Position in chronology
Robertson diss. p. 349, CBS 7435
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P262436.
Transliteration
1(barig) sze-am a-na iszkur-e-sar lu2 nin-dingir iszkur dumu-munus lugal giri3 el-li-tum masz iti ki 2(disz) du6-ku3 u4 2(u)-kam mu ki 4(disz) i3-si-in ba-dab-ba
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Babylonian (ca. 1900-1600 BC)) — Robertson diss. p. 349, CBS 7435. 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 (P262436) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P262436..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.