'"
New Evidence on the Last Days of Ugarit
MICHAEL C. ASTOUR
In the thirteenth century n.c. Ug3ri1 was a popu­
lous and prosperous city, one of the largest and
richest capii.als of the ancient Near East. The felici-
1ous policy of one of its earlier kings, Niqmnd II,
who had joined the Hittite alliance and recognized
the overlordship of the great king of Hatti, brought
about a considerable territorial increase of the
Ugaritic domain at the expense of the vanquished
Mukish.' Niqmad's successors remained loyal to
the great Anatolian power. As attested in the rec­
ords of Ramses II and co�fumed by a recently dis­
covered war report from a Ugaritic commander,
the army of Ugarit played an important role in the
Hitto-Egyptian war that culminated in the battle
of Qadesh in 1299.' Soon afterward, the two rival
empires peacefully settled their con8ict and agreed
on spheres of domination. Ugarit easily took ad­
vant3gc of the long period of relative peace in the
last century of the Bronze Age in Srria.
The kingdom of Ugarit possessed many prereq­
uisites for an extraordin>ry economic upsurge: a
vast, fertile, and thickly rettled territory producing
grain, oil, wine, wool, flax, and valuable kinds of
lumber; a long sea-coast with at lc3st three ports,•
not counting the ha.rbor of Ugarit itself; and a most
advantageous geographical situation at the com­
mercial crossroads of the ancient world. Ugarit was
a thriving industrial center, manufacturing and
exporting fabrics and garmcncs of wool and linen,
which were dyed in various shades of expensive
purple, as well as in more popularly priced mad­
der;' its artists cxcdled in producing ornamented
vessels of bronze and gold; and its swordsmiths
supplied Eg)'pt with long bronze swords inscriW
witl1 the cartouchcs of the reigning Pharaoh.'
Ugaritic merchant ships carried the highly valued
• Tbi.s pap<:r was recd .u 6� M«litcrran�an Studies C'.ol­
loquium, B,andeis Univmity, (,Jt December 10, 1963.
1 Noogayrol, PRU IV, RS 17.237, 17.340, 13.62, 17.339A,
17.366, and p. 14: present au,1.or, JNES » (1963) 1361.
2 RS 20.33 (unpubli$hcd), rcponed bf Nouga}•rol, CRAI
(1957) Sof, and Jr,q 15 (Aut,mo 1963) 119!; Drwud, AR
m, \309.
• i\n,lig (Virollc>ud, PRU V, No. 56 = RS 18.119, 1-2);
Gib'ala (PRU JV, RS 17.335:i9, mod. DjcbtJch), :lncl Himulli
"in the midn of the tCJ'' (RS 1i.62:1,; 20.13, unpublhhe!d, ace
CRAI (i957] 77), th.at is, on th� Pigeon h�nd north ol Ugarit.
Mycenaean ceramics from Kaphtor to their home
city,' and made it possible to distribute them all
over Syria. They traveled all along the shore, visit­
ing the cities of Phoenicia, Palestine, and Egypt,'
as well as the neighboring island of Alashia-C)'prus.
On land, Ugaritic caravans reached the heart of
Anatolia.' Large groups of merchants from Egypt,
Ass)'ria, Alashia, the Cilician city of Ura, Beirut,
Ashdod, and other places came to Ugarit, or cs•
tablished emporia and enclaves there. The enor­
mous dimensions of the Ugaritic rO)'al palace bear
witness 10 the vast resources of the kingdom.•
High material prosperity was paralleled by a re­
markably flourishing cultural life. In addition to
tltc unique lot of West Semitic literary texts dating
from the Amarna Age, unearthed during the first
campaigns at Ras Shamra, more recent excavations
of this seemingly inexhaustible site have revealed a
great number of new religious and mythological
tablets in the Ugaritic language. Even from the
scant)' information disclosed so far by Virollcaud,
Nougayrol, and Schaeffer, it appears that the publi­
cation of these tcxcs will open a new chapter in the
study of U garitie literntwe. According to the latest
discoveries, not only palaces and temples, but evm
private houses contained collections of literary,
scholarly, and lexicographical tablet.� in Ugaritic,
Akkadian, and occasionally in Hurrian.10 National
and eth.n.ic problems evidently did not trouble Uga­
rit. Its West Semitic and Hurrian inhabitants were
completely integrated within the realm's social struc­
ture. The fclici1ous feature of polytheistic religions
-their aptitude for syncretism and absorption­
precluded any religious discord. Canaanite, Su­
mero-Akkadian, and Hu.rrian deities figure peace­
fully together on lists of offerings.
