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MARI

(Akk. Mari)

An ancient city in the middle Euphrates Valley, situated on the bank of the Euphrates and on caravan routes between the East and the West, a crossroads where these cultures intersected and merged. Discovered in 1933, Tell µarīrī has proved to be one of the most important Assyriological discoveries of the 20th century. Investigations led by André Parrot soon identified the city from an inscription on the statue of Lamgi-mari discovered in the palace. Excavations which have continued to the present have yielded additional monumental structures including the Ishtar temple and a ziggurat, as well as murals depicting ritual scenes and a large archive of texts.

History

Mari is first mentioned within a list of cities in a mid-3rd millennium b.c.e. document from Lagash. Mari also appears in an inscription of Sargon of Akkad (2334-2279) as one of the cities captured during his reign. During the 3rd Dynasty of Ur (2112-2004) Mari was a caravan outpost of the city-state, ruled by governors called šakkanakku, subordinate to the rulers of Ur. With the end of the Ur dynasty, political control of the Middle Euphrates region, including Mari, disintegrated.

Though the documentation is not entirely clear, by the late 19th century we can reconstruct an early history of an independent Mari. Yaḫdun-lim, son of Yaggid-lim, came from north of Mari from a group known as the ³ana and united several small principalities, making Mari the center of his political realm. Within a short period, however, the Assyrian king Šamši-addu I (1812-1781) annexed Mari as part of his expanding kingdom. Šamši-addu divided his vast realm between the Tigris and Euphrates between his two sons, placing Išme-dagan I on the throne in Ekallatum in the east and Yasmaḫ-addu in Mari in the west. Letters found in the royal palace at Mari demonstrate that Šamši-addu remained the primary king in the region and regularly gave his sons political advice and counsel, if not direct assistance. Upon the death of Šamši-addu, Išme-dagan inherited his realm and continued to support his brother as a viceroy at Mari.

The Assyrian domination of Mari ended in 1775 when Zimri-lim, son of Yaḫdun-lim, regained control of the throne with the apparent assistance of Yarim-lim, king of the region of Yamḫad W of Mari, whose capital was Aleppo. Zimri-lim reigned at Mari until 1762, when the army of Hammurabi of Babylon captured and destroyed the city. In the process of destruction, the palace of Zimri-lim was burned, firing the clay tablet archives and preserving them for posterity.

Texts

The archive discovered in the palace at Mari contains texts that span almost 500 years, reaching back to the šakkanakku period and the 3rd dynasty of Ur and continuing to the end of the city in the 18th century. The majority of the documents come from the city’s last 50 years under the final two kings, Yasmaḫ-addu and Zimri-lim. Excluding the few texts written in Hurrian and bilingual Sumerian and Akkadian inscriptions, the language of the documents is Akkadian. The Akkadian used is distinctive in that it preserves proper names and vocabulary, as well as syntactical arrangements which are clearly West Semitic in origin.

Internal administrative texts shed light on the daily workings of the palace through records of receipt and disbursement of raw materials as well as disbursement of food for royal banquets. Palace personnel are listed in records of the various types of artisans at work in royal shops within the palace and women in the royal harem. Officials appointed to various duties throughout the realm, who report directly to the king, are indicated in records of disbursement of materials for their support. Lists of disbursement of oil, clothing, and food to priests and prophetic figures indicate the segments of the ancient society which were dependent upon the palace.

Other administrative texts provide information on the external business of the palace. These record royal gifts sent to foreign kings and dignitaries. Other accounts indicate special royal gifts offered to various deities as well as regular cultic offerings. There are also records of the receipt of gifts and taxes coming into the palace at Mari or being received by the king’s representatives at outlying palaces.

By far the most interesting and informative of Mari documents are the letters. These texts exist in the form of communications between individuals, but they contain information concerning the administration of the realm. Letters from royal representatives in distant capitals report their observations on the courts of foreign rulers, as well as communications from the foreign kings.

Letters to the king of Mari from palace officials, royal women of the palace, priests, and various prophetic figures indicate oracular activity in Mari. Information received through extispicy, the reading of divine messages in the entrails of sacrificed animals, ecstatic behavior, and dreams is passed on to the king in letters from a wide range of individuals. Though these documents reveal prophetic activity only as it relates to the king, it is evident that this was a key element in the ancient social structure. The number of women included in this correspondence is indicative of the prominent role of women in the palace at Mari.

Other, more personal, letters reveal private and intimate communications among family members. Beyond political advice received by Yasmaḫ-addu from his father and brother, there are letters which contain personal advice concerning his behavior. Zimri-lim received letters from Šiptum, his primary wife, as well as his daughters and older women in the palace. Whole some of these letters communicate important political and religious information to the king, many are personal familial messages which express concern for his health and well-being.

In addition to administrative and epistolary documents, there are treaty documents between the king of Mari and various allied rulers which provide considerable information on the political relationships of this period.

The importance of all the various types of documents found at Mari cannot be overestimated. It is through the decipherment and careful study of all of these documents that the history of the site has been reconstructed. Moreover, the interpersonal communications contain information about cultural practices and protocols previously unknown, such as the use of the hem of a person’s garment and/or a lock of hair as verification of the message, particularly when the message emanates from a prophet.

Relationship to the Bible

Scholars have long recognized apparent similarities between the culture found at Mari and that of the patriarchs and the kingdom of Israel in the Bible. Their arguments rest on several points. First, there are cultural phenomena at Mari that seem very much like what is found in biblical material. Records of prophetic oracles sent to the king indicate a similarity in the way the people of Mari and of Israel understood the relationship between God and king.

A second point of similarity is in personal names and vocabulary. Names in Mari, such as Sumuʾil and Yaqub-il, have form and meaning similar to names in the Bible. The name of a semi-nomadic group known as the DUMU.MEŠ ia-mi-na has provided interesting possibilities. If read as East Semitic, mārī yamina, the name seems less significant than if read as West Semitic, benê yamina. The homophony with the Hebrew name Benjamin is obvious.

A further point of connection is the biblical presentation of the patriarchs as having a familial connection with the people of this region. In Gen. 24, , when Abraham sent his servant to obtain a wife for Isaac, he sent him to the land where his family dwelt, to Aram-naharaim and the city of Nahor. This recollection, added to the similarity of names and vocabulary, is considered by some as evidence of a genetic connection between the people of ancient Israel and Mari.

Other scholars, however, offer different explanations for these phenomena. Since the rulers and much of the population of ancient Mari were Amorites, a people of West Semitic origin, the linguistic similarities between Mari and the Bible may be attributed to their use of languages from the same language family. Furthermore, since language and culture may be considered inextricably bound together, it is only natural that we should find similarities between cultures using related languages. The common opinion is that the culture of Mari and that of the Bible are both part of the larger group of Western Semites in ancient West Asia and thus hold in common certain terms and usages, even in some cases similarities of custom and cultural practice. Without physical evidence which directly connects the two cultures, the most the linguistic argument can show is that the two are products of a common cultural milieu.

Bibliography. Archives royales de Mari, 1-27 (Paris, 1946-93); A. Malamat, “Prophecy at Mari,” in The Place Is Too Small for Us, ed. R. P. Gordon (Winona Lake, 1995), 50-73; G. D. Young, ed., Mari in Retrospect (Winona Lake, 1992).

Clifford Mark McCormick

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

MARI

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)