On the Beginnings and Continuities of Omen Sciences in the Ancient World

divninatiOn and interpretatiOn Of signs in the anCient WOrld iii divinatiOn and interpretatiOn Of signs in the anCient WOrld edited by AmAr Annus with contributions by Amar Annus, francesca rochberg, James Allen, ulla susanne Koch, edward L. shaughnessy, niek veldhuis, eckart frahm, scott B. noegel, nils heeßel, Abraham Winitzer, Barbara Böck, seth richardson, Cynthia Jean, JoAnn scurlock, John Jacobs, and martti nissinen the orientAL institute of the university of ChiCAgo orientAL institute seminArs • numBer 6 ChiCAgo • iLLinois iv Library of Congress Control number: 2009943156 isBn-13: 978-1-885923-68-4 isBn-10: 1-885923-68-6 issn: 1559-2944 ©2010 by the university of Chicago. All rights reserved. Published 2010. Printed in the united states of America. the oriental institute, chicago the university of ChiCAgo orientAL institute seminArs • numBer 6 series editors Leslie schramer and thomas g. urban with the assistance of felicia Whitcomb cover illustration: Bronze model of a sheep’s liver indicating the seats of the deities. from decima di gossolengo, Piacenza. etruscan, late 2nd–early 1st c. b.c. Photo credit: scala / Art resource, ny Printed by edwards brothers, ann arbor, michigan the paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American national standard for information services — Permanence of Paper for Printed Library materials, Ansi Z39.48-1984. v tABLe of Contents PrefACe . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii introduCtion 1. on the Beginnings and Continuities of omen sciences in the Ancient World . . . . . . amar annus, university of chicago 1 seCtion one: theories of divinAtion And signs 2. “if P, then Q”: form and reasoning in Babylonian divination . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . francesca rochberg, university of california, berkeley 19 3. greek Philosophy and signs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . James allen, university of Pittsburgh 29 4. three strikes and you’re out! A view on Cognitive theory and the firstmillennium extispicy ritual . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ulla susanne Koch, independent scholar 43 5. Arousing images: the Poetry of divination and the divination of Poetry . . . . . . . . . edward l. shaughnessy, university of chicago 61 6. the theory of Knowledge and the Practice of Celestial divination . . . . . . . . . . . . . . niek Veldhuis, university of california, berkeley 77 seCtion tWo: hermeneutiCs of sign interPretAtion 7. reading the tablet, the exta, and the Body: the hermeneutics of Cuneiform signs in Babylonian and Assyrian text Commentaries and divinatory texts . . . . . . eckart frahm, Yale university 93 8. “sign, sign, everywhere a sign”: script, Power, and interpretation in the Ancient near east . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143 scott b. noegel, university of washington 9. the Calculation of the stipulated term in extispicy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 163 nils P. heeßel, university of heidelberg 10. the divine Presence and its interpretation in early mesopotamian divination . . . . . 177 abraham winitzer, university of notre dame 11. Physiognomy in Ancient mesopotamia and Beyond: from Practice to handbook . . . 199 barbara böck, csic, madrid seCtion three: history of sign interPretAtion 12. on seeing and Believing: Liver divination and the era of Warring states (ii) . . . . . 225 seth f. c. richardson, university of chicago 13. divination and oracles at the neo-Assyrian Palace: the importance of signs in royal ideology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267 cynthia Jean, université libre de bruxelles, fnrs 14. Prophecy as a form of divination; divination as a form of Prophecy . . . . . . . . . . . . 277 Joann scurlock, elmhurst college 15. traces of the omen series Åumma izbu in Cicero, de divinatione . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 317 John Jacobs, loyola university maryland seCtion four: resPonse 16. Prophecy and omen divination: two sides of the same Coin . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 341 martti nissinen, university of helsinki v vii PrefACe this book makes available the revised versions of the papers read at the fifth annual university of Chicago oriental institute seminar science and superstition: interpretation of signs in the ancient world, which took place at march 6–7, 2009. the printed volume has a slightly different title, and it includes two papers from scholars, who were invited to the seminar, but could not come — from Barbara Böck and niek veldhuis, while one participant, Clifford Ando, has decided to publish his paper elsewhere. i remain thankful to all the contributors for a very smooth and efficient collaboration that gave birth to this sizable volume. i am grateful to gil stein, who initiated this remarkable post-doctoral symposium program, and to the oriental institute for giving me the opportunity to organize this event, so making one of my dreams a reality. i would like to extend my warmest thanks to mariana Perlinac, Kaye oberhausen, and Christopher Woods for all that they have done to help me organize this event. i also thank thomas urban and Leslie schramer for their help with the printing and editing of this book. i am also thankful to Cathy duenas for her help in everyday matters. finally, i should mention my family — my wife merili, and children Kaspar and Kreeta, who patiently shared half of my time here in Chicago. i am happy that they were willing to come with me to a far-away city, where Kaspar could satisfy his ever-increasing curiosity, and where Kreeta literally made her first steps in life. Amar Annus vii symposium participants, from left to right: front row: John Jacobs, Amar Annus, JoAnn scurlock, ulla Koch, martti nissinen, Ann guinan, francesca rochberg, James Allen. Back row: edward shaughnessy, nils heeßel, eckart frahm, seth richardson, scott noegel, Clifford Ando, Abraham Winitzer, robert Biggs. Photo by Kaye oberhausen on the beginnings and continuities of omen sciences in the ancient world 1 1 On the Beginnings and COntinuities Of Omen sCienCes in the anCient WOrld AmAr Annus, university of ChiCAgo introduCtion the study of signs, portents observed in the physical and social worlds indicating the will of supernatural agents and the course of future events, was undoubtedly important in all ancient cultures. the first written evidence for a concept of sign, however, comes from cuneiform texts of ancient mesopotamia. the study of signs from gods was vitally important for ancient mesopotamians throughout their history. the first references to diviners and divination are already found in the written sources of the third millennium b.c., which indicate a number of professional titles (see falkenstein 1966). Among the early examples of celestial divination one can point to the cylinders of King gudea, who needed an auspicious sign (ĝiåkim in sumerian) from his divine master ningirsu, confirming his consent for building a new temple in Lagaå. this evidence from the twenty-second century b . c . is the earliest that clearly