t On -1he Lauer, d, PRU V, N'o. 51 (RS 19.56): 5•6: 1,,m.
mot. kbd. p1vJ, whe1e /'IVI l$ Heb. pu,vw4, Aiab. /t1;v�
''dycr'5 madder," followed by £mn, maJ, P£tm "6vc: hundred
(uniu) of linen."
f Sch:tc:ffcr, Ugarilit:11 If{, 169-171.
• PR.U IV, lS 16.238 1 on a ,ihip of ll rich Ugaritic mc:n:.ha11t
rcturnint from m•tk_aplrNi.
'E.g. PRU V, RS 18.31.
8 PRU IV, RS 17.59, 17.383.
'Sducllu, CM/ (195s) 251.
10 Nougayrol, CRAI (1960) 163-171; (1961) 232-236.
254 1':IJCHAEL C. ASTOUR
Most, if not all, of the newly discovered texts
belong to the late thirteenth century. Ugaritic in­
tcllectuals proudly looked back at the cemury-old
history of their city, and one of them inscribed
the reverse side of a m ythologieal text with a list
of all the Ugaritic kings going back 10 the early
second millennium." The last entry, judging by
the context, was the name of Ammurapi ('mrpi)­
nnd he actually was to be the Inst king of Ugnrit.
It was under this Ammurapi that the city of Ugarit
was so completely destroyed that it was never re­
built, but was abandoned and forgotten (or more
than thirty-one centuries. It is common doctrine
that any civilization must pass through the stages
of rise, crest, and decline, before suffering its ulti­
mate fall; but such a scheme docs not apply to
Ugarit. No decay whatsoever, either material or
spiritual, can be observed in Ugarit on the eve of
its destruction. The city fell at the height of its
vitality, suddenly, as the result of a terrible caw.s­
trophe-the more terrible because it was not a
natural disaster, but was wrought by human hands,
the more colossal because Ugarit shared its doom
with Hanushash, Tarsus, Carchcmish, Alalah, Qa1-
na, Qadesh, Hazor, Lachish, and many other an.
cient cities. Stratigraphical data prove that the Late
Bronie Age in Syria and J\J1atolia came to an end
in a single historical catastrophe, and the identity of
its authors is established by the records of Pharaoh
Ramses III. We still follow the lead of his Medinet
Habu inscriptions'·' in calling these invaders the
Peoples of the Sea. They include this highly rele­
vant 11assage:
uThc fordJ,'ll countries made a conspiracy in their
islands. R,movtd and scattered in the fray were the
lands at one time. No land could stand before their
arms from Hatti, Qadi, Carchcrnish, Arzawa, and
J\lnshia on, (but they were) cut off at I.one time].
A c.1mp was set up in one place in Amurru. They
desolated its people, and its land was like that which
has never come into being. They were coming, while
the Rame was prepared before them, forward toward
Egypt. Their confederation was the Pursata, Tjika­
ra, Shakarusha, Dauuna, and Washasha lands
united. They laid their hands upon the lands 10
11 S(h.;ieftcr, A/0 ao (1·963) :u5,
12 W. P. Edgerton and J. A. Wil�on, Hi11oriNtl R.Cf"'Ord1 o/
Ram.set Ill, The Texis of Mcdir,,:J Hahu, 2 vols. (Chic.go 1936).
u Op.rit. ,o; ANI:, T 262. TI1 e n.ame, of the Sea People,: uc
...
