Ruffing, Kai; Droß-Krüpe, Kerstin; Fink, Sebastian; Rollinger, Robert: Societies at War. Proceedings of the tenth Symposium of the Melammu Project held in Kassel September 26-28 2016 & Proceedings of the eight Symposium of the Melammu Project held in Kiel November 11-15 2014. Wien: Verlag der Öst..., 2020
Introduction 1 In the 7 th century BCE Assurbanipal, the King of Assyria, "ruler of the whole wor... more Introduction 1 In the 7 th century BCE Assurbanipal, the King of Assyria, "ruler of the whole world", had a huge collection of inscribed clay tablets gathered in order to found a library. He also asked for tablets of various rituals and incantations that were powerful enough to maintain his royal power but also for "rare tablets […] that are not in Assyria" (CT 22,1) 2. He had them searched in the sanctuaries of Babylonia. Adressed to his scholarly agents who nolens volens had to execute his command and "not to hold back one of the tablets", he also explicitly mentioned tablets of two series of rituals called ÉŠ.GAR MÈ (iškar taḫāzi)-"The series: Battle" and ina MÈ GI ana LÚ NU TE.GÁ (ina taḫāzi qanû ana amēli lā teḫê) 3-"(For) in the battle the reed (of the arrow) might not approach the man" (lines 18 and 21) among other ritual texts ša ana šarrūti ṭâbi-" that are good for kingship" (line 25). 1 Although there are countless publications of the topics of "war" and "ritual" from different perspectives, not too much explicit treatments have been written about the connection of "war and ritual".
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