Position in chronology
KKS 22b
Translation · reference
ExperimentalSource: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P359959.
Why it matters
Transliteration
[a-na i]-ku-pi2-a-szur _kiszib3_ sa3-ba-si2-[a] [ki?]-ma a-wa-at t,up-pi2-ni [...] ka3# li-ba-al-ki-tam2 [...] [...]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Assyrian (ca. 1950-1850 BC)) — KKS 22b. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic (P359959) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P359959..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.