vocaliud here according to the system of W. F. Albright (A/A
54 (1950) 170),
u I owe my acquainunce with the l'foof, of this volume to
[AJA 69
the (very) circuit of the earth, their hcartS con­
fident and trusting: 'Our plans will succeed I' "13
This text still remains the on!y consistent narra­
t ive about the events of that stormy time, but it is
no longer the sole piece of contemporary written
evidence. The excavations at Ras Sharnra have
revealed documents in Akkadian and Ugaritic
which belong to the very last years of Ugarit's
existence. The alphabetic texts of the 18th and 19tl1
campaigns are published by Ch. Virolleaud in
Le palais royal d'Ugarit, volume V, recently pub­
lished (1965)." The ones most relevant to our in­
quiry belong to the lot found in an oven for bak­
ing tablets-the first implement of this kind ever
discovered. All the tnblcts o( this lot arc incoming
letters. How did they get into the oven? We are
obviously not dealing with originals, but with lo­
cally made U garitic translations, similar to those
discovered earlier." Two letters written by Ugaritic
officers may be the originals, delivered unbaked
and put into the oven for better prcser1•ation. The
royal chancellery, it is quite clear, continued its
routine work, even though the dispatches &om the
war front were alarming. Tbe very fact that the
palace employees had no time to take these tablets
from the oven to the archives is eloquent testimony
to the suddenness of the final catastrophe. The
letter PRU V, No. 114 (RS 19.11 ), and two leners
&om the 16th campaign, RS 16 -402 and 16.379,
published in PRU II as Nos. 12 and 13 respectively,
probably refer to the same events.
The Akkadian letters of t!1e 20th campaign are to
be published by Nougayrol in Ugaritira V. Part
of them arc known from the expositions and partial
translations in this scholar's report to the French
J\cadcmy of Inscriptions." For this preliminary
survey we must satisfy ourselves with the pub­
lished glimpses of information. The letter RS 20.-
21z, sent by the Hiuitc court to a late thirtee11th­
oentury Ugari1ic king (whose name, unfortunately,
rus not been preserved), is highly significant for
our understanding of Ugarit's in1crna1ional role in
the last years of its existence. Although the king
of Ugarit (according to the Hittite digniwy) was
solemnly relieved of every "service," he is nevcn.he-
rhe kindness of Pro(�or C. JI. G-Ordon, and the prnni ;:.iion 10
u�e them for the prCKnt pdpcr, t·o that of Pwleuor Ch, Virol,
lc11ud,
u E.g. S!1u1)pHuHuma's letter lo Niqm:id 11 (UM 118).
16 CRAl (196o) 163-171; now al�o in "Cucne ct p:.ix i
lTg..uit."' 1r11q 2, (Autumn 1963) 1Jo•123.
1965) NEW EVTDENCF. ON THE LAST DAYS OF UGARlT
less obliged occasionally to "listen and execute"
what he is told-but he has not been doing this,
and the situation must change. (We thus learn that
by the end of the thirteenth century Ug;irit was
only nominally a vassal of Hatti.) Now the king
of Hatti demands tlm the king of Ugnrit furnish a
ship and crew to traniport 2,000 measures of grain
from the neighboring Mukish to the Hittite port of
Urn (in Western Cilicia), and the :,uthor of the let­
ter repeats several times that this is a matter of life
or death, let the king of Ugarit not linger! It is
known that during a severe famine in the l latti­
land, Pharaoh Mernephtah sent ships with grain.17
Was this lctter eonncctal with the same distress, or
was it a Inter one? Another detail is very interest•
ing: the letter specific; that a single large ship
would be sufficient, and that such a vessel would
be able to transport the enlire load in one, or at
most, two trips. As remarked by Nougayrol,'' the
cargo was evideotly coumed in the regular unit of
grain measure, kor, c,ich kor conL1ining 300 qa,
or approximately 300 liters. Thus the ship's total
capacity was about 6,000 hectoliters, or 450 metric
tons, an unexpectedly J,igh, but by no means im­
probable, figure.