attests to the idea of signs in heaven and that omens conveyed divine decisions (rochberg 2006: 337–38, 346–47). subsequently, consulting the will of the gods is a wellattested practice in ancient mesopotamia, accompanying every significant political or private action or undertaking. the omen lore of the third millennium b.c. must have been of oral nature, because texts recording omens do not appear in mesopotamia until more than a millennium after the invention of writing.1 the first written samples of omen collections using the list format are attested in the texts from the old Babylonian period onward. According to n. veldhuis, the list as a traditional text type in mesopotamia was put to a much wider use in that period than previously. Word lists had existed from the very beginning of cuneiform writing, but in the old Babylonian period … an entirely new set of lexical texts was invented and put to use in the scribal schools…. Lists are used to explain writing, sumerian vocabulary, grammar, and mathematics. List-like texts are used to record laws, medicine, and omens. the list becomes the privileged format for recording knowledge. the list-like format of the omen compendium, therefore, indicated that this is scholarly knowledge. it connects to the conventional format of a knowledge text, a format that was expanded and explored in particular in the old Babylonian period (veldhuis 2006: 493–94). By establishing the format of knowledge text, the systematic omen recording into lists could begin. under long processes of adding and editing, these collections grew into 1 for a discussion of this situation in regard to liver divination, see richardson, this volume. 1 2 amar annus compendia of ominous phenomena, where segments of original observations were expanded into very comprehensive omen series, found in the archives and libraries of first-millennium b . c . mesopotamia (see maul 2003). these omen compendia were given both practical and theoretical value, which explains comprehensiveness of the phenomena recorded in the collections, as practically everything observable in the universe could have an ominous import to mortals.2 the holistic worldview of the ancient mesopotamians assigned a firm place to every object and event in the universe according to divine will. thus the incipit of the celestial omen series en„ma anu enlil suggests that the gods Anu, enlil, and ea themselves designed the constellations and measured the year in primeval times, thereby establishing the heavenly signs. Accordingly, mesopotamian divination was an all-embracing semantic system designed to interpret the whole universe.3 the belief that the entire universe is causally connected is an ionian greek invention (scurlock 2003: 397), but a forerunner of it is already found in the Babylonian diviner’s manual (ll. 38–42): the signs on earth just as those in the sky give us signals. sky and earth both produce portents though appearing separately. they are not separate (because) sky and earth are related. A sign that portends evil in the sky is (also) evil in the earth, one that portends evil on earth is evil in the sky (oppenheim 1974: 204). As the divinatory texts testify, not all omens occurring in the cuneiform series were observed in the real world, because many examples describe phenomena that are impossible and could never occur.4 this indicates that simple observation and recording was complemented by theorization and systematization. the original practical purpose of omen collections was later expanded, and even superseded, by theoretical aspirations (oppenheim 1964: 212). When every single phenomenon in the world could be considered as a possible object for recording in the spirit of examination and divinatory deduction, one can see in this attitude an early example of the encyclopaedic curiosity, which is the basis for all scientific endeavor (Bottéro 1992: 127). once an element of ominous import was uncovered, mesopotamian scholars were able to record it extensively in hypothetically varying circumstances, sometimes creating attenuated and increasingly arcane sequences (guinan 2002: 19). the format of the knowledge text endorses speculation in its own right, which comfortably steps over the boundary of the observable.5 the worldview represented by the omen series is not irrevocable determinism, in the sense that every event is causally determined by an unbroken chain of prior occurrences. the 2 the standardized omen compendia cover, in J. Bottéro’s words, “almost the entire material universe: stars and meteorites; the weather and the calendar; the configuration of the earth, of waterways, and of inhabited areas; the outlook of inanimate and vegetal elements; the birth and the conformation of animals and their behaviour, especially of man himself — his physical aspects, his behaviour, his conscious and sleeping life, and so on. in addition to these phenomena which present themselves to observation, a number of others were latent and had to be revealed, such as the internal anatomy of sacrificed animals. or they could be virtual and needed to be provoked, such as the shape taken by oil or flour thrown in water” (Bottéro 1992: 127). 3 Koch-Westenholz 1995: 13–19; see also Winitzer, this volume. 4 see Brown 2000: 109; and rochberg, this volume. 5 As n. veldhuis points out, “… the speculative or scholarly side of divination is a context and use of its own, with its own relevance…. speculation does not stop at the border of the possible; the systematic character of compendia actually encourages crossing this border, exploring the observed, the likely, the unlikely, and the impossible on an equal footing” (veldhuis 2006: 494). on the beginnings and continuities of omen sciences in the ancient world 3 omens revealed a conditional future, best described as a judicial decision of the gods, who gave “a verdict against the interested parties on the basis of the elements in the omen, just as each sentence by a tribunal established the future of the guilty person based upon the dossier submitted to its judgement” (Bottéro 1992: 142). it is best described as an assembly of gods making decisions concerning the course of world’s affairs and the fate of human beings. in the mesopotamian system of sign interpretation, the portent which predicted, for example, the king’s death, was not the cause of the king’s death, but only the sign for it. the prediction was considered solely a warning that could be diverted by ritual measures provided by the series namburbi.6 the heart and core of these release rituals is an appeal from the part of the person affected by an evil omen to the divine judicial court, in order to effect a revision of the individual’s fate, announced by a sinister omen (maul 1999: 124–26). the metaphor of the court of law promotes the presentation of the omen as a communicative sign sent by an angry god whom the ritual serves to appease (Koch, this volume). the mesopotamian omen texts had diverse origins, and among several of their functions was to represent the god-given “laws” of divination (fincke 2006–2007). it seems reasonable to insist that for ancient mesopotamian societies the omens recorded in compendia enjoyed the status of the “laws” of the divine world order. As a consequence, the process of interpretation of a sign was understood as a performative act that empowered the interpreter, while simultaneously promoting the cosmological system upon which mantic exegesis was based (noegel, this volume). the unique window into how everyday divination worked in a framework of royal power is provided by numerous letters and reports sent by the neo-Assyrian scholars to the kings esarhaddon and Assurbanipal. the omens and other lore of the mesopotamian scholars represented divine wisdom that ideologically originated in primeval times of the antediluvian period, but which was being continuously updated and outlined by the scientific methods of the day (veldhuis, this volume). the omen compendia and their commentaries represented both speculative sciences and the most valuable practical means for predicting what was about to happen. 