HSS 68, 238

~2080 BCE·Ur III · Neo-Sumerian·P407136

Translation · reference

Experimental

Source: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P407136.

Why it matters

Transliteration

3(disz) sila4
u4 7(disz)-kam
ki ab-ba-sa6-ga-ta
in-ta-e3-[a]
i3-dab5
iti ki-siki-nin-a-zu
mu en nanna ba-hun
3(disz)

Scholarly note

Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — HSS 68, 238. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Šulgi y15 — The en-priest of Nanna was installed based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.

Attribution

Image: Harvard Museum of the Ancient Near East, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA (P407136) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P407136..

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The earliest historical document in human history.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.