found by Sir Leonard Woolley during his excavations in Ur and dates from around 1750 BC [2]. Distinguished Assyriologist A. Leo Oppenheim translated and published the letter in the 1960s as part of a very curious volume that is now of print (see footnote 1) [3]. The letter became the subject of renewed attention this year, after a photo of the tablet surfaced on the entertainment news website Reddit [4]. Here is the text of Oppenheim’s translation in its entirety:

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 umi-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 Samas.
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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Cuneiform tablet CDLI no. P414985: A letter from Nanni to Ea-nasir complaining about the quality of copper ingots delivered after a gulf voyage and about misdirection and delay of a further delivery, from Ur ca. 1750 BC. The photo is a crop of the original posted by Reddit user tcb34 on Imgur. This tablet is presently housed at The British Museum. http://www.anecdotesfromantiquity.com/a-customer-complaint-letter-from-mesopotamia/

Letters From Mesopotamia: Official, Business, and Private Letters on Clay Tablets from Two Millennia
A. Leo OppenheimDownload Terms of Use
This book contains the translations of one hundred and fifty letters written in Akkadian on clay tablets. The earliest date from the time of King Sargon of Akkad (about 2334-2279 B.C), the latest from the period of Persian domination over Mesopotamia (beginning 539 B.C.). The tablets come either from Mesopotamia proper or from regions to the west, even from as far as Asia Minor, Cyprus, and Egypt. Oppenheim selected these letters from many thousands of published clay tablets of this type to provide a panoramic view of Mesopotamian civilization during this extended span of time. His purpose in making such an anthology is to convey a more intimate and varied image of this civilization than that offered by the readily available translations of Akkadian epic texts, royal inscriptions, and law codes. Although the selection is, ultimately, subjective, two guiding principles were adopted: he chose the atypical rather than the typical to reproduce, however inadequately, the kaleidoscopic diversity of life as mirrored in these documents; and he concentrated on letters that are reasonably well preserved and that do not urgently require comment and elucidation.

• Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1967
• Pp. xii + 217; 16 figures, 1 map
• Out of Print

A Leo Oppenheims two introductory essays to his translations of these letters are Sublime. They are a Tour de force on Political Economy, Human Nature and The Foundations of the Thought Behind The Conquest of Dough.

"if you are digging up history. You have to dig it all up. If they dig up 60 years , I will dig up 600. If we go back far enough in the history. Always, there will be some grievance, and I´ll fight on him, I´ll fight on you, I´ll fight on everyone. Where is the beginning? I cannot find it? 
Dig up all the problems and you will find they have a root cause in one place: Greed. Where there is greed, there is no satisfaction"
Guru Guruji, Quoted from "Towards" Unity by 
Stuart Hastings. 
​http://towardsunity.org:80/the-kumbh-mela/

Stuarts Book Towards Unity was offered up by the digital gods whilst researching the timelines for the chronology of my own Novel. The Themes of Stuarts Philosophy and inspirations go back to the same wonder of where all this leads from and where it might lead to. 
"​GEORGE SOROS: "Markets are inherently unstable, or at least potentially unstable. An appropriate metaphor is the oil tankers. They are very big; and therefore, you have to put in compartments to prevent the sloshing around of oil from capsizing the boat. The design of the boat has to take that into account. And after the, uh, uh, Depression,  regulations actually introduced these very ti-, watertight compartments. And deregulation has led to the end of co-, compartmentalization." 01:18:27.21 ​the Inside Job transcript – Sony Pictures – September 2010 p. 16

From “A Way of Life”
Address given to Yale students, 1914
By Sir William Osler
​"The load of tomorrow, added to that of yesterday, carried today makes the strongest falter. To youth, we are told belongs the future, but the wretched tomorrow that so plagues some of us, has no certainty, except through today. Who can tell what a day may bring forth?
Look heavenward, if you wish, but never to the horizon — that way danger lies. Truth is not there, happiness is not there, but the falsehoods, the frauds, the quackeries, the ignes fatui which have deceived each generation — all beckon from the horizon and lure the men not content to look for the truth and happiness that tumble out at their feet.
Waste of energy, mental distress, nervous worries dog the steps of the man who is anxious about the future. Shut close, then, the great fore and aft bulkheads, and prepare to cultivate the habit of a life of day-tight compartments. Do not be discouraged — like every other habit, the acquisition takes time, and the way is one you must find for yourselves."
http://www.artofmanliness.com/2016/06/11/manvotional-the-happy-habit-of-living-for-the-day-only/

