New Evidence on the Last Days of Ugarit

Author(s): Michael C. Astour

Source: American Journal of Archaeology , Jul., 1965, Vol. 69, No. 3 (Jul., 1965), pp.
253-258
Published by: Archaeological Institute of America

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/502290

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 New Evidence on the Last Days of Ugarit*
MICHAEL C. ASTOUR

Mycenaean
In the thirteenth century B.c. Ugarit was a popu- ceramics from Kaphtor to their home
city,6 and
lous and prosperous city, one of the largest andmade it possible to distribute them all
richest capitals of the ancient Near East. The
overfelici-
Syria. They traveled all along the shore, visit-
tous policy of one of its earlier kings, Niqmad
ing the cities
II, of Phoenicia, Palestine, and Egypt,'
who had joined the Hittite alliance and recognized
as well as the neighboring island of Alashia-Cyprus.
On brought
the overlordship of the great king of Hatti, land, Ugaritic caravans reached the heart of
about a considerable territorial increase of the Anatolia.8 Large groups of merchants from Egypt,
Ugaritic domain at the expense of the vanquished Assyria, Alashia, the Cilician city of Ura, Beirut,
Mukish.' Niqmad's successors remained loyal to
Ashdod, and other places came to Ugarit, or es-
the great Anatolian power. As attested in the tablished
rec- emporia and enclaves there. The enor-
ords of Ramses II and confirmed by a recently dis-
mous dimensions of the Ugaritic royal palace bear
covered war report from a Ugaritic commander, witness to the vast resources of the kingdom.9
the army of Ugarit played an important role in the High material prosperity was paralleled by a re-
Hitto-Egyptian war that culminated in the battle markably flourishing cultural life. In addition to
of Qadesh in 1299.2 Soon afterward, the two the rivalunique lot of West Semitic literary texts dating
from the Amarna Age, unearthed during the first
empires peacefully settled their conflict and agreed
on spheres of domination. Ugarit easily tookcampaigns
ad- at Ras Shamra, more recent excavations
vantage of the long period of relative peace inofthe this seemingly inexhaustible site have revealed a
last century of the Bronze Age in Syria. great number of new religious and mythological
The kingdom of Ugarit possessed many prereq- tablets in the Ugaritic language. Even from the
uisites for an extraordinary economic upsurge: scanty
a information disclosed so far by Virolleaud,
Nougayrol, and Schaeffer, it appears that the publi-
