Aramaic translation of the behistun inscripton

The Behistun papyrus, formally known as Berlin Papyrus P. 13447, is an Aramaic-Egyptian fragmentary partial copy of the

Behistun inscription The Behistun Inscription (also Bisotun, Bisitun or Bisutun; , Old Persian: Bagastana, meaning "the place of god") is a multilingual Achaemenid royal inscriptions, Achaemenid royal inscription and large rock relief on a cliff at Mount Behistun i ...

, and one of the

Elephantine papyri The Elephantine Papyri and Ostraca consist of thousands of documents from the Egyptian border fortresses of Elephantine and Aswan, which yielded hundreds of papyri and ostraca in hieratic and demotic Egyptian, Aramaic, Koine Greek, Latin and Cop ...

discovered during the German

excavations In archaeology, excavation is the exposure, processing and recording of archaeological remains. An excavation site or "dig" is the area being studied. These locations range from one to several areas at a time during a project and can be condu ...

between 1906 and 1908. The text is known as DB Aram in the identification code of the

Achaemenid royal inscriptions The Achaemenid royal inscriptions are the surviving inscriptions in cuneiform script from the Achaemenid Empire, dating from the 6th to 4th century BCE (reigns of Cyrus the Great, Cyrus II to Artaxerxes III). These inscriptions are primary sources ...

, and separately as TADAE C2.1+3.13. It is the only known Aramaic version of an Achaemenid royal inscription, despite Aramaic being considered the

lingua franca A lingua franca (; ; for plurals see ), also known as a bridge language, common language, trade language, auxiliary language, link language or language of wider communication (LWC), is a Natural language, language systematically used to make co ...

of the Achaemenid Empire. The papyrus is held at the

Egyptian Museum of Berlin The Egyptian Museum and Papyrus Collection of Berlin () is home to one of the world's most important collections of ancient Egyptian artefacts, including the Nefertiti Bust. Since 1855, the collection is a part of the Neues Museum on Berlin's ...

Discovery and Historical Context

The papyrus was unearthed amid the 1906-1908 German

archaeological excavation In archaeology, excavation is the exposure, processing and recording of archaeological remains. An excavation site or "dig" is the area being studied. These locations range from one to several areas at a time during a project and can be condu ...

s at

Elephantine Elephantine ( ; ; ; ''Elephantíne''; , ) is an island on the Nile, forming part of the city of Aswan in Upper Egypt. The archaeological site, archaeological digs on the island became a World Heritage Site in 1979, along with other examples of ...

, a site known for its historical significance as a Jewish colony within the

Persian Empire The Achaemenid Empire or Achaemenian Empire, also known as the Persian Empire or First Persian Empire (; , , ), was an Iranian empire founded by Cyrus the Great of the Achaemenid dynasty in 550 BC. Based in modern-day Iran, it was the larg ...

. The papyrus's discovery was a part of a broader excavation effort to uncover the cultural, social, and political landscape of the region during antiquity.

Publication

Eduard Sachau Carl Eduard Sachau (20 July 1845 – 17 September 1930) was a German orientalist. He taught Josef Horovitz and Eugen Mittwoch. Biography He studied oriental languages at the Universities of Kiel and Leipzig, obtaining his PhD at Halle in 186 ...

's publication in 1911 brought the papyrus to scholarly attention, followed by Arthur Ernest Cowley's English language edition in 1923. Subsequent research and contributions, including the 1982 edition by the '' Corpus Inscriptionum Iranicarum'' (CII 1.1), provided further understanding of the papyrus's significance.

Content

The document contains two primary texts, one on the front (the Behistun text) and one on the back.

Behistun inscription

The papyrus's recto and initial columns of the verso feature an

Aramaic Aramaic (; ) is a Northwest Semitic language that originated in the ancient region of Syria and quickly spread to Mesopotamia, the southern Levant, Sinai, southeastern Anatolia, and Eastern Arabia, where it has been continually written a ...

version of

Darius I Darius I ( ; – 486 BCE), commonly known as Darius the Great, was the third King of Kings of the Achaemenid Empire, reigning from 522 BCE until his death in 486 BCE. He ruled the empire at its territorial peak, when it included much of West A ...

's well known

Behistun Inscription The Behistun Inscription (also Bisotun, Bisitun or Bisutun; , Old Persian: Bagastana, meaning "the place of god") is a multilingual Achaemenid royal inscriptions, Achaemenid royal inscription and large rock relief on a cliff at Mount Behistun i ...

