Adad-guppi

649–547 b.c.e.

Queen Mother

Sources

The Secret to Longevity. In her funeral stele, Adad-guppi claimed to have lived 104 years. During that time, she witnessed the fall of the Assyrian Empire and the establishment of a Babylonian Empire by Nabopolassar (625–605 b.c.e.) and Nebuchadnezzar II (604–562 b.c.e.). The wife of Nabu-balassu-iqbi, a “learned counselor,” she lived long enough to see her son Nabonidus (555–539 b.c.e.) sit on the Babylonian throne, after the murderous intrigues that cut short the lives of Nebuchadnezzar’s immediate successors. Her inscription, found on the bottom of a paving step at the north entrance to the Great Mosque in Harran in Syria, was originally her funeral stele, which stood in the E-hulhul, the temple dedicated to the moon god Sin. In the inscription, written in the first person, she attributed her longevity to her piety and simple lifestyle: “I am Adad-guppi, the mother of Nabonidus, king of Babylon, who worships Sin, Ningal, Nusku and Sadarnunna, my personal gods, whose godheads I have constantly sought after since my youth.… In order to satisfy my (personal) god and goddess, I did not put on fine wool clothing, nor jewels, nor silver and gold, nor a new garment, nor would I anoint myself with perfumes and sweet oil. I wore a torn garment. My clothing was sackcloth. …”

Sources

Paul-Alain Beaulieu, The Reign of Nabonidus King of Babylon 556–539 B.C., Yale Near Eastern Researches, 10 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1989).