This impressive tome counting more than a thousand pages is a true treasure-trove for the Hellenistic historian. It collects and edits hundreds of cuneiform ‘chronographic’ texts, which record historical events arranged in chronological order, ‘a registration of historical data’ (1). Among these, one will find lists of kings (Part 5), chronicles (Part 1) and, although not technically a chronographic text, also the last cuneiform royal inscription, the Antiochus Cylinder (Part 6). By far the richest genre, however, are the historical sections of the Astronomical Diaries (parts 2–4). The Diaries are a record of ‘regular observations’ (naṣāru ša ginê) organized in monthly sections, largely dedicated to astronomical data but also including information about the price of basic commodities and the water level of the Euphrates. They also contain detailed descriptions of historical events such as the king’s whereabouts, battles and the movement of troops, festivals and sacrifices, and more. All this historical information was filtered through the eyes of the traditional temple community at Babylon, who produced these texts between the early fourth and late first centuries BCE. With a few exceptions, the exact find context of the tablets remains unknown, for museums bought them on the antiquities markets in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

For the first time, Babylonian Chronographic Texts from the Hellenistic Period gathers all of these documents and provides critical editions, solid translations and extensive commentaries on each of the texts, thus disclosing them in a reliable format to both specialists and non-specialists. The book also contains an extensive glossary of terms and topics, with further references to the existing literature. Because the focus lies on the text editions, most of the discussion sections in the book remain at a surface level, although much of value is hidden in the line-to-line commentaries. This means that in order to get the most out of this work, one should read it cover to cover. As such, this is not a reference work, but a source for (necessary) further research. The book is relatively unwieldy due to its size, and it would have been nice to have it in digital format. Its length also prevented the inclusion of an index of all the texts but note that one is available on my academia.edu page (https://celinedebourse.academia.edu).

Although the exact reasons behind the collection of all this historical data in the chronographic texts remains debated, it is agreed that they contain highly reliable accounts that are moreover securely dated, either in the colophons preserved on the tablets or on the basis of the astronomical information they contain (e.g. Diary no. -319). This makes them a rich dataset for doing Hellenistic political history, fine-tuning the timeline of events and adding to the cast of characters. For example, the Diaries famously provide the exact time of Alexander the Great’s death in the afternoon of 11 June 323 BCE (Diary -322B); the Babylonian King List firmly situates the epoch of the Seleucid Era six years before Seleucus crowned himself king (969); and Diary -273B describes the different actions undertaken by Antiochus I in preparation for the First Syrian War (7). The chronographic texts continue across regime change and give details about the Battle at Gaugamela (e.g. Diary -330; Chronicle 15), the Wars of the Diadochi and the establishment of Seleucid rule (e.g. Chronicles 3–3b, Babylonian King List), and the many struggles during the mid-second century BCE over Babylon’s throne, which the Seleucids eventually lost to the Parthians.

While many such details remain to be discovered in these late cuneiform texts, I believe that they are even more significant as sources for understanding how Hellenistic rule was experienced on the ground. There is no other dataset as rich as the cuneiform record to study empire ‘from below’ and nuance the narrative that was long dictated by the accounts of Classical authors. The texts collected in the volume reveal the world of a community with profound local roots that sought ways to uphold its own traditions in negotiation with a new reality. The mere fact that their authors chose to record the chronographic texts in cuneiform exemplifies this strongly, since Aramaic and Greek were readily available to them too. Two major concerns speak from these records. First, the chronographic texts focus on the interactions of kings and their officials with the Babylonian community, tied to its temple Esagil, framing them in terms of traditional Babylonian kingship. Second, these cuneiform records are replete with details about temple worship, revealing how, despite growing socio-political marginalization, this community continued to position itself as a religious authority in the empire.

Babylonian Chronographic Texts from the Hellenistic Period is an invaluable resource for anyone interested in the Hellenistic world. The high-quality and reliable translations of hundreds of cuneiform texts offer many avenues for future research. As such, the book is bound to significantly influence scholarship for decades to come.