| A large animal tribute center by the name of the Office of Puzri-Dagan, which isnow the Drehem site in Iraq, was built by the second term king ulgi of Ur III dynastyat his38thyear’s dominance. In the period of Ur III dynasty, the center royal familyand court officials, the governors and nobles of the cities needed an office to managetheir animal sacrifices, which were frequently offered to the deities. The palace andthe officials of the royal court as well as the soldiers also needed the a large number ofdomestic animals as food. The receiving and withdrawals of the large amount ofanimals required the special accounting office. It was a famous animal manageablecenter in ancient Mesopotamia, and it also occupied a very important place in theeconomy of Ur III dynasty.The work in this paper is to reconstrust the documents of Zubaga, who receivedanimals maily from Abba-sagga, the majordomo of the center. The text of the archiveof Zubaga are listed in the chronological order, and presented in three languages:Sumerians, English and Chinese. From the archive we learn that the career of Zubagalasted from the5thmonth of Year of Amar-S n8to the13thmonth of Year of u-S n1.The duty of Zubaga concerns two aspects: on one hand, he take over the animals fromAbba-sagga, on the other hand, he withdrawn the animals according to different needs,for example, worshipping the deities and kings, giving the animals to the ambassadorsas the gifts, meanwhile, he transfers the dead to ulgi-uru-mu.Through the reconstruction and analysis of the archive of Zubaga, we can clearlysee the basic work of main officials and the administration of the tribute AnimalCenter, and the foundational profession and duty of Zubaga, which contributes toprovide primeval and trustworthy documentary testimony for the research of thetribute Animal Center and the politics, economics, religion and diplomacy of Ur IIIdynasty. It also provides reliable documental foundamentation for studying theelementary social form of Sumerian country. |
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