PHILOLOGICAL COMMENTARY

Note that Sm 0472+ r 1' and K 06315+ 24' (*22' in If a City 2, 287) are kept separate by Freedman (If a City 2, 286-287, *38.70' and *38.80' respectively). However, their association seems probable for a number of reasons. The most important is that both lines are preceded on their respective manuscripts by a single horizontal ruling (traces of it are still visible on Sm 0472+), which on K 06315+ indicates the end of the thematic section containing the three ḫubibītu-ḫurbabillu-kitturru omens (38.63'-65'), and the beginning of a new section. This is also the first preserved line on the reverse of Sm 0472+, which unlike the excerpt K 06315+, is a standard manuscript (see the introduction). All the preserved protases in the new thematic section concern nammaštu 'swarm'. The space available before the sign traces on Sm 0472+ shows that they belong to the beginning of the protasis. However, the broken sign preceding the unclear E does not look like -tu₄ (nam-maš-tu₄). Perhaps a Status constructus of nammaštu is to be restored in the break, followed by the indication of the swarm's apparition in the man's house. Alternatively, a logographic reading of nammaštu, A.ZA.LU.LU, could be lost in the break.