The text contains a set of resolutions concerning the cult of Ištar/Šavoška of the (Battle)field of Šamuḫa. Oracular inquiries discovered the anger of the goddess, presumably for the neglect of her cult in Šamuḫa. In order to placate the deity, the king in person vows to restore an appropriate daily regime of offerings for the goddess in this town. He even makes arrangements for the delivery of her statue to him at the end of some military operations, in order to “invoke” her for several days and worship her personally.

Rather than a letter, this text is a detailed oracular question with the goal of verifying whether the listed measures will placate the anger of the goddess. After the expression of the vow, in fact, a bird oracle is to be performed. The last line reads: “These are the birds”, which in oracle reports usually introduces the description of a flight observation and the augural response, positive or negative. Since the tablet is finished, and all these parts are missing, it appears these were expected in another tablet.

Lebrun R. 1976a, 167-171; Wegner I. 1981b, 135-137; Klinger J. 2010a, 154-162; Beckman G. 2012c.; Trameri A. 2025a, 487-489.

Autography: H. Ehelof (KUB 32).

The tablet is peculiar for its small format (ca. 5.5x7.5 cm) and the landscape orientation of writing. Additionally, a passing hole was purposefully drilled in the tablet clearly before writing, as demonstrated by the distribution of signs above and at the sides of the passing hole. Some aspects of content, such as the reference to an oracular inquiry, might explain these peculiarities of the document. The tablet was written in continuity, including the lower and upper edges, but also on one of the short sides, where the text ends.

MS (mh.); diagnostic signs AḪ, AR, DA, DI, IT, (KAT), (ŠAR), TA, URU.

Klinger J. 2010a, 156 also points out A-NA written with “ligature”, and other linguistic and orthographic elements compatible with an early dating (such as the spellings i-e-ez-zi, obv. 8; pé-i-e-mi, obv. 12; pí-iš-ki-ši, l.e. 33) and the use of katta with enclitic possessive -mi (obv. 13, u.e. 28) (ibid. 161).

While the tablet was previously attributed to Mursili II, compelling paleographic, linguistic, and historical-cultural arguments have been put forward in support of its early date to the Early New Kingdom, perhaps even to Tudḫaliya I (Klinger J. 2010a, 162-167; also Beckman G. 2012c, 2; Gilan A. 2019b, 178-179).

If assigned to Tudḫaliya I, the text features a very early reference to the Hurrianized cults imported into central Anatolia from the south, perhaps via Kizzuwatna (see Trameri A. 2025a, §8.5.1).

The presence of a passing hole suggests that another document was attached to the tablet: possibly, more than one tablet was thus brought together as various parts of the oracular procedure (see Beckman G. 2012c, 6).

Note that one of the rare examples of similarly pierced tablets, DAAM 1.31, also dating to the Early New Kingdom (Middle Script), only contains a bird flight report, this time for the case of a little girl who had fallen sick. KUB 32.130 possibly accompanied one such oracular protocol. If the request for the inquiry came with an attached letter, the augurs could re-use the pierced tablet, attaching their response to it and sending both back to the king after the observation.

The proposal of Schwemer D. 2016a, 10-11 that the tablet could be attached to the cage of the birds referred to in l.e. 35, seems less likely because of the standardized formulation, which suggests this sentence introduces an augural report. Moreover, one such example of report “attachment” might exist, as we pointed out (DAAM 1.31).