Amarna letter EA 271

Amarna letter EA 271, titled: "The Power of the 'Apiru,"^[1] is a moderately short, tallish, rectangular clay tablet letter, approximately 3 in wide x 4 in tall, from Milkilu the mayor/ruler of Gazru (Gezer), of the mid 14th century BC Amarna letters.

The Canaanite city-states were visited by the scribes, with short 'status reports' sent to the Pharaoh (King) reporting on city or regional accounts, for example the troubles with the habiru, or other external affairs. Many of the Canaanite letters are short, with some nearly identical phraseology of words, as well as the layout of the individual clay tablet letters. Milkilu authored EA 268 through EA 271. Amarna letter EA 270-(29 lines) is nearly identical in shape to EA 271-(27 lines), with the beginning lines of the obverse, nearly identical in wording, and spacing.

The Amarna letters, about 300, numbered up to EA 382, are a mid 14th century BC, about 1350 BC and 20–25 years later, correspondence. The initial corpus of letters were found at Akhenaten's city Akhetaten, in the floor of the Bureau of Correspondence of Pharaoh; others were later found, adding to the body of letters.

Letter EA 271 (see here [1]; or here: [2]-(EA 271)), is numbered VAT 1531, from the Vorderasiatisches Museum Berlin.