:! iti-I-se workers escaped for one month a-bi 3600 7-kam their allotment is 3600, 7 times? se-bi 13 gur 120 sila their grain is 13 gur, 120 quarts (4020 quarts) grain allotment of escapees se-ba zaJ:!-ba ka, returned to the granary a g14their wool is 33 pounds sig-bi 33 ma-na wool allotment of female workers rev. sig-ba geme zaJ:!-Ua escaped e-gal-la gi 4-a returned to the palace En-sa-ga-ria ugula us-bar-ra to PN, overseer of weavers ba-na-zi it was issued iti se-gurw-kus-ta from month (xii) iti diri ki-sig-e-us-sa-se to month (v) mu-us-sa bad ma-da-a ba-du-a year: (Sulgi 38) [ ] geme 30 sila-ta

Nikol'skii, Dokumenty khoziaistvennoi otchotnosti...Likhacheva 436n.d. zaJ:! dSara-a-mu dumu Ur-dNin-tu zaJ:! Ur-dMa-mi ses Lugal-e-ba-an-s~

Myhrman, Babylonian Expedition 3: 1 Nippur Su-Sin 5 month xii. See the translation and bibliography by W.H.Ph. Romer in Texte

5. ki Ur-igi-sig, zaJ:! lja-ba-Ius-e dumu Lugal-a-zi-da

fledPN sonofPN fled PN brother of PN fund ofPN fled PN son of PN

168

ARCHIVAL TEXTS

APPENDIX I

z3.b Kaj-a kit-dim fled PN the silversmith z3.b Lii-dingir-ra ir ll fled PN slave of 10. dumu Lugal-inim engar the son ofPN, the plowman z3.b Lugal-ba?-zu? gudu sanga Inanna" fled PN, anointing priest, administrator of (a place) z3.b Nam-lugal-i-du., fled PN dumu son of (blank) rev. z3.b E-gissu dumu fled PN son of iju-un-bu PN z3.b Lu-dSuen dumu fled PN son of Lugal-gii-en-e Ur-gal PNs 5. z3.b Lugal-edin dumu Geme-dNanna fled PN son ofPN z3.b Da-ga-bi? fled PN z3.b Ba-sig, dumu Hu-zi-ru fled PN son ofPN z3.b Ur-dSara dumu E-tur fled PN son ofPN z3.b Nig-sa-ge ses Ur-zu fled PN brother of PN· 10. z3.b Ses-an-ni su-i fled PN the barber z3.b Ur-dA-dulO dumu fled PN son of Ur-gu-la ab-dab, PN the cowherd z3.b Pu-zur, dumu Za-a-na fled PN son ofPN z3.b Ses-kal-Ia fled PN 15. dumu Ur-nigin-gar su-.ga son ofPN the fisherman side: 1 Lugal-la dumu Lu-dSara PN son ofPN Ur-Nun-gal e Ir-mu-ke, PN, house ofPN

Sigrist, Messenger 41:2 month iv; similar: Gregoire, Archives 176: 10 Lagas no date 3 sila kas 2 sila ninda (rations) A-bi-Ia-nlim hi-kas, For Apilanum the runner 25 ...25 ...8 gin I-gis sa-dull u4-5-kam, (rations) regular offering of the 5th day, Da-da-ni sukkal hi-zah dabs-de gin-na Dadani the messenger to go to seize the person who fled

iti su-numun

169

month: (iv)

Sigrist, Syracuse 36 Amar-Suena 4 1 un Lu-dSuen dumu Igi-dSara z3.b gu-la-ta 1 un Ur-dlskur dumu Ba-zi-ge z3.b-ta 5. iti dirig-ta u415-am

1 menial ofPN son ofPN from the big escape 1 menial ofPN son ofPN from an escape since month (xiii) day 15 ba-ra-zal-ta having passed PN took in charge rev. Ba-sa, i-dab, mu En-mah-gal-an-na ba-hun year: (Amar-Suena 4) side: Ba-sClt;, dub sar, dumu PN, scribe, son of Lugal-sag-ga PN

Sigrist, Syracuse 259 broken iti? se-gur-ra 1 gurus un-il U4- 7-se z3.b-ta en-nun-ga ti-la

Amar-Suena 2 months xiii, i

month? of harvest 1 worker, porter, for 7 days

from escaping, completed? by the guard 20 workers for 1 day 5. 20 gurus u4-1-se zi? gurus rna-a bi-Ib-si flour the workmen filled a ship gir Da-da-ga viaPN rev. iti diri uiti se-gurlO-kus month: (xiii and i) mu Ur-bi-lum" ba-hul Year: (Amar-Suena 2)

Szlechter, Tablettesjuridiques et administratives, IDS 40 no date z3.b 0-se-.ge-gin

EscapedPN

APPENDIX I

170

zan La-ni ses Ur-sa.-ga ensi en-na-ni 5. gin-na-as 2-a-bi en-nun-ga \}e-ti rev. inim-ensi-ka A-kal-la ses Ukkin-ni Ur-sukka[l se]s Lu-kala-ga dMu dumu Ur-nigin su-ha, urn? \}e-mi-ni-dab s

escapedPN brother of Ursaga governor of... for going a second time let the guard take them In the word of the governor PN, brother ofPN PN, brother ofPN PN son of PN the fisherman in the city let them take.

Yoshikawa, Acta Sumerologica 9 (1987):307:4 Amar Suena 4 Umma dv

,

'v

1 Sara-i-sag,

PN, son ofPN, the mill-worker dumu Te-me-a-ni gim-ar from PN, the priest, ki Ur-e.j-e gala-ta , d"', l' PN, the chair-bearer, Lu- Sara gu-za- a from the guard he fled. en-nun-ta ba-an-da-zah for their sake mu-bi-se Lu-dSara gu-za-la a un-il-se PN, the chair-bearer, for the work of carrying PN took in charge. Lu-kiri.-zal i-dab, iti su-numun-ta since the month (vi), mu En-mah-gal-an-na en dNanna ba-hun Year: (Amar-Suena 4)

