Position in chronology
AlT 023
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P347990.
Transliteration
3(u) _gin2 ku3-babbar_ sza am-mi-ta-kum _ugu_ be2-en-tam-mu _szu-i3_ ki-ma _ku3-babbar_ be2-en-tam-mu _szu-i3_ a-na _e2 e2-gal_-lim a-na li-it,-t,i wa-szi-ib szum-ma i-hal-li-iq in-na-bi-it _ku3-babbar ugu_ zu-he2-ra-shi / _szesz_-szu u3 _ugu_ a-ia-a-ha-ti a#-ha-su qa3-tu-szu-nu _igi_ we-ri-ki-ba _igi_ zu-un-na
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Babylonian (ca. 1900-1600 BC)) — AlT 023. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, UK (P347990) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P347990..
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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The earliest historical document in human history.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.