Šulgi
c. 2094 BCE · Ur
Šulgi, son of Ur-Namma, was the great king of the Third Dynasty of Ur, ruling c. 2094–2047 BCE (Middle Chronology) for some 48 years. He consolidated a centralized state with a vast bureaucracy and a reformed system of administration, weights, and a calendar, and was deified during his reign. A large cycle of royal hymns (the Šulgi hymns) praises him as a paragon of strength, wisdom, scribal learning, and justice — among the richest royal self-presentations to survive from Mesopotamia.
Did you know?
The king who boasted he ran a marathon between two cities
In a royal hymn, King Šulgi of Ur (reigning around 2094 BCE) boasts of running from Nippur to Ur and back — roughly 160 km each way — to preside over festivals in both cities on the same day, even through a hailstorm. Whether or not the run happened, Šulgi is credited with building a network of roads with roadside rest-houses and a royal messenger service across his kingdom.
How we know
Šulgi of Ur, Third Dynasty of Ur, reign c. 2094–2046 BCE (Middle Chronology); the run appears in the Sumerian royal hymn Šulgi A. 2094 + 2026 = 4,120 years ago.
Life journeyclick any stop, or use ←/→Trace on the map →
Ur
We know they were here, but the specifics of what they did at this stop aren’t recorded yet in our corpus.
About Ur
A great southern city sacred to the moon-god Nanna (modern Tell el-Muqayyar), capital of the Third Dynasty of Ur. The pin marks the tablet's findspot; the small adjacent mounds of Diqdiqqah are grouped here.
Works
No works attributed in the corpus yet.