7 the speculative and practical aspects are also present side-by-side in mesopotamian law codes, and similar cyclic processes of omen collecting and law collecting may have applied to the creation of both kinds of compendia (see Westbrook 1985). the form And use of An omen the sentences in the mesopotamian knowledge texts or scientific handbooks almost always occur in the specific format of conditionals (see rochberg, this volume). the first part of a sentence is called a “protasis” in modern scholarship, and is introduced by the indication of an observation or a hypothesis — “if (something happens).” the second part, the “then” clause, is called the “apodosis,” which shows the part of the future that can be derived from 6 for an edition of these texts, see maul 1994. in addition to namburbis, some omens derived from human voluntary acts with favorable outcome may also reflect their deliberate use for revoking ill omens, for example, Åumma Ωlu 10.161: “if somebody renovates (the figure) of gilgamesh, the anger of his god will be re[leased]” (freedman 1998: 168). 7 for an analysis of the full support divination enjoyed in the neo-Assyrian society, that is, political, social, and psychological validation, see Jean, this volume. 4 amar annus the omen, the prognosis, or the prediction. it is the universal form for many mesopotamian scientific treatises, where concrete circumstances are always described as leading to a specific outcome. Like mesopotamian law codes and medical treatises, Babylonian omen texts never outline the principles behind the concrete “if … then” sentences and observations. the nature of principles behind the concrete statements should be reconstructed on the basis of written examples contained in the law codes and omen texts, assumed that these texts reveal only some parts of the oral lore they are based on. the oral background of the ancient mesopotamian celestial omen literature is emphasized by d. Brown as follows: … not only the categorisation of celestial phenomena, but the establishment of a simple code and a series of rules, which enabled them to be interpreted, had taken place before the writing down of the first celestial omens took place. some of these premises must, to a large extent, be understood to be given — or in other words recognised that they derive from an oral background, or are “traditional” (Brown 2000: 112). When celestial omens first appear in writing, some already demonstrate the effects of their literate production (Brown 2000: 112). the Babylonian omen compendia represent parts of the ancient mesopotamian worldview and are by no means separated from other genres of literature. thus, the observation of Anzu’s footprints in a house or in a city is an ill omen according to terrestrial omen series Åumma Ωlu 1.155 and 19.38', reminding us of Anzu’s sinister role in the Akkadian epic of Anzu (freedman 1998: 38, 278). Also, the city making noise is prone to dispersal, while the quiet city “will go on normally” (Åumma Ωlu 1.8–13), reminding us of the Babylonian epic of Atrahasis, where the disturbed gods attempt to destroy mankind on account of the noise they make. Accordingly, studies in intertextuality indicate that there is no sea change in terms of content between the omens and other mesopotamian texts: As for subject matter and style, the apodoses of the omen literature are closely linked to literary texts of the late periods that describe the blessings of peace and prosperity or the horrors of war, famine, and rebellion as well as elaborate blessings and curses similar to those found in certain mesopotamian royal inscriptions and public legal documents (oppenheim 1964: 211). there are some historical texts that extensively record omens or ominous happenings — the Chronicle of early Kings and the religious Chronicle. the material contained in the first gathers the apodoses of historical omens about the kings naram-sin and sargon. the second chronicle collects bizarre events observed during new year festivals in Babylon, such as wild animals appearing in the city, statues moving, and astronomical phenomena. this recording of bizarre phenomena, which have some similarity to omens, was a major concern for the author of the religious Chronicle (grayson 1975: 37). the content of the Chronicle of early Kings finds its origin in prognostic literature, as it consists of omen apodoses, while the content of the religious Chronicle is similar to omen protases. however, the religious Chronicle does not mention any events which could be construed as results of the protases, and these protases seem not to occur in omen collections. on the other hand, the Chronicle of early Kings used the so-called historical omens as source material (grayson 1975: 37, 45). the historical omens often summarize anecdotal stories or legends about kings, and therefore they are of very dubious historical value (see Cooper 1980). A lesson to learn from these historical omens is that certain omens were written down to record legends about eminent historical personages. it finds a parallel in the hebrew Bible, where certain historical events were presented as highly ominous on a literary level (scurlock, this volume). on the beginnings and continuities of omen sciences in the ancient world 5 it seems that the “if … then” scientific format is only a pragmatic characteristic of omen sentences, which does not prescribe any special type of content. one could easily transcribe different types of traditional oral lore and teachings into this handbook format of conditional sentences for its use by the omen interpreters. for example, the tablets pertaining to human behavior in the series of physiognomic omens alandimmû were called by its first modern editor f. Kraus as “ein sittenkanon in omenform,” a canon of good manners in the form of omens (Kraus 1937). this circumstance indicates that omen compendia occasionally collect and contain some items of oral lore, especially of wisdom literature. the inevitable conclusion is that the material included in the omen texts is of diverse origin, including proverbs, parables, fables, and perhaps also other types of learned folklore. Accordingly, it is of heterogeneous origins, culled from the accumulated oral wisdom, from an “inherited conglomerate” of a community (Böck, this volume). Fables erica reiner has pointed out that apodoses of some omens “read as if they were the summary or the moral of a story” (1998: 651). her observation can be complemented because some protases, especially in human behavioral omens, also look like abbreviated stories.8 in the Babylonian diviner’s manual there are many incipits of the omen series for which we lack textual evidence in cuneiform texts. some of the protases give an impression of an underlying fairy tale or a popular story, for example “if bundles of reeds walk about in the countryside,” or “if a wildcat opens its mouth and talks like a man,” or “if a great beast that has two legs like a bird…,” etc. (oppenheim 1974: 203, lines 11–12, 20). such omens probably summarize certain popular stories with a pedagogical import belonging to the repertoire of Babylonian wise men, and to the teaching example is given the scientific form of an omen. Parables and logia reiner also demonstrates that some Babylonian omens remind the hearers of traditional stories, some of which are present in the new testament. sometimes an omen apodosis corresponds to a saying that we find in the new testament logia, like “he who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted” (reiner 1998: 652). the introductory statement of the parable of the rich fool (Luke 12:16ff.), who does not know where to store his crops, finds a forerunner in a Babylonian omen. in both instances the rich man needs to find storage place for his harvest, but only the new testament relates the full story about his death before he could enjoy his riches. Both the canonical and apocryphal gospels contain sayings that are comparable to parts of wisdom recorded in the mesopotamian omen compendia (see reiner 1998: 653–54). it is intriguing to compare, for example, the beginning of the first line in the Babylonian compendium Åumma Ωlu “if a city is set on high…” to a logion found in the gospel of thomas (no. 32), “A city built on a high mountain and fortified, it cannot fall, nor can it be hidden” (cf. matthew 5:14). the image of a city situated on a high 8 for example, the following omen may have been based on a well-known story or a popular “decameronian” novella: “if a man talks with a woman on a bed and then he rises from the bed and makes manhood (= masturbates?), that man will have happiness and jubilation bestowed upon him; wherever he goes all will be agreeable; he will always achieve goal” (see guinan 1998: 43). 6 amar annus place was probably used as a metaphor for several thousand years before the gospels, being an image used in wisdom sayings. moreover, the first omen of the compendium Åumma Ωlu, “if a city is situated on a hill, the inhabitants of that city will be depressed; if a city is situated in a valley, that city will be elevated” is nonsense, because most cities in the ancient near east were situated on a hill, as n. veldhuis observes (1999: 170). he continues that “a city on a hill” and “a city in a valley” may well be understood as referring to moral maxims concerning pride and modesty (veldhuis 1999: 170). When in the parallel passage matthew 5:14 the teacher says to his disciples: “you are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden,” the saying follows the same pattern of exalting the humbled ones, which is also on the background of the Babylonian omen. Proverbs and counsels some omens listed in the compendia may have had a currency as proverbs and may have even their origin in proverbs. the proverbs or similes were traditional tools of ancestral and fatherly instruction in ancient mesopotamian literature, from the sumerian instructions of shuruppak to the Aramaic teachings of Ahiqar. some proverbs tend to relate specific actions to equally specific prognostics, which is a feature common to omen collections, with the difference that the proverbs are characteristically admonitory, rather than casuistic. thus in the instructions of shuruppak, one finds a warning, “do not curse a ewe, you will give birth to a daughter; do not throw a lump (of clay) into a money chest, you will give birth to a son” (lines 256–57). this example, which does not exhaust the available witness, is to be compared to many omens that bear on the question of the sex of future offspring (Cryer 1994: 192). the omen format is most transparently used by the famous Akkadian literary text known as Advice to a Prince, which lists a number of instances of princely behavior to be approved or censured, like “if the king does not heed justice, his people will become confused, and the country will be destroyed. if he does not heed his magnates, his own days will be shortened.” these are statements of instruction, but they sound very much like conditionals used in omens.9 the Advice to a Prince is a text in which didactic and ominous traditions flow together in the interests of political ideology which borders on forming a concept of natural law, above the demands of which not even the king is elevated (Cryer 1994: 193). more generally, many omens found in the compendia have their more natural origins in everyday common sense, in the instruction of proper behavior and the morals of the day. law stiPulations many scholars have noted the formal similarity between the casuistic form of omens and the law stipulations in so-called “law codes” of ancient mesopotamia (Bottéro 1992: 187–94). According to A. guinan, this similarity is deceptive because in individual laws “we can understand the connection between protasis and the apodosis. We can also deduce the underlying principles that govern the structure of the text” (guinan 2002: 19), which is not always the case for the omen texts. however, J. fincke has recently put forward a stronger argument for 9 As veldhuis observes: “the text differs from the omen collections proper by a few formal features — the sentences do not begin with åumma ‘if,’ even though these ‘ifs’ must be supplied to make the text intelligible. Advice to a Prince is a literary composition and does not belong to the inner core of the omen compendia. yet given its contents the omen format is understandable” (veldhuis 1999: 170). on the beginnings and continuities of omen sciences in the ancient world 7 defining the omens as laws, namely, as “the god-given laws of divination” (fincke 2006– 2007). As is pointed out above, there is some evidence that ancient mesopotamians considered the future predicted by observed omens like sentences handed down by a divine court, and according to the texts pertaining to the release rituals namburbi, the effects of sinister omens could be temporarily revoked by appealing to a higher divine court. According to namburbis, the person to whom the evil omen was announced had to placate the anger of the gods that had sent it to him and effect the gods’ revision of their decision. By so doing, the person tried to achieve a correction of his fate which the gods had decreed. he or she had to appeal to the Judge of heaven and earth, the sun-god Åamaå, who was supposed to revoke the evil judgment against him (maul 1999: 124–25). the divine triad Åamaå, ea, and Asalluhi form the assembly