vast, fertile, and thickly settled territory producing
grain, oil, wine, wool, flax, and valuable kinds of of these texts will open a new chapter in the
cation
lumber; a long sea-coast with at least three ports,3
study of Ugaritic literature. According to the latest
discoveries, not only palaces and temples, but even
not counting the harbor of Ugarit itself; and a most
advantageous geographical situation at the com-
private houses contained collections of literary,
mercial crossroads of the ancient world. Ugarit was
scholarly, and lexicographical tablets in Ugaritic,
a thriving industrial center, manufacturing Akkadian,
and and occasionally in Hurrian.'o National
exporting fabrics and garments of wool and linen,
and ethnic problems evidently did not trouble Uga-
which were dyed in various shades of expensiverit. Its West Semitic and Hurrian inhabitants were
purple, as well as in more popularly priced mad-
completely integrated within the realm's social struc-
der;` its artists excelled in producing ornamented
ture. The felicitous feature of polytheistic religions
vessels of bronze and gold; and its swordsmiths
-their aptitude for syncretism and absorption-
precluded any religious discord. Canaanite, Su-
supplied Egypt with long bronze swords inscribed
with the cartouches of the reigning Pharaoh.5mero-Akkadian, and Hurrian deities figure peace-
Ugaritic merchant ships carried the highly valued
fully together on lists of offerings.
40n the latter, cf. PRU V, No. 51 (RS 19-56): 5-6: tmn.
* This paper was read at the, Mediterranean Studies Col-
loquium, Brandeis University, on December 0o, 1963. mat. kbd. pwt, where pwt is Heb. puwwd, Arab. ftwwa
1Nougayrol, PRU IV, RS 17.237, 17.340, 13.62, 17.339A,
"dyer's madder," followed by tmn. mat. pttm "five hundred
17.366, and p. 14; present author, JNES 22 (1963) 236f.
(units) of linen."
2RS 20.33 (unpublished), reported by Nougayrol, CRAI5 Schaeffer, Ugaritica 111, I69-177.
(1957) 8of, and Iraq 25 (Autumn I963) 119f; Breasted, AR
6 PRU IV, RS I6.238, on a ship of a rich Ugaritic merchant
III, ?309. returning from matKaptu-ri.
S Attalig (Virolleaud, PRU V, No. 56 = RS 18.xI9: 1-2); 7 E.g. PRU V, RS 18.31.
Gib'ala (PRU IV, RS 17.335:19, mod. Djebeleh), and Himulli 8PRU IV, RS 17.59, 17.383-
"in the midst of the sea" (RS 13.62:25; 20.13, unpublished, see 9Schaeffer, CRAI (1955) 251.
CRAI [19571 77), that is, on the Pigeon Island north of Ugarit. 10Nougayrol, CRAI (1960) 163-171; (1961) 232-236.

