This fragment preserves the lower part of a four-column tablet with an unusual commentary text. The base text, which is hitherto unrecovered, is an astrological treatise containing cryptographically written omens. Many of the omens of the base text appear to have been written numerically, i.e., the logograms typical of divinatory texts were replaced by numbers.1 The commentary provides the key for the interpretation of these omens (ostensibly only the apodoses). Thus, in lines ii 10′ – iii 1, the omen written “3.20 27 10” is said to mean “the king of Amurru will die,” and this interpretation is justified by means of a series of equations: “3.20 means ‘king,’ 27 means ‘Amurru,’ 10 means ‘death’.” In l. ii 8′ – 9′, the rare writing 3.3-lá.giš is said to mean malāḫīšina, “their sailors,” and the explanation is justified by means of the equations 3.3 = malāḫu, “sailor,” and lá.giš = šina, “their.” The fourth column of the tablet, however, seems to be concerned with the movement of planets and zodiacal constellations.

As summarized in Pearce 1998,2 the basic hermeneutical operations performed in this tablet are:

1. Citation of well-attested lexical equivalences, e.g. iii 3, peš = rapāšu and idim = nagbi.
2. Semantic association, e.g. ii 2′, gaz = ḫepû and naqāru. Whereas the equation gaz = ḫepû is well attested elsewhere, the equation gaz = naqāru is unique to this commentary. It probably originates from the fact that both ḫepû and naqāru are elsewhere equated with the same Sumerian word, gul.3
3. Explanation of numerically written words and phrases, such as the ones discussed above.

No colophon is preserved, but the form of certain signs (in particular the form of lagab without a top horizontal in ll. i 6′, iv 1, and iv 3) is “suggestive of a date of writing somewhere in the twilight of cuneiform.”4 The fact that this commentary, which might be as late as the second or first century BCE, is one of the most complex yet found is testimony to the sophistication of Mesopotamian hermeneutics at the very end of cuneiform culture.

• 1. Although the specific base text is unknown, several tablets of omens that contain numerical writings are known. Firstly, the unpublished pieces (1) BM 30432+, which belongs to the same consignment as the present tablet (76-11-17) and was probably found with it; (2) BM 40475; and (3) BM 54288+ are mentioned by L. E. Pearce, Cuneiform Cryptography: Numerical Substitutions for Syllabic and Logographic Signs. PhD thesis, 1982. P. 131. Secondly, (4) DT 72, (5) DT 78, and (6) BM 41523, the three of which belong to a series, were published by C. J. Gadd, “Omens Expressed in Numbers”, Journal of Cuneiform Studies, vol. 21, pp. 52-63, 1967.. They were independently published by H. Hunger, “Kryptographische astrologische Omina”, in Lišān mitḫurti. Festschrift Wolfram Freiherr von Soden zum 19.VI.1968 gewidmet von Schulern und Mitarbeitern, M. Dietrich and Röllig, W. , Eds. Butzon & Kevelaer, 1969, pp. 133-145.
• 2. L. E. Pearce, “Babylonian Commentaries and Intellectual Innovation”, in Intellectual Life of the Ancient Near East. Papers Presented at the 43rd Rencontre assyriologique internationale, J. Prosecký, Ed. Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Oriental Institute, 1998, pp. 331-338. Pp. 335-338.
• 3. This principle of association is styled “lexical transitivity” in L. E. Pearce, “Babylonian Commentaries and Intellectual Innovation”, in Intellectual Life of the Ancient Near East. Papers Presented at the 43rd Rencontre assyriologique internationale, J. Prosecký, Ed. Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Oriental Institute, 1998, pp. 331-338. P. 335.
• 4. A. R. George and Frame, G. , “The Royal Libraries of Nineveh: New Evidence for King Ashurbanipal's Tablet Collecting”, Iraq, vol. 67, pp. 265-284, 2005. P. 266