Gaby
In 1750 B.C., a Mesopotamian named Nanni was so furious about the copper he bought from a merchant named Ea-nasir that he filed an official complaint on a clay tablet. Today that Bronze Age tablet is known as the oldest recorded customer complaint.
Writing and trade have always been closely linked. Some of the earliest surviving examples of writing are inventory and accounting records inscribed in ancient Mesopotamian cuneiform.
Because copper is a key component of the bronze that named the era, disputes over it could get heated.
Back then there was no customer service hotline or AI chatbot. Frustrated Nanni could only etch his grievances onto clay and send them with a messenger — the ancient equivalent of a courier.
Nanni filled both sides of the tablet with his complaint, leaving no empty inch of clay.
The tablet, which measures 11.6 by 5 centimeters, was translated from Akkadian by the Assyriologist Adolf Leo Oppenheim and published in his 1967 book “Letters from Mesopotamia.”
What Did the Text Say?
Nanni wrote, “You placed inferior copper ingots before my messenger and said: ‘If you want to take them, take them; if not, go away!'” Scholars think Nanni had likely already paid Ea-nasir for the copper and then realized it wasn’t a wise purchase.
Although the complaint painted Ea-nasir as a terrible copper merchant, the tablets show he kept careful records. In the 1920s a University of Pennsylvania excavation in the ancient city of Ur, in present-day Iraq, uncovered the tablet. The artifact was found alongside several other tablets addressed to the same merchant, likely in what had been his residence. It appears Ea-nasir had angered quite a few customers.
Nanni’s wasn’t the only complaint, but it ended up the oldest and the harshest.
“Why do you treat people like me with such disdain? I sent messengers as worthy as I am to collect the bag of my money (left with you), but you treated them with contempt, sending them back empty-handed several times,” Nanni wrote.
Scholars believe that in the third millennium B.C., traders brought several hundred kilograms of copper from Dilmun to southern Mesopotamia, including the city of Ur. By the time Nanni wrote his complaint in 1750 B.C., copper trade in Dilmun had declined. If Ea-nasir was dishonest with his customers, dwindling copper supplies might have been the reason.
“Now you must return my money in full. Take into account that from now on, I will not accept copper from you that is not of good quality. I will henceforth choose and accept individual ingots in my own courtyard,” Nanni demanded.
We may never know whether Nanni got his money back, but the final word was certainly his.
Guinness World Records lists Nanni’s tablet as the oldest recorded customer complaint in history.