APPENDIX II

TRANSLITERATIONS OF SELECTED LEGAL, TREATY, AND CANONICAL TEXTS ON FREEDOM AND ESCAPE The legal and treaty texts here are in chronological order, the order in which they are discussed in Chapters Three and Four, but the canonical texts are at the end ofthis Appendix. The transliterations of legal texts rely on Martha T. Roth, Law Collections from Mesopotamia andAsia Minor; Godfrey Rolles Driver and John C. Miles, The Assyrian Laws, and The Babylonian Laws, 2; Albrecht Goetze, The Laws ofEsnunna; and Harry Hoffner, Jr., The Laws ofthe Hittites. Ur-Nammu A iii 114-124, C 11-10 nam-ga-es, ma-lah, gal utul-e gud dabs udu dabs anse dabs uri Iu gi[rs-ra] Ki-en-g[i Ki-uri-a] su ba-a[n-bar] ud-ba Aksak" Mara-da" Gir-kal" Ka-zal-lu" mas-gan-bi U-saru-um" nig An-sa-anv-a nam-arad he-eb-ak-e a dNanna lugal-gata ama-ar-gi.-bi hu-rnu-gar The translation foreigner relies on the equation of lug i r, with Akkadian ubdrum, "protected foreigner."

u

Lipit-Istar ii 1-15 (A iii 9-23) [ud-b ]i-a [dumu-ni]ta dumu-munus [Nib[ru" [dumu--ni]ta dumu-munus [U]ri ki_[ rna] [du]mu-nita dumu-munus l-si-inv-na [dumu]-nita dumu-munus [Ki-en]-gi Kiuri [lu gu-bji-a [suduli'] nam-arad [hu-mju-ni-ib-ak [amja-ar-gi.-bi [huj-mu-gar ki-bi-se he-bi-dab, 12. tukum-bi geme arad hi-u sa-uru-ka ba-zah e hi-ka 1 iti-am itus-a ba-an-gen-en sag sag-gin? ba-ab-sum-mu 13. tukum-bi sag nu-tuku 15 gin ku-babbar i-la-e

173

APPENDIX II

LAW, TREATY, AND CANONICAL TEXTS

Esnunna 50 sum-ma sakkanakkum sa-pir6 niirim be-el te-er-tim

226 sum-ma galliibum ba-lum be-el wardim ab-bu-ti wardim la see-im u-gal-li-ib ritti galliibim su-a-ti i-na-ak-ki-su

172

ma-la i-ba-as-su-u wardam ha-al-qa-am amtam ha-li-iq-tam alpam ha-al-qa-am imeram ha-al-qa-am sa ekallim'" muskenim is-ba-at-ma a-na Es-nun-na KI la ir-di-am-ma i-na biti-su-ma ikta-la u 4-mi se-be <eli> warham istin u-se-te-eq-ma ekallumr" suur-qd-am it-ti-su i-ta-wi

u

227 sum-ma a-wi-lum galliibam i-da-as-ma ab-bu-ti wardim la see-im ug-da-al-li-ib a-wi-lam su-a-ti i-du-uk-ku-su-ma i-na babi-su i-lJa-al-la-lu-su galliibum i-na i-du-u la u-gal-Ii-bu i-tam-ma-ma

u-ta-as-sar 51 wardum uamtum sa Es-nun-na sa ka-an-nam mas-ka-nam uab-bu-ut-tam sa-ak-nu abul Es-nun-naKI ba-lumbe-li-su u-ul ussi KI

u

52 wardum amtum sa it-ti miir si-ip-ri-im na-as-ru-ma abul isnun-na'' i-te-er-ba-am ka-an-nam ma-as-ka-nam ab-bu-tam issa-ak-ka-an-ma a-na be-li-su na-se-er

u

Hammurapi 15 sum-ma a-wi-lum lu warad ekallim lu amat ekallim lu warad muskenim lu amat muskenim abullam us-te-st id-da-ak 16 sum-ma a-wi-lum lu wardam lu amtam hal-qa-am sa ekallim

ulu muskenim i-na bi-ti-su ir-ta-qi-ma a-na si-si-it na-ga-ri-im la us-te-si-am be-el bitim su-u id-da-ak

17 sum-ma a-wi-lum lu wardam lu amtam hal-qa-am i-na si-ri-im is-ba-at-ma a-na be-li-su ir-te-di-a-as-su 2 siqil kaspam be-el wardim i-na-ad-di-is-sum

Middle Assyrian 24 sum-ma assafl t a 'ile ina pa-ni mu-tt-sa rama-an-sa tal-ta-da-ad lu-u i-na libbi iile am-mi-e-im-ma lu-u i-na iiliini qur-bu-u-te a-sar beta ud-du-si-i-ni a-na bet As-su-ra-ia-e te-te-rab is-tu belet bite u-us-bat 3-su 4-su be-da-at bil bite ki-i assat" a 'ile i-na beti-su us-bu-tu-u-ni la-a i-di i-na ur-ki-it-te siniltu si-i ta-at-ta-as-bat bil bite sa assas-su [i-na] pa-ni-su ra-mo-an-sa [tal-d]u-du-u-ni assas-su [u-na-ka-as-ma la] i-laq-qe [assa ]flt a 'ile sa assas-su il-te-sa us-bu-tu-ni uz-ni-sa u-na-ku-su ha-di-ma mu-us-sa 3 bilat 30 ma-na annaka sim-sa i-id-dan hadi-ma assas-su i-laq-qe-u sum-ma bil bite ki-i assat a 'ile i-na biti-su istu assi[ti-su] us-bu-tu-u-ni i-[de] salsiitea-te i-id-da-an sum-ma it-ti-ki-e-ir la-a i-di-e-ma i-qa-ab-bi a-na Ndrim il-lu-u-ku sum-ma a'ilu sa assat" a'ile i-na beti-su us-bu-tu-u-ni i-na Niirim it-tu-u-ra salsiitea-te i-id-da-an sum-ma a 'ilu sa assas-su ina pa-ni-su ra-ma-an-sa tal-du-du-ts-ni i-na Niirim it-tu-ra za-a-ku gi-im-ri sa Niirim u-mal-la sum-ma a 'ilu sa assas-su i-na pa-nisu ra-mo-an-sa ta-al-du-du-u-ni assas-su la-a u-na-ak-ki-es assassu-ma i-laq-qe e-mi-it-tu mi-im-ma la-as-su

u

u

u

u

u

18 sum-ma wardum su-u be-el-su la iz-za-kar a-na ekallim i';'ri-iddi-su wa-ar-ka-su ip-pa-ar-ra-ds-ma a-na be-li-su u-ta-ar-ru-su Hittite 22 tdk-ku ARAD-as hu-u-wa-i na-an EGIR-pa ku-is-ki u19 sum-ma wardam su-a-ti i-na bi-ti-su ik-ta-la-su wa-ar-ka wardum i-na qa-ti-su it-ta-as-ba-at a-wi-lum su-u id-da-ak 20 sum-ma wardum i-na qa-at sa-bi-ta-ni-su ih-ta-li-iq a-wi-lum su-u a-na be-el wardim ni-ts i-lim i-za-kar-ma u-ta-as-sar

wa-te-iz-zi t[dk-ku ma-an-ni-in-ku-ani e-ip-zi nu-us-si kuSE. SIR-us pa-a-i tak-ku ke-e-ez ID-az 2 [GiN KU-BABBARpa-a-i] tak-ku e-di ID-az nu-us-si 3 GiN KU-BABBAR [pa-a-i]

