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Finding Aid for the Lloyd E. Cotsen Cuneiform Tablets collection, ca. 3200 -1500 B.C.E.
1883
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Title: Lloyd E. Cotsen Cuneiform Tablets collection
Date (inclusive): ca. 3200 -1500 B.C.E.
Collection number: 1883
Creator:
Cotsen, Lloyd E.
Extent:
206 boxes house 215 tablets (9 boxes are partitioned to hold 2 tablets)
Abstract: The collection consists of 215 cuneiform tablets, the majority of which were written by students in ancient Mesopotamian schools.
Tablet subjects include writing composition and language, mathematics, science, law and religion. The chronological range
of the tablets extends from the Uruk Period (c. 3200 BCE) to the Old Babylonian period (c. 1800-1600 BCE). The collection
was donated to UCLA by Lloyd Cotsen in January, 2011.
Language: Finding aid is written in
English.
Repository:
University of California, Los Angeles. Library Special Collections.
Los Angeles, California 90095-1575
Physical location: Stored off-site at SRLF. Advance notice is required for access to the collection. Please contact UCLA Library Special Collections
for paging information.
Open for research. STORED OFF-SITE AT SRLF. Advance notice is required for access to the collection. Please contact UCLA Library
Special Collections for paging information.
Restrictions on Use and Reproduction
Property rights to the physical object belong to the UC Regents. Literary rights, including copyright, are retained by the
creators and their heirs. It is the responsibility of the researcher to determine who holds the copyright and pursue the copyright
owner or his or her heir for permission to publish where The UC Regents do not hold the copyright.
Provenance/Source of Acquisition
Gift of Cotsen Family foundation, 2011.
Processed by Sara Brumfield in the Center for Primary Research and Training (CFPRT), with assistance from Kelley Wolfe Bachli,
2011.
[Identification of item], Lloyd E. Cotsen Cuneiform Tablets collection (Collection Number 1883). UCLA Library Special Collections,
Charles E. Young Research Library, UCLA.
The Lloyd Cotsen Cuneiform Tablet Collection was created from other smaller, private collections, acquired over several decades.
The tablets in the Cotsen Collection were chosen specifically for their scholastic content. The tablets were integrated in
the existing Cotsen Children's Library Collection housed at Princeton University. In 2011 the Cotsen Institute donated the
cuneiform tablet section of the Children's Library to UCLA Special Collections.
Overall, this collection provides a comprehensive view of scribal training and writing techniques in the Mesopotamian educational
system covering a span of 1600 years. The collection consists of 215 cuneiform tablets (211 school texts and four non-school
texts) from Mesopotamia (ancient Iraq). These tablets were written in the Mesopotamian school, the
eduba ("House of Tablets"), by students training to become professional scribes,
dubsar ("tablet writer").
The majority of tablets in this collection date to the Old Babylonian period (c. 1900-1600 BCE), which was known for the development
and proliferation of individual scribal schools. In addition to the Old Babylonian texts there are tablets from the Uruk III
period (c. 3200-3000 BCE), the Early Dynastic III period (c. 2600-2350 BCE), the Old Akkadian period (c. 2340-2200 BCE), and
the Third Dynasty of Ur (c. 2100-2000 BCE).
School texts cover a rich variety of topics, yet comprise a very small percentage of known cuneiform documents. This collection
includes exercises in vocabulary, sign formation, literature, grammar, law, epistles, administration, sealing and stylus practices.
These student exercises cover the entire curriculum of scribal training, from the most basic beginner lessons to the advanced
lessons of the final stage of education. The wide variety of exercise offers researchers unique insight into the everyday
life of the ancient Mesopotamian.
Typical for the period and genre, the majority of the school texts are written in Sumerian. A few dozen tablets, mostly letters,
are written in Akkadian, while a handful of lexical texts contain multiple languages (Sumerian, Akkadian, West Semitic). It
is not clear in the remaining tablets, mostly mathematical exercises, which language is being used by the scribe.
The non-school texts include one legal document from the Early Dynastic period, and three letters written by king Rim-Suen
of Larsa (c. 1822-1763 BCE). These royal letters are part of an ancient archive that has since been dispersed across several
collections in America and Europe.
Tablets are described at the item level.
The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in the library's online public access catalog.
Lloyd E. Cotsen --Archives.
Cuneiform tablets.
Available at Library Special Collections, Charles E. Young Research Library, University of California, Los Angeles.