Position in chronology
OTR 075
Translation · reference
ExperimentalSource: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P123010.
Why it matters
Transliteration
2(u) 5(asz) 3(barig) sze# gur# lugal sze e2 kin-ga2 i3-dub me-luh-ha sze ur5-ra ki szesz-kal#-la#-ta lu2-lamma dumu ga?-ni [...] szu ba-ti mu# gu#-za [en-lil2-la2 ba]-dim2#
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — OTR 075. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Ur-Nammu y14 — The throne of Enlil was fashioned based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.
Attribution
Image: Columbia University Library, New York, New York, USA (P123010) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P123010..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.