Position in chronology
Cuneiform Foundation Tablet (4695995469)
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: Wikimedia Commons file: File:Cuneiform Foundation Tablet (4695995469).jpg. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ACuneiform_Foundation_Tablet_(4695995469).jpg. Description: Achaemenid Period (ca. 550 - 330 BCE) In the museum at Persepolis, Iran. A translation of the text appears in the next photo.
Scholarly note
Tablet image sourced from Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0). No scholarly translation referenced in source metadata. Source description: Achaemenid Period (ca. 550 - 330 BCE) In the museum at Persepolis, Iran. A translation of the text appears in the next photo.
Attribution
Image: A.Davey from Portland, Oregon, EE UU — Wikimedia Commons. source
Translation excerpted from Wikimedia Commons file: File:Cuneiform Foundation Tablet (4695995469).jpg. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ACuneiform_Foundation_Tablet_(4695995469).jpg. Description: Achaemenid Period (ca. 550 - 330 BCE) In the museum at Persepolis, Iran. A translation of the text appears in the next photo..
Related tablets
Related sources
One of the earliest specimens of human writing. Not literature, not law — accounting. The need to keep track of grain in a temple bureaucracy is what pushed marks-on-clay into a system that could one day carry epics.
Marks the boundary between proto-writing and writing. We can see signs being used systematically — but not yet phonetically. The leap to recording speech itself comes a few centuries later.
The earliest historical document in human history. Before this, we have lists, accounts, and dedications. Here, for the first time, a ruler tells us what happened — with names, places, and consequences.