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 254 MICHAEL C. ASTOUR [AJA 69
Most, if not all, ofthe the newly
(very) discovered
circuit of th
belong to the late thirteenth
fident and century.
trusting: Ugar
'O
tellectuals proudly looked
This text back at the
still remains centu t
history of their city,
tive andabout one the of events
them ins of
the reverse side of ano mythological
longer the sole textpiece wit
of all the Ugaritic evidence.
kings The excavations
going at Rasback
Shamra haveto th
second millennium.11revealed documents
The lastin Akkadian
entry, and Ugariticjudgi
the context, was thewhichname
belong to theofvery last years of Ugarit's
Ammurapi ('
and he actually wasexistence.
to be the last king
The alphabetic texts of the i8th and 19th of
It was under this campaigns are published
Ammurapi that by Ch.
theVirolleaud
city in of
was so completely destroyed
Le palais royal d'Ugarit, that it was
volume V, recently pub- ne
built, but was abandoned and
lished (1965).14 The forgotten
ones most relevant to our in- fo
than thirty-one centuries. Itfound
quiry belong to the lot isin common
an oven for bak- do
that any civilization
ing must pass
tablets-the first through
implement of this kind ever the
of rise, crest, and decline, before
discovered. All the tablets of thissuffering
lot are incoming it
mate fall; but such a How
letters. scheme
did they get intodoes
the oven? We not
are ap
Ugarit. No decay whatsoever, either mate
obviously not dealing with originals, but with lo-
spiritual, can be observed
cally made Ugaritic in Ugarit
translations, similar toon
those the
its destruction. The city
discovered fell
earlier.5" at written
Two letters the height
by Ugaritic
vitality, suddenly, as the
officers mayresult of
be the originals, a terrible
delivered unbaked
trophe-the more terrible because
and put into the oven for better preservation.it
The was
naturaldisaster, but royal
was wrought
chancellery, by
it is quite clear, human
continued its
the more colossal because
routine work, even Ugarit shared
though the dispatches from the it
with Hattushash, Tarsus,
war front wereCarchemish,
alarming. The very fact that the Alala
na, Qadesh, Hazor, palace
Lachish,
employees had noand many
time to take these tablets oth
cient cities. Stratigraphical
from the oven to data
the archivesprove that
is eloquent testimony th
Bronze Syria Age
to theand
suddenness in
Anatolia came
of the final catastrophe. The to
in a single historical letter
catastrophe, and the
PRU V, No. ii4 (RS i9.1i), and two letters iden
its authors is established by
from the i6th the RS
campaign, records of Ph
16.402 and 16.379,
Ramses III. We still follow the lead of his M
published in PRU II as Nos. 12 and 13 respectively,
Habu inscriptions12 inrefer
probably calling these invad
to the same events.
Peoples of the Sea. They include thisarehighl
The Akkadian letters of the 2oth campaign to
vant passage: be published by Nougayrol in Ugaritica V. Part
"The foreign countries made
of them are known from atheconspiracy
expositions and partial in
islands. Removed and scattered in the fray
translations in this scholar's report to the French we
lands at one time. No land could stand before
Academy of Inscriptions."1 For this preliminary
arms from
Qadi, Hatti,
Carchemish,
survey we must satisfy ourselves with the pub-Arzaw
Alashia on, (but they
lished glimpses of information. The letter RS 20.-[one
were) cut off at
A camp was set up 212,
insent one place
by the Hittite court to ain Amurru
late thirteenth-
desolated its
people, century
andUgaritic
its kingland was
(whose name, like that
unfortunately,
has never come into has
being. They
not been preserved), were
is highly coming
significant for
the flame was prepared before
our understanding them,
of Ugarit's forward
international role in
Egypt. Their confederation was Although
the last years of its existence. the the Pursata
king
ra, Shakarusha, Danuna,
of Ugarit (accordingand Washasha
to the Hittite dignitary) was l
united. They laid their hands
solemnly relieved upon
of every "service," the lan
he is neverthe-
11 Schaeffer, AfO 20 (1963) 215. the kindness of Professor C. H. Gordon, and the permission to
12 W. F. Edgerton and J. A. Wilson, Historical Records ofuse them for the present paper, to that of Professor Ch. Virol-
Ramses III. The Texts of Medinet Habu, 2 vols. (Chicago 1936).leaud.
13 Op.cit. 43; ANET 262. The names of the Sea Peoples are
vocalized here according to the system of W. F. Albright (AJA 15 E.g.
16 CRAI Shuppiluliuma's letter
(196o) 163-171; nowtoalso
Niqmad II (UM 118).
in "Guerre et paix
54 [I950] 170). Ugarit," Iraq 25 (Autumn 1963) 11-123.
141I owe my acquaintance with the proofs of this volume to

