Position in chronology
Gudea Statue P
Translation — scholar edition
ETCSRI(i 1) When Ninĝirsu, the powerful warrior of Enlil, had established a dwelling in the city and established fields and canals on the agricultural land for Ninĝišzida, child of Ninazu, the beloved of the gods, (and when) for Ninĝirsu, his master, Gudea, ruler of Lagaš, the just person who is loved by his personal god, had built his E-ninnu-anzud-babbar and the E-ĝidru, his temple of seven niches, then for Nanše, the mighty lady, his lady, he built her E-sirara, the mountain rising from among the houses, for the great gods of Lagaš he built their temples, (and) for Ninĝišzida, his personal god,…
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 Q001554.
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/Q001554/.
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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The earliest historical document in human history.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.