for the person whom a sinister omen had threatened. he comes as plaintiff before the gods to implore them to change the evil fate which they had allotted him, a revision of the judgment. the next part of the ritual is a trial in which the affected person as well as his opponent, the omen carrier or its image, appear before the highest divine judge. the ritual before Åamaå had all the elements of a regular earthly trial, where the sun-god plays the part of the judge, whereas the person and the carrier are the two suitors of equal rights. there could be no appeal beyond the decision of this court, no other god could challenge or alter Åamaå’s final judgment once it was rendered (maul 1999: 126). Accordingly, the ancient mesopotamians reacted to some evil omens as they were unfavorable judgments made by the court of gods, which may be similar to or even taken from the contemporary practice of law (Koch, this volume). is there A BAByLoniAn theory of signs? As discussed above, the material gathered into mesopotamian omen compendia is of heterogeneous origin, and consequently different groups of omens should be interpreted with different methods. therefore, instead of attempting to discover one singular Babylonian omen theory which unifies all methods of divination, it seems more fruitful to give an account of many. in the following discussion, omens recording traditional wisdom or representing pieces of common sense in the ancient mesopotamia are left out from consideration. mesopotamian scribes never expressed general principles of sign interpretation in abstract terms. only when individual and groups of omens are contrasted and compared do systematic patterns of positive and negative meaning emerge (guinan 1998: 40). much of the learning of the Babylonian divination priest involved technical observational knowledge, such as sectors and zones in heaven, liver, or lung. the Babylonian scholars strove to cover the range of interpretation of the signs observed there by means of systematic permutations in pairs — such as left and right, above and below — or in long rows (oppenheim 1964: 212). despite some transparent principles of interpretation that scholars have identified in ancient omen texts, these texts are still often quite obscure. the most difficult problems to solve in the mesopotamian divination are the theoretic and hermeneutic principles underlying the interpretation of omen texts, namely the kind of thinking or the system of ideas that connects protasis with apodosis. As oppenheim wrote about a half of century ago: only exceptionally are we able to detect any logical relationship between portent and prediction, although often we find paronomastic associations and secondary computations based on changes in directions of numbers. in many cases, subconscious 8 amar annus association seems to have been at work, provoked by certain words whose specific connotations imparted to them a favorable or an unfavorable character, which in turn determined the general nature of the prediction (oppenheim 1964: 211). in various branches of mesopotamian divination, some more or less universal principles apply that can easily be outlined. in general, the right side or part in mesopotamian omen theory was considered to be related to good omens, and the left side to negative ones. signs were divided into good, bad, and neutral. in some branches of divination, like Babylonian extispicy, signs were classified according to their intensity into stronger and weaker. thus, a strong sign in the right side of the sacrificial animal was a favorable omen, but the same sign in the left side was unfavorable. the opposition of light and dark was also meaningful: a light color of the ominous organ conveyed favorable significance and dark color an unfavorable one. dark color was essentially connected with the left side, and a light hue with the right side of the sacrificial animal’s parts under examination. these principles were universally applied (starr 1983: 18–19). it is striking, however, how often — for example, in the physiognomic omen series alandimmû — the right side is ill-omened and the left side favorable, and cases also exist where both sides are equally good or bad. Why is the usual pattern reversed? J. scurlock suggests: … there are in fact four types of signs, those that are good (and therefore good on either side, although usually somewhat less good on the left), those that are bad (and therefore bad on either side, although usually somewhat less bad on the right), those that are neutral (and become good only when placed on the right, and bad only when placed on the left), and those that are bad but not irreversibly so (that is, they are bad when placed on the right, but are transformed into good when placed on the left) (scurlock 2003: 398). the opposition of “right” and “left” is observed differently in omen texts and in scientific handbooks. in the scientific compendia, the signs are observed from the observer’s point of view. in the physiognomic omen text alandimmû, the “right” and “left” of the body of the observed human being is measured from the client’s point of view, but in the diagnostic series sakikku signs are influenced in a good or bad direction from the physician’s, not the patient’s, point of view: it follows that neutral signs are good on the observer’s left (which would be observed’s right) and bad on the observer’s right, which would be the observed’s left — apparently an inverted pattern but actually normal for alamdimmu. Conversely, signs that are bad but not irreversibly so are good on the observer’s right (which would be the observed’s left) and bad on the observer’s left (which would be the observed’s right), apparently a normal pattern but actually inverted for alamdimmu. it follows that the picture of the ideal woman should be modified to include only signs that are good on both sides, since … all other signs are either bad (i.e., undesirable) or neutral (scurlock 2003: 398). thus even the notions of “right” and “left” are not without difficulties and complexities in the knowledge texts. Ambivalences of reading the signs differently in different lights and contexts are deliberately used by the Babylonian diviners (heeßel, this volume). this also applies to the medium of writing, because most of the cuneiform signs are polyphonous, and a different reading of the sign used in protasis could provide its interpretation in apodosis, on the beginnings and continuities of omen sciences in the ancient world 9 thus creates a meaningful protasis-apodosis string (frahm, this volume). the hermeneutical method of giving speculative Akkadian values to sumerian logograms is well attested in Babylonian philology, most notably in the last two tablets of the Babylonian Creation epic (Bottéro 1992: 87–102). Puns and wordplays also played a role in omen interpretation. thus the Assyrian dreamBook says: “if a man dreams that he is eating a raven (Ωribu), he will have income (irbu). if a man dreams he is eating human flesh (åêru), he will have great riches (åarû).” such wordplays are also used in explaining dreams in the Babylonian talmud and in the oneirocritica of Artemidorus daldianus (noegel 