The ''Story of Appu'' is a mythological
Hittite text (CTH 360). The text is fragmentary, and the sequence of events in the story is a reconstruction.
The text is usually taken as an account of a
Hurrian myth, but it does not itself contain any Hurrian names or other vocabulary to support this judgement. The geographical setting is in
Mesopotamia
Mesopotamia is a historical region of West Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the Fertile Crescent. Today, Mesopotamia is known as present-day Iraq and forms the eastern geographic boundary of ...
.
The reconstructed argument of the text is as follows:
Appu is a rich man, but he is unhappy because he has no son.
The text hints at the possibility that Appu doesn't know anything about
sex. He sacrifices a
lamb to ask the help of the gods. The
sun-god appears and advises him to get drunk and then have sex with his wife.
Eventually, Appu's wife gives birth to a first son, named () "bad, evil". At this point the text alludes to a rite of
name-giving, paralleled in the ''
Song of Ullikummi'', where the newborn is
set on the knee of the father.
Appu's wife later gives birth to a second son, named () "good, righteous".
When both sons have reached adult age, Idalu suggests that they divide the paternal estate among them.
He argues that, as each of the gods has
his own city, so should they also each have their own
property
Property is a system of rights that gives people legal control of valuable things, and also refers to the valuable things themselves. Depending on the nature of the property, an owner of property may have the right to consume, alter, share, re ...
. Idalu tricks his brother, taking most of the estate and leaving him only with a barren
cow
Cattle (''Bos taurus'') are large, domesticated, bovid ungulates widely kept as livestock. They are prominent modern members of the subfamily Bovinae and the most widespread species of the genus '' Bos''. Mature female cattle are called co ...
. But the sun-god blesses the cow and restores her
fertility
Fertility in colloquial terms refers the ability to have offspring. In demographic contexts, fertility refers to the actual production of offspring, rather than the physical capability to reproduce, which is termed fecundity. The fertility rate ...
. At this point the first tablet ends and the rest of the story is very fragmentary.
It appears to deal with litigation between the brothers; Idalu seems to take Handanza to court before the sun-god at Sippar. When the god rules in favour of Handanza, Idalu curses, and the sun-god refuses to conclude the case, sending the brothers to
Ishtar
Inanna is the List of Mesopotamian deities, ancient Mesopotamian goddess of war, love, and fertility. She is also associated with political power, divine law, sensuality, and procreation. Originally worshipped in Sumer, she was known by the Akk ...
at
Nineveh
Nineveh ( ; , ''URUNI.NU.A, Ninua''; , ''Nīnəwē''; , ''Nīnawā''; , ''Nīnwē''), was an ancient Assyrian city of Upper Mesopotamia, located in the modern-day city of Mosul (itself built out of the Assyrian town of Mepsila) in northern ...
to conclude the case.
[Gwendolyn Leick, ''A dictionary of ancient Near Eastern mythology'' (1991).]
References
*Geoffrey William Bromiley, ''International Standard Bible Encyclopedia'', vol. 4, {{ISBN, 978-0-8028-3785-1, 1995, p. 82.
Hittite texts
Hurrian mythology
Works set in Mesopotamia