Alashia (Cyprus) was another country which
Ugarit supplied with f<«I, but &om Ugarit's own
resources. Nougayrol's forthcoming publication in­
cludes a letter from the king of Alashia to Am­
murapi, king of Ug;irit (No.23 = RSL , ), and the
=
latter's answer to it (No. 24 RS 20.:238). The
king of Ugarit styles the king of Alashia "my fath­
er," a very unusual formula in correspondence
between kin1,,s of CCJual rank, since Ugarit was in
no way subject to A.la1hia-both kingdoms were,
at least formally, vassals of Hatti." Could it be that
the king of Alashia was A.mmurapi's maternal
=
uncle or grandfather? Now, one of the tablets from
the oven (PRU V, No. 61 RS 18.147) ls tl,c
Ugaritic translation of a letter from a certain Pg11
who addresses the king of Ugarit, i.e. Animurapi,
"my son." This concurrence of terminology makes
it possible to suppose 1.hat Pgn is the very s;1mc
11 Brc:utcd, AR Ill, §sJ 8.
"Cl/Al (1960) 165.
u Mnuwand,uh Ill cl:limc:I thu Al:uhi� w�s under Hinite
royal overlorclihip, bul tht, claim w.u noc univcmilly reeog­
nized (d. A. Goetze, Modd1,11,a11/U, §Js•), Under his brother
:ant.I tuCC:C$:.Ot Sbuppilullu1111 II, howcvtr, Alashi:a w:11 ictu.ally
conquered by H:iui :ind became a uibu!.iry, as shown by the
rt-et.ntly clii,tovc:rcd 8oghaz.kby 1:1blct Kllo XU 38, ob"cnc I
(Heinrich Otten, ''Ncue Quclbn zum Auskbog dr., Hcthiti�chen
25S
king of Alashia whom Ammurapi calls "my father."
The essential part of Pgn's letter, after the standard
introductory formulas, runs as follows:
kr,lik, bny Since my son sent me
/�1. ak l, 'my
(10) a tablet of food,"
midy tv ghny'• there is plenty and abun­
dance witl1 me,
rv. bny. hnk1 and let my son in the
same way
yJ/(n (,) Qll)>l equip a sea-ship,
ym. ysrr? strengthen (?) (it)
"'· ak[l? ..... ] and foo[ d.. ........)
[...] 1 [.....J
However, Ammurapi', answer to the king of
Alashia deals with much niorc alarming events.
"My father," wiites Ammurapi, "behold, the ene­
my's ships came (here); niy cities (?) were burned,
and they did evil things in my country. Does not
my father know that all my troops and chariots(?)
are in the Hittite coumry, and all my ships arc in
the land of Lycia? ...Thus, the country is aban­
doned to itself. May my father know it: the seven
ships of the enemy thal came here inAictcd much
domage upon us." He asks the king of Alashia to
inform him if other ships of the enemy were no­
ticed,
We are in the presence of the first stage nf the
Sea Peoples' invasion. The main forces of the
enemy arc still in the Aegean, but their intentions
arc known, and the king of Ugarit, instead of pas­
sively waiting for their arrival, attempts 'to oppose
tl1eir offensive at its very start. I !is entire Beet soils
westward to Lycia to defend the passage from the
Aegean to the Mediterranean maio, while all of
his lanchroops join the Hittite army in on eJTort
to stop the aggression in the western marches of
the empire. Meanwhile, small flotillas of the in­
vaders take advanrage of the situation to n1tack the
unprotected coast of the Ugaritic kingdom. A letter
to the king of Ugari\ from Eshuwara, Grand Su.
pcrvisor of AJashin (Nougayrol's No. 22 = RS 20.
t8), states that some of the king's subjects, who
Reid.,,,.. MDOG 94 (1963] 13f).
to We believe that ib,i is to be: under�tood .u an .ihstract in
4r, of the Heb. root '1ib II, whence ',fl, ''thick, ,. knst," Atnb.
iRNJ "thickness, dentit)·."
11 Compare Bottiro, ARM Vil, ,i8, n. ,, where the upre$•
tion }11 1 bi/111 k,u-pim tup•f<Nim is cxpl:iincd :u .1 check upon
whose reteipt one t:tlcnt of sih•cr ihouhl be paid to th: he.1:rer.
