Position in chronology
CDLI Literary 000546, ex. 003
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P278772.
Transliteration
lugal#-gu10#-ra u3-na#-[a-du11] szagina# bad3 igi-[hur-sag-ga2] puzur4-nu-musz#-[da] ARAD2-zu na-ab#-[be2-a] lugal-gu10 ku3-sig17#? [...] ugu#?-gu10# [...] dim2-ma-bi# [in-dab5] ki-tusz-bi ga#-[ba-ni-kur2] he2-zu ge6-ta# [...] nam-tag-ni [...] ARAD2 szul-gi lugal-ga2# [...] nu-mu-da-[...] lugal-gu10 he2-en#-[zu] a-ma-ru-kam [...]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Babylonian (ca. 1900-1600 BC)) — CDLI Literary 000546, ex. 003. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA (P278772) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P278772..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.