Abstract

In this article we publish two silver balanced accounts from Umma, very different from those till now known. They record amounts of silver received by the Fiscal Office of Umma, but only a part of this silver was used to meet Umma administration’s needs, while the large majority of it was transferred to the capitals of the empire, to Ur or to Nippur. The silver amounts which constitute the “capital” of the two accounts derive from almost every type of economic activity: duty for the produce of the most various goods, sale of cattle and sheep, payment of arrears, merchants’ contribution, tax for the irrigation. In their expenditure section regular and exceptional withdrawals are registered. The former ones concern offerings for feasts in Ur, Umma and Nippur; the latter ones refer to very important events, as the death of Šu-Sîn and the coronation of Ibbi-Sîn.

The two balanced accounts are to be assigned to two years in succession, respectively the ninth year of Šu-Sîn and the first of his successor, so that a gap of the former text, that is the total of its expenditures, can be filled on the basis of the surplus of the withdrawals of the preceding year, registered in the latter account. Unfortunately, in both the tablets the name of the official responsible of the silver deliveries is lost. But it is possible to advance the hypothesis that he was Ur-eˀe, the head of the administration of Apisal, and, consequently, that the silver allotted to the Fiscal Office of Umma was the annual income of this district.