Position in chronology
WF 059
Translation · reference
ExperimentalSource: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P011016.
Why it matters
Transliteration
1(iku@c) GAN2 lugal-ezen 1(iku@c) ur-ESZ?-HA 3(iku@c) ur-lamma 3(iku@c) ur-nin-girinx 3(iku@c) e2-kur-pa-e3 1(esze3@c) amar-szuba3 4(iku@c) AN-sag-tuku 3(iku@c) AN-URUDU-si 1(esze3@c) il2 3(iku@c) anzu 1/2(iku@c) a-NI-NI 1/2(iku@c) USZ
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED IIIa (ca. 2600-2500 BC)) — WF 059. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Vorderasiatisches Museum, Berlin, Germany (P011016) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P011016..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.