Cuneiform Culture and Science, Calendars, and Metrology in Elam

Little is known about the study and development of what we would call today exact sciences in Elam. The knowledge of practical notions can be deduced e.g., from the attainments in architecture and art (especially in brick manufacturing and bronze metalworking), the definition of a metrological system, and the adoption of a lunisolar calendar. Surely sciences were studied in the wider framework of cuneiform culture, i.e. the shared education of the literate segment of Elamite society. While one could think that two cuneiform cultures, one in Elamite language (attested by an omen tablet, a hemerology, and a couple of less-understood tablets from Susa) and one in Akkadian (known from several documents including literary texts and school and mathematical tablets from Susa and Haft Tappeh), existed in Elam, it seems better to view them as the result of elite bilingualism, where the choice of one or the other written language was dictated by the textual typology and other unwritten but shared codes.