Position in chronology
CST 555
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P108071.
Transliteration
1(disz) szesz-a-ni szitim iti nesag-ta iti diri-sze3 e2-szitim gub-ba e2 szara2-ka du-[...] ugula i7-pa-e3 kiszib3 lugal-nir mu szu-suen lugal-e na-ru2-a-mah mu-du3 lugal-nir dub-sar dumu ur-[szara2] sza13-dub-ba-ka
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — CST 555. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Šu-Suen y1 — Šu-Suen became king based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.
Attribution
Image: John Rylands Library, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK (P108071) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P108071..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.