Position in chronology
JCS 24, 093, 06
Translation · reference
ExperimentalSource: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P462147.
Why it matters
Transliteration
[...] 1(ban2) i3-x [...] szu ti-a suen-i-bi-szu ki a-na-pa-ni-dingir giri3 utu-tukul-ti iti sig4-a u4 2(u) 5(disz)#?-kam mu ri-im-[suen lugal] uri5-[ma]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Babylonian (ca. 1900-1600 BC)) — JCS 24, 093, 06. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Rim-Sin I y1 — Rim-Sin became king based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.
Attribution
Image: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA (P462147) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P462147..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.