APPENDIX II

LAW, TREATY, AND CANONICAL TEXTS

23 tdk-ku ARAD-is hu-u-wa-i na[-as A.NA K]UR uru L[u-u-i-ia pa-iz-zi ku-i-sa-an EGIR-pa] u-wa-te-ez-zi nu-us-se 6 Gi[N K]UBABBAR pa-a-i tak[-ku ARAD-as hu-wa-a-i] na-as ku-ru-ri-i KUR-e pa-iz-z[i ku- ]i-sa-an EGIR[ -pa-ma u-wa-te-ez-zi] na-anza-an a-pe-a-as-pat [da-]a-[i]

Treaty ofKing ofHatti with Nipmepa ofUgarit. J. Nougayrol, Le palais royal d'Ugarit 4,98, 17,79+374.

174

24 tdk-ku ARAD-is na-as-ma GEME-as [bu-wa-a-i] is-ba-as-siS[a-an ku-e-el ba-as-si-i] u-e-mi-ia-zi LV-na-as [ku-u]s-s[a-a]n SA MU 1.[KAM 2 Yz MA.NA KU-BABBAR pa-a-i] MUN[US-S]ama ku-us-sa-an SA (MU.l.KAM)] 50 GIN [KU.BABBARpa-a-i] 173b tdk-ku ARAD-as is-bi-is-si a-ra--ez-zi A.NA DUGUTUL pa-iz-zi

Suppililiuma's Treaty with Ugarit. Jean Nougayrol, Le palais royal d'Ugarit 4,52, text 17.369 A.

37.' sum-ma is-tu mal allja-at-ti amilu mu-nab-tu, in-n[a-bi-it] 1 AT' r v, matalll v IV lq-me-pa I"l-l~-ba t-su-ma a-na sar ~ a-a [ t-tl'I'l-l'd- diIn sum-ma la-a] 40.' is-tu ma-mi-ti [te-ti-iq] sum-ma 'v tU matalU'- [ga-rt-it '" tn-na- bii-tt" t-na matll amt-Iu mu-nab- tU4 lS~ a-at-ti'] il-Ia-[a-ka-a?] sar matallja_at_ti u-ul [i-ka-al-Ia-a-su?]

Idrimi Sidney Smith, The Statue ofIdri-mi.

' alvaU Ia-a b KI biIt a- bii-ta 3· t-na 4. ma-si-ik-tu it-tab-si ubal-ka-nu pan 5. amelutt'": alE-marKI a-ba-teJjl·A

u

6. sa um-mi-ia as-ba-nu a-na alE-marKI ill.A , I" b ~JjI.A 7 · ah v -h~ e: -ta sa e i-ta ra u 8. it-ti-ia-ma as-bu-ts ma-an-nu-um-ma V a hV v , l ih-s. v 9 · a-wa-te MESsa v -su-su u-u lv -su-us 10. um-ma a-na-ku-ma ma-an-nu-um bit a-bi-su 11. lu-u mar sakkanaki rabii ma-an-nu-um 12. a-na miireJjl.A al E-marKI lu-u ARAD (ardu) 13. sisi-ia narkabti-ia kizi-ia 'v 'Iam ma-at hu-ri 14. eI-t e-qe-su-nu u, l~ u-rt-t'b-te KI C" KI " u'I'l- bil sa-b e-MES Su-tu-u 15. e- t e-ti-iq 16. e-te-ru-ub it-ti-su a-na li-bi 17. ku-zi "Zak-kar bi-ta-ku i-na sa-ni umi" 18. an-mu-us-ma a-na ma-at Ki-tn-a-nimr' 19. al-li-ik i-na ma-at Ki-in-a-nim': 20. aIAm-mi-iaKI as-bu i-na "Am-mi-ioi' 21. mare MES allja_la_apKI mare MES ma-at Mu-ki-is-be KI 22. mare MES ma-at Ni-ib KI U [mare]MES ma-at 23. A-ma-eK1 as-bu 24. i-mu-ru-un-ni-ma v

7.' um-ma-a sum-ma-mi i-na arki" iimi" aml-I-MES u mu-un-na-bil-t'u-u t-tu 4 sa matNu_has U lu-u sa matMu-kis 10.' lu-~u sa mdtdti MES sa-na-ti-ma sa is-tu libbi" matati MES u~-~u-u-ni(!) i-na libbi mat "Usga-ri-it i-na ardutiMESUI-li sa sar maIU-ga-ri-it rev. i-te-er-bu-ni 15.' sarru sa-nu-um-ma sa mati sa-ni-tim-ma ma-am-ma-am-an la-a i-la-qi-su-ma is-tu qati 1 Ni-iq-ma-an-da sar matU-ga-ri-it U is-tu qiiti marl MES_SU marl MES marl MES_SU a-di sa-a-ti dSamsisi sarru rabii ri-ki-il-ta 20.' kdn-na-a ir-ku-us

u

u

u

175

u

u

u

u

176

APPENDIX II

u

25. i-nu-ma mar be-li-su-nu a-na-ku a-na mubbi-ia 26. ip-hu-ru-nim-ma a-ka-a-na-ka ur-tab-bi-a-ku 27. u-ra-ak a-na li-bi ~abeMES biibire 28. a-na MU-7-KAMMES as-ba-ku issure u-za-ki 29. pubade ijI.A ab-ri-ma use-eb-i sa-na-ti dIM 30. a-na qaqqadi-ia it-tu-ru e-te-pu-us elippate 31. ~abeMEs Nu-ul-la a-na elippate u-sar-ki-ib-su-nu 32. tiimta a-na ma-at Mu-ki-is-biKl 33. et-be-e-ka al-ku pa-an bursani lja-zi 34. a-na td-ba-lim ak-su-ud e-li-ia-ku 35. ma-ti-ia is-mu-un-ni-ma alpu immeri 36. a-na pa-ni-ia ub-lu-u-nim ui-na U4-1-KAM 37. ki-ma isten en amelu ma-at Ni-bi KI ma-at A-ma-eKI 38 ma-at Mu-ki-is-hi KI UaIA-la-la-ahKI aliKI-ia . -MES . 39 ·. a-na za-sz-zm t°t- t u-ru-nzm a hh -za v e v 40. is-mu-u-ma a-na mah-ri-ia il-li-ku-u 41. ab-biijI·A-ia it-ti-ia-ma in-na-hu-u . 1u as-sur-su-nu v 42 . ah he,ijI·A-ta

u

u

u

u

u

u

0

Vo

v

0

u

v

-v

Treaty from Sefire. H. Donner and W. Rollig, Kanaaniiische und Aramiiische Inschriften, 1:224.

