Textbook of Aramaic Ostraca from Idumea, Volume 4

Since the early 1990s, about two thousand Idumean Aramaic ostraca have found their way onto the antiquities market and are now scattered across a number of museums, libraries, and private collections. This multivolume textbook classifies these ostraca according to subject matter and brings them together into a single publication. With this fourth installment, Bezalel Porten and Ada Yardeni continue their comprehensive edition of Aramaic ostraca from Idumea.

Volumes 1–3 published and cataloged 255 Personal Name Dossiers containing 1,152 texts. Volume 4 contains 377 texts divided into six dossiers, including 54 payment orders, 77 accounts, 74 workers texts, 62 names, 87 jar inscriptions, and 23 letters. The payment orders document officially authorized transfers of goods, while the accounts show how those goods were inventoried. The workers texts illustrate the distribution and supply of laborers, the name lists show people as individuals, and the jar inscriptions track vessels in motion. Color photographs, ceramic descriptions, hand-copies, transcriptions, translations, and commentaries are provided for the texts, along with figures and tables, and introductions and summaries of each dossier.

A unique source for the onomastics and social and economic history of fourth-century Idumea—and, by extension, of Judah—this multivolume work will become the primary resource for information on these texts.

“The publication of these texts represents an important source of information for social and religious life in Idumea—and by analogy also for Judea—in the Persian period. The text editions should therefore not be absent from any library, because they allow a variety of possibilities for scientific analysis in the future.”—W. Zwickel, Zeitschriften-und Bücherschau

Bezalel Porten is Professor Emeritus at the Hebrew University. He is the author or coauthor of ten books and more than one hundred articles.

Ada Yardeni is the author or coauthor of more than fifty articles and books on Hebrew paleography, including The Book of Hebrew Script.

Acknowledgments

Abbreviations and Select Bibliography

Introduction

Explanation of Typographic Conventions

Grain Equivalencies

Terminology of Ceramic Descriptions

Numeration Legend

Missing Photos and Drawings

Texts

B1.1–4.7 Payment Orders and Instructions Dossier (54 Texts, Tables B1–5)

B1.1–7 Payment Orders of Ḥor

B2.1–35 Payment Orders of Yaddu

B3.1–5 Other Payment Orders

B4.1–7 Instructions

C1.1–9.9 Accounts Dossier (77 Texts, Tables C1–5)

C1.1–12 Accounts of Wheat

C2.1–18 Accounts of Barley

C3.1 Account of Wheat and Barley

C4.1–6 Accounts of Other Grains

C5.1–6 Accounts of Non-Grain Agricultural Commodities

C6.1–12 Accounts of Unnamed Agricultural Commodities

C7.1–7 Accounts of Non-Agricultural Commodities

C8.1–6 Accounts of Currency

C9.1–9 Accounts Lacking Commodity or Measure

D1.1–9.7 Workers Texts Dossier (74 Texts, Tables D1–5)

D1.1 Sacrifice and Workers from the Clans of Gur and Baalrim

D2.1–16 Workers from the Clan of Baalrim

D3.1–16 Workers from the Clan of Gur

D4.1–14 Workers from the Clan of Qoṣi

D5.1–2 Worker(s) from the Clan of Al(i)baal

D6.1–4 Workers from the Clan of Y(eh)okal

D7.1–3 Workers from Miscellaneous Clans

D8.1–9 Dated Texts of Workers Unaffiliated with a Clan

D9.1–7 Undated Texts of Workers Unaffiliated with a Clan

E1.1–5.2 Names Dossier (62 Texts, Tables E 1–5)

E1.1–12 Lists of Names with Filiations

E2.1–5 Single Names with Filiations

E3.1–29 Lists of Unaffiliated Names

E4.1–14 Single Unaffiliated Names

E5.1–2 Names in “Jewish” Cursive Script

F1.1–5.12 Jar Inscriptions Dossier (85 Texts, Table F 1–4)

F1.1 Jar Inscription with Explanation

F2.1–21 Jar Inscriptions with Lamed

F3.1–33 Intact or Mostly Intact (and Restored) Jar Inscriptions without Lamed

F4.1–22 Jar Inscription Fragments without Lamed with Uncertain or Incomplete Readings

F5.1–12 Miscellaneous Other Jar Inscriptions

G1.1–5.1 Letters Dossier (23 Texts, Table G 1–4)

G1.1–6 Paleographically Early

G2.1–6 Two-Sided Letters (Opisthographs)

G3.1 One-Sided Complete Letters

G4.1–9 Letter Fragments Arranged by Epistolary Formulas Present

G5.1 Paleographically Late Letter Fragment

Tables

Indexes of Names

Table 1. 323 Names That Appear in TAO Volume 4 (TAO B–G), Ordered Alphabetically

Table 2a. 142 Names That Appear Only in TAO Volume 4 (TAO B–G), Ordered Alphabetically

