Art. XXIII.—The Cuneiform Inscriptions of Van, deciphered and translated

A. H. Sayce

doi:10.1017/S0035869X00018335

Art. XXIII.—The Cuneiform Inscriptions of Van, deciphered and translated

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 15 March 2011

A. H. Sayce

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It is now more than half a century ago that the existence of inscriptions written in the Cuneiform character, and found in different parts of Armenia, first became known. The French Professor, Saint-Martin, in 1823, gave an account in the Journal Asiatique of the antiquities of Van, and drew attention to the fact that the Armenian historian, Moses of Khorene, has described them in such detail as to make it probable he had seen them with his own eyes. In the curious romance, compiled partly from the Old Testament, partly from the legends of Greek writers, partly from the names of localities, which was made to take the place of the forgotten early history of Armenia, these monuments were ascribed to Semiramis, to whom Van was imagined to owe its foundation. Saint-Martin concluded that some of them, at any rate, must still be in existence, and at his instigation, therefore, a young scholar from Hesse, Prof. Fr. Ed. Schulz, was sent by the French Government to Armenia, in 1826, in order to examine them. In 1828, accordingly, Van and its neighbourhood were thoroughly explored by Schulz, who succeeded in discovering and copying no less than forty-two Cuneiform inscriptions. Considering his utter ignorance of both the language and the character, the accuracy of his copies is really wonderful. They were published in the Journal Asiatique (3rd ser. vol. ix. No. 52) in 1840, but the unfortunate discoverer never returned home, having been murdered in 1829 by a Kurdish chief, along with several officers of the Shah of Persia. His papers were subsequently recovered from the Prince of Julamerk.

Type: Original Communications
Information: Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society , Volume 14 , Issue 3 , July 1882 , pp. 377 - 496

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0035869X00018335 [Opens in a new window]
Copyright: Copyright © The Royal Asiatic Society 1882

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^{page 378 note 1} The close resemblance, as regards both the forms of the characters and the dialect they express, between the inscriptions fonnd in the 2nd column of the Akhæmeniau texts, and at Mai Amir in Susiania, led me in 1874 (Tr. Soc. Bibl. Arch. vol. iii. p. 2Google Scholar) to state my conviction that the so-called Skythic or Protomedie was really the old language of south-western Elymais. The discovery that Kyros and his predecessors were kings of Anzan rather than of Persia, has confirmed this belief, since Anzan was the native name of the district in question, and the fact that it was the original kingdom of Kyros would sufficiently explain the prominence given to its language in the inscriptions of Darius and his successors.

^{page 380 note 1} The Ansayrii, vol. ii. pp. 151–2 (1851).Google Scholar

^{page 384 note 1} These are not the first hronze objects obtained from Van. A bronze solar disk of remarkable form, and resembling the solar disk of Hittite art, discovered in the neighbourhood of Van, is figured in the Mélanges asiatiques de l'Acad. de S. Pétersbourg, vol. vi. pp. 486Google Scholar, etc. It bears a curious resemblance to a humanheaded and winged solar disk of bronze found at Olympia (Archäologische Zeitung, 37. 4, p. 181; 1879Google Scholar), as well as to two similar ones found at Palestrina or Præneste (Mon. dell' Instituto, 1876 and 1879).Google Scholar

^{page 389 note 1} Ap. Joseph, , Antiq. i. 3Google Scholar, Euseb. Prœp. Ev. 9. According to the local tradition, the ark had rested on Mount Baris ahove Minyas. Baris is the Lubar of the Book of Jubilees (ch. 5), which Epiphanius (Adv. Hœr. i. 5Google Scholar) makes the boundary between Armenia and the Kurds (see Syncell, . Chronog. p. 147Google Scholar; Cedrenus, G., Camp. Hist. p. 20).Google Scholar

^{page 393 note 1} Rowandiz seems to be the Baris of Nicolaus Dam., the Luhar of Jewish tradition. See note on p. 389.

^{page 394 note 1} W.A.I, i. 45, ii. 30.

^{page 394 note 2} Niribu is a niphal derivative of eribu ‘to descend,’ and is always used of the low ground into which one descends from a height.

^{page 395 note 1} Nigdiara, king of the Idians, defeated by Shalmaneser in B.C. 856, is called Migdiara by Samas-Rimmon, whose general, Mulis-Assur, captured 300 cities belonging to his son and successor, Khirtsina or S'artsina, on the shores of ‘the sea of the setting sun,’ i.e. Lake Van (B.C. 824).