.Slmilarly, /ljs okl might ha,·e been ;i docutucnt to the ctr«r
that food should be delivered to the addrcsice.
256 MICHAEL C. ASTOUR [AJA 69
stopped at Alashia with their ships, surrendered a d bsrt. 111. ank which thou lackest
flotilla 10 the enemy. -I will
How large was the Ugaritic navy in those fateful a1tn. I. iby providt for my
daysl A letter from the oven (PRU V, No. 62 = brother,
RS 18.1 48) was written to the king by one Yd», w. ap. ank, m11111 and I too, whatever
who cailed himself ngr bwtk "the guardian of thy f (I],[, )1. 111. uby I l[a]ck-my
life" and 'bd mlk, "king's servant." He urges the brother
king: tiknn bm1m I m[i]1 any "equip a hundred (20) (y]'m111.1mn will load it there.
and fifty ships."" This would clearly be a rein­ w.[u?)by. al yb'rn And let my brother
foroemcnt of the existing navy. A hundred and not squander itl
fifty ships is a very considerable number. Accord,
ing to Herodotus (8.1.14), the entire fleet of the Ammurapi addresses the king of Alashia as "my
Greek coalition which met the Persian invasion in fothcr." He would hardly hove written in a tone
48o n.c. numbered 324 triremes and 9 fifty-oar slJ.ip,;, of equality to his northeastern neighbor, the Hittite
of which 200 triremes were provided by the Atheni­ dynast of Carehemish. It is, therefore,possible that
ans. Tbe Ugaritic ships of the thirteemh century the other pnrty in this agreement was his southern
should, of course, be compared with the earlier neighbor, the king of Amurru.
type of Greek war vessels, the pentecomers or fifty• Another tablet from the oven (PRU V, No. 6o =
oar ships, rather than the later triremes.The strong­ RS 18.38) is the Ugaritic translation of a letter writ­
est Gre.�k sea-power of the sixth oemury was S•­ ten to Ammurapi by "The Sun, thy lord," that is,
mos, whose tyrant Polycrates "bad a fleet of a hun­ by the king of Hatti. 'm Jps kll midm Jim "with
dred pcnteconters, and bowmen to the number of The Sun, everything is very well,'' announces the
a thousand. Herewith he plundered all, without standard introductory formula which is bitterly
distinction of friend or foe.... He captured many contradicted by what is said in the la11cr part of
of the islands, and several 1owns upon the main­ the letter:
land" (Herodotus 3.39, Rawlinson's transla1ion).
If we turn farther bock, to the nge when the 1/iad (31) ib. '/In. a(...] y the enemy [ advances I)
was being composed, we find in the C1talogue c,f against us
the Ships that the largest imaginable naval con­ (µ) w.spr.in [ ..]'(l)dm and there is no mun­
tingent from a single sme was the hundred sbi1:s bcr [ ...].
from Mycenae (Iliad 2.576). Accordingly, the sea• (33) sprn. /fir [.•...) our number is pure(/)
forces of Ugarit were superior to the naval resourt(S [ l
of any state in pre-classical Greece." (34 ) •!'· if. bq! whatever is available,
One of the tablets from the oven (PRU V, No. look fo,· it
=
65 RS 18.75) shows that tbe Syrian rulers were (35) 111.1111. ly and send it to me.
hastily concluding treaties of mutual assistance. We This the king of Ugnrit did,for the Ugaritic army
do not know who was the other party to the treaty fought in the Anatolian theater of war,as we know
because the obverse of the 1.able1 is virtually obliter­ from the letter to the king of• Alashia quoted above.
