Position in chronology
Robertson diss. p. 338, UM 29-15-946
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P256583.
Transliteration
1(asz) gur sze-bi nu-ur2-utu ad-da mar-tu 1(asz) BAD ka2-nin-urta da-bi-a-am giri3 el-li-tum masz [...] x udu-me [...] kasz-de2-a [...] e?-ne [...] x x 2(ban2)# sza3-gal ansze en-lil2 u3 nin-urta 2(barig) sza3-gal ansze-edin-na giri3 u-bar-utu 5(ban2) igi-kar2 utu-zi-mu iti du6-ku3 u4 7(disz)-kam mu us2-sa i3-si-in ba-dab-ba
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Babylonian (ca. 1900-1600 BC)) — Robertson diss. p. 338, UM 29-15-946. 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 (P256583) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P256583..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.