# What was the first "office" ? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 3, 2007, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-office/428662 "2007-12-03T15:11:36Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Emilio\_Lizardo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/898d66/32.png) [@Emilio\_Lizardo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Emilio_Lizardo)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2007, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-office/428662/1 "2007-12-03T15:11:36Z")
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. ---
**Author:** ![Keeve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/f07891/32.png) [@Keeve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Keeve)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2007, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-office/428662/2 "2007-12-03T15:15:58Z")
My guess would be some sort of temple or other religious place. ---
**Author:** ![pravnik](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8edcca/32.png) [@pravnik](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pravnik)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2007, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-office/428662/3 "2007-12-03T15:20:25Z")
Does a market count? If not, maybe a Sumerian temple where the priest class went about their priesting. ---
**Author:** ![jimmmy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/73ab20/32.png) [@jimmmy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jimmmy)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2007, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-office/428662/4 "2007-12-03T19:10:15Z")
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 ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2007, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-office/428662/5 "2007-12-03T19:19:10Z")
[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. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2007, 7:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-office/428662/6 "2007-12-03T19:25:21Z")
[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. ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2007, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-office/428662/7 "2007-12-03T19:46:25Z")
[QUOTE=Bryan Ekers] Ahhh… VisiCalc. [/QUOTE] That’s right. The early cuneiform version. ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2007, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-office/428662/8 "2007-12-03T19:59:45Z")
[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.”? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Billdo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/billdo/32/315_2.png) [@Billdo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Billdo)\ **Post date:** [December 3, 2007, 10:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-office/428662/9 "2007-12-03T22:36:22Z")
[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.”? 🙂 [/QUOTE] I think that was Lotus’s argument in the litigation over whether they could rip the idea off of VisiCalc. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![bonzer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/45deac/32.png) [@bonzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bonzer)\ **Post date:** [December 4, 2007, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-was-the-first-office/428662/10 "2007-12-04T00:09:52Z")
[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_](http://www.amazon.com/History-Mathematical-Tables-Sumer-Spreadsheets/dp/0198508417/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1196725053&sr=1-1). That said, Eleanor Robson’s chapter in it on tabulation in cuneform records - [which is online](http://fds.oup.com/www.oup.co.uk/pdf/0-19-850841-7.pdf) (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.