Position in chronology
Šamši-Adad IV 3
Translation — scholar edition
RIAo(1') [...] ... [... had become] dilapidated. Two (monumental) lions on right and left [...] (3') [When the ...] of the goddess Ištar, my lady, becomes old and [dilapidated], may [a future ruler] restore it. (5') [As for the one who does not restore it], may [(the god) Aššur and the goddess Ištar] overthrow [his kingship and make] his name and [his] seed [disappear from his land]. (6'b) [Month ..., ...th day, eponymy of Š]amšī-Adad (IV), king of Assyria.
Royal Inscriptions of Assyria online — scholar edition (ORACC / MOCCI).
Why it matters
Dedicates a restored shrine to Ištar and threatens divine destruction of any future king who neglects it — an early Assyrian formula binding successors to temple maintenance under penalty of dynastic annihilation.
Transliteration
[...] x x [...] x / [... e-na]-aḫ 2 UR.MAḪ.MEŠ ša ZAG u GÙB / [...] x diš₈-tár NIN-ia ú-šal-ba-ru-⸢ma⸣ / [...] x a-na áš-ri-šu lu-ter x [x] / [... LUGAL-su] ⸢lis⸣-ki-pu MU-šu ù NUMUN-[šu] / [i-na KUR-šu lu-ḫal-li-qu ITI.... UD ... li-mu m]⸢šam⸣-ši-dIŠKUR MAN KUR [AŠ]
Scholarly note
Royal inscription of an Assyrian king, published in the Royal Inscriptions of Assyria online project (RIAo). Translation reproduced from the ORACC edition. ORACC text Q006003.
Attribution
Image: BM 123468 (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/artifacts, P422547). source
Translation excerpted from Royal Inscriptions of Assyria online (RIAo), Munich Open-access Cuneiform Corpus Initiative (MOCCI), Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München; in association with the RINAP Project, University of Pennsylvania. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/riao/Q006003/.
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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The earliest historical document in human history.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.