ated, but the reverse reads as follows:
Another letter from the oven (PRU V, No. 63 =
inm. 'bdk hwt ... when" thy servant RS tS.40) is a dispatch from the Ugaritic com­
delivered (?) mander on the northern front whoS< name was
[y?)rJ. 'my. (thy) word to me, Shiptibaal:
(15) m»m. irJtk, Whatever is thy de- I. m/k, b'(/Jy To the kind, my l(o]rd,
sire r g m say:
12 In line 61 'prm arc meotLoncd outtidc :iny context. J{ tbc Shu1,piluliumu. JJ, thriGc ddcatcd cnCnl)' ,hips cotnin,g U<>m
word is uall)· to be te:ic.J in this way (the ayin in thei e tCXIS Alashu (KBo XJJ 38, tC"VCJJc ill, tramlitcr:uion and translation
is n_ry similar to 3 gimtl, ,o that it may hoe b«n ,,,,,.,, = by Heinrich Otten, MDOG 94 ( 1963) ,oQ. Tbc nnly way to
tdpltrlm, trees for ship construction), it p0$sibly rdc.rs not to make lhis record consi.ucnt with the contemporary Ugarit.C
the lhbiru, bu1 10 "n1, •1I crew,"-tg)•pri11n 'pr. It may be dn111 p,cscnt'ing Ab.,bia II ao ally of Ugttit (11.r.d, accordingly,
noc:ed tl\a1 another word from Upiitie naval terminology, bt, of Hatti), is to accept Otten'$ vic.w that the ships in question
is ol El)'pti3n 01ia:ln (UM ho,351). belonged not to tl1e kiosdom of Aluhia but to che Peoples ol
111 Ug4'ntie ships must ccrtainl}1 b.ne formed the bulk of th
:: the Sea who had tempo�til)• taken hold of lht iii.and.
Hittite Recr which, according to o. rc«>rd of chc last Hittite kin.r, 2' inm is probably Akkadizln ,-n11ma,
196S] NEW 1,VIDENCE ON THE LAST DAYS OF UGARIT 2S7

tbm !Pfb('I] Message of Shiptibaal a lengthy letter (PRU II, No. 12 -·- RS 16.402)
[']bd( kl (thy s)c:rva[nt.J written by Ewir..Sharruma (lwr-f_rm") to his "La­
dy" (adty), who apparently was the mother of the
(5) (i.p J'n. b'ly To the feet of my lord
Ugaritic king. The first part of the letter is very
[sb'Jd. Jb'[d ] seven times (and) seven badly damaged, but line 10 is clear enough: ]p. h11.
times ib. ti. b. mglb "and, behold, the enemy who is in
[mr] f,qtm from afar
Mugishhc,"" and so are the lines 15-17, of which
qlt I fall. only the latter parts arc extant:
'bdk. b. Thy servant in
(15) ( .....).IV. ap. an k . .. and I, too,
( 10) ltvsnd Lawasanda
[y ]b1r. (16) [.....J.l.gr.amn ... to Mount Amanus
fortified [ hisJ positions (17 ) [••.••). ktt. hn. ib ...behold, the enemy
'm[. ]mlk with the king.
destroyed
tu, l,t And behold,
mlk, syr" tlie king retreated, Ewir-Sharruma worries about tbc two thousand
(15) ns. 111. !Ill ncd, and there horses (a/pm IStum) which the king entrusted to
ydb b he sacrificed him. He would be glad to deliver them to whom­
ml g ml[ k?) ever the kiJJg would scud for that purpose.Two
tu. m"/d( ]!/y thousand horses is a very impressive number, cor­
y( l ( rest incom p rehensible) responding to a thousand chariots.In the Amarna
Age, the forces of the smnll city-kings of Phoenicia
The clue to the meaning of the letter is the word and Palestine were rarely larger tl1an thirty or
in line 10, ltvsnd, unexplained by the publisher. fifty chariots. Only much later, in the ninth cen­
This is the nnmc of a city in the land of Kizzu­ tury n.c., could the more important rulers of Syria
watna which the Hittites called Laivazantiya and muster greater numbers of chariots and cavalrymen.
