Volumes of the Chicago Assyrian Dictionary

Chicago Assyrian Dictionary

Project Type Research Project
Status Active
Field Domain Lexicography
Time Period Antiquity
Regions Middle East, Iraq

Overview

Launched in 1921, the Chicago Assyrian Dictionary is one of ISAC’s landmark research projects. Over ninety years, scholars at the University of Chicago and around the world worked to document Akkadian, the earliest known Semitic language, written in cuneiform on clay tablets and other objects from ancient Mesopotamia and its neighbors.

The completed dictionary records Akkadian vocabulary across dialects and historical phases, from the third millennium BC into the first centuries AD. Its entries bring together spellings, meanings, grammar, and examples from thousands of ancient texts, making the CAD essential for studying Mesopotamian culture.

Today, ISAC continues this work by transforming the CAD into a searchable, connected digital resource. Learn more on the Chicago Assyrian Dictionary website.

CAD Logo

dNisaba za₃-mi₂ "Nisaba, praise" 

Martha Roth with CAD

Martha Roth with CAD

A. Leo Oppenheim and Erica Reiner working on the CAD

A. Leo Oppenheim and Erica Reiner working on the CAD

Miguel Civil in the CAD

Miguel Civil in the CAD

Cards from the CAD files

Cards from the CAD files

Support the Chicago Assyrian Dictionary

Help the Chicago Assyrian Dictionary usher a century of scholarship on the Akkadian language into the twenty-first century.

Support the CAD

ISAC Publications

By the numbers

The CAD’s scale is extraordinary: tens of thousands of Akkadian words, millions of references, and more than 11,000 pages of scholarship built over nearly a century. Together, these numbers represent far more than a dictionary—they reflect one of the great collaborative achievements in the study of the ancient world.

21

Volumes

28K+

Words

11K+

Pages

2M+

References

Behind every number is a century of scholarship: words collected, references checked, meanings debated, and ancient texts brought into conversation with the modern world.

The Chicago Assyrian Dictionary Team

The Chicago Assyrian Dictionary has always been a collective achievement. Today’s CAD team carries forward a century-long tradition of Assyriological collaboration, editorial rigor, and philological care, making the dictionary’s legacy accessible to new generations of readers, researchers, and students.

Former Editors-in-Charge

The former Editors-in-Charge shaped the Chicago Assyrian Dictionary across generations, guiding its transformation from a vast collection of citation cards into one of the defining scholarly achievements of Assyriology. Their work established the editorial principles, intellectual scope, and collaborative standards that continue to guide the CAD today

The dictionary’s importance can’t possibly be overestimated. It opens up for study the richest span of cuneiform writing.

Jerrold Cooper Professor Emeritus in Semitic languages at Johns Hopkins University

ISAC Publications

Select Publications

Articles

Conferences and Symposia

Funding, Supporters, and Collaborators

  • Yelda Family

  • University of Chicago AI Pillar

  • National Endowment for the Humanities

  • Research Computing Center