Position in chronology
CDLI Literary 000634, ex. 002
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P269682.
Transliteration
[...]-mu# e2-a [...] [...]-gin7# sila4 he2-em-tum2 he2-tum2 [nin9]-mu# e2#-a ga-mu-u8-da-tum2#-[tum2] [...] masz2# he2-em-tum2 he2-[tum2] nin9#-mu e2-a ga-mu-u8-da#-[tum2-tum2] u8-gin7 sila4-sa6-sa6#-[...] nin9-mu e2-a ga-mu-u8-[da-tum2-tum2] ud5-gin7 masz2-gun3-gun3#?-[...] nin9#-mu e2-a ga-[...] [...]-da#-lam gaba-[...] [...]-da#-lam gal4-[...]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Babylonian (ca. 1900-1600 BC)) — CDLI Literary 000634, ex. 002. 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 (P269682) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P269682..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.