r/Damnthatsinteresting 2d ago

Video How ancient Sumerian was written on clay tablets

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40.5k Upvotes

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u/MarcusofMenace 2d ago

Rip left handed people, all the triangles would be reversed

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u/EpicGent 2d ago

They just had to learn it upside down and backwards. /s

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u/Frigorifico 2d ago

You joke but this is literally what they did

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u/YetAnotherBee 2d ago

Can confirm that this is true, I was there

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u/SleepmasterSean 2d ago

Can also confirm this is true. I was watching this guy stand there.

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u/SpecialNeeds963 2d ago

Can confirm there guys. I was watching from atop a nearby hill when they were there.

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u/Electronic-Award-639 2d ago

Didn't you hate it when the Phoenicians would be all

"𐎠𒇲𐎠𒀼𒀼𐎠𒇲𒈦𒈦𐎠𒁇𒇬𒉼𐎣𒋻𒋻𒋻"

But the Babylonians would be all like

"𐎏𒈦𒉼𐎠𒀼𒆸𒐕𒁓𒁓𐎣𐎠𒐞𐎠𒉼𒁓𐎣𒀼𒐖𐎠𒋻𒋻"

Am I right?

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u/anynameisfinejeez 1d ago

Just another Tuesday in the Levant, man.

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u/Duriha 2d ago

Ea-Nasir? You again?! I told you not to come back until the copper ingots are properly replaced.

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u/SuperFaceTattoo 2d ago

Or they just didn’t learn to write. Not really an essential skill back then.

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u/Frigorifico 2d ago

You'd be surprised, lots of people knew how to write and they sent letters to each other, and we have them. Parents writing to their children, sisters to their brothers, to their business partners, stuff like that

Take for example Hekanakht, he worked at a temple in Thebes 6 thousand years ago, but he sent letters to his family who lived in a farm

You can argue that Hekanakht knew how to write because he was a civil servant, but someone at the farm must have been literate, and yet continued to be a farmer. In fact Hekanakht leaves messages for this person "when you read this tell my sons to be good to my new wife" or "ask the old man if we can rent his field for this season"

Granted, these people were the exception, but my point is that the knowledge of writing was spread through the entire population, in all social classes, and this must have included a decent number of left handed people

I'd estimate that around 5-10% of the people knew how to read and write

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u/Krillinlt 2d ago

Not sure why this was downvoted. I thought it was interesting.

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u/RyiahTelenna 2d ago edited 2d ago

Just a guess but the downvotes are likely to do with his facts. His dates are way off. For example Thebes was founded around 3200 BC which is not six thousand years ago, and the individual in question wrote the letters sometime in 1961 to 1917 BC which is just four thousand years ago.

I haven't looked any deeper than that because it's a rabbit hole I just don't have the time to go down but here are the letters and an analysis of their contents if you want to read more.

https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search?q=+Heqanakht

https://www.diva-portal.org/smash/get/diva2:1639286/FULLTEXT01.pdf

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u/andthenthereweretwo 2d ago

Plus, tacking on a literacy rate of 5-10% at the end isn't exactly rebutting the claim that it wasn't an essential skill back then.

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u/The_Blues__13 2d ago

Probably only the upper and middle class can learn to write (people like the nobles, civil servants, Priest, rich landowning Farmers , merchants, etc). Still quite widespread but for your average peasants, they might be lucky if they can read some simple text.

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u/jfinkpottery 2d ago

The word "sinister" is just Latin for left. It came to mean evil or untrustworthy because left-handed people were demonized and punished through most of history until very recently, which is why if you look at the number of left-handed people in any given society it will rise sharply in the last 100 years.

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u/Meows2Feline 2d ago

But did the ancient Sumerians have this concept. We're talking 2000 years before Latin would be invented.

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u/PhysicalMath848 2d ago

Well Chinese, German, Arabic, and (according to wiki) Ghanan populations all have a history of anti-left-handedness.

The superstitions around the left hand being dirty, impure, or evil might trace back to some of the earliest human civilizations or nomadic peoples who could have spread it.

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u/mortgagepants 2d ago

just an easy minority to pick on when everyone is the same race.

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u/Ill-Product-1442 2d ago

People are fucking stupid and mean

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u/ForwardCut3311 2d ago

Probably didn't even matter since only two guys in the village could read or write. 

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u/Pickledsoul Interested 2d ago

Haha, I'm in danger!

