Position in chronology
Gudea Statue A
Translation — scholar edition
ETCSRI(shoulder 1) Gudea, ruler of Lagaš, who built the E-ninnu of Ninĝirsu. (statue i 1) For Ninḫursaĝa, the lady who had become one with the city, the mother of all children, his lady, Gudea, ruler of Lagaš, built her temple in the city of Ĝirsu. He fashioned her holy chest, fashioned her lofty throne of ladyhood, and brought them before her into her lofty temple. He transported diorite from the mountains of Magan, fashioned his statue from it, named it for her sake "The lady, who decides the fates in heaven and earth, Nintur, the mother of the gods, has prolonged the life of Gudea, the temple-builder", and brought it before her into the temple.
Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Royal Inscriptions — scholar edition (Vienna).
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 Q001540.
Attribution
Image: .
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/Q001540/.
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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The earliest historical document in human history.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.