Position in chronology
Chicago 20060119a
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P313083.
Transliteration
5(disz) ma-na sa nig2-dab5 gu3-di-da ki da-da gala giri3 ur-ba-ba6 ki a-kal-la-ta iti ezem-mah sza3 bala-a mu en-unu6-gal inanna ba-hun lu2-kal-la dub-sar dumu ur-e11-e szusz3
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — Chicago 20060119a. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Amar-Suen y4 — En-unugal of Inanna installed based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.
Attribution
Image: private: anonymous, Chicago, Illinois, USA (P313083) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P313083..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.