​´´every living thing can become healthy, strong and fruitful only within a horizon; if it is incapable of
drawing a horizon around itself or, on the other hand, too selfish to
restrict its vision to the limits of a horizon drawn by another, it will wither
away feebly or overhastily to its early demise. Cheerfulness, clear conscience,
the carefree deed, faith in the future, all this depends   in the case of an individual as well as of a people, on there being a line which  distinguishes what is clear and in full view from the dark and unilluminable; it depends on one's being able to forget at the right time as
well as to remember at the right time; on discerning with strong instinctual
feelings when there is need to experience historically and when unhistorically.
Precisely this is the proposition the reader is invited to consider:
the unhistorical and the historical are equally necessary for the health of
an individual, a people and a culture. "
 Friedrich Nietzsche: 1844-1900
ON THE ADVANTAGE AND DISADVANTAGEOF HISTORY FOR LIFE

Sources of chronological data Inscriptional[edit]Thousands of cuneiform tablets have been found in an area running from Anatolia to Egypt. While many are the ancient equivalent of modern grocery receipts, these tablets, along with inscriptions on buildings and public monuments, provide the major source of chronological information for the ancient Middle East.[10]
Underlying issues[edit]

• State of materials

While there are some relatively pristine objects, such as you might see in the Louvre or the British Museum, the vast majority of recovered tables and inscriptions are in much worse condition. They have been broken with only portions found, intentionally defaced, and damaged by weather or the effects of being buried underground. Many tablets were not even baked in antiquity and have to be carefully handled until they are heated properly.[11]

• Provenance

The site of an item's recovery is an important piece of information for archaeologists. Unfortunately, two factors impinge on this. First, in ancient times old materials were often reused either as building material or fill, sometimes at a great distance from the original location. Secondly, looting has been a fact of life for archaeological sites, dating at least back to Roman times. The provenance of a looted object is difficult or impossible to determine.

• Multiple versions

Over time, key documents like the Sumerian King List were repeatedly copied across the generations. As a result, there are sometimes multiple versions of a chronological source that differ from each other. It can be very hard to determine which version is correct.[12]

• Translation

The translation of cuneiform documents is quite difficult, especially given the damaged nature of much source material. Additionally, our knowledge of the underlying languages, like Akkadian and Sumerian, have evolved over time, so a translation done now may be quite different than one done in AD 1900. The result of all this is that there can be honest disagreement what the document really says. Worse yet, many archaeological finds have not yet been published, much less translated. Those held in private collections may never be.

• Slant

Many of our important source documents, such as the Assyrian King List, are the products of government and religious establishments. They often have a built-in slant in favor of the king or god in charge. A king may even take credit for a battle or construction project of an earlier ruler. The Assyrians in particular have a literary tradition of always putting the best possible face on history. The tablets or inscriptions in question still have value, though one does have to keep the slant in mind.





​Variant Bronze Age chronologies
Middle chronology of the main dominationsDue to the sparsity of sources throughout the "Dark Age", the history of the Near Eastern Bronze Age down to the end of the Third Babylonian Dynasty is a "floating chronology". In other words, it fits together internally as a "relative chronology" but not as an "absolute chronology".
The major schools of thought on the length of the Dark Age are separated by 56 or 64 years. This is because the key source for their dates is the Venus tablet of Ammisaduqa and the visibility of Venus has a 56/64[clarification needed] year cycle. More recent work by Vahe Gurzadyan has suggested that the fundamental 8-year cycle of Venus is a better metric.[1] (see update in [2]) There have been other attempts to anchor the chronology using records of eclipses and other methods, but they are not yet widely supported. The alternative major chronologies are defined by the date of the 8th year of the reign of Ammisaduqa, king of Babylon. This choice then defines the reign of Hammurabi.
The middle chronology (reign of Hammurabi 1792–1750 BC) is commonly encountered in literature, and many recent textbooks on the archaeology and history of the ancient Near East continue using it.[3][4][5][6][7] The alternative "short" (or "low") chronology is less commonly followed, and the "long" (or "high") and "ultra-short" (or "ultra-low")[1]chronologies are clear minority views. There are also some scholars who discount the validity of the Venus tablet of Ammisaduqa entirely. Early twenty-first century dendrochronology has essentially disproved the short chronology.[8][9] For much of the period in question, middle chronology dates can be calculated by adding 64 years to the corresponding short chronology date (e.g. 1728 BC in short chronology corresponds to 1792 in middle chronology).
The following table gives an overview of the competing proposals, listing some key dates and the deviation relative to the short chronology:

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Middle chronology of the main dominations

"How might one tell the story of how we as a species, having spent virtually all our span on planet earth as hunters and gatherers, ended up assembled in great clumps, growing grain, tending livestock, and governed by the political units we call states and empires? " 
James C Scott ​tannerlectures.utah.edu/_documents/a-to-z/s/Scott_11.pdf