Position in chronology
Cuneiform Tablet LACMA M.41.5.1b (1 of 2)
Translation · reference
ExperimentalSource: Wikimedia Commons file: File:Cuneiform Tablet LACMA M.41.5.1b (1 of 2).jpg. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ACuneiform_Tablet_LACMA_M.41.5.1b_(1_of_2).jpg. Description: Mesopotamia, circa 2052 B.C. Tablets Clay Gift of Miss Carlotta Mabury (M.41.5.1b) Art of the Ancient Near East
Why it matters
Transliteration
Scholarly note
Tablet image sourced from Wikimedia Commons (Public domain). No scholarly translation referenced in source metadata. Source description: Mesopotamia, circa 2052 B.C. Tablets Clay Gift of Miss Carlotta Mabury (M.41.5.1b) Art of the Ancient Near East
Attribution
Image: Image: http://collections.lacma.org/sites/default/files/remote_images/piction/ma-31272250-O3.jpg Gallery: http://collections.lacma.org/node/228141 archive copy at the Wayback Machine — Wikimedia Commons. source
Translation excerpted from Wikimedia Commons file: File:Cuneiform Tablet LACMA M.41.5.1b (1 of 2).jpg. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3ACuneiform_Tablet_LACMA_M.41.5.1b_(1_of_2).jpg. Description: Mesopotamia, circa 2052 B.C. Tablets Clay Gift of Miss Carlotta Mabury (M.41.5.1b) Art of the Ancient Near East.
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.