Pre-cuneiform writing tablet noting food ratios, Archives from the Temple of the Sky God, from Uruk (Irak), Late Uruk Period, around 3300 BC, Louvre Lens, France (26939082575)

~3300 BCE·Uruk Period·noting

Translation · reference

Experimental

Source: Wikimedia Commons file: File:Pre-cuneiform writing tablet noting food ratios, Archives from the Temple of the Sky God, from Uruk (Irak), Late Uruk Period, around 3300 BC, Louvre Lens, France (26939082575).jpg. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3APre-cuneiform_writing_tablet_noting_food_ratios%2C_Archives_from_the_Temple_of_the_Sky_God%2C_from_Uruk_(Irak)%2C_Late_Uruk_Period%2C_around_3300_BC%2C_Louvre_Lens%2C_France_(26939082575).jpg. Description: The first documents written on clay tablets appeared in Uruk IV, around 3300 BC.

Why it matters

Transliteration

Scholarly note

Tablet image sourced from Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 2.0). No scholarly translation referenced in source metadata. Source description: The first documents written on clay tablets appeared in Uruk IV, around 3300 BC.

Attribution

Image: Carole Raddato from FRANKFURT, Germany — Wikimedia Commons. source
Translation excerpted from Wikimedia Commons file: File:Pre-cuneiform writing tablet noting food ratios, Archives from the Temple of the Sky God, from Uruk (Irak), Late Uruk Period, around 3300 BC, Louvre Lens, France (26939082575).jpg. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File%3APre-cuneiform_writing_tablet_noting_food_ratios%2C_Archives_from_the_Temple_of_the_Sky_God%2C_from_Uruk_(Irak)%2C_Late_Uruk_Period%2C_around_3300_BC%2C_Louvre_Lens%2C_France_(26939082575).jpg. Description: The first documents written on clay tablets appeared in Uruk IV, around 3300 BC..

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The earliest historical document in human history.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.