Table of Contents for Maarav 28.1-2 (2024)
Pp. 1-56: “The First Tablet of the Ugaritic Krt Text, Column II, Lines 4–5: Reading and Reconstruction” by Tommaso Bacci, Tyler J. Harris, Jaeseok Heo, Dennis Pardee, and Alexis Wolf
This article introduces a new reconstruction and critical reading of two partially-damaged lines (4–5), from Tablet I, Column II of the Ugaritic Krt Text (RS 2.[003]+). The first section of this article outlines the lengthy history of previously-offered readings and restorations of these lines. The second section provides a detailed epigraphic analysis and reconstruction, based on new photos of the tablet. Following the proposed reconstruction, the third section offers a philological analysis, including vocalization and translation of relevant portions. The fourth and final section of the article explores pertinent literary considerations around the proposed reconstruction, demonstrating how these lines fit lexically and thematically within the immediate passage and the broader story. This article’s new proposal underscores the significance of Krt’s first refusal of an offer of wealth and precious items after the loss of his household (I 52–II 3)—a key motif that recurs twice more within the Krt Epic (III 33–37; VI 22–27). The holistic approach to reconstruction utilized herein centers around the distribution of terms related to the concepts of “house(hold)” and “progeny/family,” illuminating the poetic techniques used in Krt’s request for a bride, as instructed by the god ʾ, and its pivotal role in the unfolding narrative.
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Pp. 57-88: “‘And I Deported ʾAriʾēl, Its Leader, from There’: Line 12 of the Mesha Inscription in Light of Shared Scribal Practices in Moab and Ancient South Arabia,” by Mario Tafferner
Translating the phrase ʾš . mšm . ʾt . ʾrʾl . dwdh in line 12 of the Mesha Inscription remains problematic. This essay goes beyond previous approaches to interpreting this clause by comparing it to related instances of formulaic language usage in the Old Sabaic royal summary inscription RES 3945/3946. The resulting anaylsis illuminates several aspects of the Moabite phrase: the verbal root underlying the form ʾš, the type of object represented by ʾrʾl . dwdh, and the identity with which it is associated within the framework of the inscription’s rhetoric. The essay concludes that ʾš . mšm . ʾt . ʾrʾl . dwdh likely communicates the deportation of a human being that the writers of the account presented as either Israelite or closely associated therewith.
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Pp. 89-95: “Beth-Shemesh East and the lmlk Stamped Jar handles: A Rejoinder,” by Lily Singer-Avitz and Yehuda Govrin
The present rejoinder discusses the article published recently in this journal by Gross, Wrathall, Koch, and Lipschits and its conclusions. Their article reviews the lmlk stamped handles found in a limited area of the large-scale salvage excavations conducted during the years 2018–2020 to the east of Tel Beth-Shemesh. According to these partial data they reconstruct the chronology and history of the site. In this rejoinder we present a different set of chronological data as obtained from all the excavation areas which requires another historical reconstruction.
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Pp. 97-142: “A Reedition of Three Palmyrene Funerary Busts at the Barracco Museum in Rome (PAT 1064, 1065, 1759),” by Ali Kesserwani, Jeremy M. Hutton, and Konstantin M. Klein
The Museo Barracco di scultura antica (Barracco Museum of Ancient Sculpture, Rome, Italy) houses three Palmyrene funerary busts (PAT 1064, 1065, 1759). In this study, we analyze all three reliefs, providing discussions of their iconographic features, onomastics and prosopography, and script-styles, with particularly detailed descriptions attending the latter. We confirm prior readings and make additional observations regarding the subjects’ professional and social identities.
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Pp. 143-172: “A Scroll of One’s Own? Scribal, Philological, and Literary Aspects of 4QIsak (4Q64),” by Noam Mizrahi
The paper offers a new investigation of a fragmentary Isaiah scroll from Qumran Cave 4, 4QIsak (4Q64), which contains Isa 28:26–29:9. A new material reconstruction of the surviving fragments leads to a detailed evaluation of the scribal properties of the manuscript. The philological analysis of its text vis-à-vis the MT and the other textual witnesses takes into consideration the literary structure and rhetorical design of the prophetic units, leading to some conclusions concerning the nature of this specific scribal artifact and its place within the textual history of Isaiah.
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Pp. 173-218: “A Tale Twice Told—Between Variants and Versions in the Transmission of Mandaic Spells,” by Matthew Morgenstern
In contrast to Mandaic magic spells that have survived in epigraphic sources dating from the fifth to seventh centuries which show considerable literary variation, those attested in manuscript sources—the earliest surviving example of which was copied in the seventeenth century—mostly preserve only a single recension of each spell. One rare exception is a spell that has been incorporated in a longer and shorter recension into two different collections of formulae, Šap̄ta ḏ-Pašar Haršia “The Scroll of the Exorcism of Sorceries” and Šap̄ta ḏ-Mihla ḏ-Sidma ḏ-Sahria u-Kibša ḏ-Daiuia (Pašar Mihla) “The Scroll of Salt, the Restraint of Sahirs and the Subduing of Devs (The Exorcism of Salt).” This article presents an editio princeps of both recensions of this spell with a translation and brief philological notes and emphasizes the importance of examining all available textual witnesses and establishing the relationship between them when such an edition is produced. It is shown that where the two traditions of transmission of this spell are parallel, some of the textual variants appear to reflect slightly different versions of the text that were incorporated into the two collections, while others have probably arisen at a later stage in the transmission of each collection.
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