^{page 396 note 1} Kirkhi is described as ‘opposite the land of the Hittites,’ i.e. the northern portion of the Hittite territory on the east bank of the Euphrates. Among the towns of Âssa and Kirkhi were Umalie and Khiranu in Adana; after leaving these, the Assyrian king marched into the land of Amadanu, that is, the district of Amida or Diarbekir. Having burned Mallanu in Arkania, and the cities of Zamba, he crossed the Sua (W.A.I, i. 25. 97 sq.), reached the Tigris, and then the towns of Barza-Nistun, Dandamusa, and Ameda. From Ameda he withdrew to Allabzie and Uda, in the mountains of Kasyari or Masius. Amadana is mentioned along with fifteen other mountainous regions by Tiglath-Pileser I. (W.A.I, i. 12, iv. 58), who, after passing through them, reached the banks of the Euphrates. Crossing the river, he made his way to Nimme, Dayaeni and twentyone other districts of ‘Nairi.’

^{page 411 note 1} The first attempt that has been made to analyze the Georgian language according to the scientific method is to he found in an article by M. J. A. Gatteyrias in the Revue de Linguistique et de Philologie comparée (xiv.) for 07, 1881, pp. 275–311Google Scholar. It is impossible not to be struck by the resemblance of the results obtained by M. Gatteyrias to the grammatical facts of the Vannic inscriptions. “The suffix which expresses relation,” that is, the Vannie genitive-dative, is i in the personal pronouns, as in Vannie stems in -i; Gatteyrias believes it to be a demonstrative, entering into combination with other letters in i-man ‘he,’ i-gi, i-si ‘that,’ like the Vannie i in i-ni ‘this,’ i-u ‘thus,’ ie-s ‘which.’ Local nouns ending in a and e insert vie before the suffix isa (e.g. Jordane-vie-sa ‘of the Jordan’), like Vannie local nouns which suffix -ve after -na (e.g. Biaina-ve). In MSS. other nouns take the semivowel (as tsa-vie-sa ‘of the sky’) just as in Vannie. As in Vannic, too, -is- is an adjectival suffix, as well as -n(i)-. M. Gatteyrias shows that the Georgian sa is originally a local demonstrative, as it is in Vannie, while da forms adverbs of place as it does in Vannie. The Vannic ini-da ‘here’ is strictly analogous to the Georgian man-da ‘there,’ and sada is ‘there’ in Vannie, ‘where’ in Georgian. The phonology is remarkably alike, so far as can be seen. Georgian possesses the vowels a, i, u, e, and o (as does Vannic, if we make 〈 o), the semivowels ie, and vie, and the aspirated ho (Vannic ha). The first person of the verb is formed by the suffix -bi, as in Vannie, while the 3rd pers. pl. contains, as Gatteyrias shows, the suffix -ni, as in qwareb-en ‘they love,’ ar-i-an ‘they are’ (arie-dha is ‘he was’ in Vannie). In Vannic -ni marks the 3rd person both singular and plural. The nominative and accusative plural of Georgian nouns terminates in -ni and (e)bi, which M. Gatteyrias shows must be analyzed into -n-i and eb-i, i alone marking the case. We may compare the Vannic eba-n-i ‘countries’ and ati-b-i ‘thousands.’ The suffix th is shown to have had originally the local sense of ‘departure,’ and then to have passed into a locative suffix. It is difficult not to compare the Vannic locative di, especially when we find that th is also found in verbal forms like dae in Vannic, and that the suffixes etha, ath, eth, ith, iath, oth, and uth are traced back to da. Shina or shi, which now forms the locative in Georgian, is the old word for ‘house,’ which may be the same as the Vaunic asi(s). The Vannic suffix li seems to be found in the Georgian adjectival ali, eli, ili, and uli, which show that a suffix li is attached to stems in a, e, i, and u. The pronoun of the 3rd person is identical with that of Vannic—mes ‘he,’ mani ‘him’—the ‘demonstrative’ case being men and m(a)s ‘to him’; even misi ‘his’ is the Vannic mesi(s). In the Vannic ada ‘and,’ we find the origin of the Georgian copulative conjunction da. The only dialects allied to the Georgian, which are at present known are the Mingrelian—the nearest akin, of which Klaproth has published some phrases in the Journal Asiatique 1829Google Scholar, while Zagarelli has lately published some studies upon it; the Suanian, said to be full of foreign words; and the Lazian, spoken nearest the Black Sea, and more archaic in character than the Georgian. A grammar and vocabulary of it have been published by Rosen in the Abhandlungen der Berlin. Akademie, 1843, 1845. The elements of Georgian grammar are given in Brosset's Grammaire, 1834, the analysis of the verb having been subsequently accomplished by Friedrich Müller, and a Dictionnaire géorgien-russe-français, by P. D. Tchubinof, appeared at St. Petersburg in 1840.

