Position in chronology
Sargon II 106
Translation — scholar edition
RINAP 2Not preserved (ii 1') [...] ... [...] (ii 2') [...] for water [...] (ii 3') [...] they made his/its [...] scarce (ii 4') [...] the neighborhood of his city (ii 5') [... fo]r horses to show their mettle (ii 6') [...] ... (ii 7') [... a] major [defeat on th]em (ii 8') [(...) they blo]cked up the river [with their corpses]. (ii 9') They burned [...], (turning them) into [ash]es, established [devastation in the land] Hamath, a[nd ...]. They brought him (Ilu/Iaū-biʾdī), together with [his] family, [int]o my city Aššur. (ii 13') [Because the god Aššur who goes] at my side cont[inually an]swered…
Royal Inscriptions of the Neo-Assyrian Period, volume 2 — scholar edition (ORACC).
Spotted an error? Suggest a correction — confirmed corrections feed the engine's knowledge base.
Transliteration
[...] x x x [...] / [...] a-na A.⸢MEŠ⸣ [x (x)] / [...]-šú ú-qí-ru-⸢ma⸣1 / [...] ⸢i⸣-te-e URU-šu / [... a]-⸢na⸣ šit-mur ANŠE.KUR.RA.⸢MEŠ⸣ / [...]-ti LÚ.e-qa-x2 / [... di-ik-ta?]-⸢šú⸣-nu ma-at-⸢tu⸣ / [... is]-⸢ki⸣-ru ÍD / [... di?-tal?]-⸢li⸣-iš iq-mu-ú-⸢ma⸣3 / [x x (x) i-na KUR].a-ma-at-te iš-ku-nu-⸢ma?⸣ / [...] x šá-a-šú ga-du kim-ti-[šú] / [a-na qé]-⸢reb⸣ URU-ia aš-šur.KI ⸢ub-lu⸣-[ni] / [...]…
Scholarly note
Royal inscription of Sargon II, edited by Grant Frame (RINAP 2, 2021). ORACC text Q006587.
Attribution
Image: Created by Grant Frame and the Royal Inscriptions of the Neo-Assyrian Period (RINAP) Project, 2019. Adapted for RINAP Online by Joshua Jeffers and Jamie Novotny and lemmatized by Giulia Lentini, Nathan Morello, and Jamie Novotny, 2019, for the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation-funded OIMEA Project at the Historisches Seminar - Abteilung Alte Geschichte of Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München. The annotated edition is released under the Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike license 3.0..
Translation excerpted from Frame, G. 2021. The Royal Inscriptions of Sargon II, King of Assyria (721–705 BC). RINAP 2. University Park, PA: Eisenbrauns. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/rinap/rinap2/Q006587/.
Related tablets
Related sources
An early example of administrative writing from Uruk. Its fragmentary numerical entries and commodity signs document record-keeping during the formative period of writing.
An early witness to systematic administrative notation at Kish. Its signs and numerals can be catalogued, but that does not establish a full translation or prove that it is the world's first writing.
An early surviving historical monument that joins named rulers, a territorial dispute and religious oaths. It shows how a city-state turned victory into a lasting public claim, without establishing that this was the first recorded conflict.