1h "IN ')hN 1n 1N ')1p£l 1h p1P '))b mt» )il1(4b) Oil[? 1]011? :1?n ):Jil')1 ')1'):1 ')~ NbY 1n 1N ')010 (5) ) 01ill1?1 O:J1\'JN?Y 1?'lJ Oil? 1bNl1?"I Oh? )[J.'lJP? )il1 ')? OilJ.'lJil111 OilP111 ilP1 '))b Oil'lJJ.(6) OilP1N1 il)N 1ilN 1Y O'lJ 1P11p1NJ. on? Oil? 10111 '))b O(7)il'lJJ.) tnnn jm il1'lJNJ. ))£l11 ?N"I [O]:Jl1nl1? 1J.'lJ Oil? 1bN111 )?N N')1YJ. 0111P'lJ

LAW, TREATY, AND CANONICAL TEXTS

177

Materialen zum sumerischen Lexikon 1, by Benno Landsberger, 28-29, tablet 2 iv 7'-15'. 7'. [e] lugal-a-ni-ta ba-da-zah is-tu bit beli-[su ib-li-iq]

8'. [b[a-da-zah-ta im-ma-an-gur-es ii-tu ih-li-qu u[-te-ru-nis-sui 9'. ba-da-zah-ta im-ma-an-gu-es-a-ta is-tu (ditto) u-te-ru-nis-S[u] 10'. gis-gir-gir-na in-gar kur-sa-a a-na se-pi-su is-k[un] II '. urudu-slr-sir mi-ni-in-sum str-str-a-ta i-pa-s[u] 12'. gis-gan-na Ib-ta-bal bu-ka-na u-se-ti-iq 13'. lu-zu-zah gis e-dab ha-taq sa-bat 14'. igi-ni {-na-ni} in-bal i-na pa-ni-su iq-qur

15'. nam-arad-a-ni mi-ni-in-zu ardus-su u-ra-ad-di

Sayings ofAhiqar James M. Lindenberger, The Aramaic Proverbs ofAhiqar, 55-56, Saying 6.

ilbN<1> [ P1£l 1J.Y mp ....] [1]il [1n]£l ilJ.)[:\] ilY1~1 ')il1J.N O'lJ I [?J.n'))] [il]111n1\'J O\'JJ.

178

APPENDlXII

Joan Goodnick Westenholz, Legends ofthe Kings ofAkkade, 234235. 5. [i-nu-m]i-su-ma LUGAL-ki-in a-bi a-lam U-ru-ufCG i-ne-er-ma 6. [an-du-r]a-ar ki-is-si-i-im KI is-ku-un 7. [u? ap-pa-ti-S]u-nu u-sa-ag-li-ib u [k]ur-~e-e-su-nu 8. [u-ba-a~]-#-ib ...

Erica Reiner, Surpu, 13, tablet ii 28-32. 28. KI ru-u '-a ru-u '-a-su ip-ru-su sab-ta la u-mas-si-ru ka-sa-a la u-ram-mu-u 30. so, E si-bit-ti la u-kal-lt-mu nu-u-ru a-na sa-ab-ti sa-bat-su-ma a-na ka-si-i ku-us-si-su-ma iq-bu-u ul i-di ser-ti riINGIR ul i-di en-nit dES4-DAR .

Ibid., 25-26, tablet iv 2 and 31-36. 2. bul-lu-tu sul-lu-mu dAMAR.un it-ti-ka-ma 31. sa E si-bit-ti su-su-u ZALAG kul-lu-mu bu sa ina KU SI [x] KI? sab-tu x y z e-te-ru bu sa URU-su ru-u-qu KASKAL-su ni-sa-[a]t bu sal-mes a-na [URU-S]u a-la-ku bu 35. sal-la u ka-ma-a a-na UN.MES-su tur-ru bu i-na IGI UN.MES-su a-ma-ru bu

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1995. _____. "Scholastic Tradition and Mesopotamian Law: A Study ofFLP 1287, A Prism in the Collection of the Free Library of Philadelphia." Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 1979. Rouault, Olivier. L 'Archive de Puzurum. Malibu: Undena, 1984. Rubinsohn, Wolfgang. Die grossen Sklavenaufstiinde der Antike. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1993. Ste. Croix, G.E.M. de. "Greek and Roman Accounting." In Studies in the History of Accounting, edited by Ananias C. Littleton and Basil S. Yamey, 17-74. Homewood, Illinois: R.D. Irwin, 1956. Schott, Albert. "Hohe Beamte und freie Stadte im Spiel der assyrischen Staatskunst." , In Atti del XIX Congresso internazionale degli Orientalisti, 75-77. Rome: Senato, 1938. Septuaginta. Edited by Alfred Rahlfs. Wiirttemberg: Wiirttembergische Bibelanstalt, 1935. Sharashenidze, OJ. Formy ekspluatatsii rabochei sily v gosudarstvennom khoziaistve Shumera II. pol. III. tys. do n. e. (Forms of exploitation of work power in the state economy of Sumer of the second half of the third millennium before our era.) Tbilisi: Metsniereba, 1986. Sigrist, Marcel. Drehem. Bethesda, Maryland: CDL, 1992. _____. Messenger Texts. Potomac, Maryland: Capital Decisions Limited, 1990. _____. Textes economiques neo-sumeriens de l'Universite de Syracuse. Paris: Editions Recherches sur les Civilisations, 1983. Smith, Morton. Palestinian Parties and Politics That Shaped the Old Testament. New York: Columbia, 1971. Smith, Sidney. The Statue of Idri-mi. London: British Institute of Archaeology in Ankara, 1949. Snell, Bruno. The Discovery ofthe Mind. New York: Harper and Row, 1960. Snell, Daniel. "Intellectual Freedom in the Ancient Near East?" Intellectual Life ofthe Ancient Near East = Compte rendu de la XLIII Rencontre assyriologique internationale. Edited by Jill Prosecky, 359-363. Prague: Oriental Institute, 1998. _____. "The Lager Texts: Transliteration, Translation, and Notes." Acta Sumerologica 11 (1989): 155-224. _____. Ledgers and Prices. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1982. _____. Life in the Ancient Near East. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1997. _____. "Methods of Exchange and Coinage in Ancient Western Asia." In Civilizations of the Ancient Near East, edited by Jack M. Sasson, 3: 1487-1497. New York: Scribner's, 1995. _____. "The Structure of Politics in the Age of David." Luigi Cagni Memorial Volume. Naples: in press. _____ and Carl H. Lager. Economic Texts from Sumer = Yale Oriental Series 18. New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1991. Soden, Wolfram von. Akkadisches Handworterbuch. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 19651981.

