Kuttamuwa

Kuttamuwa was an 8th-century BC royal official from Aramean city Sam'al who ordered an inscribed stele, that was to be erected upon his death. The inscription in Aramaic requested that his mourners commemorate his life and his afterlife with feasts "for my soul that is in this stele". It is one of the earliest references to a soul as a separate entity from the body. The 800-pound basalt stele is three feet tall and two feet wide. It was uncovered in the third season of excavations by the Neubauer Expedition of the Oriental Institute in Chicago, Illinois.[1] The official publication was by Dennis Pardee, “A New Aramaic Inscription from Zincirli.” Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research, no. 356, 2009, pp. 51–71

References

"Found: An Ancient Monument to the Soul". New York Times. November 17, 2008. Retrieved 2008-11-18. In a mountainous kingdom in what is now southeastern Turkey, there lived in the eighth century B.C. a royal official, Kuttamuwa, who oversaw the completion of an inscribed stone monument, or stele, to be erected upon his death. The words instructed mourners to commemorate his life and afterlife with feasts “for my soul that is in this stele.”

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[1] "Found: An Ancient Monument to the Soul". New York Times. November 17, 2008. Retrieved 2008-11-18. In a mountainous kingdom in what is now southeastern Turkey, there lived in the eighth century B.C. a royal official, Kuttamuwa, who oversaw the completion of an inscribed stone monument, or stele, to be erected upon his death. The words instructed mourners to commemorate his life and afterlife with feasts “for my soul that is in this stele.”