Lullaya

Lullaia or Lullaya, inscribed in cuneiform phonetically ^mlu-ul-la-a-a,^{[i 1][i 2]} a hypocoristic name, was the 53rd king of Assyria to be added to the Assyrian King List. He was a “son of a nobody,” i.e. unrelated to a previously monarch, and reigned 6 years, from 1621–1616 BC (middle chronology) or 1599–1594 BC (short chronology), during a period when a rather diminished Assyria was overshadowed by its more powerful neighbor, the Mitanni.^[1] Reade speculates that he may be identified with the earlier king, Aššūr-dugul, on the basis of their similar lengths of reign and lack of royal parentage.^[2]

Biography

He was the last in the sequence of kings omitted from the dissident Assyrian Kinglist known as KAV 14,^{[i 3]} which otherwise provides the only extant sequence of Šamši-Adad I’s later successors, [Mu]t-Aškur and Rīmu[š].^[3] The Synchronistic Kinglist^{[i 4]} gives his Babylonian counterpart as Ayadaragalama of the Sealand Dynasty.^[4] There are no extant inscriptions from Lullaia's or his predecessor's reigns in marked contrast with their Sealand contemporaries.^[1]

He was succeeded by ŠÚ- or Kidin-Ninua, the son of his predecessor, Bāzāiu, for whom he may have acted as regent until reaching his majority as there is no tradition that Lullaia was a usurper.

Inscriptions

1. Khorsabad List, IM 60017 (excavation nos.: DS 828, DS 32-54), ii 22.
2. SDAS List, IM 60484, ii 19.
3. Assyrian Kinglist fragment VAT 9812 = KAV 14: 5.
4. Synchronistic Kinglist, Ass 14616c (KAV 216), I 7’.

References

1. Stephanie Dalley (2009). Babylonian Tablets from the First Sealand Dynasty in the Schoyen Collection. CDL Press. p. 3.
2. Julian Reade (Jan 2001). "Assyrian King-Lists, the Royal Tombs of Ur, and Indus Origins". Journal of Near Eastern Studies 60 (1): 7. doi:10.1086/468883. JSTOR 545577.
3. Jean-Jacques Glassner (2005). Mesopotamian Chronicles. Society of Biblical Literature. p. 88.
4. A. Leo Oppenheim (1969). "Babylonian and Assyrian Historical Texts". In J. B. Pritchard. Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament (ANET). Princeton University Press. p. 273. line feed character in |title= at position 47 (help)