Sealed clay envelope
Sobre de arcilla sellado para contratos y cartas
- Date
- c. 2000 BCE · confidence high
- Place
- Kanesh (Kültepe), Anatolia, Turkey and Ur, Iraq
- Credited to
- Assyrian merchants of Kanesh and scribes of Ur III
- Field
- Communication
What it is
Clay envelope enclosing the tablet, on which the text or summary is repeated and the seals of the parties and witnesses are impressed. It is broken only before a court, guaranteeing that the document has not been altered.
What it led to
- Inviolable contracts, the basis of long-distance commercial credit between Assur and Anatolia
- Confidential private correspondence and the notion of epistolary secrecy
- Notarial practice of witnesses and seals that persists in law
Built on
Made possible
- Written contract with witnessesc. 450 BCE
- Commercial contract
- Notary
- Diplomatic correspondence