What was the first "office" ?

Factual Questions
1

I’m thinking of a place where no one lives, but where multiple people, all of whom live seperately elsewhere, come daily to perform some non-machine-related task (I’m ruling out mills, smithies and the like) I assume it would belong to some kind of bank or trading organization.

2

My guess would be some sort of temple or other religious place.

3

Does a market count? If not, maybe a Sumerian temple where the priest class went about their priesting.

4

The first writings, in fact, were records from an “office”.

Sumerian farmers brought grain to city storehouses and bureaucrat-priests parceled out food to citizens while keeping track of what was going in and out of the state storehouses. The priests-government officials didn’t live there but showed up and kept track of stuff

5

[QUOTE=jimmmy]
The first writings, in fact, were records from an “office”.

Sumerian farmers brought grain to city storehouses and bureaucrat-priests parceled out food to citizens while keeping track of what was going in and out of the state storehouses. The priests-government officials didn’t live there but showed up and kept track of stuff
[/QUOTE]

I’ve seen some examples of the records they kept. They look exactly like Excel spreadsheets, just on clay tablets instead of a screen - even though I don’t understand the script, I could still see what was column and row headings, and calculated totals.

6

[QUOTE=Mangetout]
I’ve seen some examples of the records they kept. They look exactly like Excel spreadsheets, just on clay tablets instead of a screen
[/QUOTE]

Ahhh… VisiCalc.

7

[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers]
Ahhh… VisiCalc.
[/QUOTE]

That’s right. The early cuneiform version.

8

[QUOTE=Spectre of Pithecanthropus]
That’s right. The early cuneiform version.
[/QUOTE]
I wonder whether anyone tried to patent the spreadsheet, and was refused with a letter, “Sorry. We have prior art dating to 2200 BC.”? :slight_smile:

9

[QUOTE=Sunspace]
I wonder whether anyone tried to patent the spreadsheet, and was refused with a letter, “Sorry. We have prior art dating to 2200 BC.”? :slight_smile:
[/QUOTE]

I think that was Lotus’s argument in the litigation over whether they could rip the idea off of VisiCalc. :wink:

10

[QUOTE=Mangetout]
I’ve seen some examples of the records they kept. They look exactly like Excel spreadsheets, just on clay tablets instead of a screen - even though I don’t understand the script, I could still see what was column and row headings, and calculated totals.
[/QUOTE]

As the subtitle suggests, this parallel is one of themes in The History of Mathematical Tables: From Sumer to Spreadsheets.

That said, Eleanor Robson’s chapter in it on tabulation in cuneform records - which is online (a pdf) - emphasises that the history appears somewhat haphazard. The basic tabular format that now looks overwhelming natural to us even fell out of favour with the Sumerians for a while and seems to have had to be reinvented.