# Sumerian > A scholarly reconstruction of the history of Mesopotamia, sourced from primary cuneiform tablets. Every claim is anchored to a tablet — visible inline with transliteration, translation, and scholarly notes. ## About the project Built and maintained by an independent French citizen, no academic affiliation, no funding. Translations are drawn from established scholarly sources (Roth, George, ETCSL, RIME) where available, and AI-assisted (Claude API) elsewhere with explicit confidence indicators. Photograph integration is multimodal: the engine examines tablet images directly and cross-checks the transliteration. - [About](http://localhost:3001/about) - [The translation engine — how it works](http://localhost:3001/engine) ## Sections - [Chronology — full timeline](http://localhost:3001/timeline) - [Themes — six thematic axes](http://localhost:3001/themes) - [All tablets — sortable catalog](http://localhost:3001/tablets) ## Periods (12) - [Ubaid (5500–4000 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/period/ubaid): Before writing — the first villages, the first temples. - [Uruk Period (4000–3100 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/period/uruk): The birth of the city, the birth of writing. - [Early Dynastic (2900–2334 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/period/early-dynastic): City-states, kings, the first wars. - [Akkadian Empire (2334–2154 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/period/akkadian): The world's first empire under Sargon. - [Ur III · Neo-Sumerian (2112–2004 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/period/ur-iii): A bureaucratic golden age, the Code of Ur-Nammu. - [Old Babylonian (2000–1600 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/period/old-babylonian): Hammurabi, the Epic of Gilgamesh, mathematics. - [Old Assyrian (2000–1700 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/period/old-assyrian): Aššur the merchant city — the great trade with Anatolia. - [Middle Babylonian (1600–1155 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/period/middle-babylonian): The Kassite kings, international diplomacy. - [Middle Assyrian (1400–1077 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/period/middle-assyrian): Aššur's first imperial expansion. - [Neo-Assyrian (911–609 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/period/neo-assyrian): Empire, library, terror, scholarship. - [Neo-Babylonian (626–539 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/period/neo-babylonian): Nebuchadnezzar, exile, late astronomy. - [Achaemenid Persian (539–330 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/period/achaemenid): Persian rule, the long twilight of cuneiform. ## Themes (6) - [Mythology](http://localhost:3001/themes/mythology): Gods, heroes, the flood, the underworld. - [Law](http://localhost:3001/themes/law): Codes, contracts, justice. - [Economy](http://localhost:3001/themes/economy): Grain, silver, ledgers, trade. - [Astronomy & Mathematics](http://localhost:3001/themes/astronomy): Stars, omens, base-60, geometry. - [Daily Life](http://localhost:3001/themes/life): Letters, recipes, schools, complaints. - [Writing & Literature](http://localhost:3001/themes/writing): From accounting marks to the Gilgamesh epic. ## Tablets (11) - [Proto-Cuneiform Account Tablet (~3200 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/uruk/3200-bce/writing/uruk-iv-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 … - [Kish Tablet (~3500 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/uruk/3500-bce/writing/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. - [Stele of the Vultures (~2450 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/early-dynastic/2450-bce/law/stele-of-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 consequence… - [Code of Ur-Nammu (~2100 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/ur-iii/2100-bce/law/code-ur-nammu): The oldest surviving law code in human history. The principle that the state — not the wronged family — defines and enforces justice begins here. - [Drehem Cattle-Distribution Tablet (~2050 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/ur-iii/2050-bce/economy/drehem-cattle-tablet): A window into the world's first total state. The Ur III administration tracked every animal, every worker, every shekel — for a population in the millions. The level of paperwork was not exceeded unti… - [Code of Hammurabi (stele) (~1754 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/old-babylonian/1754-bce/law/code-hammurabi): Not the first law code, but the most complete and the most famous. Inscribed on a black diorite stele over two meters tall, displayed in a public place — law made visible, law made monumental. - [Plimpton 322 (~1800 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/old-babylonian/1800-bce/astronomy/plimpton-322): Whatever its purpose, this single tablet shows that Babylonian mathematicians, working in base-60, had an arithmetic understanding of right triangles a millennium before Pythagoras was born. - [Epic of Gilgamesh, Tablet XI (the Flood) (~650 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/neo-assyrian/650-bce/mythology/gilgamesh-xi): The single most important literary discovery of the 19th century. It rewired the understanding of the Bible's literary context and proved that the Mesopotamian flood tradition is older. It is the olde… - [Disk of Enheduanna (~2300 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/akkadian/2300-bce/mythology/enheduanna-hymn): The literary tradition is no longer anonymous from this point. Authorship — the idea that a specific human voice composes a specific work — enters the historical record with her. - [Sumerian King List (Weld-Blundell Prism) (~1808 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/old-babylonian/1808-bce/mythology/sumerian-king-list): The single most influential Mesopotamian king list — the model for every later attempt to chronicle the deep history of the region. It transmits the political theology of divinely granted kingship, an… - [Amarna Letter EA 153 — Abi-milku of Tyre (~1340 BCE)](http://localhost:3001/middle-babylonian/1340-bce/life/amarna-letter-ea-153): Part of the earliest known body of international diplomatic correspondence. Akkadian, written in cuneiform on clay, was the lingua franca of Late Bronze Age statecraft — used between Egypt, the Hittit… ## Methodology - Open-access sources: CDLI (CC-BY), ORACC, ETCSL, Met Open Access (CC0), Yale Babylonian Collection, Wikimedia Commons. - Every tablet carries source, license, and attribution metadata. - AI translations marked with confidence tier (high/medium/low/experimental) and a `read from photo` indicator when the engine has visually examined the tablet image. - Confabulation test enforced before any new prompt version or model is deployed (see /engine).