Determining the Outcome of War

In chapter 7, Bahrani continues to talk about omens, but omens specifically related to war. The courses of wars were determined by the answers that diviners received from the gods directly. These questions could be about very general things, such as "will so and so attack us on so and so day?" or very detailed. The detailed questions could ask about what weapons or methods should be used in an attack, such as "should we use battering rams, ramps, etc." or a battle plan could even be drawn up and placed in front of a god along with a sacrificial animal in order to get the god's opinion on the battle plan. However, what all these questions had in common was that they could all be answered by yes or no questions.

The work of the diviners did not end with pre-war consulting; they were taken along to ask more questions of the gods or to interpret signs as they troops marched or over the course of battle, such as if crows are seen as the troops are marching. Sometimes these signs would tell the diviner that the whole army will fall, however Bahrani does not talk about what the course of action for the army would be if it did see an unfavorable sign. Would they turn back and not fight? Would they continue on in hopes of seeing a favorable sign? Would they continue on and accept this fate because it is the will of the gods? Also, on a related issue, if a diviner performed extispicy and was told that the fate of the army and/or king would be unfavorable in a war, would the king have the extispicy redone until a favorable fate was seen? Or would they accept the reading and not go to war/ go to war and accept this fate?

Lastly, the treatment of prisoners of war was very shocking. They were relocated, violently tortured, and their bodies were desecrated. As was seen in chapter 3, the mesopotamians believed that every part of the body represented that person's identity, possibly making this practice very significant. In chapter 6, Bahrani also talks about how images of kings were also desecrated after they died, and they believed that the king still suffered and could feel the pain. Was the practice of the actual bodily mutilation of enemies based on this same idea? Also, what did they hope to achieve by putting these prisoners through such torment? The prisoners themselves would die, and thus they wouldn't e able to go back and tell their people about the torture they endured, and therefore it couldn't be used as a scare tactic. So why was this practiced?