Position in chronology
Hammu-rapi 16
Translation — scholar edition
ETCSRI(1) For Inana of Zabala, the lady whose fearsome radiance covers heaven and earth, his lady. (5) Hammu-rapi, who was appointed by An, who makes himself heard by Enlil, the favourite of Utu, the shepherd who makes Marduk's heart happy, the prince beloved by Inana, the powerful king, king of Babylon, king of Sumer and Akkad, king of the four quarters, the king who renovated all the sanctuaries of the great gods, when Inana, who makes the omens favourable for him, gave him the rule over Sumer and Akkad and entrusted their nose-rope into his hands, then for his beloved Inana, he built the E-zi-kalama, her beloved temple in Zabala, her city of ladyship.
Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Royal Inscriptions — scholar edition (Vienna).
Scholarly note
Sumerian royal inscription, published in the Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Royal Inscriptions (ETCSRI) by Gábor Zólyomi and collaborators. Translation reproduced from the ETCSRI edition. ORACC text Q002192.
Attribution
Image: .
Translation excerpted from Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Royal Inscriptions (ETCSRI), University of Vienna, edited by Gábor Zólyomi et al. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/etcsri/Q002192/.
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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The earliest historical document in human history.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.