^{page 416 note 1} Botta, 148, 4.

^{page 416 note 2} See Obelisk, Black, 176–179.Google Scholar

^{page 427 note 1} Atsus is really the case denoting duration of time (v. 2), which seems to have been the nominative in Vannic.

^{page 429 note 1} Te here must stand for -tie, just as -di will stand for -die.

^{page 439 note 1} As ma is found only in one passage (xxxvii. 26), it is very possibly a false reading.

^{page 440 note 1} Since it precedes its noun in other instances in which it is found, it is possible that here also we are to construe it with the plural nouns ‘gods’ and ‘cities’ which follow.

^{page 445 note 1} In liii. 7, where we are dealing with another dialect than the Vannic, the noun after pari is in the accusative.

^{page 446 note 1} So too in the case of the local suffix (e.g. xxxi. 3) and locative suffix (e.g. xxxi. 6, 7).

^{page 452 note 1} If we are to read anniu, it would betray a diphthongisation of the Assyrian u (in annu) on the part of the Vannic scribe.

^{page 459 note 1} A word of similar formation is ikuka-ni ‘property.’

^{page 459 note 2} The root of inus ‘chamber’ and inas ‘city’ seems to be the same. If so, the primitive Armenians would appear to have been troglodytes.

^{page 460 note 1} Si-, however, in both giei-si-da, and als'ui-si-ni may be the adjectival suffix.

^{page 463 note 1} So Layard. Schulz has a non-existent character.

^{page 463 note 2} So Layard. Schulz has a Mank.

^{page 463 note 3} So both Layard and Schulz. But we must plainly read tu-ni.

^{page 463 note 4} Schulz has here forgotten to repeat the final of the character ar.

^{page 463 note 5} If is right—and both Layard and Schulz give it—we must suppose that the Vannic scribe has confounded the two characters ‘people’ and ‘language.’

^{page 464 note 1} So Layard. Schulz has the non-existent and .

^{page 464 note 2} Layard and Schulz have .

^{page 464 note 3} So Layard. Schulz has . The triad of Khaldis, the Air-god and the Sun-god, so frequent in the inscription, requires Layard's reading.

^{page 464 note 4} So Layard. Schulz has blank.

^{page 464 note 5} So Layard. Schulz has blank.

^{page 464 note 6} So Layard. Schulz has te in this line, la below.

^{page 465 note 1} Layard's copy allows space for this letter, and marks a flaw in the rock.

^{page 465 note 2} Layard has This would make Selardis the name of the Moongod. As Schulz has a lacuna before the first character (me) of the name, this is most probably the correct reading.

^{page 465 note 3} So Layard.

^{page 465 note 4} So Layard. Schulz has lu, but ip in the duplicate.

^{page 466 note 1} So Layard. Schulz has ni.

^{page 466 note 2} So Layard. Schulz has ri!

^{page 466 note 3} So Layard. Schulz is unintelligible.

^{page 466 note 4} So Layard.

^{page 466 note 5} So Layard. Schulz has ap. Both Layard and Schulz have ap in the duplicate, but alap would be written a-la-ap, not al-ap.

^{page 466 note 6} So Layard.

^{page 466 note 7} The character is doubtful in both Layard and Schulz. It may be zu. In this case the god's name would be Zuzumarus.

^{page 467 note 1} Schulz has here introduced the ru of the preceding line. It is omitted by Layard.

^{page 467 note 2} Layard has i. But ini ‘this,’ does not suit the inscription, as it was not set up inside or outside a house. Moreover ini is not genitive.

^{page 467 note 3} Layard has ri here and in the duplicate line. But in the latter Schulz has the ideograph of “house” very clearly, and other inscriptions (see p. 459) show that this reading is right.

^{page 467 note 4} Omitted by Layard. Schulz has the two lower wedges only.

^{page 468 note 1} Both Layard and Schulz have du, incorrectly, as is shown by the equivalent ideograph in the duplicate line.

^{page 468 note 2} So Layard.

^{page 468 note 3} So Layard.

^{page 468 note 4} So Layard.

^{page 468 note 5} So Layard. Schulz has ku, but dhu in the duplicate text.

^{page 468 note 6} So Layard. Schulz has rad.

^{page 468 note 7} So Layard.

^{page 468 note 8} Layard has ni-di, plainly incorrectly.

