Prof. Scott B.Noegel ..

Chair, Dept. of Near Eastern Languages and CivilizationUniversity of Washington

Book note:Ritner, Robert Kriech. The Mechanics of Ancient Egyptian Magical Practice.Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilization, No. 54. Oriental Institute of theUniversity of Chicago, 1993.

First Published in:Religious Studies Review 22/1 (1996), 55.

Volume 22. r\um her 1 / January 1996

'1Son Ugaritic and numerous examples fromt.--par3ti\'e Semitics. A useful addition 10 theliterature on Ugaritic.

Da~'idI. OwenCOrru!/IUnil'UsityIthaca. NY /4853-2502

DIE AGYPTISCH-HETHITISCHE KOR-RESPOSDENZ AUS 'BOGHAZKc.">I INBABYLONISCHER UND HETHITISCHESPRACHE I: UMSCHRIFTEN UNDiJBERSETZUNGEN.By Elrnar Edcl. Abhan-dlungend~rRheinisch-WestfalischenAkademieder Wissenschaften. 77. Wiesbaden: Har-rassowitz Verlag. 1994.pp. 240; platcs. illustra-tions. DM 98. ISBN 3-531-05111-3.DIE AGYPTISCH-HETHITISCHE KOR-RESPONDENZ AUS BOGHAZKOI INBABYLONISCHER UND HETHITISCHESPRACHE II: KOMMENT AR. By Elmar&leI. Abhandlungen der Rheinisch-WestflUis-chen Akadcmie dcr Wissenschaften. 77. Wies-baden: Harrassowitz Verlag. 1994. pp. 382; fol-douts. DM 128. ISBN 3-531-05112-1.

For many years Elmar Edel has been theprimary interpreter of the Hittite-Egyptian corre-spondence. In this magisterial. definitive two-volUfT1epublication are complcte editions of 113'..tsi and fragments excavated by H. Winkler

cen 1906-1912 and by K. Bittel and others~the Second World War. After a brief intro-

', tion on the natUre of the archives is a sum-

mary of the Amama period correspondence writ-ten in Babylonian between the Hittites andEgyptians. The bulk of the slUdy consists of anintricate analysis of the letters from the reignsofRamses II and Hattllsili III continuing throughthe period of the latter's successors. TudhaliyaIV and Suppiluliama. In particular. the corre-Spondencewith Urhitduh and the planned mar-riage betwcen Hatusili's daughter and Ramses 11are discussed in great detail. Chronological andhistorical problems are taken up. linguistic issuesare analyzed. and many other topics are elabo-rated upon. All related texts in Hittite and Hurro-Akkadian are included as are comprehensive in-dexes of personal and divine names and wordsdiscussed. Meticulous transliterations; transla-

tions. collations and copies make up volume 11.Scholarship at its very best and beautifully pub-lished. Belongs in every library dealing with thehistory and culture of the Near East.

David I. OK'enCornell Unj\'ersio'Ithaca, NY 14853'.2502

THE MECHANICS OF ANCIENT EGYP-

TIAN MAGICAL PRACTICE. By RobertKriech Ritner. Studies in Ancient Oriental Civi-H":uion. 54. Chicago: Oriental Institute of the

versity of Chicago. 1993. Pp. xviii + 322.'>.

fhe first comprehensive discussion of the~chanics of Egyptian magic to date anda veri-

~Ie mine of information for the specialist andInterestedcomparativist. Collects the numerous

~

primary and secondary sources and synthesizesthem into a cogent and interesting analysis. Ad-dresses the"actual pract ice of themagicians." butalso "the wider question of the interpenctrationof magic. religion. and medicine." Examines themeaning of the numerous and diverse magicalvocabulary before approaching the more me-chanical aspects-spitting. licking. swallowing.burying. and burning. Also analyzes the "boundprisoncr motif:' ext'Cration practices. letters 10the dead. the Mirgissa deposit. private versusstate magic. the roles of priests and practitioners.and evidence for the ami iation of Demotic magicwith more ancient ext'Cration procedures. Recog-nizes the "imagistic" natUreof ritual acts whichrenderconcrete their intangible aspirations:'"Theeffectivenessof 'magical' words and names mustbe understood within the same continuum. thepictorial character of the Egyptian script...add-ing a further bond between the written word andobject which it embodies:The exhaustive bibli-ography and indexes alone make this a worthypurchase. It fascinates and informs and will notbe.supersededfor some time to come.

