CUNEIFORM TABLETS
(For more information see AR 3 Cuneiform Tablet Collection)
Tablet 1: Translation by Banks
No. 1. Found at Drehem, a suburb of Nippur, where there was a receiving station for the temple of Bel. The inscription is a bill for 7 lambs and 4 kid goats delivered on the 4th day of the month. It is dated in the last three lines about 2350 B.C., or early in the Ur dynasty of kings who ruled from about 2400 to 2100 B.C.
No. 2. Found at Drehem. A record of the receipt of five oxen apparently for the temple offerings. Dated about 2350 B.C.
Also on one edge is written "5 oxen".
No. 3. Found at Jokha, the ruin of the ancient city of Umma in Central Babylonia. This is a typical record of the temple offerings. After the tablet was written, and while the clay was still soft, the temple scribe rolled over the entire tablet his cylindrical stone seal and the seal impression made it impossible to change the record. The seal impression bears in raised characters the name of the scribe and of his father. It is dated about 2300 B.C.
No. 4. Found at Drehem. A temple record, sealed and dated about 2300 B.C.
No. 5. Found at Senkereh, the ruin of the Biblical city of Elassar mentioned in Genesis 14:1. This is a first Babylonian dynasty tablet with an inscription containing a contract or business document. It is dated about the time of Hammurabi, King of Babylon about 2000 B.C. This king was a contemporary of the Biblical Abraham.
Last updated 19 December 2006.