Continuity and Change of Scribal Education Essay

Continuity and Change of Scribal grooming - Essay Exampleole in the dissemination of cuneiform literacy, which firstly appeared as an educational institution in the Old Babylonian period and was referred as Eduba, a Sumerian word meaning the tablet family (Sjberg, 1974). One of the literary sources oftentimes mentioned is the purple Hymn dedicated to ulgi, the king of The Third Dynasty of Ur. ulgi is presented describing his scribal education and proclaiming himself a perfect scribe. The passage became a background for the supposition that scribal take aimings had already existed in the twenty first one C BC, however this is unlikely since all preserved versions of this Hymn came from the Old Babylonian period and primary from the school tablets in 18th century BC (Kuhrt, 1995).Archaeological evidence provides the tablets mostly referred to the administration system (lists of coarse items, receipts, taxation documents etc.). Therefore, both the archeological and literary sourc es hardly allow locating the appearance of the organized school practices earlier than the Old Babylonian epoch. However we can speculate that some scribal training was provided. A large-minded range of administration tablets could not be produced without the extensive knowledge of cuneiform literacy. Moreover, the texts from Ebla mention that the group of puppyish scribes arrived from North Babylonian Mari. These tablets possibly indicate that Babylonian scribes were sent to teach their foreign colleagues, as Mieroop suggested. His boldness allows the suggestion that scribal schools probably existed already in the third millennium, and this is only not proved because of the absence of archaeological evidence (Mieroop, 2007).We know old Babylonian Eduba due to the references found in literary sources. Apart from royal hymns, Eduba is mentioned in Eduba-Dialogues, describing the student life. Examination Text A provides information about exams in scribal school. Another frequently quoted source is Schooldays that contains a vivid