0 Scott B.NoegdCornell UnivusityIthaca, NY 14853-2502

THE SEAL IMPRESSIONS (TEXT). By Di-ana Stein. Das Archiv des Silwa-te~~up.Heft 8.Wiesbaden: Harrassowttz Verlag. 1993. pp. x +282; plates. N.p.. ISBN 3-4-J7-03200-6.THE SEAL IMPRESSIONS (CAT A-LOGUE). By Diana Stein. Das Archiv desSilwa-te~up.Heft 9. Wiesbaden:HarrassowitzVerlag.1993.Pp. vii + 588: illustrations.tables.N.p..ISBN 3-447-03317-7.

The ancient town of Nuzi in northeastern Iraqhas yielded well o\"er 5.000 texts evidencing itseconomic and social life around 1400 BC. These

documents were often sealed: anengraved. stonecylinder would be rolled over the wet clay of thetablet leaving in its wake an impression contain-ing artistic depictions and sometimes accompa-nied by an inscription. In 1947, the late EdithPorada published a masterful study of hundredsof these images in her Seal Impressions of Nuzi(AASOR 24). Stein's two-volume study of an-other group of these seal impressions is a superbsuccessor. The seal impressions come fromdocuments belonging to an important local bu-reaucrat whose large suburban villa was both aresidence and production center (e.g.. textilemanufacture). StUdy includes. in the first vol-ume. a general introduction to Nuzi. a descriptionof the archive. an essay on how and why thesedocuments were sealed. a taxonomy of seal de-signs, assorted indices. and drawings and photo-graphs of the seal impressions themselves. Thesecond. larger. volume is a three-part.catalogue:brief descriptions of all relevant tablets; for eachseal impression studied. a drawing. technicaldata. and discussion: and genealogical and otherchronological tables pertaining to those whoused theseseals. A must for libraries dealing withthe economic history of the Late Bronze Age in

RelJ.g.ious StudIes RL it.."w / 55

theNcarEast and for art historiansof this timcand region.

Maynard P. MaidmanYork Uni\'ers;o'. nNorth York. Ontario M31 IP3 CANADA u

, ,~

ARCHIVES BEFORE WRITI:'>iG: PRO-CEEDINGS OF THE P.oiTER~ATIONALCOLLOQUIUM ORIOLO RO~L-\i'iA, OC-TOBER 23-25, 1991. Edited by Picra Fenoli.Enrica Fiandra. Gian Giacomo Fissore. and Mar-cella Frdgipane. Pubblicazioni dcgli archivi distato. Pubblicazioni del Centro Imcrnazionah: diRecherche Archeologiche Antropologiche e Sto-riche, Roma. Torino: Scriptorium and Ministeroper i Beni Culturali e Ambientali Uflicio Cen-trale per i Beni Archivistici. 1994. pp. 416; illus-trations. Lira 100.000. ISBN 88-86231-11.32.

Studies by various specialists on early writ-ing. seals and sealings, and archival history. Thechronological scope ranges from neolithic Meso-potamia and the use of tokens (Schmandt-Besserat) to the late Bronze Age Aegean(Palaima) and even to modem Lybia (Hallaq).Geographically, the articles span the re-gion-Iran (Amiel). Anatolia (Esin. Frangipane,Weingarten). Crete (Palaima. Poursat, Wein-garten). Aegean (Aruz). Lybia (Hallaq) and theSudan (Liverani). Contributions on archivalstUdies by Fiandra, Pittman. Rothman. Lodolini.and Tambl~ round out the volume. Transcripts ofresponses and discussions make the text particu-larly lively. A significant contribution and shouldbe read widely by those interested in the historyof writing in the ancient Near Eastern and Medi-terranean world.

David I. OwenCornell UniversityIthaca. NY 14853-2502 ;t

MITTELASSYRISCHE RECHTSURKUN-

DEN UND VERW AL TUNGSTEXTE III ByHelmut Freydank. 92. Wissenschaftliche Vert!f-fentlichung der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft(=WVDOG]. Berlin: Gebr. Mann Verlag, 1994.pp. 32; plates. N.p..ISBN 3-7861-1746-2.

After the reunification of Germany and thereorganization of the Staatlichen Museen zu Ber-lin. the series VorderasiatischeSchriftdenkmiilerwas closed and its planned volumes were in-cluded in the WVDOG series.This volume is thethird of a series (previous two appeared as vol-umes 19(1976] and 21 [1982] in VS)oflegal andadministrative texts from Assur prepared by H.Freydank. Opens with a description of the publi-cation history by E. Klengel and J. Renger. whichis followed by a brief forward by Freydarik. Adescriptive catalogue of the 89 texts copied forthe volume. a concordance of museum and pub-lication numbers. and fifty pages of very care-fully prepared copies complete this importantcontribution. After many decades Assur contin-ues to yield its written sources which add signifi-cant new data on institutions. prosopography,law. society. and economy for mid-second mil-lennia Mesopotamia.