by Tucker Koch, Contributing Writer
The preserved history of us humans is a finicky one. Even in modern history, events can be told far differently depending on which side of the political discourse you’re on. Let alone the fact that most of the ancient history we know today comes from either word of mouth or very sparse ancient writings. One of these ancient kingdoms was Sumer. Two famous people have emerged from what little wringing we have from this kingdom. The best-known is the Epic of Gilgamesh, a collection of poems about the life of the Sumerian hero Gilgamesh. If you’re into either mythology, Final Fantasy, or Sid Meier’s Civilization, you’ve probably heard of him. However, I am not interested in talking about Gilgamesh right now; that’s definitely a topic for another article. Today, I will tell you the tale of Ea-Nasir, the world’s most famous copper merchant.
For, like, 99% of you reading this, you probably have no idea what I am talking about. Well, one of the earliest pieces of human writing we have access to today is a tablet that was found in the ruins of the ancient city of Ur (in modern-day Iraq). This tablet was written by a guy named Nanni and is essentially just a complaint about the quality of copper he purchased. Let me explain.
So, Nanni wanted copper, so he sent his servants to Ea-Nasir to buy some copper. When his servants got home, Nanni noticed the copper was subpar. So he wrote a complaint tablet about how bad the copper was, and he also told off Ea-Nasir for being rude to his servants. This tablet, along with a couple of other complaint tablets, was discovered in the ruins of Ea-Nasir’s house. Either he was a horrible copper merchant, or he found these letters humorous enough to keep.
I just find it kind of humorous that one of the earliest surviving pieces of human writing is a guy giving a one-star review on Copper. Definitely on the shorter side of these stories, but I felt the need to share this stupid information anyway. This has been Tucker Koch, and I hope you’ve enjoyed reading this.
