Excavations at Yorghan Tepe, in the area of Kirkuk (Iraq), have brought to light the remains of an ancient town called Nuzi. The rich findings at Yorghan Tepe include several thousand tablets that offer insights into the lives of the inhabitants of the town and the region. These tablets show that in the 15^th-14^th centuries BC, Nuzi belonged to the kingdom of Arrapḫe, which was in turn subordinate to the kingdom of Mittani. The Nuzi tablets, mostly found in private archives, include no literary or religious texts, but offer a wealth of documentation relating to everyday practices. About a hundred letters have been found among them.

The Nuzi letters have not often been the focus of academic interest for a number of reasons, including the fact that they represent only a small part of the total number of surviving texts. However, they provide invaluable insights into Nuzi society, administration, language, and writing practices. This lecture will analyse the characteristics of the Nuzi letter corpus in order to contextualize these documents within the wider Ancient Near Eastern tradition.

Albert Planelles is NINO Postdoctoral Fellow 2024-2026.

Practical information

The lecture will be held as an in-person event.

• date: Wednesday 6 November 2024
• venue: Leiden University, Herta Mohr building, room 1.30 (KITLV Seminar Room)
• time: 16.00-17.00 hrs, drinks afterwards in the LIAS Common Room
• admission: free – no registration required
• main language: English

Illustration: Clay tablet HSS 14 587 (photo © CDLI)