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-----. The Ancient Orient. Grand Rapids, Michigan: Eerdmans, 1994. -----. Leistung und Grenze sumerischer und babylonischer Wissenschafi. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1965. Sollberger, Edmond. Administrative Texts Chiefly Concerning Textiles = Archivi reali di Ebla Testi 8. Rome: Missione archeologica italiania in Siria, 1986. -----. "The Rulers of Lagas." Journal ofCuneiform Studies 21 (1967): 279-286. Sommer, Ferdinand. Die Ahhiyawa-Urkunden. Munich: Bayerische Akademie, 1932. Spalinger, Anthony. "Orientations on Sinuhe:" Studien zur altiigyptischen Kultur 25 (1998): 311-339. Spengler, Oswald. The Decline ofthe West. I. London: George Allen and Unwyn, 1980. Steible, Horst. Die altsumerischen Bau- und Weihinschrifien. Wiesbaden: Franz Steiner, 1983. Steinkeller, Piotr. Sale Documents ofthe Ur-Ill-Period. Stuttgart: F. Steiner, 1989. -----. Third Millennium Legal and Administrative Texts in the Iraq Museum, Baghdad. Winona Lake, Indiana: Eisenbrauns, 1992. Stol, Martin. "Muskenum." Reallexikon der Assyriologie 8 (1997): 492-493. The Sumerian Dictionary. Edited by Ake W. Sjoberg. Philadelphia: University Museum, 1984- . Szlechter, Emile, "L'Affranchissement en droit sumero-akkadien." Archives d 'Histoire du droit oriental. Revue international des droits de l'Antiquite I (1952): 125-195. -----. Tablettes juridiques et administratives. Paris: Recueil Sirey, 1963. Al-Tabari. The History ofal-Tabari, volume 36, The Revolt ofthe Zanj, translated by David Waines, and volume 37, The "Abbiisid Recovery, translated by Philip M. Fields. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1992, 1987. Tadmor, Hayim. "Monarchy and the Elite in Assyria and Babylonia: The Question of Royal Accountability." In The Origins and Diversity ofAxial Age Civilizations, edited by S.N. Eisenstadt, 203-224. Albany: State University of New York Press, 1986. -----. "'The People' and the Kingship in Ancient Israel: The Role ofPolitical Institutions in the Biblical Period." Cahiers d'Histoire mondiale II (1968): 46-68. Thapar, Romila. A History ofIndia, I. Baltimore: Penguin, 1966. Thecdorides, Aristide. "Freiheit." Lexikon der A'gyptologie 2 (1977): 297-304. Thucydides. The Landmark Thucydides. Edited by Robert B. Strassler. New York: Free Press, 1996. Tiumenev, A.l. Gosudarstvennoe Khoziaistvo Drevnego Shumera (Governmental Economy of Ancient Sumer). Moscow: Nauka, 1956. Toynbee, Arnold J. A Study of History, I. Abridged by D.C. Somervell. New York: Dell,1965. Treadgold, Donald W. Freedom, A History. New York: New York University Press, 1990. Van der Ploeg, J. "Les chefs du peuple d'Israel et leurs titres." Revue Biblique 57 (1950): 40-51. -----. "Les 'Nobles' israelites." Oudtestamentische Studien 9 (1951): 49-64. Van de Mieroop, Marc. The Ancient Mesopotamian City. Oxford: Clarendon, 1997. Vaux, Roland de. "Les Hurrites de I'Histoire et les Horites de la Bible." Revue Biblique 74 (1967): 481-503. Vermes, Geza. The Dead Sea Scrolls, Qumran in Perspective. Philadelphia: Fortress, 1981.

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19.0

191

INDEX

Abbasids 45 abolition 15,41, 144 Abraham 127 absenteeism 37, 38 Abydos 70 accounting 34 Achaemenids 61 See also Persians. Achish 126, 127 Acton, Lord II, 12, 149 Adad 109 African-Americans 156 Africans 41 ag a - U s 49 agriculture 56 Ahhiyawa94 Ahiqar 10 I, 102, 177 Akhnaton 16, 17 Akkad 75, 88, 102, 178 Akkadians 75 Akkadian language 20,21,23,29, 31,47,58,63,67,75,77,100, 125 Alalakh 66,88,95,108, 109, 129 n. 20 Aleppo 1, 97, 109 Alexander 144,147 amargi 26 Amelekite 126 Amenemhet I 106 Amenemope 139 n. 3 American South 41,55 American slaves 42,55 Ammisaduqa 22, 65, 66 Amorites 56 Amurru 91, 93 Androtion 73 anduraru 23,26,29,123,140,150 n.21 Angola 16 Arabic 8,16,21,28, 147

Aramaean 128 Aramaic 97, 101 archival texts 3-4,33,59,99 archives 48 Aristotle 71, 147, 150 Asia 154 n. 29 Asoka II assembly, city, rural 18 Assur 99 Assyria 100 Assyrians 103, 151 Assyriologists 140 atheists, village 149 Athenians 14, 153 Athens 11,49,71,72,135 Augustus 39 Babylon II, 70 Babylonians 151 Bakenrenef71 n. 20 Baltimore 156 Barbados 41, 54 barber 81 bedouin 57, 148 Benjamin al-Nahawandi 143 Boccharis 71 n. 20 Brazil 16,42,43,44 British, the 148, 155 Burckhardt, Jacob xi, 7, 8,151-152 bureaucrats 30, 33, 35, 36, 38, 48, 50,54,60,99 Burma 2 Cambyses 18,71 Canaan 109 canonical literature 104, 117 castes 152 Celebes Islands 16 Chicago voters 48 children 35, 50, 52-54

