Position in chronology
Gudea Statue B
Translation — scholar edition
ETCSRI(i 1) From the temple of his master, 1 sila of beer, 1 sila of bread, half a sila of flour, and half a sila of husked emmer groats are the regular offerings placed before the statue of Gudea, ruler of Lagaš, builder of the E-ninnu. If a ruler revokes this and (thereby) strips (the statue) of the divine powers of Ninĝirsu, then may his regular offerings from the temple of Ninĝirsu be revoked, and may his (statue's) mouth remain closed. (ii 1) When Ninĝirsu had looked favourably upon his city, and chosen Gudea as the true shepherd of the Land, taking him by the hand from among the multitude of…
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 Q001541.
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/Q001541/.
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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The earliest historical document in human history.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.