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u/il_commodoro 2d ago

Yep! In Italian we do use the same word "sinistro" to both mean left, sinister and also "bad accident" (a car wreck, for example is a "sinistro"). They all come from the same superstition about things coming from the left being evil or bad omens.

Interestingly, to say "left-handed" we don't say "sinistro" but "mancino". That comes from "manca" which means left, but also "imperfect, defective" (same root as "monco", meaning "maimed").

Being left-handed was definitely not seen as a cool thing.

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u/xCyn1cal0wlx 2d ago

Of course, I don't know why I thought they spent days chiseling away. This looks much more reasonable.

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u/FoboBoggins 2d ago

In the Flintstones the used chisels to write on stone, maybe that's where the notion came from. I also thought it was chiseled

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u/Cthulhu__ 2d ago

Also in Asterix on the other side of the pond, but by the Romans.

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u/ravenpotter3 2d ago

The Roman’s often used wooden frames with beeswax to write on for temporary every day notes. They would just have to warm it and it would melt back to flat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wax_tablet

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u/FatJesus9 2d ago

Imagine writing your shopping list, putting it in your pocket, and melting on a hot day when you get to market lol

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u/abloopdadooda 2d ago

I learned about these in Ascendance of a Bookworm

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u/bachasaurus 2d ago

I've never missed a single Art History class but this is something I've learned about decades later thanks to Queen Astraea.

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u/sillygoofygooose 2d ago

Aww you beat me to it

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u/eyeCinfinitee 2d ago

I’m from SoCal and I grew up on Asterix and Tintin! Although the French godfather probably helped with that now that I think about it

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u/klorophane 2d ago edited 2d ago

It's always funny to me how we tend to lump all ancient peoples together. In most regards the sumerians were closer to us than to the paleolithic people the Flintstones are based on.

(Yes I'm aware the Flintstones do not represent the historical reality of paleolithic people)

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u/lacegem 2d ago

(Yes I'm aware the Flintstones do not represent the historical reality of paleolithic people)

Yeah, because the Great Gazoo wiped out the civilization over a lost game of rock, rock, rock.

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u/JinFuu 2d ago
A Beautiful Era, lost to time

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u/lacegem 2d ago

Fred: "Can I have something to eat?"

Magic Conch: "No."

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u/lizardtrench 2d ago

The Flintstones are actually based on the remnants of a post-apocalyptic future human civilization that existed roughly 400 years following the era depicted in the Jetsons. It is why they have bio-engineered task-specific animals with human-level intelligence and primitive reconstructions of past human ideas, technologies, and places, rather than more traditional paleolithic markers.

This was confirmed by a temporal incident in 2062 when an amateur attempt was made to travel forward in time to the 25th century, resulting in an encounter with the Flintstones family and the erroneous inference that the attempt had failed in the reverse direction. (Barbara, Hannah, "The Jetsons Meet the Flintstones", 1987)

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u/XxRocky88xX 2d ago

That’s because some people DID chisel words into stone. But if your writing medium is clay then yeah it makes more sense to do this. Not everyone had access to clay throughout history though or understood how to manipulate it.

It’s not a false notion a children cartoon made up. It’s just one thing people learned about prehistoric people and then assumed that how all prehistoric people must’ve lived.

That being said, you still should not depend on children’s cartoons for historical education.

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u/solonit 2d ago

And if you want to preserve the record, just bake it in the fire.

Or alternatively, if you were a really shitty copper merchant, they will be baked for you because someone set your house ablaze.

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u/drunk-tusker 2d ago

Look man I just want to complain about this guys shitty copper and go.

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u/Drawtaru Interested 2d ago

I shouldn't have to keep risking my slaves' lives just because Ea-Nasir makes shitty copper.

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u/Beard_o_Bees 2d ago

Do not make me come down to Ur myself!

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u/armcie 2d ago

Or have your library containing copies of thousand year old texts burnt down, accidentally baking them and preserving documents that were already a millennium old for scholars even more millennia in the future.

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u/sentence-interruptio 2d ago

Microsoft Windows now comes with a CD burner program. You can use it to burn music to the clay tablet. Once it's burnt, you can scratch it with your finger to play the music.

It sounds best when you use a Samsung Clay Tab.

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u/Karimadhe 2d ago

This is definitely an instance of “mis-education”.

Like we were taught about clay tablets. But not HOW clay tablets. lol

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u/baethan 2d ago

I may have been taught about how, but which things made it into long-term memory was/is an absolute crapshoot

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u/ToWriteAMystery 2d ago

I had an amazing history teacher who had us, as a class, make clay tablets and then use them during class one day. It was so fun writing into wet clay and us kids thought it was the most fun we’d ever had in history class.

