Position in chronology
Prag 789
Translation · reference
ExperimentalSource: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P359358.
Why it matters
Transliteration
[...] x szu-ma [a-hi sza] ke-na-tim a-[ta] [...] _ku3#-babbar_ a-na _an-na_ 9(disz) _gin2-ta_ [...] _gin2-ta_ ni-la2-qe2-e [...] x sza x u2? a?-hu-um [...] i-ta-ba-al-ni-a-ti2 [...] _an-na_ ki-ma _an-na_ [...]-ni li-di2-na-ma [ma-la2] _ku3#-babbar_ u2-ka3-i-lu-u2 [u2 a-ta] ka3-i-il5 a-hi a-ta# [... i]-na li-bi4-ka3 [...] i-a-ti2 u3 [...]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Assyrian (ca. 1950-1850 BC)) — Prag 789. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic (P359358) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P359358..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.