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1965] NEW EVIDENCE ON THE LAST DAYS OF UGARIT 255

less obliged occasionally to "listen and

king of execute"
Alashia whom Ammurapi calls
what he is told--but he has not been
The doingpart
essential this,
of Pgn's letter, after
introductory
and the situation must change. (We thus learn formulas,
that runs as follows
by the end of the thirteenth century Ugarit was
only nominally a vassal of Hatti.) ky.
Nowlik.
the bny
king Since my son s
of Hatti demands that the king (Io) /ht. akl. 'my
of Ugarit furnish a a tablet of foo
midy w ghny20 there is plenty
ship and crew to transport 2,000 measures of grain
dance with me,
from the neighboring Mukish to the Hittite port of
w. bny. hnkt and let my son in the
Ura (in Western Cilicia), and the author of the let-
same way
ter repeats several times that this is a matter of life
y'kn [.]
or death, let the king of Ugarit not anyt equip
linger! a sea-ship,
It is
ym. yrr? strengthen (?) (it)
known that during a severe famine in the Hatti-
w. ak[l?
land, Pharaoh Mernephtah sent ships with ....] and foo[d ..........]
grain.17
[.. .] S distress,
Was this letter connected with the same [.....] ..................
or
was it a later one? Another detail is very
However, interest-
Ammurapi's answer to the king of
ing: the letter specifies that aAlashia
single dealslarge ship
with much more alarming events.
would be sufficient, and that such a vessel
"My father," writeswould
Ammurapi, "behold, the ene-
be able to transport the entire load
my's shipsincameone, or
(here); myatcities (?) were burned,
most, two trips. As remarked by and Nougayrol,18
they did evil things thein my country. Does not
cargo was evidently counted in mythe regular
father unit
know that all myoftroops and chariots (?)
grain measure, kor, each kor containing
are in the Hittite 300 qa,and all my ships are in
country,
or approximately 300 liters. Thus the
the land of ship's
Lycia? . .total
. Thus, the country is aban-
doned to or
capacity was about 6,000 hectoliters, itself.
450Maymetric
my father know it: the seven
tons, an unexpectedly high, but ships
byof no
the enemy
means thatim-came here inflicted much
probable, figure. damage upon us." He asks the king of Alashia to
Alashia (Cyprus) was another country
inform which
him if other ships of the enemy were no-
Ugarit supplied with food, butticed.
from Ugarit's own
resources. Nougayrol's forthcoming publication
We are in the presence of thein-first stage of the
cludes a letter from the king Sea
of Peoples'
Alashia invasion.toTheAm-main forces of the
murapi, king of Ugarit (No. 23 - are
enemy RSL still ini),
the and the
Aegean, but their intentions
latter's answer to it (No. 24are-known,
RS and 20.238). The
the king of Ugarit, instead of pas-
king of Ugarit styles the king of Alashia "my fath-
sively waiting for their arrival, attempts to oppose
er," a very unusual formula theirin offensive
correspondence
at its very start. His entire fleet sails
between kings of equal rank, westward
since toUgarit was
Lycia to defend in
the passage from the
no way subject to Alashia-both Aegean to the Mediterranean
kingdoms were, main, while all of
at least formally, vassals of Hatti.19 Could
his landtroops join it
the be that
Hittite army in an effort
the king of Alashia was Ammurapi's maternal
to stop the aggression in the western marches of
uncle or grandfather? Now, one theofempire.
the Meanwhile,
tablets smallfrom flotillas of the in-
the oven (PRU V, No. 61 i -vaders RStake 18.147) issituation
advantage of the the to attack the
Ugaritic translation of a letter unprotected
from coast a certain Pgn
of the Ugaritic kingdom. A letter
who addresses the king of Ugarit, i.e.
to the king Ammurapi,
of Ugarit from Eshuwara, Grand Su-
"my son." This concurrence of pervisor of Alashia (Nougayrol's
terminology makes No. 22 = RS 20.
it possible to suppose that Pgn 18),is the
states that very same
some of the king's subjects, who
17 Breasted, AR III, ?518. Reiches," MDOG 94 [1963] i3f).
s CRAI (I960) I65. 20 We believe that gbn is to be understood as an abstract in
19 Arnuwandash III claimed that Alashia was under Hittite-dn of the Heb. root 'j'b II, whence 'db "thick, dense," Arab.
royal overlordship, but this claim was not universally recog-
gibat "thickness, density."
nized (cf. A. Goetze, Madduwattal, ?35*). Under his brother 21 Compare Bottero, ARM VII, 228, n. 2, where the expres-
and successor Shuppiluliuma II, however, Alashia was actually
sion la i bilat kaspim tup-pa-am is explained as a check upon
conquered by Hatti and became a tributary, as shown by thewhose receipt one talent of silver should be paid to the bearer.
recently discovered Boghazk6y tablet KBo XII 38, obverse I
Similarly, 1ht akl might have been a document to the effect
(Heinrich Otten, "Neue Quellen zum Ausklang des Hethitischen
that food should be delivered to the addressee.

