Position in chronology
CST 523
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P108039.
Transliteration
pisan-dub-ba sze gesz-e3-a GAN2-gu4 apin-la2 u3 nig2-ka9-ak ARAD2 ka-guru7 mu us2-sa e2 puzur4-da-gan ba-du3 i3-gal2
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — CST 523. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: John Rylands Library, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK (P108039) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P108039..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.