Table 2b. 142 Names That Appear Only in TAO Volume 4 (TAO B–G), Ordered by Frequency

Table B1a. 57 Names That Appear in the Payment Orders Dossier (TAO B), Ordered Alphabetically

Table B1b. 57 Names That Appear in the Payment Orders Dossier (TAO B), Ordered by Frequency

Table B2. 29 Names That Appear in Both the Payment Orders Dossier and Commodity Chit Dossiers (TAO B and A)

Table B3. 4 Names That Appear Only in the Payment Orders Dossier and Non-Chit Dossiers (TAO C, D, E)

Table B4. 24 Names That Appear Only in the Payment Orders Dossier (TAO B)

Table B5a. 33 Names That Appear in the Arad Payment Orders (TAO B2)

Table B5b. 15 Names That Appear Only in the Arad Payment Orders (TAO B2)

Table C1. 142 Names That Appear in the Accounts Dossier (TAO C), Arranged Alphabetically

Table C2. 109 Names That Appear in Both the Accounts and Commodity Chits Dossiers (TAO C and A)

Table C3. 8 Names That Appear Only in the Accounts Dossier and Other Non-Chit Dossiers (TAO C and E, H, and J)

Table C4. 25 Names That Appear Only in the Accounts Dossier (TAO C)

Table C5. 56 Names That Appear in Both the Accounts Dossier (TAO C) and the Clans Dossiers (TAO A1–6)

Table D1. 65 Names That Appear in the Workers’ Texts Dossier (TAO D), Arranged Alphabetically

Table D2. 48 Names That Appear in Both the Workers’ Texts and Commodity Chit Dossiers (TAO D and A)

Table D3. 7 Names That Appear Only in the Workers’ Texts and Non-Chit Dossiers (TAO D and E, F, G, H, and J)

Table D4. 10 Names That Appear Only in the Workers’ Texts Dossier (TAO D)

Table D5a. 24 Names That Appear in Both the Workers’ Texts Dossier (TAO D) and the Clans Dossiers (TAO A1–6)

Table D5b. 12 Persons That Appear in Both the Workers’ Texts Dossier and the Clans Dossiers (TAO D and A1–6)

Table E1a. 160 Names That Appear in the Names Dossier (TAO E), Arranged Alphabetically

Table E1b. 160 Names That Appear in the Names Dossier (TAO E), Arranged by Frequency

Table E2. 100 Names That Appear in the Names and Commodity Chits Dossiers

(TAO E and A) 369

Table E3. 14 Names That Appear Only in the Names (TAO E) and Other Non-Chit Dossiers (TAO B, C, F, H, and J)

Table E4. 46 Names That Appear Only in the Names Dossier (TAO E)

Table F1a. 47 Names That Appear in the Jar Inscriptions Dossier (TAO F), Arranged Alphabetically

Table F1b. 47 Names That Appear in the Jar Inscriptions Dossier (TAO F), Arranged by Frequency

Table F2. 35 Names That Appear in the Jar Inscriptions and Commodity Chits Dossiers (TAO F and A)

Table F3. 3 Names That Appear Only in the Jar Inscriptions Dossier and Other Non-Chit Dossiers (TAO D, E, and J)

Table F4. 9 Names That Appear Only in the Jar Inscriptions Dossier (TAO F)

Table G1. 21 Names That Appear in the Letters Dossier (TAO G), Arranged Alphabetically

Table G2. 12 Names That Appear in the Letters and Commodity Chits Dossiers (TAO G and A)

Table G3. 1 Name That Appears Only in the Letters Dossier and Other Non-Chit Dossiers (TAO D)

Table G4. 8 Names That Appear Only in the Letters Dossier (TAO G)

Other Tables

Table 3a. 35 (34) Payment Orders of Yaddu at a Glance

Table 3b. Comparing Products in Accounts and Commodity Chits

Table 4. The Workers Dossier at a Glance

Table 5. Workers Listed according to Date

Three Dossiers of Miscellaneous Products

Table 6. The Dossier of Jars ( חביה ), Years 4 and 6 (355 and 353), 25 Entries (23 Chits)

Table 7. The Dossier of Flour ( 22 ,(קמח Chits

Table 8. The Dossier of Gyd/r ( 10 ,(גיד\ר Chits

Figures

Figure 1. Breakdown of the 57 names in the Payment Orders Dossier

Figure 2. Breakdown of the 141 names in the Accounts Dossier

Figure 3. Breakdown of the 65 names in the Workers’ Texts Dossier

Figure 4. Breakdown of the 160 names in the Names Dossier

Figure 5. Breakdown of the 47 names in the Jar Inscriptions Dossier

Figure 6. Breakdown of the 21 names in the Letters

Comparative List of Entries

Comparative List of Entries Listed by ISAP Number (B–G)

Comparative List of Entries Listed by TAO Number (B–G)