Sumerian cuneiform is one of the earliest
known forms of written expression. First
appearing in the 4th millennium BC in what
is now Iraq, it was dubbed cuneiform
(‘wedge- shaped’) because of the distinctive
wedge form of the letters, created by
pressing a reed stylus into wet clay. Early
Sumerian writings were essentially
pictograms, which became simplified in the
early and mid 3rd millennium BC to a series
of strokes, along with a commensurate
reduction in the number of discrete signs
used (from c.1500 to 600). The script
system had a very long life and was used by
the Sumerians as well as numerous later
groups – notably the Assyrians, Elamites,
Akkadians and Hittites – for around three
thousand years. Certain signs and phonetic
standards live on in modern languages of
the Middle and Far East, but the writing
system is essentially extinct. It was
therefore cause for great excitement when
the ‘code’ of ancient cuneiform was cracked
by a group of English, French and German
Assyriologists and philologists in the mid
19th century AD. This opened up a vital
source of information about these ancient
groups that could not have been obtained in
any other way.
Cuneiform was used on monuments
dedicated to heroic – and usually royal –
individuals, but perhaps its most important
function was that of record keeping. The
palace-based society at Ur and other large
urban centres was accompanied by a
remarkably complex and multifaceted
bureaucracy, which was run by professional
administrators and a priestly class, all of
whom were answerable to central court
control. Most of what we know about the
way the culture was run and administered
comes from cuneiform tablets, which record
the everyday running of the temple and
palace complexes in minute detail, as in the
present case. The Barakat Gallery has
secured the services of Professor Lambert
(University of Birmingham), a renowned
expert in the decipherment and translation
of cuneiform, to examine and process the
information on these tablets. The following is
a transcription of his analysis of this tablet:
‘Not dated, but from script and content to be
assigned to the latter part of the Third
Dynasty of Ur, c. 2050-2020 B.C. The text is
an administrative letter, of which many
were produced during this dynasty, but this
is entirely exceptional for its very large, well
spaced script. Most probably this is a scribal
exercise in letter writing, done by a very
good student, since all the signs, including
some very elaborate ones, are correctly
written. However in line 7 a complex sign is
written in place of the simple ‘za’, and the
sense of lines 10-12 is hard to follow. The
beginner’s lack of experience is perhaps to
blame.
Translation:
Say to Tum? : let the men measure out
1800 gur of barley, the barley of Mr Ibbi-pi,
on the steppe. You measure out (the barley)
for Mr Lu-Nanna on the bank of the canal.
Where he hands over the barley of the
palace, give him that barley also. This order
will not be repeated.
A gur was a measure of capacity, over 25
litres. Barley was the normal crop in Sumer,
since it tolerates the saline soil better than
wheat. This is an unusual document and in
fine condition.’