(DB Aram). The original rock inscription, itself carved in three languages and scripts, narrates Darius I's ascension to power, his accomplishments, and his lineage. The Berlin Papyrus's version of DB Aram offers scholars a unique window into the linguistic nuances and variations of this monumental proclamation. The papyrus is highly fragmented, but is thought to have originally been written on a scroll of 24 sheets in eleven columns, nine on the recto and two on the verso. None of the eleven original columns are preserved intact; in total parts of fourteen paragraphs are readable: * Column I: fragments of 2 lines * Column III: fragments of 4 lines * Column IV: fragments of 10 lines * Column V: fragments of 17 of the original 18 lines recovered * Column VII: fragments of almost all lines recovered * Column VIII: fragments of almost all lines recovered * Column XI (verso): fragments of all except upper right half and the last linePorten and Yardeni, p. 59-70

Memoranda (Mem.) and Administrative Insights

The verso columns of the papyrus host a collection of

memoranda A memorandum (: memorandums or memoranda; from the Latin ''memorandum'', "(that) which is to be remembered"), also known as a briefing note, is a Writing, written message that is typically used in a professional setting. Commonly abbreviation, ...

, providing detail on the administrative and economic activities of Elephantine. These memoranda record transactions involving diverse goods, including valuable items such as bowls and

incense burner A censer, incense burner, perfume burner or pastille burner is a vessel made for burning incense or perfume in some solid form. They vary greatly in size, form, and material of construction, and have been in use since ancient times throughout t ...

s, as well as commodities like

grain A grain is a small, hard, dry fruit (caryopsis) – with or without an attached husk, hull layer – harvested for human or animal consumption. A grain crop is a grain-producing plant. The two main types of commercial grain crops are cereals and ...

s. The repetition of the term "zokrān" (memorandum) highlights a systematic approach to documenting transactions and suggests an organized record-keeping practice. The coexistence of DB Aram and the memoranda on the same papyrus raised scholarly questions about their role within the YHW-temple library. This suggests a connection between

administrative record Administration may refer to: Management of organizations * Management, the act of directing people towards accomplishing a goal: the process of dealing with or controlling things or people. ** Administrative assistant, traditionally known as a se ...

s and

education Education is the transmission of knowledge and skills and the development of character traits. Formal education occurs within a structured institutional framework, such as public schools, following a curriculum. Non-formal education als ...

al materials. It is possible that the papyrus served as a resource for training

scribe A scribe is a person who serves as a professional copyist, especially one who made copies of manuscripts before the invention of Printing press, automatic printing. The work of scribes can involve copying manuscripts and other texts as well as ...

s in the art of

temple management A temple (from the Latin ) is a place of worship, a building used for spiritual rituals and activities such as prayer and sacrifice. By convention, the specially built places of worship of some religions are commonly called "temples" in Engli ...

and

record-keeping Records management, also known as records and information management, is an organizational function devoted to the management of information in an organization throughout its life cycle, from the time of creation or receipt to its eventual dispos ...

, revealing a nexus between practical applications and pedagogical purposes.

References

External links

Bibliography

, 1911, Aramäische Papyrus und Ostraka aus einer jüdischen Militär-Kolonie zu Elephantine *
Text
*
Plates
* Arthur Ernest Cowley, 1923
Aramaic papyri of the fifth century B.C
page 248-271 * Bezalel Porten and Ada Yardeni,

Textbook of Aramaic Documents from Ancient Egypt Textbook of Aramaic Documents from Ancient Egypt, often referred to as TAD or TADAE, is a four volume corpus of Aramaic inscriptions written in Egypt during the Ancient Egyptian period, written by Bezalel Porten and Ada Yardeni. Originally envisa ...

Volume 3
pages 59-70 * Halévy, J., �
L’inscription de Darius Ier à Behistun: Texte araméen
�� RevSém 20 (1912c): 252–62 * * *Tavernier, J., �
The Origin of DB Aram. 66-69
�� NABU 4 (1999): 83–84. * Bae Chul-hyun, "Comparative Studies of King Darius's Bisitun Inscription." Ph.D. Dissertation, Harvard Univ.. (2001): . * Bae Chul-hyun
Literary Stemma Of King Darius’s; Bisitun Inscription Evidence Of The Persian Empire’s Multilingualism
* * * {{cite journal , last=Mitchell , first=Christine , title=Berlin Papyrus P. 13447 and the Library of the Yehudite Colony at Elephantine , journal=Journal of Near Eastern Studies , publisher=University of Chicago Press , volume=76 , issue=1 , year=2017 , issn=0022-2968 , doi=10.1086/690226 , pages=139–147 , s2cid=164833849 , url=https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10.1086/690226 , archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230930181250/https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/full/10.1086/690226 , archive-date=30 September 2023 , access-date=26 August 2023 , url-status=bot: unknown , url-access=subscription Egyptian papyri in Aramaic