2002: 168–69). rhyming or juxtaposition of similarly sounding words in oracular couplets was a well-known practice of divination in early China. the verbal methods of divination may easily become linked to poetry, in which an arousal of one poetic image, drawn usually from the animal or botanical world in China, associatively prepares the ground for another image that describes an event in the human world (shaugnessy, this volume). diffusion of BAByLoniAn omens in eAst And West the diviners of mesopotamian extispicy and lecanomancy were ideologically descendants of the antediluvian king enmeduranki, who learned the art directly from the gods Åamaå and Adad at an audience in heaven (Lambert 1998). Biblical scholars generally agree that the religious-historical background of the figure of enoch, the seventh antediluvian patriarch in genesis 5:23f. and subsequently the apocalyptic authority in enochic literature, lies in this seventh mesopotamian antediluvian king (Collins 1998: 26, 45–46). enmeduranki’s connection with enoch establishes a continuity of tradition from mesopotamian divination to Jewish apocalyptic literature, where enoch occurs as the seer and knower of divine secrets. even in much later strata of enochic mysticism, as in the third book of enoch, traces can be found of the mesopotamian divinatory traditions (Arbel 2008). Apart from the figure of enoch in Jewish literature, the omen branch of cuneiform sciences extensively influenced many other parts of ancient world. there is evidence in Aramaic, greek, hittite, Latin, sanskrit, sogdian, and in other languages that knowledge of mesopotamian omen compendia was widespread both in space and time. the aramaic world the Akkadian omen compendia must have been translated into Aramaic quite early, while the former was still a living language, and the Aramaic form gave to these texts much wider circulation. evidence has been found for mesopotamian physiognomic and astrological omens in Aramaic from Qumran (greenfield and sokoloff 1995), and for celestial omens in the texts of the Cairo genizah (greenfield and sokoloff 1989). Jewish Aramaic parallels have been found to such omen series as Åumma izbu, Åumma Ωlu, dream omens, physiognomic omens, and astronomical omens. rabbinic literature records many omens listed under the rubric darkei ha-emori “Amorite Practices,” where the “Amorite” probably stands for speakers of a more ancient Aramaic. many talmudic omens have clearly mesopotamian origins, such as one regarding a snake: if a snake fell on the bed, it says: “he is poor, but he will end up being rich. if (the woman) is pregnant, she will give birth to a boy. if she is a maiden, she will 10 amar annus marry a great man” (tosefta shabbat 6, 16). the twenty-second tablet of the series Åumma Ωlu concerns itself with omens derived from snakes in the house, among which are omens in a broken passage which refer to a snake which falls upon a man’s bed (geller 2000: 3–4). the later form of Aramaic, syriac, preserved many forms of divinatory texts of mesopotamian style, and the rich omen literature in Arabic mostly derives from syrian antecedents. the most complete syriac source is the Book of Prognostications of al-hasan ben Bahlul, dating from the twelfth century a.d. (fahd 1991).10 there are Arabic manuscripts of malhama literature, some of the ottoman period, which attest to the practice of reading astral and meteorological omens of an ancient Babylonian type. other types of omens are also represented in Arab divination — from phenomena of animals, of human beings, of birds, the physiognomic and astrological omens. Certain magical practices were in use against unfortunate omens, like mesopotamian namburbis (see fahd 1966: 418–519). it is difficult to say anything for certain on the relationship between the Arab and earlier mesopotamian omen collections, because the field remains understudied. inside the Aramaic world omens were transmitted from one culture to another both by means of written texts and orally. in the secret lore of the mandaean priests, the tradition of omen interpretation persisted orally until modern times, and only some parts of it were written. originally mesopotamian elements may be traced in the mandaean Book of the Zodiac (asfar / sfar malwaåia) of sasanian origins, which is a compilation from various sources of astrological and divinatory content. the major Babylonian sources for the origins of the book are the celestial omen series en„ma anu enlil and its hemerological companion iqqur Ïpuå. the last five chapters of the first part of the mandaean book collect various omens which may be described as meteorological, astral, and at the end, a few “terrestrial” omens similar to those of the Babylonian series Åumma Ωlu (see rochberg 1999). not all omens were written in the mandaean culture, as the priest in Ahwaz, speaking of secret knowledge transmitted from priest to priest, once vaunted to Lady drower as follows: if a raven croaks in a certain burj (= astrological house) i understand what it says, also the meaning when the fire crackles or the door creaks. When the sky is cloudy and there are shapes in the sky resembling a mare or a sheep, i can read their significance and message. When the moon is darkened by an eclipse, i understand the portent: when a dust-cloud arises, black, red, or white, i read these signs, and all this according to the hours and the aspects (drower 1937: 5). india and iran According to d. Pingree, mesopotamian omen literature was transmitted to india during the two centuries that followed the Achaemenid occupation of gandhΩra in northwestern india and the indus valley in the sixth century b.c. (see Pingree 1992: 376). As Pingree has pointed out, the author of the sermon brahmajΩlasutta, allegedly delivered by Buddha and included in the collection dÏghanikΩya (i 1.1–3.74) was very familiar with the contents of both Babylonian terrestrial and celestial omen compendia (Pingree 1997: 33). the sermon condemns some wandering diviners, Śramanas and BrΩhmanas, who earn their living from the useless knowledge of omens. Almost every type of omen mentioned by the Buddha is found 10 the best-known syriac published manuscript containing omens and prognostications is the last part of the famous syriac Book of medicines (see Budge 1913). on the beginnings and continuities of omen sciences in the ancient world 11 both in cuneiform literature and in the later sanskrit texts. the enumeration of the terrestrial omen carriers follows exactly the order of the tablets of the Akkadian compendium Åumma Ωlu — houses, ghosts, snakes, poisons, scorpions, mice, vultures, crows, and quadrupeds (see Pingree 1992). the transmission of mesopotamian omen texts — both protases and apodoses — to india in the fifth and early fourth centuries b.c. is even clearer, for the contemporary sanskrit and Prakrit literature is replete with references to and examples of such omens. in this period much of the mesopotamian omen literature, perhaps from Aramaic versions, was translated into an indian language, and these translations, though undoubtedly considerably altered to fit with indian intellectual traditions and with the indian