194 China 2 Christ 144-145 See also Jesus. Christianity 144-146 Christians 39, 145, 148, 154 Chronicler 114 cities 19,25 city governor 49-50, 52 Civil War, American 156 civilizations as entities 152 client 16 Clinton, William 155 Code of Harnmurapi 104 See also Texts Cited. Columbian exchange 152-153 Communism 1-2 communities 18, 19 Constitution of Athens 71 contracts 66 Corinthians 153 corvee 3, 25, 57, 67, 70, 74 covenant 121, 133 Crete 12 cultural contacts 138

dariiru 23 Darius 18 David 106 n. II, 110, Ill, 112, 112, 113, 114, 115, 122, 126, 127, 138, 151 death penalty 79, 80, 83 debt 21,139 cancellation 72 release 24, 67, 69 slavery 23, 26, 46, 134 debtors 64 dedicated ones 35, 52 definite article 5 democracy 17-18 deportations 88 bar 123, 134 n. 28, 140 desert 44,106, 127 Deuteronomy 28, 130 See also Texts Cited. Diodorus Siculus 71 n. 20 diseases 153 dissent 6,7, 121 Domenica42

INDEX

INDEX Early Dynastic period 46 Ebla 24, 47,68,69 Eccelsiasticus 140-141 edicts 12,21,22,23,57,59,63,64, 65,66,70,74 Egypt 2, 16, 17 n. 13,39,60 n. 52, 70,71 n. 20, 73-74, 90, 94,101102,106-108,119,121,127,128, 129,131-132,148 Egyptian language 29 Elam 88 Elamite 59 eleuther 20, 150 n. 21 Elijah 106 n. 11 Elisha 106 n. 11, 143 elites 15, 16,23,30,31,34,63, 137 Emar 109 English as official language 153, 154 Enmetena64 escape See flight. Esnunna56, 77,85,172 See also Texts Cited. Essenes 144 n. 10 Euripides 12 European influence 148 excommunication 146 Exodus 120-122, 138, 143 See also Texts Cited. exorcism priest 100 Ezra, Book of 61 family 54 first millennium 9, 17 fled and dead texts 52, 55,158,163 flight 9, 79,81,105 direction of 43,47 family 51 group 51, 54, 62, 137 of free persons 104 narratives, 104 periodicity of 52-53 punishment of 57 rarity of mention 53 escapee status 50 escapees, young 49 See also refugees, runaway. flood stories 151 free societies 12

freedom 1-2,9, 75 aspects of 13 as value 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 23,103, 104, 135, 142, 144, 148, 150, 154, 156 civic 13-14,17,19,25,137,144, 48 definition of 148-152 gift from gods 104 Greek 3, 25 history of 8, II, 12, 14,42 ideology of9, 63, 98, 115 in Christ 145 individual 13-14, 120-122 lack of 12, 15 love of 147 of thought 149 n.20 personal 16, 19,29, 144, 148, 149, 154 sovereignal13, 15-17, 144 n.IO words for 19-20 French 149 n. 20 gardener 54 Gath 112, 126, 127 gender, of runaways 41, 42,53 generalization 4-6 Gentile 143 Ghana 155 n. 30 Girsu See Lagas-Girsu. Goliath 122 goring ox 139 n. 3 gouging, of eyes 57, 101 governments, totalitarian 151 grain 48 Greece 2, 12, 13, 14, 18,38, 152, 154 Greek, language 20, 49, 144-145 literature 130 miracle 2, 9, 135, 148 Greeks4,5,8, 19,33,71,119,120, 139, 144, 147, 153 Guadaloupe 42 guarantors 51,56 Hadad 128 Hagar 127-128 Hahhu 67

195 Haiti 42 !}alqu 31 Hammurapi 46, 79,85, 138, 172-173 See also Texts Cited. Hana66 Hapalla 93 hapiru 58, 60, 62 harboring 39,61,76-77,79, 80,83, 85,89,94,96-98,115 Hattin,175 Hattusi Ii I 67 Hattusili III 94 Hebrew Bible 6-7, 19,46, 108, 117118,125,127, 138, 141, 145, 154 See also Texts Cited. Hebrew 21,27-28, 125, 139 Hegel 11, n. 1 Herodotus 5,18,71,144 n. 10 M(y)rilt 27 n. 32, 125 n. 13 Hittite laws 82, 85, 173-174 See also Texts Cited. Hittites 24,67,68,69,82,89,90-91, 93, 94-95, 138 n. 2 /:lofti 29,122-123 Holiness Code 131,134 Hong Kong 154 n. 29 /:lor 28, 125 horim 28, 134 humanities funding 8 !}upsu 29, 122 hurr 147 Hurrian 24, 27, 28, 68, 69 hurriyak 28 !}urru 27, 125 hwr 27n. 32 Ibalpiel56 Ibrahim Pasha 148 ideology 56, 63, 98,115, 137 idleness 141 Idrimi 86,88-89,108-109, 110, 138, 151,175-176 imperialism 13, 153 incantations 100, 103, 104 India 11,153, 155 individual, the xi, 8, 151 interest rates 86 n. 43

196

INDEX

INDEX

inveigling 76 n. 33 Ionia 14,94 Iraq 3, 59, 70, 77 Isaac 128 Isaiah 118 See also Texts Cited. Islam 16, 146, 148,154 Israel7, 12, 16,28, 110, 112-113, 117-119,121,129,137,140,143 Italy 151

liberalism 1 liberation theology 122 Lipit-Istar 57, 75, 76, 85, 171 See alsoTexts Cited. list-making 5 literary texts 99 loans 22, 64, 65 Luke 145 Luwiya82

Jacob 128 Jesus 145 See also Christ. Jews 11,28,61,70,120, 123, 140, 141, 143, 144, 154 Jewish Wars 141 Jezebel28, 125 Jonah 128 Jonathan Ill, 112, 113 jubilee 131,134,142 Judah, Judaea 110, 112, 113, 118, 133, 141 Judah the Patriarch 143 Judaism 140 Judges 121 jurists, Muslim 146-147 justice 22, 59, 66, 69, 139

magic 99 manumission 26, 46, 75, 133, 147 Mari 57 maroons 44, 45, 52, 112 Masoretic Text 145 n. 13 Medes 18 Mesopotamia 3-5, 6-8,12, 20, 25, 3132,34,40,137 messenger 47,49 Middle Assyrian laws 83-85 Middle Babylonian period 58-60,70, 123 military 55 mill-worker 54 Mira-Kuwaliya 93 missing persons 37 Mittani 93 monarchy 18 money, grain as 34 monumental texts 99, 108 Moses 106 n. 11, 108, 119, 120 n. 3 multiculturalism 153 Mursili II 91 Muslims 146, 148 mutilation for escape 51, 84 See also gouging, of eyes.

