In ancient Assyrian sources, the phrase "son of a nobody" (Akkadian: mār lā mamman) is used to indicate a king of disreputable origins.
[1] The earliest instance of the phrase occurs in a fragmentary annal of Naram-Sin, who reigned in the 23rd century BCE, where it is used to deride the Gutian king Gula-AN.
[2] Ashur-uballit I, who established the Middle Assyrian Empire in the 14th century BCE, used the term to describe a Kassite usurper installed by the army following the murder of the previous ruler, Kara-ḫardaš.
Dynastic lists from around this time began calling previous usurper kings “sons of a nobody” to indicate their non-royal ancestry,[4][5] which consequently made them unqualified to govern according to the patrilineal principle of legitimacy relied upon by later monarchs.
Usage of the term was not universally negative, however, as Tiglath-Pileser notes the king of Tabal, whom he personally installed, behaves in the way prescribed by Assyrian state ideology in spite of his status as the “son of a nobody”.