Position in chronology
USC 6636
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P235447.
Transliteration
1(disz)# geme2# u4# 2(disz)#-sze3 mun?-gazi? saga ki szara2#-za-me-ta# kiszib3 lu2#-kal-la# iti dumu-zi mu# amar-suen# [lugal-e ur]-bi2-lum[] mu-hul lu2-kal-la dub-sar dumu ur-e11-e szusz3
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — USC 6636. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Amar-Suen y2 — Urbilum destroyed based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.
Attribution
Image: Archaeological Research Collection, University of Southern California, Los Angeles, California, USA (P235447) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P235447..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.