Position in chronology
Trouvaille 89
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P134762.
Transliteration
u4-de3-nig2-saga u3-na-a-du11 1(disz) sila4 mu-kux(DU)-ta suhusz-ki-in he2-na-ab-szum2-mu na-mi-gur-re ab-ba-kal-la dub-sar dumu lu2-nin-gir2-su
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — Trouvaille 89. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Musées royaux d’Art et d’Histoire, Brussels, Belgium (P134762) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P134762..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.