Position in chronology
BE 03/1, 050
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P105602.
Transliteration
2(disz) tug2-mah mudra5-bi 5(disz) [ninda] 1(disz) esz2 ma-du3 ki amar-szuba3-ta lu2-du10-ga simug gal szu ba-ti iti gu4-si-su mu [ma2?]-dara3#?-abzu#? x [...]-ne# [x] lugal-he2#-gal2 dumu lugal-ma2-gur8-re# [dam]-gar3#?
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — BE 03/1, 050. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA (P105602) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P105602..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.