Thread by @digi_hammurabi

I saw a tweet recently asserting that ancient, non-Christian/Hebrew peoples didn't see value in documenting peoples lives, focusing only on myths and gods. While this may seem like a reasonable statement to make, I'm here to say that, actually, quite the contrary is true. 1/?

While yes, we have many literary/religious texts from the ancient near east (I'm thinking specifically of Mesopotamia and Egypt, but others too), we have FAR more textual evidence for daily life, history, medicine, science, trade, taxation, bureaucracy...the list goes on :)

The famous literary texts that we all know and love (Gilgamesh, Enuma Elish, Atrahasis, Ishtar's Descent), these truly are in the minority. bit.ly/1jLYqzv

They're just more well-known because - frankly - they're more interesting than a receipt for clothing (bit.ly/2TRZHYK). That doesn't change the fact that the earliest forms of writing are concerned with people's daily lives.

The earliest writing appears to have served an economic/administrative function, and give a window into the lives of people in the late 4th millennium BCE (bit.ly/2xLxA3F and bit.ly/2yPwcP8)

There's also a large amount of personal letters, written by people from various social strata, including kings, merchants, and diviners (bit.ly/2WXPL1Q). My personal favorite collection are the Old Assyrian letters written during the early 2nd millennium BCE.

These show not only (more) economic and trade practices, but also show personal relationships between families. They also are an excellent example of functional literacy, showing that reading and writing wasn't always restricted to the elite scribal class bit.ly/2N88YcB

There are also the Amarna letters, diplomatic correspondence detailing relationships between kings of the 14th century BCE. I say 'diplomatic'...they're mainly poorly-disguised demands for expensive gifts!
bit.ly/2Ec8K1h

Kings also commissioned royal inscriptions that often provide detailed historical accounts - written from the winner's perspective, of course! These can be found for almost all of cuneiform's history, from the Stele of the Vultures (c. 2450 BCE bit.ly/2BGsRTH)

thought to the Neo-Babylonian period, 1157-64 BCE (bit.ly/2SEbiOL) and beyond (bit.ly/2TRERIX).

This thread doesn't even begin to touch on the full richness of the cuneiform textual record. We have legal texts (bit.ly/2GL4R5c), recipes for making glass (bit.ly/2tquS1Y), mathematical exercises (bit.ly/2DM6wEG),

astrology (bit.ly/2DM6XPk), and erotic literature (bit.ly/2BDft2J)...and much, much more.

If you want more cuneiform-related information, then I'd recommend checking out these excellent people:
@Moudhy @Eleanor_Robson @willismonroe @gvkonsta @shana_zaia