Solar Omens of Enuma Anu Enlil

Solar Omens of Enuma Anu Enlil
Author: W. H. van Soldt
Publisher: Peeters
Total Pages: 188
Release: 1995
Genre: Foreign Language Study
ISBN:

The Babylonians considered the corpus of celestial omens, called Enuma Anu Enlil, the culmination of scholarship. A modern edition of this series of 70 tablets was initiated by Erica Reiner in cooperation with David Pingree in 1975. Since then tablets 63 (Venus; 1975), 50-51 (fixed stars; 1981) and 12-22 (lunar eclipses; 1988, by F. Rochberg-Halton) have been published. The present volume brings an edition of tablets 22-29, devoted to the sun and dealing with a variety of phenomena, such as its sighting in clouds of particular shapes and colours and in a halo, the appearance of "disks" (parhelion, paraselene etc.), the sun's radiance and colours, unexpected appearances and early risings, athmospheric phenomena at sunrise and sunset, conjunction with planets and stars, and features called "glow" and coloured "webs". The edition follows the pattern of earlier volumes, providing introductions, transliterations, translations and short notes for each tablet, together with colophons, ancient commentaries (on parts of all tablets), excerpts (of tablets 24-26), and unplaced fragments. The original tablets (from Assur, Babylon and Nineveh) have been collated and new sources are offered in 15 photographs. Indexes list all words, names and texts.

Weather Omens of En?ma Anu Enlil

Weather Omens of En?ma Anu Enlil
Author: Erlend Gehlken
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 346
Release: 2012-08-03
Genre: Foreign Language Study
ISBN: 9004225889

This book presents the second half of the weather section of En?ma Anu Enlil, a Mesopotamian omen series dealing with the stars, sun, moon, and weather. It attained particular importance when scholars used it to explain phenomena to Assyrian kings.

Babylonian Planetary Omens: without special title

Babylonian Planetary Omens: without special title
Author: Erica Reiner
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 304
Release: 1998-01-01
Genre: History
ISBN: 9789056930110

This third fascicle of Babylonian Planetary Omens contains the edition of all cuneiform texts dealing with the planet Venus known to us. Most of these tablets are kept in the British Museum; the large number of unpublished texts were transliterated and the previously published texts were checked and collated from the originals. The texts are accompanied by translations, and each group of texts is commented upon by David Pingree from the point of view of the text history and astronomical significance. A general introduction, also by David Pingree, analyzes the descriptions of Venus that occur in the texts in terms of astronomical phenomena. Indices are included to facilitate the study of this large corpus.

Astral Sciences in Mesopotamia

Astral Sciences in Mesopotamia
Author: Hermann Hunger
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 325
Release: 2015-11-02
Genre: Reference
ISBN: 9004294139

Astronomy and astrology, or the astral sciences, played an enormous, if not a key role in the political and religious life of the Ancient Near East, and, later, of the Greek and Roman world. This is the first comprehensive and up-to-date account of the origins of the astral sciences in the Ancient Near East. Every type of Sumerian or Akkadian text dealing with descriptive or mathematical astronomy, including many individual tablets are thoroughly dealt with. All aspects, such as the history of discovery, reconstruction, and interpretation come to the fore, accompanied by a full bibliography. At that the reader will find descriptions of astronomical contents, an explanation of their scientific meaning and the place a given genre or tablet has in the development of astronomy both within the Mesopotamian culture and outside of it. Because celestial omens are intimately related to astronomy in Mesopotamian science, these are also discussed extensively. The material is arranged both chronologically and thematically, so as to help make Astral Sciences in Mesopotamia a reference work on the subject in its truest sense.