Position in chronology
KM 89144
Translation · reference
ExperimentalSource: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P234929.
Why it matters
Transliteration
5(disz) masz2 sila4 ki ur-mes-ta ur3#-re-ba-du7 i3-dab5 iti# ezem#-nin#-a#-zu# su-su-dam mu us2-sa bad3 mar-tu ba#-du3 ur3#-re#-ba#-du7# dub-sar dumu [...]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — KM 89144. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Šulgi y38 — Year after: The Amorite wall was built based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.
Attribution
Image: Kelsey Museum of Archaeology, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA (P234929) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P234929..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.