Šulpaʾe (dSul-pa-e)

Definition

Šulpaʾe (cuneiform dSul-pa-e, also dšul.pa.è; literally "brilliant youth," a Sumerian god attested from the Early Dynastic period onward) is one of the older theophoric names under which the planet Jupiter (and, per Brown, occasionally Mercury) appears in the Babylonian omen tradition. Distinct from the dominant Akkadian Sumerogram Sagmegar and the meridian-position epithet Nēberu, Šulpaʾe is the heliacal-rising name — the Marduk-planet at its first eastward appearance.

In Tradition

In Assyriological scholarship Šulpaʾe is treated as a position-conditioned theophoric Jupiter-name within the wider cluster of Jupiter-designations. Brown classes it as a C-name applicable when the Marduk planet (Jupiter and, against the standard view of Black-Green / Gössmann / SAA 8 index, also Mercury) is rising heliacally, citing text 8147:7 for the explicit statement. Reiner and Pingree confirm Šulpaʾe alongside Sagmegar, dAMAR.UD (Marduk), UD.AL.TAR, MUL.BABBAR, Dapinu, and Nēberu in the BPO 4 Jupiter-name inventory.

In Practice

For the student of Babylonian astral religion, Šulpaʾe illustrates how the omen scholars distributed multiple names across one observed planet by sky-position. The BPO 3 Venus-omen corpus contains a cluster (VAT 10218 omens 51-59) in which Venus reaches, comes near, follows, or stands "in balance with" Šulpaʾe, with apodoses concerning floods, high water, and the fate of the king of Amurru; the BPO 4 Group F manuscript K.4052 uses Šulpaʾe as the Jupiter protasis-subject — "If Šulpaʾe stands inside the horn of the Scorpion: rains in the sky" — and the name also appears in Group C's K.10196. The K.148 omen-commentary equates the Yoke, the Ferry (Nebiru), and UD.AL.TAR with Jupiter, locking Šulpaʾe into the multi-name web. Astrolabe B (B:III:23) describes Šulpaʾe as the sukkallu, "herald," of Marduk — a relationship Brown reads as visualizing Jupiter near the eastern horizon and suggesting an older syncretism. Treating Šulpaʾe as merely an alternate Sagmegar misses the heliacal-rising specificity.

Historical Origin

Šulpaʾe is attested from the Early Dynastic period onward as a Sumerian deity; MUL.APIN source D colophon iv 12 supplies "Jupiter (is) Šulpaʾe" (Hunger-Steele 2019, p. 183). The name occurs across BPO 3 (VAT 10218 omens 51-59; LKU 111 Group F) and BPO 4 (K.4052 Group F; K.10196 Group C), and in Brown's Neo-Assyrian Reports survey (texts 8147, 8212 for Jupiter; 8093, 8114 for Mercury). Treatments: Reiner & Pingree, *BPO Part Three* + *Part Four*; Brown (2000).

Further Reading

• Erica Reiner & David Pingree, Babylonian Planetary Omens Part Three
• Erica Reiner & David Pingree, Babylonian Planetary Omens Part Four
• David Brown, Mesopotamian Planetary Astronomy-Astrology
• Hermann Hunger & John Steele, The Babylonian Astronomical Compendium MUL.APIN