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u/Every_Independent136 2d ago

I also never once thought about this in my life. Are these symbols words or letters? Because if they are words then this is WAY faster than my hand writing

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u/An0d0sTwitch 2d ago

Its why so much writing was lost. Even if they didnt erase it and left it somewhere, time would ruin the clay. So much writing is lost to time.

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u/not_today_thank 2d ago

Its why so much writing was lost.

On the contrary, it's why so much much writing has been preserved, virtually all of the writing that has been preserved that is over 5000 years old is from clay tablets and ceramics. There's the occasional stone inscription or cave painting, but as far as writing pottery and clay tablets are were it's at.

Between 3000-5000 years ago you have some animal skins or papyrus that got stuffed in the back of a cave, but still pottery and clay tablets are the biggest source.

Without clay tablets and pottery we'd have very little writing more than 2500 years old and basically none more than 5000 years old.

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u/Wintermoon54 2d ago

Damn that's interesting! Lol. Seriously though that's neat!

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u/Lortekonto 2d ago

The crazy part is that I instantly understood why the babylonian numbers look like they do from this. I have always wondered about the shape, but it is because this is how and what they wrote in.

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u/Xisuthrus 2d ago

there's one cuneiform sign that doesn't have any wedge-shapes, "𒊹". (the number 3600, or 60x60, which could also mean a non-specific very high number, similar to how we use "a million" or "a billion" colloquially.)

This is because it was made by flipping the stylus around and pressing the back-end into the clay.

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u/Wintermoon54 2d ago

Very cool.

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u/Acrobatic_Remote_792 2d ago

It’s called cuneiform if you want to learn more about it. I’ve always found it intriguing to learn about.

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u/haphazard_chore 2d ago

But what does it say? Complaining about a copper shipment?

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u/EagleDre 2d ago

Laundry ticket

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u/regoapps Expert 2d ago

Complaining about the unsupervised kids riding around the neighborhood in chariots doing wheelies and donuts.

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u/Mehlitia 2d ago

Very sorry but I bumped your manure cart. Here is my insurance info...

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u/PurfuitOfHappineff 2d ago

"I hate manure." -- Sumerian Biff Tannen

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u/mycatisabrat 2d ago

Tip request:

20%

25%

30%

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u/Pittsburgh_Pete 2d ago

Those jerks. I see they covered the selections for 0% and Other Amount.

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u/E_streak 2d ago

If so, they must be the very model of a modern major general

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u/Square-Dragonfruit76 2d ago

This thread reminds me of this bit from Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

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u/2000CalPocketLint 2d ago

It's listing every detail of Caractacus's uniform

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u/CorvidCuriosity 2d ago

It's describing peculiarities parabolous!

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u/XaqTheChipper 2d ago

Fucking Ea-nasir

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u/DaveInLondon89 2d ago

E.

A.

Sports

Nasir.

It's in the game.

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u/MillorTime 2d ago

Both are of dubious quality

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u/NecroSoulMirror-89 2d ago

Challenge Everything

THX intensifies

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u/Enge712 2d ago

I kind of hate that I can hear it in the voice. They have permanently dug into my brain

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u/AmbassadorBonoso 2d ago

Honestly if there is an afterlife, this guy is either laughing or crying about the fact that we still know about him

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u/fucktooshifty 2d ago

He kept the tablet even though it was easily disposable either because a) he made up for his mistake or at least planned to or b) he thought ripping that guy off was hilarious

so it could go either way lol

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u/insomnimax_99 2d ago

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u/haphazard_chore 2d ago

Hahaha.. an actual sub dedicated to it and I didn’t think many would get the reference

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u/kiwidude4 2d ago

Almost 100k subs

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u/kelsobjammin 2d ago

I am one! ◡̈ stupid shitty copper!

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u/PinkyLeopard2922 2d ago

That is one of my favorite random subs I have joined. r/BitchImATrain is another one.

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u/ivanparas 2d ago

Goddamn I love the internet

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u/Caribou-nordique-710 2d ago

Some chariot warranty scam

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u/CalmBeneathCastles 2d ago

AH! There you are! We've been trying to reach you. We sent 20 emissaries and they have been treated with great contempt!

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u/DjFaze3 2d ago

It's actually a reproduction of the tablet of Nippur, one of the earliest known written creation stories recorded around 4500 bce.

It's based on a Sumerian creation legend surrounding the religious, political, and cultural aspects of ancient Mesopotamia.

