PHILOLOGICAL COMMENTARY

• The signs GÌR ḪUL, read here as šēp lemutti literally ‘foot of evil’, are attested in other omens (CAD Š/2, 307 s.v. šēpu 6b). The ritual šēp lemutti ina bīt amēli parāsu ‘to block the entry of the enemy in someone’s house’ is a multi-day ritual involving the fashioning and purification of protective statues as well as the purification of the house. At the end of the ritual, the statues are buried to protect the house (Wiggermann 1992, 4). The evil described by GÌR.ḪUL can be a general fright or terror, but also has connotations of illness and death and is an evil that “portend[s] the approach of further evil” (Wiggermann 1992, 94).
• For the reading ‘to invade’ for KU₄, see CAD E, 266–67 s.v. erēbu 1f.