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 256 MICHAEL C. ASTOUR [AlA 69
d hsrt. w.
stopped at Alashia with ank whichships,
their thou lackest surre
flotilla to the enemy. -I will
astn. 1. iMy provide
How large was the Ugaritic navy forin my those f
days? A letter from the oven (PRU V, N brother,
w. ap. ank.to
RS 18.148) was written mnmnthe
and I too,king
whatever by o
[4]s[r]t. w. uhy I l[a]ck-my
who and
life" called
'bd himself ngr
ml( "king's .hwtk He
servant." "the guardian
urges the of thy brother
king: tkenn h msm l m[i]t any "equip a hundred (20) [y]'msn. tmn will load it there.
and fifty ships."22 This would clearly be a rein- w.[u?]hy. al yb'rn And let my brother
forcement of the existing navy. A hundred and not squander it!
fifty ships is a very considerable number. Accord-
ing to Herodotus (8.1.14), the entire fleet of the Ammurapi addresses the king of Alashia as "my
Greek coalition which met the Persian invasion in father." He would hardly have written in a tone
480 B.c. numbered 324 triremes and 9 fifty-oar ships, of equality to his northeastern neighbor, the Hittite
of which 200 triremes were provided by the Atheni- dynast of Carchemish. It is, therefore, possible that
ans. The Ugaritic ships of the thirteenth century the other party in this agreement was his southern
should, of course, be compared with the earlier neighbor, the king of Amurru.
type of Greek war vessels, the penteconters or fifty- Another tablet from the oven (PRU V, No. 6o =
oar ships, rather than the later triremes. The strong- RS 18.38) is the Ugaritic translation of a letter writ-
est Greek sea-power of the sixth century was Sa- ten to Ammurapi by "The Sun, thy lord," that is,
mos, whose tyrant Polycrates "had a fleet of a hun- by the king of Hatti. 'm p s' ll midm lm "with
dred penteconters, and bowmen to the number of The Sun, everything is very well," announces the
a thousand. Herewith he plundered all, without standard introductory formula which is bitterly
distinction of friend or foe.... He captured many contradicted by what is said in the latter part of
of the islands, and several towns upon the main-the letter:
land" (Herodotus 3.39, Rawlinson's translation).
If we turn farther back, to the age when the Iliad (31) ib. eltn. a[...] y the enemy [advances?]
was being composed, we find in the Catalogue of against us
the Ships that the largest imaginable naval con- (32) w. spr. in [. .](?)dm and there is no num-
tingent from a single state was the hundred ships ber [...].
from Mycenae (Iliad 2.576). Accordingly, the sea- (33) sprn..tr [ .....] our number is pure(?)
forces of Ugarit were superior to the naval resources [ 1
of any state in pre-classical Greece.23 (34) atr. it. bqt whatever is available,
look for it
One of the tablets from the oven (PRU V, No.
65 = RS 18.75) shows that the Syrian rulers were (35) w. stn. ly and send it to me.
hastily concluding treaties of mutual assistance. We
This the king of Ugarit did, for the Ugaritic army
do not know who was the other party to the treaty
fought in the Anatolian theater of war, as we know
because the obverse of the tablet is virtually obliter-
from the letter to the king of Alashia quoted above.
ated, but the reverse reads as follows:
Another letter from the oven (PRU V, No. 63 =
inm. "bd( Iwt ... when24 thy servant RS i8.40) is a dispatch from the Ugaritic com-
delivered (?) mander on the northern front whose name was
[y?]r'. my. (thy) word to me. Shiptibaal:
(i5) mnm. irtlk Whatever is thy de- 1. ml. b'[l]y To the kind, my l[o]rd,
sire
r g m say:
22 In line 6, 'prm are mentioned outside any
Shuppiluliuma context.
II, If the
thrice defeated
word is really to be read in this way
Alashia (the
(KBo ayin
XII 38,in these texts
reverse III, tr
is very similar to a gimel, so
bythat it mayOtten,
Heinrich have been
MDOGgprm =
94 [19
g6phrim, trees for ship construction),
make thisit possibly
record refers not
consistent to
with
the Habiru, but to "naval crews"-Egyptian 'pr. Itas
data presenting Alashia may be
an ally
noted that another word from ofUgaritic naval
Hatti), is terminology,
to accept Otten's br,
view
is of Egyptian origin (UM ?20.351).
belonged not to the kingdom of A
23 Ugaritic ships must certainly
the have formed
Sea who had the bulk of the
temporarily take
Hittite fleet which, according to24
a record
inm is of the lastAkkadian
probably Hittite king,
enum

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 1965] NEW EVIDENCE ON THE LAST DAYS OF UGARIT 257