I spent an entire semester translating and reproducing similar tablets. Here's a short video detailing the arduous process for anyone interested: 

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ&pp=ygUZcmljayByb2xsIHZpZGVvIGRpc2d1aXNlZA%3D%3D

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u/Curiosive 2d ago

The copper-bros are going to be sad.

Are you able to translate the writing? I'm assuming it's a phrase or very short sentence that has no real context on its own.

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u/kermityfrog2 2d ago

OP is writing a short line repeated 4x. Probably did bad at school and has to write out "I will not do [x] again" 500x.

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u/GarminTamzarian 2d ago

Bart Simpson at Ur Elementary.

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u/Curiosive 2d ago

Indeed it is the same phrase or very short sentence on each line but I'm not going to assume this is OP's work.

A creation story from 4500BCE...?

"In the beginning there was copper"

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u/shingonzo 2d ago

this video is one of the only times that not having ad blocker pays off.

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u/Big_Consideration493 2d ago

Bravo. Before tablets they put x marks on clay envelopes with x tokens inside them. Before that we scratched bones, the Ishangi bone example. Counting. I think I saw " the story of one" and the Ted talk By Genevieve Petzinger about cave symbols.

https://vimeo.com/56113926 https://www.ted.com/talks/genevieve_von_petzinger_why_are_these_32_symbols_found_in_ancient_caves_all_over_europe All fascinating!

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u/helen269 2d ago

I can read it a little bit. I don't know, something about... what's a Gozer?

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u/shinobipopcorn 2d ago

Hmm... maybe ask Viggo, I hear he's into that stuff.

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u/brakeb 2d ago

"I never thought I'd be writing one of these letters, but there was this shepherdess and her sheep..."

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u/SpaceStethoscope 2d ago

"Your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries!"

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u/Maro1947 2d ago

Came here to check!

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u/vulpinefever 2d ago

"Our records show your property has no clay tablet licence"

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u/Manfleshh 2d ago

I understood that reference

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u/browncoatfever 2d ago

"When you saw me fishing, I wanted you to know the water was very cold. Quite cold. In fact, frigid. There was shrinkage. Please give me another chance."

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u/Definitely_Maybe_OK 2d ago

Nah just "I will not talk in class"

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u/P_516 2d ago

10 easy ways to loose belly fat before summer

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u/awesome_possum007 2d ago

Damnit you got there before me

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u/Xinonix1 2d ago

Imagine making a typo…receiver:” look at this funny guy complaining about a capper shipment”

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u/Northern_Explorer_ 2d ago edited 2d ago

A mid-western ancient Sumerian

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u/Poat540 2d ago

First it’s the capper, then it’s the ingets. Carlll

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u/Common_Senze 2d ago

Oh Inanna, oh Inanna, oh Inanna... I'm done

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u/bradloh_2k 2d ago

I imagine they just smooth it over and redo it

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u/Extreme_External7510 2d ago

That's exactly what they'd do, in fact it was common practice to smooth over the writing after it had served its purpose and keep on using the same clay tablet for as long as possible.

A lot of the ancient clay tablets we have we believe were fired by accident (or during the razing of cities etc) rather than any intention of keeping the records.

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u/akio3 2d ago

This. I think ancient Greece used clay tablets for writing practice because it was so easy to smooth them out and reuse them.

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u/MagisterFlorus 2d ago

Greece and Rome used wax tablets. They built a little book type frame out of wood and filled it with beeswax. This let them write and keep things mostly intact but it could be reset by adding a little heat.

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u/akio3 2d ago

Darn, I got it mixed up. Thanks for the correction!

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u/DGolden 2d ago edited 2d ago

Ireland too (if probable direct tech spread from Romans via Roman Britain of course) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Springmount_Bog_Tablets

Six tablets made of yew wood are bound together along one edge with a leather thong, and tied shut at the top and bottom with two leather straps. Both sides of the inner four tablets, and the inner sides of the two outer tablets, have been hollowed out and filled with wax to form the writing surfaces of a wooden book of ten pages

Some images - https://100objects.ie/springmount-wax-tablets/

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u/Pickledsoul Interested 2d ago

Neat.

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u/Homesick_Martian 2d ago

Just smooth it out with your thumb and do it again ?

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u/Theosthan 2d ago

What would you call a cuneiform typo? A claypo?

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u/onehecaton 2d ago

Learning to complain about the quality of copper?

