Position in chronology
Gudea 086
Translation — scholar edition
ETCSRI(1') ..., the builder Ninĝirsu's E-ninnu, ....
Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Royal Inscriptions — scholar edition (Vienna).
Why it matters
One of the Gudea corpus inscriptions commemorating construction of the E-ninnu temple at Lagaš: a witness to the Sumerian ruler's self-presentation as pious builder rather than military conqueror.
Scholarly note
Sumerian royal inscription, published in the Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Royal Inscriptions (ETCSRI) by Gábor Zólyomi and collaborators. Translation reproduced from the ETCSRI edition. ORACC text Q001518.
Attribution
Image: ROM 975.035.002 (Royal Ontario Museum of Archaeology, Toronto, Ontario, Canada) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.earth/artifacts, P417448). source
Translation excerpted from Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Royal Inscriptions (ETCSRI), University of Vienna, edited by Gábor Zólyomi et al. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/etcsri/Q001518/.
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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The earliest historical document in human history.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.