society which the diviners had to serve, form the basis of the rich indian literature on terrestrial and celestial omens. the indian tradition also used pacification rituals comparable to mesopotamian namburbi, by which the anger of the god who sent the omen is appeased (Pingree 1997: 31–33). the other examples of the diffusion of Babylonian omens in the east involve some lunar and snake omens that are found in iranian texts (see Panaino 2005). A Christian sogdian group of omens concerning calendrical prognostics based on the appearance of natural phenomena such as thunder, earthquakes, rainbows, and eclipses, has its origin in the Babylonian almanac iqqur Ïpuå (see sims-Williams 1995). the classical world the traditional knowledge of mesopotamian divination was transplanted to the classical world by wandering diviners; one such was likely the Chaldaean who visited Plato during his last night alive (Kingsley 1995: 199).11 the etruscan discipline of taking omens from liver inspection or hepatoscopy (haruspicina in Latin) shows remarkably close correspondence to the same form of divination developed in mesopotamia. this can best be explained as the transmission of a “school” from Babylon to etruria. the system of the slaughter of sheep, models of sheep livers of clay or metal, and the custom of providing them with inscriptions for the sake of explanation are peculiar things found precisely along the corridor from the euphrates via syria and Cyprus to etruria. (Burkert 1992: 46–48). the etruscan written texts pertaining to hepatoscopy are lost and can be reconstructed only piecemeal from Latin and greek texts. the internal tradition of the etruscan discipline goes back to the seventh century, to precisely that period whose glory is reflected in many near eastern imports. it seems that hepatoscopy had no place in the older strata of homeric epic, but it makes its appearance in the final version we have, dating to around 700 b.c. Calchas, Agamemnon’s seer, is the best of the “bird-diviners,” and by virtue of this art he has “led” the army (iliad 1.69).12 But a “sacrifice-diviner” (thyoskoos) is mentioned in the iliad (24.221) and has a role in the odyssey (21.145; 22.318–23). the observation of the liver remained by far the most predominant divination practice in greece; from Plato (Phaedrus 244c) we learn that hepatoscopy enjoyed greater prestige than bird augury (Burkert 1992: 46–49). the mesopotamian divination by “lecanomancy” constituted a special art in greece, whether in the pouring of oil onto water or the sprinkling of flour onto liquid. the liquids 11 for the philosophical doctrines of signs in the Classical world, see Allen, this volume. 12 A greek inscription from ephesus, from the sixth century b . c ., published in dittenberger 1924 , vol. 3, no. 1167, lists some bird omens in mesopotamian style, see Lonsdale 1979: 152–53. 12 amar annus were poured out into a dish, called lekane in greek, a word which is cognate with Akkadian lahannu and Aramaic laqnu. “to pour vinegar and flour into same glass” and to watch their movements is mentioned by Aeschylus in agamemnon 322. such practices did not become as prominent as liver inspection in greece (Burkert 1992: 53, 184). the wandering diviners, sometimes called “Chaldaeans” in the mediterranean sources, were often responsible for the dissemination of the mesopotamian wisdom in the late antique world. An interesting question is possible mesopotamian influence on the stoic theory of signs given the circumstance observed already by f. Cumont that all first masters of the stoic school were orientals (Cumont 1912: 69–71, 81–82). the stoic philosopher Chrysippus of soli analyzed the conditional “if someone is born when Canicula (sirius) is rising, he will not die in the ocean” (Cicero, de fato 12). this appears to be related to a record in a Babylonian principal manual of instruction “the place of Cancer: death in the ocean” (textes cunéiformes du louvre 6 14, obv. 23). this correlation shows that the Babylonian science of birth omens was known in the greek world by the late third century b.c. Babylonian birth omens were probably known in greece even long before the stoic philosophers debated about their validity (Pingree 1997: 23). on birth omens in Cicero’s de divinatione, see Jacobs, this volume. ProPhecy and divination Prophecy and divination are historically related to each other more closely than is generally assumed.13Apart from ancient kinds of prophetic literature, the mesopotamian theology of signs, in which everything in the world can be viewed as a part of divine revelation, is persistent in different middle eastern theological schools using in their writings a semitic idiom. the word for “sign” in Aramaic is ΩthΩ, in hebrew ’ˇth, and in Arabic Ωya, all of which are etymologically related to the Akkadian word ittu “sign, omen.” in Jewish writings of the second temple, there are plenty of references to signs and portents, which can be understood only by those skilled in interpreting them. for many theologians, the model interpreter of the divine signs is the apocalyptic authority enoch, a figure modeled on mesopotamian enmeduranki. in Jewish apocalyptic literature, reading the signs of god mostly denotes the ability to predict the course of the world’s eschatology. According to the Jewish historian Josephus, the divine or demonic beings reveal their warnings from time to time throughout the course of history. in his bellum Judaicum (6.288–310) he enumerates the omens which preceded the destruction of the second temple: a stationary comet, an abnormal light, a cow that gave birth to a lamb, a temple gate that opened automatically, chariots and armed men flying through the sky, a peasant who for some years prophesied disaster, etc. in Josephus’ thought, the demonic communicated with men through omens, signs, portents, dreams, and prophecy, which are all closely related to one another (smith 1987: 246). the reputed theologians of Jewish, Christian, and muslim traditions gave much higher regard to prophecies because of their alleged origin in monotheistic belief, and disregarded divination as pertaining to polytheistic past. however, Jewish, eastern Christian, and muslim traditions still enjoin believers to “ponder” or “reflect” on the natural world and its movements in order to discover the signs of god’s omnipotence and appreciate his majesty. in 3 enoch the terms such as “beholding,” “seeing,” and “looking” signify the act of discerning inner nature of things, accessing divine secrets about god’s cosmic creation and plans (Arbel 2008: 13 see nissinen, this volume; and scurlock, this volume. on the beginnings and continuities of omen sciences in the ancient world 13 310–11). in other texts, the ancient mesopotamian divinatory traditions were modified by rejecting the practical side of omen divination, its apodoses, and every historical or natural portent became a sign of god’s greatness. for the Babylonian priests everything could be read as a sign, and possibly everything becomes a sign of god for a monotheist, to the extent that all verses of the Quran are called by the term Ωya, just like all entries were called ittu in the mesopotamian omen compendia. in the islamic traditions, the multiplicity of the signs from god is successfully fitted in to tell the stories of oneness: All the outward manifestations, the different forms of revelations, are signs … the human being can only seize the hem of his favor and try to find the way to him through his signs.