KM 89325

~2080 BCE·Ur III · Neo-Sumerian·P235071

Translation · reference

Experimental

Source: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P235071.

Why it matters

Transliteration

1(disz) udu
ba-usz2 u4 1(u)-kam
sza3 tum-ma-al
ki en-dingir-mu-ta
szul-gi-iri-mu
szu ba-ti
iti ezem-szul-gi
mu en nanna ba-hun

Scholarly note

Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — KM 89325. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Šulgi y15 — The en-priest of Nanna was installed based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.

Attribution

Image: Kelsey Museum of Archaeology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA (P235071) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P235071..

Related tablets

Related sources

~3200 BCE

Proto-Cuneiform Account Tablet

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.

~3500 BCE

Kish Tablet

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.

~2450 BCE

Stele of the Vultures

The earliest historical document in human history.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.