Position in chronology
MDP 31, 025
Translation · reference
ExperimentalSource: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P009365.
Why it matters
Transliteration
[... M278~f?] , [3(N14)] 8(N01)# M278~f , 2(N14) [5(N01)] [|M278+1(N24)|] , 3(N01)# M283~a1 , 5(N01) M276~e , 5(N01) M290~a# , 7(N01) M064~a , 1(N14) M228~gb M278~f |M351+1(N14)| , 1(N34) 3(N01) |M278+1(N24)| , [3(N01)] M290~a , 7(N01) M064~a , 1(N14) M276~e , 5(N01)
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Proto-Elamite (ca. 3100-2900 BC)) — MDP 31, 025. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Louvre Museum, Paris, France (P009365) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P009365..
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The earliest historical document in human history.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.