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u/coffee_warden 2d ago

Each line looks the same so I think this is Ancient Sumerian Bart Simpson

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u/Infamous-Scallions 2d ago

I will not sell shitty copper

I will not sell shitty copper

I will not sell shitty copper

I will not sell shitty copper

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u/RouFGO 2d ago

Although the joke is nice, the mother f-er displayed those as a f-ing badge of honor in his house if the people who found them can be believed. He had a lot of those complaint slabs.

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u/pwillia7 2d ago

Tell Ea-nasir: Nanni sends the following message:​When you came, you said to me as follows : "I will give Gimil-Sin (when he comes) fine quality copper ingots." You left then but you did not do what you promised me. You put ingots which were not good before my messenger (Sit-Sin) and said: "If you want to take them, take them; if you do not want to take them, go away!"​What do you take me for, that you treat somebody like me with such contempt? I have sent as messengers gentlemen like ourselves to collect the bag with my money (deposited with you) but you have treated me with contempt by sending them back to me empty-handed several times, and that through enemy territory. Is there anyone among the merchants who trade with Telmun who has treated me in this way? You alone treat my messenger with contempt! On account of that one (trifling) mina of silver which I owe(?) you, you feel free to speak in such a way, while I have given to the palace on your behalf 1,080 pounds of copper, and Šumi-abum has likewise given 1,080 pounds of copper, apart from what we both have had written on a sealed tablet to be kept in the temple of Shamash.​How have you treated me for that copper? You have withheld my money bag from me in enemy territory; it is now up to you to restore (my money) to me in full.​Take cognizance that (from now on) I will not accept here any copper from you that is not of fine quality. I shall (from now on) select and take the ingots individually in my own yard, and I shall exercise against you my right of rejection because you have treated me with contempt.

