Rear - Line 18

Note

[.... Saturn] was balanced 6 fingers above Mercury and 3 fingers below Venus

In 568 BC, Saturn is never above Mercury whilst being below Venus. In the morning of Day 15 seems to be the closest to what the translators are describing.

	6	six
	SI	Translated as: fingers
	E	above
	GU4.UD	Mercury
	U	Translated as: and
	3	three
	U2	Translated as: fingers? On every other occasion on this tablet it is translated as cubit.

There are several problems, Mercury has a magnitude of +0.6, Saturn's magnitude is +0.3 this means that they were less bright than some stars in the sky. From the moment they rose above the horizon the twilight sky would have been get brighter every minute. Mercury was already not very bright, as it rose higher it would have faded into the brighter twilight sky. The observer wouldn't be able to see Mercury and definitely not Saturn after about 5:35am. Each day earlier, Mercury and Saturn would have been closer to the Sun and therefore even more difficult to see.

Each day that passes Mercury's magnitude becomes brighter making an earlier sighting more difficult

The tablet also indicates that Saturn should be 3 cubits below Venus not 3 fingers as the translation says. This would have had to been observed several days earlier when the conditions would have been harder to see Mercury and Saturn