Position in chronology
CDLI Literary 000755, ex. 001
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P278456.
Transliteration
[...]-de3# e2 sza-ba-da-an#-[...] [...]-de3# lu2 sza-ba-da-an#-[...] [...]-bi lu2 a-ba-an-dab5# [...]-ra-bal-e [lu2-gu-la a2-disz]-e ga-na-gam-en-de3-[en] [...] he2-em-me-re-a-e11-de3# [...]-in-da-tum3 sa6-ga sza3 szi#-[...] [...]-an#-da-tum3 [...] sza3# am-ga-am3
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Babylonian (ca. 1900-1600 BC)) — CDLI Literary 000755, ex. 001. 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 (P278456) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P278456..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.