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Primary sourceDocument7th century BCE

Shumma Alu Divinatory Tablet from the Library of Ashurbanipal

7th century BCE

A cuneiform clay tablet from Ashurbanipal's library at Nineveh, part of a divinatory series about city life.

This tablet was part of the library Ashurbanipal assembled at Nineveh, showing his role as a collector of knowledge.

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Photograph of a rectangular clay cuneiform tablet with dense rows of wedge-shaped script covering its face, with a visible crack running down the middle, displayed on small white supports against a dark green background.
Shumma alu divinatory tablet, 7th century BC. Library of Ashurbanipal, Nineveh. British Museum K.116.

About this source

What it is

This clay tablet is the 61st of 120 tablets in the Shumma alu series, a divinatory text concerned with omens from city life. It comes from Nineveh, from the library assembled by King Ashurbanipal in the 7th century BC, and is held today in the British Museum.

Why it matters

Ashurbanipal built one of the largest known collections of texts in the ancient world, gathering scholarly and religious works from across Mesopotamia. This tablet shows the kinds of knowledge valued at his court, including divination used to interpret signs and predict the future.

Look closer

  • What does the care taken to copy and preserve this text tell you about the king's interests?
  • Why might a ruler want to collect texts about predicting the future?
  • What does the cracked, damaged state of the tablet tell you about its long history?

This document is part of the curated material that grounds the AI version of Ashurbanipal on Humy.ai — when students ask about related events, the AI can quote it and cite it.

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