Position in chronology
En-anatum I 10
Translation — scholar edition
ETCSRI(i 1) When he built the Ebgal for Inana, restored his temple for Nindara, the mighty master, built his temple for Hendursaĝa, built his great temple in Urub for Lugal-Uruba, and built her temple in Saĝub for Ama-ĝeštin-ana, then for Lugal-Uruba, his powerful servant En-ana-tum, ruler of Lagaš, child of Aya-kurgal, ruler of Lagaš, built the great storehouse of Urub. (iii 7) May this (stone boulder) pay obeisance to Lugal-Uruba in the great temple of Urub, for his (En-ana-tum’s) well-being.
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 Q001080.
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/Q001080/.
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.
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.