Position in chronology
NATN 238
Translation · reference
ExperimentalSource: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P120936.
Why it matters
Transliteration
2(asz) sze gur lugal 1(barig) munu4 si-e3 1(asz) gu2# SZIM saga 3(asz) gu2 SZIM da-ni-um ki lu2-du10-ga-ta er3-ra-dan szu ba-ti iti sze-sag-ku5 mu ha-ar-szi ba-hul
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — NATN 238. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Šulgi y26 — Harši destroyed based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.
Attribution
Image: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA (P120936) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P120936..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.