thm tptb['l] Message ofa Shiptibaal

lengthy letter (PRU II, No. 12 RS 16.40
[']bd[k] [thy s]erva[nt.] written by Ewir-Sharruma (Iwr-trm28) to his "L
dy" (adty), who apparently was the mother of t
(5) [l.p]'n. b'ly To the feet of my lord
Ugaritic king. The first part of the letter is ver
[Pb']d. ~b'[d] seven times (and) seven
times badly damaged, but line io is clear enough: ]p. h
ib. d. b. mg'h "and, behold, the enemy who is
[mr] hqtm from afar
Mugishhe,"29 and so are the lines 15-17, of whi
qlt I fall. only the latter parts are extant:
'bdk. b. Thy servant in
(15) [ . . ]. w. ap. ank ... and I, too,
(Io) lwsnd Lawasanda (16) [.....]. 1. gr. amn ... to Mount Amanu
[y]bsr. fortified [his] positions
m [.]mlk with the king. (07) [. .. . ]. lktt. hn. ib ... behold, the enem
destroyed
w. hAt And behold,
Ewir-Sharruma worries about the two thousand
mlk. syr25 the king retreated,
(i5) ns. w. tm fled, and there
horses (alpm 3'swm) which the king entrusted to
ydbh he sacrificed him. He would be glad to deliver them to whom-
mlg ml[k?] ever the king would send for that purpose. Two
w. mu/d[ ]t&/y thousand horses is a very impressive number, cor-
y[ ] (rest incomprehensible) responding to a thousand chariots. In the Amarna
Age, the forces of the small city-kings of Phoenicia
The clue to the meaning of the letter is the word
and Palestine were rarely larger than thirty or
in line io, lwsnd, unexplained by the publisher.
fifty chariots. Only much later, in the ninth cen-
This is the name of a city in the land of Kizzu-
tury B.c., could the more important rulers of Syria
watna which the Hittites called Lawazantiya and
muster greater numbers of chariots and cavalrymen.
which, according to the Hittite story of Inthe
853,siege
Ben-Hadad of Damascus mustered 1,200
of Urshu under Hattushilish I, lay between the
chariots and 1,200 horsemen in the battle of Qar-
Antitaurus and the upper Euphrates, that is, far in
qar, while Irhuleni of Hamath commanded only
the east of the Hittite Empire.26 Many centuries
700 chariots and 700 horsemen, and the strongest
later, in the Annals of Shalmaneser III, the same
contingent of chariots, 2,000 of them, was provided
name appears as alLusanda, but this city was
by clearly
Ahab of Israel.30
situated in Eastern Cilicia, not far from Mount
Ewir-Sharruma wrote to the "Lady," because the
Amanus.27 It does not seem possible that the two
king of Ugarit was also absent from his capital:
documents refer to one and the same city, although
he was moving somewhere (. .. s'. hn. mlk, 1. 8),
the name is certainly the same in both cases. It was
he spent the night somewhere (.k. ybt. mlk, 1. 14)-
probably transferred to the Cilician city during the
Ewir-Sharruma's letter is tragic:
brief period of Kizzuwatni's rule in Eastern Cilicia.
(27) w.
In the Ugaritic letter, Lawasanda is rather the hn. ibm. Isq ly and, behold, the enemies
Cili-
cian city of this name. Therefore, Virolleaud's res- oppress me,
(28) p. 1. art. atty but I shall not leave my
toration of line II-[w.] b sr-"and in Tyre"-is
eliminated, and the missing first letter should be wife (and)
(29) n'ry.
restored as y, giving [y]bsr "he fortified." The th. I pn. ib my children . . before
king referred to by Shiptibaal could only be the the enemy.
king of Hatti himself. The most important thing we learn from this
Thus, the united armies of Hatti and Ugarit
letter is that the enemy had already crossed the
retreated all the way to the Syrian border.
Amanus of
All and was now in Mukish-immediately
Anatolia had already been lost almost up to the
north of Ugarit. The only enemy to whom this
Amanus. The name of this mountain appears in
could possibly refer is the Peoples of the Sea. We
25 syr, from the root str "retreat, turn away." similarity of the signs w and r in Ugaritic script.
26See references in my Hellenosemitica (E. J. Brill, 1965) 29 The identity of MgJh with Mukil, MukiJhe, Mugil was
30ff. first recognized in JNES 22 (1963) 237.
27 Fuad Safar, "A Further Text of Shalmaneser III from 30 Shalmaneser III's Monolith Inscription, year 6; transla-
Assur" (Sumer 7 [1951] 12, Iv:22-34). tion ANET 278f.
28Actually written Irr-wrm, a mistake caused by the close