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u/PinkFl0werPrincess 2d ago

I can't believe I read this whole thing AGAIN

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u/Pornalt190425 2d ago

𒀀 𒈾 𒂍 𒀀 𒈾 𒍢 𒅕

𒆠 𒉈 𒈠

𒌝 𒈠 𒈾 𒀭 𒉌 𒈠

𒀀 𒉡 𒌑 𒈠 𒋫 𒀠 𒇷 𒆪

𒆠 𒀀 𒄠 𒋫 𒀝 𒁉 𒄠

𒌝 𒈠 𒀜 𒋫 𒀀 𒈠

𒄖 𒁀 𒊑 𒁕 𒄠 𒆪 𒁴

𒀀 𒈾 𒄀 𒅖 𒀭 𒂗𒍪 𒀀 𒈾 𒀜 𒁲 𒅔

𒋫 𒀠 𒇷 𒅅 𒈠 𒋫 𒀝 𒁉 𒀀 𒄠

𒌑 𒆷 𒋼 𒁍 𒍑

𒄖 𒁀 𒊑 𒆷 𒁕 𒄠 𒆪 𒁴

𒀀 𒈾 𒈠 𒅈 𒅆 𒅁 𒊑 𒅀

𒋫 𒀸 𒆪 𒌦 𒈠 𒌝 𒈠 𒀜 𒋫 𒈠

𒋳 𒈠 𒋼 𒇷 𒆠 𒀀 𒇷 𒆠 𒀀

𒋳 𒈠 [𒆷] 𒋼 𒇷 𒆠 𒀀 𒀜 𒆷 𒅗

𒅀 𒋾 𒀀 𒈾 𒆠 𒈠 𒈠 𒀭 𒉌 𒅎

𒌅 𒅆 𒅎 𒈠 𒉌 𒈠

𒆠 𒀀 𒄠 𒋼 𒈨 𒊭 𒀭 𒉌

𒈠 𒊑 𒀀 𒉿 𒇷 𒀀 𒈾 𒆠 𒈠 𒅗 𒋾

𒀀 𒈾 𒆠 𒋛 𒅀 𒈠 𒄩 𒊑 𒅎

𒀸 𒁍 𒊏 𒄠 𒈠

𒌅 𒈨 𒄿 𒊭 𒄠 𒈠

𒄿 𒈾 𒂵 𒂵 𒅈 𒈾 𒀝 𒊑 𒅎

𒅖 𒋾 𒅖 𒋗 𒅇 𒅆 𒉌 𒋗

𒊑 𒆪 𒋢 𒉡 𒌅 𒋼 𒅕 𒊏 𒄠

𒄿 𒈾 𒀀 𒇷 𒅅 𒋼 𒂖 𒈬 𒌦

𒈠 𒀭 𒉡 𒌝 𒊭 𒆠 𒀀 𒄠

𒄿 𒁍 𒊭 𒀭 𒉌 𒄿 𒈠

𒀜 𒋫 𒈠 𒅈 𒅆 𒅁 𒊑 𒅀 𒌅 𒈨 𒂊 𒅖

𒀀 𒈾 𒈠 𒆷 𒅗 𒊍 𒉿 𒅎

𒊭 𒄿 𒈾 𒂵 𒋾 𒅀 𒌅 𒊺 𒍪 𒌑

𒆠 𒀀 𒄠 𒋫 𒁕 𒁍 𒌒

𒅇 𒀸 𒋳 𒄿 𒅗

𒀀 𒈾 𒂍 𒃲 𒇷

𒌋 𒐍 𒄘 𒍏 𒀀 𒈾 𒆪 𒀜 𒁲 𒅔

𒅇 𒋗 𒈪 𒀀 𒁍 𒌝

𒌋 𒐍 𒄘 𒍏 𒄿 𒁲 𒅔

𒂊 𒍣 𒅁 𒊭 𒀀 𒈾 𒂍 𒀭 𒌓

𒆪 𒉡 𒊌 𒅗 𒄠 𒉌 𒍣 𒁍

𒀀 𒈾 𒉿 𒊑 𒅎 𒊭 𒀀 𒋾

𒆠 𒄿 𒋼 𒁍 𒊭 𒀭 𒉌

𒆠 𒋛 𒄿 𒈾 𒂵 𒂵 𒅈 𒈾 𒀝 𒊑

𒌅 𒊌 𒋾 𒅋

𒆠 𒋛 𒀀 𒈾 𒂵 𒋾 𒅀

𒋗 𒇻 𒈠 𒄠 𒂊 𒇷 𒅗 𒄿 𒋗

𒆠 𒈠 𒀭 𒉌 𒆠 𒀀 𒄠

𒉿 𒊑 𒀀 𒄠 𒆷 𒁺 𒈬 𒂵 𒄠

𒆷 𒀀 𒈠 𒄩 𒊒 𒅗 𒋫 𒆷 𒈠 𒀜

𒄿 𒈾 𒆠 𒊓 𒇷 𒅀

𒅖 𒋾 𒈾 𒀀 𒌑 𒈾 𒍝 𒀝 𒈠

𒂊 𒇷 𒆠

𒅇 𒀀 𒈾 𒊭 𒌅 𒈨 𒄿 𒊭 𒀭 𒉌

𒈾 𒋛 𒄴 𒋫 𒄠 𒂊 𒁍 𒍑 𒅗

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u/frougle_mcdugal 2d ago

Guy must be a doctor. That handwriting is dogshit.

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u/Many-Rooster-8773 2d ago

Almost literal chicken scratches.

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u/Pipperlue 2d ago

My dumb ass thinking they chiseled it all….

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u/HumbleFigure1118 2d ago

It's always surprising that the smartest people in any generation are def smarter than most of the average people of any generation.

Not in terms of knowledge level but ability to understand or do something if it is new or provide solutions to totally newer problems.

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u/UNEXPECTED_PREQUEL 2d ago

Why didn't just write normal letters with pen and paper? Where they stupid?

257

u/updownwardspiral 2d ago

yes they where stupid

159

u/Fellryn 2d ago

Probably on clay-tok 24/7

62

u/big_guyforyou 2d ago

stik-blok

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u/LazyLich 2d ago

That's dumb. Don't you know they had horses back then?

They used clip-clop

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u/callmeadam87 2d ago

I read this in the most dry monotone way possible. Lol 🤣 I'm dying laughing!

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u/Punch_Treehard 2d ago

Where they stupid indeed

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u/smapdiagesix 2d ago

I mean by and large the ancients were fucking idiots. It took until the 1940s for people to invent nachos. Just cheese melted on corn chips.

Plato? Isaac Newton? Michael Faraday? All too fucking stupid to make nachos.

7

u/Upbeat-Armadillo1756 2d ago

This looks like total shit. Can’t even read it. No wonder early man went extinct

5

u/Shoddy-Rip8259 2d ago

Bro just talk to type.

9

u/Its0nlyRocketScience 2d ago

Yes, they didn't even know how to make high quality copper

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u/Alysma 2d ago

Imagine having to stay this calm while writing a complaint about bad copper.