Karaite 143 Khurasanians 147 kidinnu 24, 25 kings, critiques of 17 Kizzuwatna 89, 93 labor 32-34, 54 forced 48, 147 See also corvee. Lagas-Girsu 45,52,64 languages, Mesopotamian 8 Latin 3, 20 law, and practice 65 codes 5, 65, 74 See also Texts Cited. Jewish 145 Lebanese 148 Lebanon 106 n. 11 legal texts 129 letters 57, 94,102 lexical lists 31,100, 101

Nabal III Nabonidus 70 Naboth 28, 125 naduriiru 29 Napoleon Bonaparte 148 Naram-Sin 88 Nazareth 145 Nehemiah 28, 70 134, 135 Book of 61 See also Texts Cited. Neo-Assyrian period 25

Neo-Babylonian period 60-62 New Testament 144-146 Ninevites 128 Nippur45 Niqmepa95 nomads 44,56,59, 112 Nubia 70 Nuhassi 93 nutrition 36 Nuzi 59, 60, 70 oath 51, 54 Old Akkadian period 46 Old Babylonian period 21-23, 25, 51, 55-57,59,65-66,77,123,149 Old Testament 6 oligarchy 18 orallaw 141 oral traditions 7, 138 Oriental despotism 7, 146 Palestine 58,106,140 Palmares 44 pass systems 55, 149 passing as free 40 patrolling 43, 49 Paul 144, 145 people of the land 142 Pericles 12 Persians 18,28,71, 144n.lO, 151 pestle 101 Petition of Right 155 Pharisees 141 Philistines Ill, 112 Philo 144 Pilliya 88, 110 Piyamaradu 94 Plutarch 73 policemen 49 Pope Gregory VI 146 porter 54 primitive democracy 17 prisoner 103 prisons 44, 154 n. 28, 147 privileges, city 24, 25 propaganda 18 prophets, Israelite 12, 118 See also Texts Cited.

197 Ptolemy(ies) 39 V Epiphanes 73 VIII Euergetes II 73 Pythagorean theorum 4 rabbis 142 Rabbi Hisda 143 Ramses II 90-91 rations 34-35, 48, 52, 54 redemption 119 reform texts 12 refugees 58, 76, 88, 91,94-95 release, remission 67, 124, 133 of debt 21, 59, 66, 69-70, 123 (of slaves) 68 Renaissance 151 Rezon 128 rice 153 Rome 2, 34, 38-39, 55,152 Rosetta Stone 73 rowdy groups 27 royal inscriptions 4,59,64 runaway 6,32,35,42-43,48, 101, 102 family of 50; free 86 laws summary 85 punishment of 44 returning 52 slaves 39, 40,86, 100, Ill, 142 n.

7 status of 50, 51, 86 See also flight and refugees. Russian style of argument 6 Russo-Ottoman treaty 148 SA.GAZ 58 Samson 106 n. 11 Samsuiluna 23 n. 23, 66 Samue119 Samuel-Kings 114 Sarah 127 Sargon 102 Saudi Arabia 2 n. 1 Saul 110, Ill, 113, 114, 122, 126,127 scribes 33, 35, 45 Sefire 97, 176 Seha River 93

198 seisachtheia 72 Senusret I 106 Septuagint 71 n, 19, 122, 145 n. 13 Seti I 70 Shimei 126, 127 silversmith 54 Simti 50 Sinuhe 106, 107,111 Sirach, Jesus son of 140-1 slave(s) 15,21,22 n. 22, 23, 26, 3839,45-47,51-52,54,66,75, 89,95-96,104,140-141 branding of 61-62 by nature 147 community 47 Egyptian 126 escape of79, 81 haircut 77, 81, 85 Hebrew 131, 133 held by rabbis 142 in army 147 in polite speech 105 narratives 105 numbers of 87 percentage of 61 price of 52, 61, 77 n. 34 slave(s) rebellion 83, 87 royal 61 temple 61-62 slavery 12, 60 history of 31-32 in the Americas 40 or service 119, 121 seven-year 131, 134 smiths 49, 54 Solomon 126, 128 Solon 11,71-73 Spartacus 87 Spartans 153 Spengler, Oswald 152 St. Jerome 28 Stalin 32 stealing men 130 Stoic 144-145 subarn1 24, 25 Subartu 57 suicide 43, 106 n. II Sulgi-simti 50

INDEX

INDEX Sumer75 Sumerian 20, 21, 31, 47, 58, 63, 100, 139 Sumerian King List 45 Sunassura 89 Suppiluliuma 90, 174 Surpu 103, 178 See also Texts Cited. Suruppak46 Susa25 Swahili 28, 149 n. 20 Syria I, 2, 24, 47, 57-58, 62, 66-69, 86,88,90-91,95,106 n. 11,108, 148

West, the 1-2,9, 12, 14, 15, 19, 20,152-155 Western Asia 107 wife, claims on 78 Wilusa 94 wisdom collections 151 women 12 n. 2,13,34-35,46,50,51, 53-54, 83 and n. 40, 84, 88, 89 n. 48,132

199

work ethic 48 wstl.-tn 29 Xerxes 71

zab-ba

31 Zanj 45 Zedekiah 133

ANCIENT NEAR EASTERN TEXTS CITED Talmud 142-143 Tatars 148 Tawagalawa 94 taxes 22, 64, 71, 73, 139 Telepinu 67 Tessub 68, 109 texts, preserved 8 Thucydides 153 n. 27 tobacco 153 toleration, religious II tomatoes 153 Toynbee, Arnold 152 tradition, steam of 33 See also canonical literature. treaties 58,86-97 Tudhaliya II 89 Tudhaliya IV 67 Tunip 95 Tuppi-Tessub 91 Turkey 2 n. I, 24, 82, 88, 108 Turkish 21 Two Brothers, Story of 106 nil Ugarit 60, 90, 92-94, 174- 175 Umma48 United States 154-155 Ur III period 3, 32, 48, 64 Ur70 Ur-Nammu code 75, 171 Uruinimgina 64, 66 village communities 36-37 weaving 35

