Lunar eclipses were more than just entertainment for the ancient Babylonians , who fancy these celestial events as harbingers of doom . Reading the signals lurking in the shadows that devoured the Moon was therefore an important scientific discipline , and leave in the output of a series of texts document the various omens to be found in an eclipse .
spell incuneiformin the early 2nd millenary BCE , these 4,000 - class - old Mesopotamian warnings have finally been interpreted from four tablets that have been sitting in the British Museum for well over a century . Presenting their translations in a young study , the researchers reveal how various lineament of an occultation could be used to foresee future outcome .
By observing the meter and date of alunar eclipse , as well as the movement of the Earth ’s shadow across the Moon , imperial adviser could predict grave misfortune that destiny had in store for a tycoon . For instance , the tablets disclose that “ an occultation in the morning watch ” signaled “ the final stage of a dynasty ” in the Mesopotamian city ofAkkad .
The tablets helped royal astronomers pre-empt the fate of the king.Image credit: © The Trustees of the British MuseumCC BY-NC-SA 4.0
“ Babylonian astrology was an academic branch of divination establish on the belief that outcome in the sky were cod signs placed there by the gods as warnings about the future prognosis of those on Earth , ” write the cogitation authors . consequently , “ astrological watching was part of an elaborate method of protecting the world-beater and regulating his behavior in conformity with the wishes of the gods . ”
By crabbed - referencing the various feature film of aneclipseagainst an “ donnish principal sum of ethereal - omen texts , ” royal advisors were able to decrypt the intent of the heavens and wait on the king in avoiding a nasty outcome . The school text analyzed by the subject author are believed to have originated in the ancient Babylonian city of Sippar , located in modern - day Iraq .
Another of the omens inscribed on the tablet explains that “ an eclipse in the evening sentinel … signifies pestilence , ” while a specially lowering submission state that “ [ if ] an occultation is the wrong way around … nothing will be spare , the Deluge will take place everywhere . ” Exactly what the ancient stargazer intend by “ the wrong way round ” is unclear , though the researchers say this probably bear on to a scenario in which the lunar disk is “ somehow estimate to be face up the opposite direction from that expected . ”
Fortunately , however , B. B. King did n’t have to take their circumstances lying down , as protective rituals could be employ to subvert unfavorable omens . Citing a letter from a diviner to King Zimri - Lim of Mari ( a region in Mesopotamia ) , the researchers say that the portents of ill - boding eclipse could be twice - checked by extispicy – which involves examine animal ’ entrails – “ to determine whether the king was in real risk . ”
“ First - millennium text show that if , after such interrogation , the king ’s advisor felt the scourge still to be present , action could be take on to vacate it , by distinguish the forces of iniquity that lie behind it and countering them with apotropaic rituals , ” explain the study authors .
Highlighting the overall grandness of these somewhat paranoid engravings , the researchers say they “ constitute the old examples of compendia of lunar - eclipse omens yet discovered and thus provide significant new entropy about celestial fortune telling among the people of southern Mesopotamia in the former second millennium BCE . ”
The study is write in theJournal of Cuneiform Studies .