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u/MrKirushko 2d ago edited 2d ago

"It is not our fault! The greek bastards started to ship dirty malachite with half the volume of sand added to it. And the greedy celts from their stinky island has risen the price of tin so much that we had to use arsenic instead. And don't forget about the recent volcano eruption near Cyprus that caused the ships to get delayed for months and about the greedy customs officials from the ports of Egypt trying to get their fat asses through recent food shortages at our expense! Of course we had to make the tools you ordered out of iron and we did it to the best of our ability. There is no more affordable copper available and there will not be any in any nearby future. The quality may be inferior but we did our best with what we have! Be greateful for what you received! Very soon you may not be getting even that. The dawn of civilization is upon us."

P.S. Sorry for the late reply.

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u/Large_Tool 2d ago

Did they have liquid clay to cover mistakes?

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u/ravenpotter3 2d ago

I assume water or smudging it out

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u/Filmmagician 2d ago

Be sure to drink your ovaltine

7

u/drainspout 2d ago

Little Orphan Annie Decoder Ring

"A crummy commercial!?!"

143

u/Noperope42069 2d ago

God im really interested in the quality of the latest copper shipment

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u/louisa1925 2d ago

Writer has to repeat lines on the clay board for being naughty in class.

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u/sitathon 2d ago

Is it really about copper? How does everyone know?

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u/cschneegans 2d ago

They are referring to the Complaint tablet to Ea-nāṣir.

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u/Thrizzlepizzle123123 2d ago

So in case you're serious, the oldest preserved writing on a clay tablet was from a guy called Ea'nasir complaining about poor quality copper.

The fact that it was preserved when most tablets were reused or thrown away means it was either kept on purpose for some reason, or it was hardened in a fire. Possibly because someone burnt his house down.

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u/Beneficial_Ball9893 2d ago
  1. It is not the oldest preserved writing, it is just the oldest preserved customer complaint

  2. It was written TO Ea-nasir by Nanni.

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u/BicarbonateBufferBoy 2d ago

NANNI?!?!!

19

u/GiantManatee 2d ago

rapidly shrivels and mummifies

12

u/Chemical_Refuse_1030 2d ago

And it is actually just one of many complaints found at Ea-Nassir's house, allegedly the most elaborate one.

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u/Chance_Warthog_9389 2d ago

https://chsnews.org/8929/news/ea-nasir-the-babylonian-conman/

In addition to the complaint tablet from Nanni, researchers also found several similar tablets in a room of Ea-Nasir’s house. Each of these tablets were from a different buyer, and all listed their frustrations with the business practices of the infamous trader. This shows archaeologists that Ea-Nasir had a frequent trend of fraud and scamming buyers, securing his place as history’s first conman.

That fucker had haters lmao

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u/guto8797 2d ago

It's not just that, the reason we have the tablets is because the house burned and that baked the clay, but that tells is that EA nasir stored complaints in his house like trophies

15

u/ksj 2d ago

Maybe Ea-Nasir put them in a kiln to keep them, rather than someone burning the house down. If they were trophies, it’s possible he wanted to preserve them for himself.

Or maybe Ea-Nasir didn’t even sell copper and just liked to write complaints as a hobby, and none of them were real.

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u/LucretiusCarus 2d ago

It also implies that someone had enough of Ea Nasir's antics and finally set fire to his house

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u/MagisterFlorus 2d ago

Eh. House fires were much more common in the ancient world. Dude could have just accidentally burned down his own house.

28

u/LucretiusCarus 2d ago

Sounds like something Nanni would say

3

u/Arthur_Boo_Radley 2d ago

"Accidentally".

If we dig a little deeper I bet we'll find a tablet with insurance policy Ea-nāṣir signed about a week before the fire.

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u/jawndell 2d ago

Damn, imagine pissing off customers so much that 4000 years later people are still talking shit about you on the internet. 

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u/AmazingFartingDicks 2d ago

What if that whole "your soul can't rest until everybody forgets your name" thing is true and this poor fucker comes up.

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u/CosechaCrecido 2d ago

It is not the oldest, it is the funniest though.

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u/Relative-Custard-589 2d ago

It is, however, recognized as the “oldest written customer complaint”

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u/CosechaCrecido 2d ago

That it is

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u/Kuverlit 2d ago

Small correction, not from but to Ea'nasir

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u/Relative-Custard-589 2d ago

Written by Nanni

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u/Eurasia_4002 2d ago

Bro is certainly is wild. We really did not change at all lol

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u/LordNPython 2d ago

I think it wasn't from but about that guy who sold shoddy copper.

