Position in chronology
Clay tablet. Dimensions of the Temples of Esagila and Ezida at Babylon. From Babylon, Iraq. 8th-7th century BCE. Vorderasiatisches Museum, Berlin
Translation · reference
ExperimentalSource: Wikimedia Commons file: File:Clay tablet. Dimensions of the Temples of Esagila and Ezida at Babylon. From Babylon, Iraq. 8th-7th century BCE. Vorderasiatisches Museum, Berlin.jpg. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AClay_tablet._Dimensions_of_the_Temples_of_Esagila_and_Ezida_at_Babylon._From_Babylon%2C_Iraq._8th-7th_century_BCE._Vorderasiatisches_Museum%2C_Berlin.jpg. Description: Clay tablet. Dimensions of the Temples of Esagila and Ezida at Babylon. From Babylon, Iraq. 8th-7th century BCE. Vorderasiatisches Museum, Berlin.
Why it matters
Transliteration
Scholarly note
Tablet image sourced from Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0). No scholarly translation referenced in source metadata. Source description: Clay tablet. Dimensions of the Temples of Esagila and Ezida at Babylon. From Babylon, Iraq. 8th-7th century BCE. Vorderasiatisches Museum, Berlin.
Attribution
Image: Osama Shukir Muhammed Amin FRCP(Glasg) — Wikimedia Commons. source
Translation excerpted from Wikimedia Commons file: File:Clay tablet. Dimensions of the Temples of Esagila and Ezida at Babylon. From Babylon, Iraq. 8th-7th century BCE. Vorderasiatisches Museum, Berlin.jpg. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3AClay_tablet._Dimensions_of_the_Temples_of_Esagila_and_Ezida_at_Babylon._From_Babylon%2C_Iraq._8th-7th_century_BCE._Vorderasiatisches_Museum%2C_Berlin.jpg. Description: Clay tablet. Dimensions of the Temples of Esagila and Ezida at Babylon. From Babylon, Iraq. 8th-7th century BCE. Vorderasiatisches Museum, Berlin..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.