Position in chronology
Seal Cylinders 026 05
Translation · reference
ExperimentalSource: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P216665.
Why it matters
Transliteration
szar#-ka3-li2-szar3-ri2 _lugal_ a-ga-de3 tu-da-szar-li-bi2-isz _nin_ i-szar-be-li2 _dub-[sar_] _szabra e2#_-ti-sa ARAD2-sa# en-lil2
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Akkadian (ca. 2340-2200 BC)) — Seal Cylinders 026 05. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Oriental Institute, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA (P216665) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P216665..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.