Never translated in any language before this page. A Vigslist translation.
A fragment with the mercy-cry (KAR 339). A fragment carrying the aḫulap mercy-cry.
First English rendering of this witness located. No edition or translation of this text in any language was located in any source checked.
A Vigslist translation — witness reading. Status: published reading. Printed in Vigslist Translations (Piece 7, DOI 10.5281/zenodo.23587830). Built 2026-10-22 from the live eBL record.
WITHHELD. The live eBL record serves a transliteration and lists the KAR hand copy and two catalogue discussions (Borger's "Hymnus?" and the museum's acquisition card). It carries zero EDITION references and zero #tr.en translation lines, and no uncurated references pointing to any edition. The desk print check (2026-10-22) located no edition and no translation of this text in any language.
One column's worth of a prayer survives — column 2′ of the fragment; column 1′ is broken away entirely. Twice the cry goes up: aḫulap — "Have mercy!" — the formal mercy-cry of Akkadian prayer, here aimed at a goddess: aḫulap libbiša, "Have mercy! Her heart…" Then the questions that fill the penitential hymns: "Who is like you…?", "Who are your people…?", "Who holds…?" A net appears — "your net he received" — the hunter's net of the gods that runs through this whole overnight dig, from KAR 312's fowler imagery to here. And near the end, through the damage, "the [great?] gods." The lines between are mostly rubble: verbs of widening, a road, a journey. What the fragment honestly gives is the prayer's gestures — the cry, the questions, the net — not its argument.
The transliteration is the eBL record's, reproduced as served. Brackets [ ] are breaks in the clay; # a damaged sign; / an alternative reading the record could not decide. The English renders what is actually on the clay and nothing else. Most lines here are fragments and are labelled so.
Counts: 22 line-units — 0 whole, 5 part, 17 fragments, 0 invented.
1′. [x] sa?# ni?# x x […] (fragments — traces only)
2′. u₂ tu ma na-maš-ši ki x […] (fragments — na-maš-ši may be namāššu, "livestock, movable goods," but the line will not carry a rendering; given as trace)
3′. a-ḫu-la-ap lib₃-bi-ša₂ na#-an#-h[u?-zi? …] "Have mercy! Her heart […]" (part — aḫulap, the mercy-cry, intact at the line's head; libbiša, "her heart" — the prayer's addressee is a goddess; the word after is too damaged to render)
4′. a-ḫu-la-ap x-la-ti x […] "Have mercy! […]" (fragments — the cry again, and the rest broken)
5′. ta-am?#/ḫu?#-ta-na dul?#/ki?# mar ša₂ an […] (fragments — the record cannot decide the readings; no sense is drawn)
6′. ša ki-i ka-a-ša su# x […] "Who is like you […]?" (part — ša kī kâša, "who is like you" — the incomparability question of the hymns, its first three words whole)
7′. ma-an-nu UN-MEŠ-ka n[a …] "Who are your people […]?" (part — mannu nišīka, "who are your people?" — the question turns from the goddess to her city)
8′. m[a?-an]-nu u₂-kal-lam […] "Who holds […]?" (part — mannu again, "who…?"; ukallam, "he holds/keeps" — the third question's verb survives, its object does not)
9′. [x x] du₃?# ma e#/un#/kal# x si x […] (fragments — traces only)
10′. [x x] x tu-x-miš₂ ne?# tu#-rap#-[pa-aš₂ …] "…you make wide […]" (fragments — turappaš, "you widen/enlarge," at the break; the line's subject and object are gone)
11′. [x x] tu-us#-sa x di […] (fragments — traces only)
12′. [ur?]-ḫu# ger-ru x u₂ i[n/r[ap …] "…road… journey […]" (fragments — urḫu, "road"; girru, "journey/expedition" — two travel words without their sentence)
13′. [(x) x š]e-et-ka i[m]-da-ḫar ma# bad?# u[š?] "[…] your net he received […]" (part — šētka, "your net"; imdaḫar, "he received / he met." The divine net again — in KAR 312 the sufferer is the bird in the fowler's cage; here someone takes the net. The clay does not say who, or whose net it truly is, and this page does not decide it)
14′. x šu# kab/nigin ta šu# na-si-is-x (fragments — traces; the signs will not construe)
15′. x an maš x x im-da-ḫar-ma# "…and he received […]" (fragments — imdaḫar-ma, "and he received," the verb of line 13′ again; its line is rubble)
16′. [x x x] x x ni/sa pi-it-tu₂/PI (fragments — traces only)
17′. [x x (x x x) DI]NGIR-MEŠ [GAL?-MEŠ?] "[…] the gods, [the great ones? …]" (fragments — DINGIR-MEŠ, "the gods," whole; GAL-MEŠ, "the great ones," is the record's uncertain restoration and is kept uncertain here)
18′. […] u₂-šad-la#-ap an x [x (x)] (fragments — a verb form in damage (ušadlap, "he let reach"?); no sense is drawn)
19′. […]-x [q]u?-u₂ [x x (x)] (fragments — traces only)
20′. […] x ra-du [x x (x x)] (fragments — traces only)
21′. […] u₂ [x (x)] (fragments — traces; a double ruling follows in the record)
22′. […] x [x (x)] (fragments — the last served trace)
None. No ušumgal, no muš, no mušḫuššu, no bašmu, no ṣerru appears anywhere in the served text. The net (šētu) in line 13′ is a hunter's net, not a serpent — cleared by name so it is not mistaken for one.
Copy: Erich Ebeling, Keilschrifttexte aus Assur religiösen Inhalts II (WVDOG 34, 1923), no. 339. Genre note: Rykle Borger, Handbuch der Keilschriftliteratur I (1967), p. 103 — "Hymnus?" Catalogue card: Vorderasiatisches Museum acquisition record, quoted in the eBL record (via Bordreuil, FAOS 14). Transliteration: the eBL Fragmentarium record for VAT 10302 (CC BY-SA 4.0), pulled live 2026-10-22; no editor named on the record. This reading: the program's, built from the served transliteration only.
Vigslist translations — AI-assisted, cross-checked against the record. Working reading; not yet published.
Nuvira Technologies conducts this research with AI assistance, cross-verified against the primary sources to scholarly integrity standards. Uncertain readings are marked; broken lines are left broken.
— Richard Vigslist, Founder, Nuvira Technologies
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