Abstract
In his introduction to the edition of the Proto-Ea series, Civil points out that lists of signs and similar exercises were usually destroyed almost immediately by erasing and reshaping the tablet, in order to save clay. The preservation of this type of exercise therefore only occurred accidentally, through an abrupt interruption in the " recycling " process in schools (é-dub-ba) : " It would therefore seem that in a well-kept é-dub-ba no exercise tablet was preserved for a long period. Occasionally, a tablet may have been moved and lost - and thus saved for posterity - but the mass of tablets was in all likelihood destroyed during the normal course of school activities. It was only when these activities were brutally interrupted by a catastrophic event that a large number of practice tablets were preserved. "
All specialists in Sumerian literature and schools have since taken up this conclusion, due to the authority that attaches to everything written by Mr. Civil, unquestionably one of the best Sumerologists who has ever existed. But the parallel with archival documents allows us to modify this view, by taking into consideration the cases where school tablets were found in the walls of certain houses, or between two floors, or in fittings such as benches, or even in pits : this is the result, not of a " catastrophic event ", but of a lesser caesura in the occupation of the building, which nevertheless continued to be occupied, even if the inhabitant changed. And it's only in the case of total abandonment that we find the tablets in situ, a situation that's actually quite rare. Instead of Mr. Civil's " all or nothing ", we can introduce an intermediate state. The fate of the tablets could therefore be :
- Recycling, which with few exceptions leaves no trace ;
- Disposal, which allows tablets to be found in a secondary context ;
- Abandonment in situ, following a fire, enemy attack, etc., which completely destroys the level of occupation.
