of professionals. Subsequently a number of the tablets recovered from Kuyunjik are writ-
ten in Babylonian script.^113 Thus during the reign of Ashurbanipal there appears to have
been a tendency towards the centralisation of the literary corpus and a mixing of scribal
cultures.^114 These are conditions that provide a solid platform from which to launch an
analysis of textual transmission. The texts from Kuyunjik will therefore be critical to our
investigation, and other material will generally be incorporated to add contrast to the pic-
ture that emerges from this particular collection.^115
In addition to the texts from Kuyunjik we can also include texts from other areas in As-
syria and Babylonia. Libraries existed in official and private contexts in many other loca-
tions in Mesopotamia during the first millennium B.C.E., and tablets are included in the
present study from Assur, Babylon, Borsippa, Nimrud, Sippar and Sultantepe. We also
include many tablets whose origins are uncertain and can only be conjectured based on
palaeography and museum catalogue numbers. Notes will be made on the issues sur-
(^113) This includes several copies that will be examined here, including copies of MUL.APIN (K3020;
K3852; K8598; K13254; K15929), and copies of the Venus Tablet (K2321+3032; K3105). S. Parpola, "As-
syrian Library Records," 5-6, found that the number of texts imported from Babylonia, as reflected in the
library records, was somewhere in the vicinity of 2,000 tablets. Considering the number of tablets uncov-
ered at Nineveh this represents “a major acquisition to the library.” 114
Assyrian scribes would presumably have copied texts that were also copied by Babylonian scribes, as
the mixture of Assyrian script and Babylonian script among the copies would seem to suggest. That the
scribal culture of Babylonia was essentially more developed and fruitful than its Assyrian counterpart has
been suggested by A.K. Grayson, "Assyrian Civilization," 227, and this would explain why texts from the
south were specifically sought out for inclusion in Ashurbanipal’s library. 115
U. Jeyes, "Assurbanipal's Bârûtu," Assyrien im Wandel der Zeiten: XXXIXe Rencontre Assyriologique
Internationale, Heidelberg 6-10 Juli, 1992 (eds H. Waetzoldt and H. Hauptmann; Heidelberger Studien
zum Alten Orient 6; Heidelberg: Heidelberger Orientverlag, 1997) 62, has observed that the material repro-
duced in the libraries at Nineveh reflects a relatively accurate copying processes, especially when compared
to the transmission of the same texts in the Late Babylonian period.