^{page 468 note 9} Layard omits.

^{page 469 note 1} So Layard. Schulz inserts a character which may be i.

^{page 469 note 2} Layard has me; but as he has si in the duplicate line, Schulz must be right.

^{page 469 note 3} So Layard.

^{page 470 note 1} This is omitted in both Layard and Schulz, and may hare been an oversight of the original engraver.

^{page 470 note 2} Layard has ; Schulz

^{page 470 note 3} So Layard.

^{page 470 note 4} So Layard.

^{page 470 note 5} So Layard.

^{page 470 note 6} Layard has ; Schulz

^{page 470 note 7} Layard has ; Schulz . Mordtmann conjectures li, but both Layard's copy and the duplicate text show that this is wrong.

^{page 470 note 8} So Schulz, probably rightly when we compare the next paragraph.

^{page 471 note 1} So Layard. Perhaps we should read di-ra-hu-he, “to the gods of Diras.”

^{page 471 note 2} So Layard, doubtfully; Schulz has a lacuna. The reading ni is certified by 1. 20.

^{page 471 note 3} So Layard.

^{page 471 note 4} So Layard.

^{page 471 note 5} So Layard. Schulz has a lacuna.

^{page 471 note 6} So Layard.

^{page 471 note 7} So Layard.

^{page 472 note 1} So Layard.

^{page 472 note 2} So Layard.

^{page 472 note 3} So Layard.

^{page 472 note 4} So Layard. Omitted by Schulz.

^{page 472 note 5} So Layard.

^{page 472 note 6} Layard has . Schulz omits.

^{page 472 note 7} So Layard.

^{page 472 note 8} So Layard.

^{page 473 note 1} So Layard. Schulz has the non-existent .

^{page 473 note 2} So Layard.

^{page 473 note 3} So Layard.

^{page 473 note 4} So Layard.

^{page 473 note 5} Layard and Schulz have li, but ada is elsewhere the copulative conjunction.

^{page 473 note 6} So Layard.

^{page 473 note 7} So Layard. Schulz has , doubtfully.

^{page 474 note 1} So Layard. Schulz has

^{page 474 note 2} So Layard.

^{page 474 note 3} So Layard.

^{page 474 note 4} So Layard.

^{page 474 note 5} So Layard.

^{page 474 note 6} Schulz has la, incorrectly.

^{page 474 note 7} So Layard.

^{page 474 note 8} So Layard, doubtfully.

^{page 474 note 9} Layard has incorrectly.

^{page 475 note 1} See note on III. 1.

^{page 475 note 2} So Layard.

^{page 475 note 3} So Layard. Probably we should read si for sal, as in VII. 5.

^{page 475 note 4} Layard has ta, Schulz has ta. The correct reading is giren by Mr. Rassam's squeeze of No. VII. line 6, where we have um or dub. I have no means of deciding which of these two values the Vannic scribes retained for the character, but it was inore probably um. At the same time was gis, and not iz.

^{page 476 note 1} So Layard.

^{page 476 note 2} Schulz has tsi, Layard doubtfully tsi or śar.

^{page 476 note 3} So Layard.

^{page 476 note 4} One character is lost here.

^{page 480 note 1} Or perhaps, more probably, the śi- is the adjectival suffix, as in alu-śi, nu-s'i.

^{page 487 note 1} It must, however, be remembered that Joannes Lydus adds that the Lydian historian Xanthos called Σρδις Εαοις, which presupposes a root khshwar or kswar.

^{page 490 note 1} It is possible that this termination -la may be a suffix bearing the same relation to -li that -na does to -ni. In that case khuru-la might signify ‘he who is after the slaying,’ i.e. ‘the priest.’ The passage perhaps refers to the portion assigned by the kings to the officiating priest.

^{page 495 note 1} Since the above was in type it has occurred to me that the correct translation of the difficult passage in 11. 29–31 (81–83) is as follows:—“After the beginning of the year 3 sheep to be sacrificed to Khaldis (&) 3 sheep to the gods of the peoples, of the chapels (&) of the monument after the spring; to Khaldis 3 sheep to be sacrificed (&) 3 sheep to the gods of the peoples, of the chapels (&) of the monument after the summer; to Khaldis 3 sheep to be sacrificed (&) 3 sheep to the gods of the peoples after the winter.”

^{page 496 note 1} Possibly mu-hu-(mu-i-ya-bi), as in xli. 15. Cf. mumuni, lxv. 23.Google Scholar

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Art. XXIII.—The Cuneiform Inscriptions of Van, deciphered and translated

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