Position in chronology
UET 3, 1363
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P137688.
Transliteration
1(bur3) GAN2 sahar? a-sza3 szul-gi-re-pa3-da 2(esze3) 3(iku) GAN2 sahar? a-sza3 gesz-gi-gal 4(gesz2) 4(u) sar [...] a-sza3 du6-[...] 2(gesz2) 5(u) [...] a-sza3 edin masz [...] szunigin 2(bur3) 1(iku) 1/2(iku) GAN2 sahar e2 zi-zi e2 da-da gala mu e2 szara2 umma ba-du3
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — UET 3, 1363. 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 (P137688) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P137688..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.