Position in chronology
HLC 209 (pl. 107)
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P110083.
Transliteration
2(disz) gin2 igi-3(disz)-gal2 1(u) sze ku3-babbar la2-ia3 su-ga ki ur-nun-gal dumu erin-da-ta e2-gal-la ba-an-kux(KWU147) giri3 ur-lamma iti szu-numun mu us2-sa amar-suen lugal
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — HLC 209 (pl. 107). No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Amar-Suen y2 — Year after: Amar-Suen became king based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.
Attribution
Image: Oriental Institute, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA (P110083) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P110083..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.