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March 13, 2008
KTU 1.114 - A Student Exercise?
Yesterday I mentioned that Ugaritic tablet KTU 1.114 was a palimpsest and that a small part of the "erased" text is somewhat readable. Here is a picture of KTU 1.114:6-8 cropped from the image of the whole tablet provided in Bordreuil and Pardee on CD ROM.
Now take a close look at the signs I have traced in black on the same image.
Notice that the partially "erased" signs are smaller than the rewritten signs but they seem to have about the same line spacing just offset from the "top" lines. If you look closely you can see some other partial signs from the "erased" text." Notice too the scribe line that appears to be between text lines 6 and 7. Does it belong to the underlying text or the top text? There is nothing in the rewritten, top, text that would explain or justify this line. So I think it part of the underlying text. We'll have occasion to look at another line, clearly part of the top text, on this tablet a little later. Also, notice that the lines are not exactly straight. Some of this may be due to deformation of the tablet itself, perhaps caused by the circumstances of preservation.
The "erased" signs between lines 5 and 6 read dm(?)a/b(?)d and the "erased" signs between lines 6 and 7 read bqr. The first thing that one can say is that the erased text was not the same as the rewritten text. These letter strings do not appear in the top text. The "erased" letters do appear to be somewhat smaller and, therefore, may be from a different hand. Beside this, there isn't much that can be said. There is no reason be believe that we are dealing with whole words and therefore any guess as to what those letter strings mean is simply that, a guess. I will note that the letter string m-b-d does not appear, even once, in the known Ugaritic texts. For that reason, my guess is that we should read the string d-m-a-d. So, should we understand this as "which increases"? This grammatical structure would be unique. The possibilities for b-q-r range from the Ugaritic phrase "at the water source" to some expression like b qrb, "in the midst." But all this is vanity and a striving after wind.
Now let's take a look at the scribe line separating text lines 28' and 29' on the reverse of the tablet. I also cropped this from the same picture in Bordreuil and Pardee's CD ROM.
I have traced the line to make it obvious in this lower resolution version of the picture. In the text, the line separates the myth of El's marzeah (banquet) (over 28 lines long) from what appears to be a three line instruction for some kind of medical treatment. A line separating sections of text on a tablet is common. Exactly how the first, mythological, section relates to the three line final, instruction, section is unclear. Perhaps some practitioner recited the myth as part of the treatment or "dissolved" it in the concoction outlined in the instructions section. Don't worry that the scribe line is not quite straight. Again, the conditions of preservation my have caused some considerable deformity in the tablet. But do note that the scribe started her or his line in a direction that, if continued, would have brought it too low in relation to the line above it. The scribe then restarted the line and continued it in a more or less correct direction. The scribe apparently did nothing to smooth over the error.
On a logical enough note, the text ends with line 31'. All of the remainder of the reverse is un-inscribed. What percentage of the back of the tablet is not used in unclear because the bottom of the obverse and the top of the reverse is broken without any induction of how much is missing. But assuming a tablet of "normal" proportions, one can safely assume that the scribe left two thirds of the reverse blank.
A couple of other things: The letters are well formed and quite even in size and execution. While there are a couple of errors (the missing n in line 3 for example), they are very few. The tablet comes from a very eclectic archive that includes inscribed clay liver models, a lung model, Hurrian texts, Akkadian texts, and unquestionable scribal exercises. KTU 5.20 and 5.21, both from the same room and archaeological context as KTU 1.114, are both Ugaritic abecedaries.
So what do I make of all this? 1) That the tablet is a palimpsest with signs from a previous use still showing and the final scribe not sufficiently concerned with his or her work product to properly re-prepare the surface of the tablet before writing on it; 2) that it's reverse is far from full; 3) that the scribe line between lines 28' and 29' starts in one direction only to be corrected without being cleaned up; 4) that the tablet was found in the archaeological/archival context containing among other tablets scribal exercises; and 5) that the lines of text are not as straight as one might expect from an experienced scribe (but this may have another explanation, see above) leads me to believe that KTU 1.114 was the work of a student, not a beginning student but still a student. This doesn't mean that the contents of his or her exercise tablet were developed from whole cloth for purely pedagogical purposes. As I explained in my discussion of the veterinary tablets, while they were, in the form we have now them, student exercises, they reflect actual veterinary practice. Likewise, I believe KTU 1.114, while the work of a student, reflects nonetheless the medical practice of the time.
Important Note: I haven't looked at a lot of the secondary literature on this tablet, so be a little careful with what I have said. It may be wrong and it may not be original.
Reference
Posted by Duane Smith at March 13, 2008 7:57 PM | Read more on Ugarit |
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