Complaint tablet to Ea-nāṣir explained

Material:Clay
Location:British Museum, London
Height:11.6cm (04.6inches)
Width:5cm (02inches)

The complaint tablet to Ea-nāṣir (81)[1] is a clay tablet that was sent to the ancient city-state Ur, written . It is a complaint to a merchant named Ea-nāṣir, from a customer named Nanni. It is currently kept in the British Museum.[2] From 2015 onwards, the tablet's content and Ea-nāṣir in particular gained popularity as an online meme.[3] [4] [5]

Description

The tablet is 11.6cm (04.6inches) high, 5frac=16NaNfrac=16 wide, 2.6frac=16NaNfrac=16 thick, and slightly damaged.

Content

The tablet details that Ea-nāṣir travelled to Dilmun to buy copper and returned to sell it in Mesopotamia. On one particular occasion, he had agreed to sell copper ingots to Nanni. Nanni sent his servant with the money to complete the transaction.[6] The copper was considered by Nanni to be sub-standard and was not accepted.

In response, Nanni created the cuneiform letter for delivery to Ea-nāṣir. Inscribed on it is a complaint to Ea-nāṣir about a copper delivery of the incorrect grade and issues with another delivery;[7] Nanni also complained that his servant (who handled the transaction) had been treated rudely. He stated that, at the time of writing, he had not accepted the copper, but had paid for it.

Ea-nāṣir was part of a group of traders called alik Tilmun, or "Dilmun traders". He is known from other texts to have been active in the 11th and 19th regnal years of the Larsa ruler Rim-Sîn I.[8]

Acquisition

The tablet was discovered and acquired by Sir Leonard Woolley, leading a joint expedition of the University of Pennsylvania and the British Museum from 1922 to 1934 in the Sumerian city of Ur.[9]

Translations

A. Leo Oppenheim translated several of the tablet's lines in a 1954 article for Journal of the American Oriental Society.[10] An English language translation of the tablet was made by in 1960; Leemans's translation incorporated these lines which Oppenheim had translated as well as some input from on the meaning of a few lines. Oppenheim published a full translation of the tablet himself in 1967, unaware of any other translations of this tablet. A translation inspired by that of Marc Van de Mieroop sent in a personal communication to Steven J. Garfinkle was published in 2010; a book review by noted that this translation "is not always true to details". I. M. Diakonoff published a translation into Russian in 1990.

Other tablets

Other tablets have been found in the ruins believed to be Ea-nāṣir's dwelling. These include a letter from a man named Arbituram who complained he had not received his copper yet, while another said he was tired of receiving bad copper.[11]

Legacy

The complaint tablet has become an internet meme due to its seemingly anachronistic nature, with Forbes stating that it bore resemblance to many modern customer complaints for poor service in the modern era.[11]

It has been recognized by the Guinness World Records as the "Oldest Customer Complaint".[12]

References

Bibliography

External links

Notes and References

  1. Book: Figulla . H.H. . Martin . W.J. . 1953 . Letters and Business Documents of the Old Babylonian Period . British Museum Press . London, UK . Ur Excavations: Texts . V . 5, Pl. XIV.
  2. News: Hyken . Shep . 2015-04-23 . Oldest customer service complaint discovered: A lesson from ancient Babylon . . 2017-02-07 .
  3. Web site: The Legend of Ea-Nāsir: how a Babylonian businessman became an internet meme . Institute of Archaeology . 8 December 2022 . 27 April 2023.
  4. News: Kern . Emily . The Radical Promise of Human History . . 3 November 2021.
  5. News: Brinkley . Liv . The World's Oldest Customer Complaint Is Almost 4000 Years Old . Grunge . 17 March 2022.
  6. Web site: Harriet . Crawford . Harriet Crawford . July 2015 . Sir Leonard Woolley and Ur of the Chaldees . The Bible and Interpretation . .
  7. Web site: tablet . object W 1953-0411-71 . .
  8. Konstantopoulos, Gina, "Gods in the Margins: Religion, Kingship, and the Fictionalized Frontier", in As Above, So Below: Religion and Geography, edited by Gina Konstantopoulos and Shana Zaia, University Park, USA: Penn State University Press, pp. 3-27, 2021
  9. Web site: Sir Leonard Woolley . Biography . Collections online . .
  10. , citing
  11. Killgrove . Kristina . 2018-05-11 . Meet the worst businessman of the 18th century BCE . . 22 July 2020.
  12. Web site: Complaint Tablet To Ea-Nasir - World's Oldest Complaint Letter . 2023-04-05 . Guinness World Records . en-US.

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