I'm asking this question because I have been fascinated by the Old Babylonian writing from 1750 BCE in this post on Reddit.
In a comment in this post, /u/labarna shares the translation of a cuneiform tablet that is essentially a complaint from one merchant to another about poor quality copper ingots.
The thought that there have surviving records of day-to-day ordinary correspondence between people that lived thousands of years ago in societies utterly alien to me is mind-blowing.
I feel that it gives a fascinating glimpse into these people's lives. It also makes me wonder what it would have been to live back then and even where I might have fit in their society long ago.
Does anyone have any other interesting examples of such writing? It could be on papyrus, it could be in cuneiform on clay tablets, it can be whatever as long as it's ancient and somewhat interpersonal. I suppose bawdy Pompeian graffiti counts, but I'm hoping for something more long-form like the complaint letter in the post above.
Now, What I mean by non-monumental (in my question) is that it's not something written on a monument celebrating a conquest or the life of a king. I'm also not interested in things like holy books.
Most of the time when I see old Egyptian or Mayan or other ancient writing on temple walls or stone engravings I think that it probably says something like "This is to celebrate the glorious victory of His Exalted King Such and Such son of Such and Such over the enemy on this day blah blah blah". That kind of stuff is not what I'm asking you kind folks to share.
Thank you!
What about the Vindolanda Tablets ? These document life on Hadrian's Wall in Britain circa first-second centuries AD. They include business correspondence, records, pleas for loans, personal letters, and even one of my favourites, an invitation to a birthday party (tablet 291):
Claudia Severa to her Lepidina greetings. On 11 September, sister, for the day of the celebration of my birthday, I give you a warm invitation to make sure that you come to us, to make the day more enjoyable for me by your arrival, if you are present (?). Give my greetings to your Cerialis. My Aelius and my little son send him (?) their greetings. (2nd hand) I shall expect you, sister. Farewell, sister, my dearest soul, as I hope to prosper, and hail.
As a bit of trivia, the Vindolanda trust believes the above birthday invitation is the oldest bit of writing in Latin by a woman.
You can search through the tablets for anything you might find interesting.
I've been involved in exchanges here before about the runic inscriptions found on wooden strips in Bergen, Norway, apparently from the floor of a tavern. I can't find those conversations right now, but they're known as the Bryggen runesticks.
They include all sorts of messages including: "Óst min, kyss mik" (‘My love, kiss me’) and the famous one, "Gyða segir at þú gakk heim" (‘Gyda says that you are to go home’), which it's believed is a message from a wife to a husband who's out drinking.
(The little links on that page go to actual photographs of the runesticks, which are really pretty cool.)
They're not technically ancient, but pretty old... from the end of the Viking era, I think, or later - the 1200s. I first ran into them in R.I. Page's little rune book, as part of his argument against runes being inherently magical or sacred.
There are some more recent and more in-depth analyses of the inscriptions out there, if you're really curious.
There's the graffiti on the walls of Pompeii
There's everything from insults to bragging about sexual prowess, with a lot of other stuff in between.
I'd like to recommend our podcast episode on the Assyrian state archives. A lot of what's discussed are things like business dealings and correspondence among government officials.