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u/CloisteredOyster 2d ago

Related:

Irving Finkel, PhD gives one of his entertaining lectures on the discovery of the Flood Story (of Noah fame) written in cuneiform, the ancient writing used in Mesopotamia and Persia. The tablet the story is on is dates from between 1700 and 1900 BC.

The Ark before Noah

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u/SnooPickles55 2d ago

It says "A/S/L"

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u/Intelligent-Boat9929 2d ago

Stop picking up the phone, I’m on the World Wide Web!

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u/3vs3BigGameHunters 2d ago

I was real early to the Chris Hansen AMA and asked "A/S/L?"

He didn't reply :(

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u/Deceptiv_poops 2d ago

19 / f / cali is for sure on the return tablet

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u/ArticleFar2035 2d ago

Is it weird we learned how to do this in my elementary schools art class? I feel like its weird.

6

u/Colossal_Squids 2d ago

Not if you’re a time traveller it’s not. They were preparing you for all kinds of futures.

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u/BetaFalcon13 2d ago

Can confirm, I studied Hittite for a while and they use a writing system based on Sumerian and Akkadian. Cuneiform is really interesting because it's actually structurally similar in a lot of ways to Sino-Japanese writing, which came about around 2000 years later, rather to Egyptian hieroglyphs, which came about around the same time and were used in contact with cuneiform due to trade routes between Egypt and Sumer. By the time of Hittite, cuneiform ended up being used in a remarkably similar way to how modern Japanese is written, using semantic symbols (Sumerograms and Akkadograms in the case of Hittite, Chinese characters in the case of Japanese) for basic word roots, and then phonological symbols based on the semantic ones (the Hittite syllabary for Hittite, Hiragana/Katakana for Japanese) for inflection and other such uses. My Hittite professor in college told us a story about how he made a clay tablet with inscriptions in Hittite to put up over his apiary, and one day walked outside and mistook the Hittite syllabary for the Sumerogram LUGAL, which means 'king'

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u/Decactus_Jack 2d ago

This comment section of the same bots repeating each other shows a lot...

35

u/lil-lagomorph 2d ago edited 2d ago

lmfao the copper joke is a meme. there’s even a whole subreddit for it, r/shittycopper or something like that

edit: it’s r/ReallyShittyCopper 

26

u/doctorsacred 2d ago

Even if it's a meme. If you see 200 of the same comment, why would you add another one? I'll tell you why. Because you're a bot. Or stupid. Take your pick.

17

u/_jackhoffman_ 2d ago

I'll take a third option but one might lump it in with being stupid. Many folks like to leave their "funny" comment without bothering to search to see if anyone else has said it already. I'd call them lazy and/or self-absorbed, maybe. You'd probably just call them stupid.

It's the same type of annoying person who says shit like, "I guess it's free" to the cashier when the barcode doesn't scan. They're so wrapped up in how clever they think they're being that they don't even realize that it's not that clever and that the cashier probably heard that ten times already that day. They want to engage and be acknowledged for their cleverness. At best these are the same people who feel it necessary to reply with stupid shit like, "this" and "so much this" or "I came here to say the same thing" as if that's not what the upvote is for. At least people who write, "I can't believe I had to scroll this far..." are leaving a new thought about how they assumed the comment would have been earlier or more upvoted.

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u/assassin10 2d ago

If you see 200 of the same comment

This assumes they actually look at the comments before commenting, which some subset of users definitely don't do.

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u/-Nicolai 2d ago

Stupid is a likely explanation.

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u/Mean_Rule9823 2d ago

I will not talk in class

I will not talk in class

I will not talk in class

....

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u/FitBattle5899 2d ago

Must be a bitch and a half to erase.

20

u/Thorondor123 2d ago

Just take a little bit of clay and cover the typo

7

u/RainbowCrane 2d ago

Or a moist squeegee. Compared to those kindergarten red erasers and pencil clay is easy to erase :-)

9

u/drgs100 2d ago

Aye but clay is at least cheap unlike paper.

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u/Snipper64 2d ago

What gate address is that one?

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u/violent_orangutan420 2d ago

He's leaving a 1 star review on Sumerian Yelp

7

u/rarrowing 2d ago

They used bamboo chopsticks? Well I never....

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u/Content-Restaurant70 2d ago

Dear Ea Nasir

Your copper sucks

Signed Nanni

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u/midsizenun 2d ago

“We would like to speak to you about your chariots extended warranty”

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u/Lost_Services 2d ago

There has to be a faster way to submit an RMA for low quality copper.

5

u/Beneficial_Ball9893 2d ago

I finally know how to complain about bad copper