On population groups in the documents from the time of the first Sealand dynasty1

This paper deals with the various ethno-linguistic groups which are recorded in the recently published documents from the time of the first Sealand dynasty. This dynasty ruled the Sealand and adjacent regions in southern Babylonia in the middle of the second millennium BCE, i.e., at the end of the Old Babylonian and the beginning of the Middle Babylonian period. Non-indigenous population groups are Elamites, practically from neighbouring Susiana, Kassites from northern Babylonia as well as very few Hurrians and Tilmunites. Some Babylonians apparently originated in northern and eastern Babylonia. The evidence for the presence of these groups is mostly implicit, practically onomastic. The Tetragrammaton is not recorded in these early documents: the final component-ya'u (with variants) in names of the documentation from the time of the first Sealand dynasty is a hypocoristic suffix.