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 258 MICHAEL C. ASTOUR [AlA 69
do not know of any other 1. b'r isinvasion of Mukish
sacked (or: burned),"6
forces hostile to Ugarit. Theand
(IO) ap. krmm offensive
also the vineyardsof Shu
luliuma against Mukish hlqinare1366
destroyed.
was made in
(Edge)
cert with the Ugaritic qrtn. hlq
king Our city isII.
Niqmad destroyed,
The Eg
w. d'. d' and
tians and the Assyrians never mayst thou
reached knowto
as far it! t
northwest as Mukish in their wars against Ha
This report may well refer to one of the ear
PRU II, No. 13 = RS 16.379 is a letter of a Ug
plundering incursions of enemy's ships, simila
ritic king 1. mlkt. u[m ]y "to the Queen, my mo
the one described in the letter to the king of
er," who is undoubtedly identical with the "La
shia quoted above. If, however, we multiply it
(adt) of Ewir-Sharruma's letter since both let
several hundred,
were found in the Central we get an image
Archives, at of the
what ha s
pened to the entire territory of the kingdom aft
depth. Evidently at the head of an army det
its navy and army were defeated in a long ca
ment far from the capital, the king writes to
paign, and the defenseless country was overrun b
mother after the usual greetings:
the Peoples of the Sea. The inhabitants of
(16) w hm. ht And ifeither
capital were the Hittites
massacred or they fled, never
(17) l7. w. likt mount, I will
return. Many send
houses were a mes
not even burned
sage
violently destroyed, but were abandoned by th
(18) 'ml. w. hm to thee, and if tenants and fell into decay.37 Some of the
(i9) 1.l.v w. lakm. they do not mount, I will stroyed cities-as Tarsus or Carchemish-were
certainly send
built after the invasion, others were not. Ugarit
(20) ilak. w. at. a message. And thou, among the latter.
(21) umy. al. tdhl(!) my mother, be not afraid31
The data of the Ugaritic texts bearing on the in
(22) w. ap. mhkm and do not put
vasion of the Peoples of the Sea are scarce; in p
(23) b. lbk. al. worries into thy ticular, we could wish that they contained the et
(24) tit heart.
nic names of these peoples spelled in the Ugar
The king apparently occupied alphabet,
a position on some
contributing to a better identification
heights, perhaps in the mountains of Amanus, and
their Egyptian transcriptions.38 But, despite
hoped that the arrival of Hittite
scarcitytroops might
of data, the texts are very significant. Fr
strengthen his resistance. Nothing, however, could
them we learn about the earlier phases of the gre
change the situation. A brief invasion,
letter to a certain
before the invaders clashed with the Eg
2rdn (or perhaps Grdn) by tians one andwho calls
were the A not unimportant ca
repelled.
addressee "my lord" (PRU V,of this14
No. defeat
- RSwere the Sea Peoples' previous lo
i9.11)
does not belong to the lot found infight
in the the against
oven, the
butretreating, but still resis
it sheds light on the fate of the ing, armiesterritory
Ugaritic of Hatti and Ugarit. As Pushkin s
in those days: about the invasion of Spain by the Moors: "T
1. (?)rdn To 2(?)rdn, Goths fell not without glory: valiantly did th
fight." In these letters, written in the fire and t
b'ly. rgm my lord, say:
sion of the events, we feel the breath of immediac
bn. hrnkl. my thy messenger arrived. and our impression from reading them is sim
(5) hbt. hw The degraded one32 to that which we gain from reading the Lach
hrd. w. 11 hw trembles,33 and the low one34
ostraca from the final days of Judah's resistance
qr'(?) is torn to pieces.35 Nebuchadnezzar.
alin. b. grnt Our food in the threshing
floors BRANDEIS UNIVERSITY

31 Virolleaud emends thus from tdh.s in the tablet,think

and ex-of Heb. i"l "lowest hem of a garb," Arab. sawila "to
plains by Heb. zhl II. hang down loose."
32 hbt = Arab. habata "to lower, to diminish" (Virolleaud).
35 Virolleaud: Heb. qard'a.
33 hrd is connected by Virolleaud with the Ugaritic noun
38Virolleaud compares 1. b'r to lebd'ar Isaiah 5:5 (RSV:
hrd that may mean "treasury," thence his translation:"it "The
shall be devoured").
poor one became rich." We would think of Heb. hdrad "to
37 Schaeffer, AfO 20 (1963) 206ff.
tremble," Arab. 4arida "to be shy."
38 Egyptian Ti-ka-ra can correspond to at least six West
34 is derived by Virolleaud from Heb. idld, Ugar. lHw
"to be peaceful": "and the wise one is miserable." We would
Semitic transliterations: Zkl, Ski, S.I, Zkr, Skr, Skr.

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