tablet

Sumerian administration document from the city of PD = Puzri¸s-Dagan. “Livestock from Mari, Ur¸su and Ebla disbursed by Na¸sa. Aradmu is the conveyer.”; ¸su-gid2. Translation: Obv: (1)X full-grown goats (from) I[¸sme]-/Dagan, of the man [of the city of Mari], (2)10 full-grown goats (from) Budur, of the man of the city of Ur¸su, (3)10 full-grown goats (from) Zurium, of the man of the city of Ebla, (4)Aradmu is the conveyer; (5)X cows, 14 sheep,
Rev: (6)X ewes, 4 goats, (7)X she-goats, (8)as a ¸su-gid2-payment(?) for the kitchen; (9)day 9. (10)– (11)Disbursed by Na¸sa; (12)The month of the great festival (ix); (13)The year after the year: The city of Kima¸s was destroyed. (¯S 47).

Ex. case no 7e.
This text documents the paying/delivering of livestock to the city of Puzri¸s-Dagan from the cities of Mari, Ur¸su and Ebla. These three very important cities are found far to the west of the central core of the Ur III state within the borders of modern Syria. The livestock were sent as a ¸su-gid2 to the “kitchen” (e2 muhaldim) of Puzri¸s-Dagan where they most likely were slaughtered and given as food rations to the officials working in city. The question of the true nature of these – undoubtedly wealthy and powerful – states in the west and their relations to each other and to the Ur III state has not been completely solved. According to D.I. Owen, who exhaustively studied the so-called Syrian city states in the Ur III period, the cities in ancient Syria should be regarded as quasi-independent kingdoms. Owen further argues that there is no secure evidence that the kings of the Ur III state exercised any strong authority in the region. This view has recently been questioned by T. Maeda, who considered many Syrian cities as vassal states of the Ur III state. According to Maeda, the use of the Sumerian terms lu2 kig2-gi4-a “envoy” and ensi2 “governor” are to be taken as indicators that a city should be regarded as a vassal state. However, the use of Sumerian terms for officials in foreign cities does not prove that the cities were dependent upon the Ur III state any more than the use of French words in the English language (such as envoy or governor) prove that England is (or has been) a subordinate of France. Nor is it surprising that the Sumerian scribes in Puzri¸s-Dagan were using Sumerian terms for officials in different foreign cities. Other local terms for those officials were probably used within the foreign city states and presumably also used for the Sumerian officials working in the Sumerian cities of the Ur III state.
Still, our text, together with several other similar texts, clearly shows that important cities in ancient Syria were liable to different payments or deliveries to the Ur III state, and this can only be explained if we assume that the Ur III state exercised some kind of influence in the area. The extent of this influence and if we can talk about political control is difficult to determine, especially since important terms such as ¸su-gid2 remain somewhat obscure.
The city of Mari, located along the Euphrates in the east of modern Syria close to the border with Iraq, was of exceptional importance during the third millennium BC with close connections to the pre-Sargonic kings of Ebla. During the Ur III period, the city was no doubt one of the most important in the area, with fertile soil combined with water from both the Euphrates and the Habur which greatly extended the acreage which could be irrigated. With its river port, the city could collect taxes on all the goods which passed along the Euphrates between Lower Mesopotamia and ancient Syria with its Mediterranean and Anatolian contacts. Moreover, it was the head of the desert route that connected Upper Mesopotamia to the important city states in southern Syria. The French archaeologists – who have been continuously excavating the city since 1933 – have uncovered more than 20,000 Old Babylonian letters and administrative texts, for which the city is best known today.
The exact location of the northeast Syrian city Ur¸su is not completely certain. Ur¸su, well known also from later Old Babylonian or Assyrian texts, is mentioned as an important station in the Euphrates valley between A¸s¸sur and the Old Assyrian trading center of Kani¸s in Anatolia. As an important center in the Ur III period, it was closely connected to Halab (modern Aleppo), Ebla (Tell Mardikh) as well as to the Hurrian empire.
The famous economic and administrative center of Ebla was located in the fertile plain of northern Syria about 55 kilometers southwest of Halab. In spite of the fact that the city undoubtedly was an important