which, according to the Hittite story of the siege In 853, Ben-Hadad of Damascus mustered 1,200
of Urshu under Hattushilish I, lay between the chariots and 1,200 horsemen in tbe battle of Qar­
Antitaurus and the upper Euphrates, that is, far in qar, while Irhulcni of Hammh commanded only
the east of the Hittite Empire." Many centuries 'JOO chariots and 700 horsemen, and the strongest
later, in the Annals 0£ Shalrnancser III, the same contiJlgent of chariots, 2,000 of them, was provided
name appears as "1L11sanda, but chis city was clearly by Ahab of Israel."
situated w Eastern Cilieia, not far &om Mount Ewir-Sharruma wrote to the "Lady," because tbe
Amanus." le docs ooc set.m possible that the two king of Ugarit was nlso absent from his capital:
documents rdc:r to one and the same city, although he was moving somewhere (, , .s'. h11. mlk, I.8),
the name is certainly the same in both cases. It was he spent the night somewhere (.k. ybt. mlk, I. r4).
probably transferred 10 the Cilician city during the Ewir..Sbarruma's letter is tragic:
brief period of Kizzuwatoa's rule in Eastern Cilicia.
In the Ugarilic letter, Lawasanda i.s rather the Cili­ (27) '"· hn. ibm. J1q ly and, behold, the enemies
cinn city of this name. Therefore, Virolleaud's res­ oppress me,
p /!! Y
toration of line 11- [1u.] b µ--"and in Tyre"-is (28) . /. aJI. I but I shall not leave my
eliminated, and the missing first letter should be wife (and)
restored as y, giving [y] b1r "he fortified." The (29) n'ry . .!_h. I pn. ib my children .. . before
king referred to by Shiptibaal could only be the the enemy.
kwg of Hatti himself. The most important thing we learn from this
Thus, the united armies of Hatti and Ugnrit letter is that the enemy had already crossed the
retreated all the way to the Syrian border.All of Amanus and was now in Mukish-immediately
Anatolia had already been lost nlmo>t up to the north of Ugarit. The only enemi• to whom this
Amanus. The name of this mountain apf>Cars in could possibly refer is the Peoples of the Sea.We
25 ,yr, from the root 1/,r "rc:1·,eat, rurn awa)'," similaf'i1)' of the signs w 11.nd r in U,raritic n:ript,
:it Set rekrenecs i.u my Jlellcno1cmitict1 (E. J. UriJI, 1965) 211 The identity of MaJb with Mul(,iJ. Mukil!Je, Mugi} was
301!. tint ,ccoani:tcd in /NES ll (1963) 237.
111 Fuad S.tfar, "A f'urther 'l'c.xt of Sb2lma1kser Ill &om 10 Shalma.ncscr Ill's MonoJitb Jnsc;ription, >•�r 6; tr.Jnsl.34
Anur" (Sumtr 7 (19,1] 12-, rv:2-2.•34), rion ANET :nSf.
u Actuall� • written IN'•f!rm, a mi.stake ca� b)' the dose
258 MICHAEL C. ASTOUR [AJA 69
do not know of any other invasion of Mukish by I. b'r is sacked (or: burned),"
forces hostile to Ugarit. The offensive of Shuppi­ (ro) ap. krm m and also the vineyards
luliuma against Mukish in 1366 was made in con­ IJlq :ire destroyed.
cert with the Ugru-itic l<lng Niqmnd II. The Egyp­ (Edge) qrtn. lJlq Our city is destroyed,
tians and the Assyrians never reached as far to the 111. d'. ,r and mayst thou know itl
northwest as Mukish in their wars against Hat.ti.
This report may well refer to one of the earlier
PRU II, No. 13 = RS 16-379 is a letter of a Ugt­
plundering incursions of enemy's ships, similar to
ritic king/. mlkt, u[m ]y "to the Queen, my moth­
the one described in the letter to the king of Ala­
er," wt.:. is undoubtedly identical with the "wdy"
shia quoted above. If, however, we multiply it by
(ad1) c.f Ewir-Sharruma's letter since both letters
several hundred, we get an image of what hap­
were found in the {:(ntral Archives, at the same
pened to the entire territory of the kingdom after
depth. Evidently at the head of an army detach­
its navy and army were defeated in a long cam­
ment far from me capital, the king writes to his
paign, and the defenseless country was overrun by
mother after the usual greetings:
the Peoples of the Sea. The inhabitants of the
(16) tu hm. IJt And if tl1e Hittites capital were either massacred or tl,cy fled, never to
(17) '/. rv. likt mount, I will send n mes- return. Many houses were not eveo burned or
sage violently destroyed, but were abandoned by their
(18) 'mk- ,v. /1111 to thee, and if tenants and fell into decay." Some of the de­
(19) /.'/. w. lakm, they do not mount, I will stroyed cities-as Tarsus or Cnrchemish-wcre re­
certain!y send built after the invasion, others were not. Ugarit was
(20) ilak, w. al. a message. And thou, among the latter.
