Conformity and Creativity: The Structure of the Elephantine Marriage Contracts

Keith L. Eades

Discussions of the Aramaic marriage contracts from Elephantine regularly note the differences in the number and order of paragraphs addressing contingencies that the future could hold for the marriage partners. Treatments of the schemata of the contracts have been organized around the contents of the paragraphs of the contracts rather than on the literary forms given to the contracts by the scribes. An examination of the grammar and syntax of the three best preserved marriage contracts (Cowley 15, Kraeling 2 and 7) and the more fragmentary remains of other marriage contracts demonstrates that while the contracts differ in their microstructures, they exhibit a uniform macrostructure. A single scribe could and did order similar paragraphs differently at the microstructural level in different contracts (Cowley 15 and Kraeling 2). In fact, the differing order of similar paragraphs, instead of appearing haphazard, in each case evidences careful consideration on the part of the scribe.

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