Position in chronology
HS 2256
Translation · reference
ExperimentalSource: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P235951.
Why it matters
Transliteration
2(disz) gu4 niga 7(disz) gu4 u2 2(gesz2) 1(u) udu 1(gesz2) la2 3(disz) x# mu-kux(DU) lugal ki na-ra-am-i3-li2-ta i3-tu-ru-um ensi2 kuara2 i3-dab5 iti szah2-ku3-gu7 mu dumu-munus lugal ensi2 an-sza-an-ke4 ba-an-tuku
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — HS 2256. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Iddin-Dagan y3 — Royal daughter married to the governor of Anšan based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.
Attribution
Image: Hilprecht Collection, University of Jena, Germany (P235951) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P235951..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.