(11) "'''Y· a/.Jd/1l(l) my mother, be not afraid" The data of the Ugaritie texts bearing on the in­
(22) w. ap. mhkm and do not put vasion of the Peoples of dtc Sen are scru-ce; in par­
(23) b. lbk_. al. worries into thy ticular, we could wish that they contained the eth­
(24) el, heart. nic names of these peoples spelled in the Ugaritic
The l:ing appnrently occupied a position on some alphabet, contributing to o better identification of
heights, perhaps in the mountains of Arnanus, and their Egyptian transcriptions.•• But, despite this
hoped that the ru-rival of Hittite troops might scarcity of data, the texts arc very signifi cant. From
strengthen his resistance. Nothing, however, could them we learn about the cru-lier phases of the 1,>reat
change the situation. A brief letter to a certain invasion, before the invaders clashed wkh the Egyp­
Zrdn (or perhaps Grdn) by one who calls the tians and were repelled. A not unimportant cause
addressee "my lord" (PRU V, No. n4 = RS 19.11) of this defeat were the Sea Peoples' previous losses
does 11« be long 10 tl1e lot found in the oven, but in the fight against the retreating, but still resist­
it sheds light on me fate of the Ugaritic territory ing, armies of Hatti and Ugarit. As Pushkin said
in thos, days: about the invasion of Spain by the Moors: 'The
I. t(?)rdn To Z(l)rdn, Goths fell not without glory: valiantly did they
b'ly. rgm my lord, say: fight." In these letters, written in the lire and ten.
sion of the events, we feel the breath of immediacy,
bn. IJrnk, mgy thy messenger arrived and our impression from reading them is similar
(5) hb1. h ,,, The degraded one" to that which we gain from reading the Lachish
brd. w. JI hw trembles,'' and the low one" ostraca from the final days of Judah's resistance to
qr'(/) is torn 10 pieces." Nebuchadnezzar.
ak!n. b. grne Our food in the threshing
floors BRAND'EIS UNJVER.SITY

st ViroDcaud emends thui from tdl,,! in the c..blct, and e>·­ thil'lk of Heb. It,,/ "lowest hem of :1: gaib," A.'2b, 1Ru,ila "to
plaim by llcb. ,pl II. h11ns down loou. 1
'

s, Ith! :::: Ar�b. ho/xi/a ''lo lower, to diminish" (Vitollc.aud;. 30 Vitollc;hid: Heb. qarU',1,
11S !;rd U connce1cd by Vi,oll�wl wlth the Ug:uitic no,m H Virolte1ud compares /. b'r to /tb4·Cr lSll_�h 5:5 (RSV:
brti th:11c m1)' mc:ao "tr<'asu.ry," thence his tr:1n�J:11ti,,n: "1'hc: '"it �hall be dci·oured").
poor one became rich," We would think of llcb. 64t•d "t> "Sc:hacaei, A/0 lO (19(ij) lo61f.
tremble,'' t\rab, 6,uidu "to be i;hy." 15 E,t)'ptbn Ii-�11,ra c.nn corre,pond ln at lc�$t six Wcrl
•• fl is derived by Virolfe1lhl fMm llcb. /iil4, Ug;ir. J/111 Stmitic l!arulitc-rations: Zit,/, Ski, $/i./; Zkr, Sk_;, $1(r-.
"ro be pe1..:cful": "and the wise one ii miser.able." We woul:I