CDLI Seals 001347 (physical)

~1950 BCE·Old Babylonian·P272857

Translation · reference

Experimental

Source: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P272857.

Why it matters

Transliteration

SU-MU-BA-LA
dumu sza?-ri-hu-um

Scholarly note

Catalogue entry from CDLI (Early Old Babylonian (ca. 2000-1900 BC)) — CDLI Seals 001347 (physical). No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).

Attribution

Image: Walters Art Museum, Baltimore, Maryland, USA (P272857) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P272857..

Related tablets

Related sources

~3200 BCE

Proto-Cuneiform Account Tablet

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.

~3500 BCE

Kish Tablet

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.

~2450 BCE

Stele of the Vultures

The earliest historical document in human history.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.