Position in chronology
AnOr 07, 365
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P101660.
Transliteration
[x] sa gi-zi [gu]-nigin2#-ba 5(disz) sa-ta [sza3]-gal# udu niga-sze3 [gi] SIG7-a [a]-sza3 en-du8#-du# [ugula?] szara2-a-mu [kiszib3 x]-kal#-la [mu] en eridu ba-hun
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — AnOr 07, 365. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Montserrat Museum, Barcelona, Spain (P101660) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P101660..
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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The earliest historical document in human history.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.