PHILOLOGICAL COMMENTARY

A possible restoration of the protasis is 'If a cricket in a man's house is frequently calling (…)'. If correct, 38.31'-33' would reflect the structure of the triad 38.51'-53'.

As can be seen from lexical attestations, as well as its description in omens 38.31'-38.36', lallaru is clearly an insect belonging to, or similar to, the order Orthoptera (e.g., crickets, locusts, katydids, cicadas, grasshoppers, etc.). Akkadian and Sumerian have many different words for the various types of orthoptera (see, e.g., Ura = ḫubullu 14, 227ff., and the commentary to 38.37' and 38.50'), and it is very difficult to distinguish between them, not least because they are relatively rarely attested. The lallaru-insect, is found only lexically and in the omens edited here. As such, in the translation, the Akkadian word is preserved. The only distinguishing characteristic of lallaru specifically is that it was noisy. Its name literally means 'wailer' (CAD L, 48 s.v. lallaru), and at least two (32' and 33') of the six omens dealing with the insect are concerned with its 'repeated calls'. Many orthopterans are loud, however, and each of those dealt with in the present chapter (see the commentary to 38.37' and 38.50') also has omens concerning their 'repeated calls'. As such, there is no way to identify the lallaru-cricket more closely. The lallaru-cricket is not to be confused with lallartu 'a kind of bee' (CAD L, 48 s.v. lallaru), the name of which presumably derives from LÀL 'honey', though perhaps the drone of the bee also influenced the name lallartu, literally meaning 'female wailer'.