Position in chronology
Ontario 2, 083
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P209789.
Transliteration
4(asz) sze gur lugal sza3-gal gu4 niga ur-e11-e [...] mu si-mu-ru-um lu-lu-bu-um a-ra2 1(u) la2 1(disz@t)-kam-asz [...] nita kal-ga lugal [uri5-ma] lugal [an-ub-da limmu2-ba] [...] [...] [...] [...]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — Ontario 2, 083. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Royal Ontario Museum of Archaeology, Toronto, Ontario, Canada (P209789) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P209789..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.