Atra-HaslsIII vi 25 151 n.23

<;Ig, Kizilyay,Verwaltungsurkunden I I 51, 157 Esnunna 30 78 Esnunna 50 77, 96, 172 Esnunna Sl 77,172 Bsnunna 52 78, 172 Genouillac, Textes Cuneiformes 2:5481 50, 157 Gilgamesh xi 181-82 151 n. 23 Gomi, British Museum 125 52, 160 Gomi,BritishMuseum333 51,161 Gomi, British Museum 519 52, 162 Gomi, Acta Sumerologica 3:166 52, 158 Harnmurapi 15 79,172 Hammurapi 16 79,172 Harnmurapi 17 80, 172 Hammurapi 18 80, 172 Harnmurapi 19 80, 172 Hammurapi 20 81, 172 Hammurapi 30, 31 56 Harnmurapi 117 86 n. 43 Harnmurapi 136 78 n, 36 Harnmurapi 170-170 89 n. 48 Harnmurapi 226 81, 173 Harnmurapi 227 81,173 Harnmurapi 250-2 139 n. 3 Hittite Laws 22 82, 173 Hittite Laws 23 82, 173

Hittite Laws 24 82, 173 Hittite Laws 173b 83, 173 Hussey, Harvard Semitic Series 4:82 49 n. 32, 162 Keiser, Yale Oriental Series 4: 190 52, 162 King, Cuneiform Texts 10:28 52, 163 Lager 115 48 Landsberger, Materialen zum Sumerischen Lexikon I 101, 177 Legrain, Ur Excavation Texts 3:1018 52, 166 Lipit-Istar 12 76, 171 Middle Assyrian laws 7 46 Middle Assyrian laws 24 84, 173 Myhrman, Babylonian Expedition 3:1 51,166 Nikol'skii, Dokumenty 436 50, 167 Sigrist, Messenger 41:2 49 n. 31, 168 Sigrist, Syracuse 36 52, 169 Sigrist, Syracuse 259 49,169 Surpu ii 28-32 103 Surpu iv 2, 31-36 104 Szlechter, Tablettesjuridiques 40 50, 169 Yoshikawa, Acta Sumerologica 9:307 50, 170

200

INDEX BIBLICALTEXTS CITED

Genesis 16:1-16 128 n. 17 Genesis 21:8-21 128n. 17 Genesis 37:28 133 n. 26 Exodus 2:14b,15a 108 n. 15 Exodus 5:1 119 Exodus 10:26 119 Exodus21:2 131,133 n. 26 Exodus 21:2-11 86 n. 43 Exodus 21:7 132 Exodus21:16 130 Exodus 21:28-32 139n. 3 Exodus 23:2 142 n. 6 Exodus 32 120 n, 3 Leviticus 25:10 124, 131 Leviticus 25:39-42 131

1 Kings 21:8,11 125,28 2 Kings 4 143 2 Kings 9:3 106 n. 11 2 Chronicles 25:6 133 n. 26 Nehemiah 2:16, 4:8, 13:17 125 Nehemiah5:5-13 134, 135 Nehemiah5:7,6:17, 7:5 125 Nehemiah5:15 133 n. 26 Esther 2:18 71 Job 3:19 123 Job 39:5 123 Proverbs 22:17-24:34 139 n. 3

Deuteronomy 15:12-18 132, 133 n, 26,86 n. 43 Deuteronomy23:16-17 129,143 Deuteronomy 24:7 130 n.22 Judges 8:23 122n. 7 Judges 14-16 106n. 11 Judges 17:10 133 n. 26

Ecclesiastes 10:17 125 Isaiah 34:12 125 Isaiah 48:20 128 n. 18 Isaiah 58:6c 123 Isaiah 61:1 124 n. 11 Isaiah 61:1-2 145

1 Samuel 111 1 Samue18 19 I Samue117:25 122 1 Samue118-21 111 1 Samue121:11 127 1 SamueI22:1-2 112 1 SamueI23:16-18 113 1 Samuel 24:20-22 113 1 Samue125:10 111 1 Samue126:25 113 1 SamueI27:1-4 113,127 1 SamueI27:5-7 113 1 Samuel30: 15 126 n. 14 1 Samuel 30:26 113 2 Samuel 16:5-13 126

Jeremiah 27:20 125 Jeremiah34:8-17 133 Jeremiah 34:9-16 123 Jeremiah34:14, 22 134

1 Kings 2:39-40 126, 129 1 Kings 11:17,23,40 128 1 Kings 19:3 106 n. 11

Luke4:18 145

Ezekiel 46:17 124, 134 n. 28 Hosea 3:2 133 n. 26 Hosea 8:4 122 n. 7 Jonah 4:2 128 Zechariah 11:12 133 n. 26 Ecclesiasticus33:24-31 140-141

1 Timothy 1:19-20 146

CULTURE AND HISTORY OF THE ANCIENT NEAR EAST ISSN 1566-2055 1. Grootkerk, S.E. Ancient Sites in Galilee. A Toponymic Gazetteer. 2000. ISBN 90 04 11535 8 2. Higginbotham, C.R. Egyptianization and Elite Emulation in Ramesside Palestine. Governance and Accommodation on the Imperial Periphery. 2000. ISBN 90 04 11768 7 3. Yamada, S. The Construction ofthe As~rian Empire. A Historical Study of the Inscriptions of Shalmanesar III Relating to His Campaigns in the West. 2000. ISBN 90 04 11772 5 4. Yener, K.A. The Domestication ofMetals. The Rise of Complex Metal Industries in Anatolia. 2000. ISBN 90 04 11864 0 5. Taracha, P. Ersetren und Entsiihnen. Das mittelhethitische Ersatzritual fur den Groffkonig Tuthalija (CTH *448.4) und verwandte Texte. 2000. ISBN 90 04 119108 6. Littauer, M.A. & Crouwel, ].H.and P. Raulwing (ed.) Selected Writings on Chariots and other Early Vehicles, Riding and Harness. 2001. ISBN 90 04 11799 7 7. Malamat, A. History ofBiblical Israel. Major Problems and Minor Issues. 2001. ISBN 90 04 12009 2 8. Snell, D.C. Flight and Freedom in the Ancient Near East. 2001. ISBN 90 04 12010 6