Position in chronology
Tutub 31
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P217287.
Transliteration
2(asz@c)# _sila4_ 4(asz@c) _udu_ 2(asz@c) _masz2_ _e3-a_ 2(asz@c) _udu_ 1(asz@c) _masz2 ga_ 3(asz@c) _masz2 u2#_ 3(asz@c) _sila4_ _mu#-kux(DU)_ me-eh-ru _dub-sar# lugal_
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Akkadian (ca. 2340-2200 BC)) — Tutub 31. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Oriental Institute, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA (P217287) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P217287..
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.
A window into the world's first total state. The Ur III administration tracked every animal, every worker, every shekel — for a population in the millions. The level of paperwork was not exceeded until the modern era.