… the plurality of signs is necessary to veil the eternal one who is transcendent and yet “closer than the neck vein” (sura 50:16); the plurality of signs and the unicity of the divine belong together. the signs show the way into his presence, where the believer may finally leave the images behind (schimmel 1994: xv). the god in the Quran has some fiery manifestations of power, among his signs are thunderstorms and lightning (sura 30:24), and thunder gives him praise (sura 13:13). one finds the similar theology of thunder with syriac authors, and it ultimately derives from Babylonian theology of Adad, the god of thunder and the giver of oracles and signs (see Annus 2006: 6–12). often these signs were inscribed into the physical appearance of the world as cuneiform script, where mesopotamian scholars could read them (see frahm, this volume). A comparable concept is found in Jewish mysticism, where the creative power of the hebrew alphabet establishes a connection of all worldly phenomena to certain letters. in the book of 3 enoch, the letters are even conceived as something inseparable from natural phenomena. the book devotes considerable attention to presenting systematic lists of natural phenomena filled with meanings — terrestrial and celestial or meteorological phenomena, including stars and constellations, lightning and wind, thunder and thunderclaps, snow and hail, hurricanes and tempests (Arbel 2008: 309). When enoch-metatron is endowed with divine secrets in heaven, he receives the letters, by which these phenomena were created, which also means knowledge and power over them. the observing of letters implied beholding of the natural phenomena, on which god’s secrets are inscribed and codified as signs (Arbel 2008: 309). these secret signs were also written on the heavenly Pargod, the curtain that separates god from the rest of heaven and which, like the mesopotamian tablet of destinies, contains the hidden knowledge about divine decisions and plans regarding the course of human history (Arbel 2008: 312–13). Likewise, for Assyrian and Babylonian scholars, cuneiform signs were of divine origin and “capable of conveying, on various levels, completely incontestable eternal truths” (frahm, this volume). ProBLems of definitions the mesopotamian omen literature presents a problem to all who want to define the corpus from the point of view of the history of science and religion. the mesopotamian omen compendia are highly complex phenomena that escape any precise and simple categorization. it can be said that from our contemporary perspective the mesopotamian omen literature consists of a blend of observational sciences, common-sense attitudes, and religious beliefs. even if not all Babylonian theories of signs make sense to a modern mind “etically,” it may not be wrong to assume that they certainly did “emically” to the participants of that culture. 14 amar annus the first part of the original title of this conference, “science and superstition,” was deliberately chosen as provocative, in order to create some discussions about our inherited cultural biases. Whether a given statement represents a false belief or a scientific truth depends on a concrete epistemological situation, and can be ascertained only by some scientific proof or disproof, which may not be always available. As a modern online dictionary defines it, superstition is “a belief or practice resulting from ignorance” (Webster), and in this sense the term, as historically overloaded with negative connotations, is indeed useless in any serious discussion about ancient science (rochberg, this volume). the philosophical or intellectual “superiority” of the monotheistic belief over any polytheistic system is often represented in the preconceived worldview of many textbooks as an axiom, thus it is often difficult to discard the popular prejudice that the science began with the enlightenment. it may be of interest, however, that the folklorist Alan dundes has tried to define superstition technically as a folkloric genre. As much as i understand dundes’ effort, it is about defining superstition as a category of knowledge in folk religion. Without any regard to the validity of the practices and beliefs involved, dundes argues, the category of superstition applies to the statements and practices making use of the logical fallacy post hoc ergo propter hoc (dundes 1961: 27). further, it interests dundes to define superstitions formally at least to such extent that one would know a superstition when he came across it in folkloristic fieldwork. According to him, the formula — or rather the underlying thinking model — is a naively expressed and literally understood “if A, then B.” this model, which is remarkably close to the form of a Babylonian omen, characterizes the sign superstitions for dundes (dundes 1961: 30). however, as i argue above, the “if … then” format neither necessarily represents causality, nor prescribes any particular type of content. the use of conditionals is not the formal hallmark capable of sorting out superstitions from other types of knowledge, not even in folklore. Accordingly, the use of the term “superstitions” for folk beliefs in this restricted sense is not without problems either. As i outline above, the omens present in the mesopotamian compendia were collected from sources of heterogeneous origin. the Babylonian omens can therefore not be classified in an “either … or” manner, for example, as mixes of “sciences” and “superstitions”; rather, they had manifold origins and functions. And most of all, they testify to the ample observational interests of ancient mesopotamians, which in turn had a deep impact on the surrounding world. the results and inferences of such observations gained in the ancient world would not always count as scientific from our contemporary perspective, but these texts contain important raw data for the study of the history of the human mind and the functioning of the human brain. one can say metaphorically that as our own times will pass into antiquity, future scholars will look at our accomplishments in the field of intellectual culture with similar glasses — as a blend of true (“scientific”) and false (“superstitious”) beliefs, often mixed up without any clear distinction. in the end, the definitions are not as important as the content. on the beginnings and continuities of omen sciences in the ancient world 15 BiBLiogrAPhy Annus, Amar 2006 Arbel, daphna 2008 Bottéro, Jean 1992 Brown, david 2000 “the survivals of the Ancient syrian and mesopotamian intellectual traditions in the Writings of ephrem syrus.” ugarit-forschungen 38: 1–25. “enoch-metatron: the highest of All tapsarim? 3 enoch and divinatory traditions.” Jewish studies Quarterly 15: 289–320. mesopotamia: writing, reasoning, and the gods. 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