Position in chronology
Anonymous 271229
About this tablet
An Old Akkadian-period ration account, roughly 2300–2200 BCE, from an unknown site in Mesopotamia. Five named men — E-tur, Ma-u, Ur-šerda, Ur-nu, and Ilala — each receive 120 loaves of bread (two sixties), apparently as monthly provisions while posted at a field called Gaba-gigal under an overseer. The tablet is pierced through the middle, a hole that let the office string it with related records — the ancient equivalent of a filing system. It is a small, vivid window into how a state fed the labor it deployed to the countryside.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
A payroll-style bread account: five men — E-tur, Ma-u, Ur-šerda, Ur-nu, and Ilala — each drew 120 loaves of bread, plus a small extra allotment of two units apiece. The issue was booked for the month of Šu-gar. The closing note explains why they were being provisioned: the overseer had them stationed out at the field Gaba-gigal, so these were their rations for duty in the fields. The back of the tablet is blank; the account is complete as written.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine1. 2(geš₂) loaves of bread, 2 (units) — 2. E-tur; 3. 2(geš₂) loaves of bread, 2 (units) — 4. Ma-u; 5. 2(geš₂) loaves of bread, 2 (units) — 6. Ur-šerda; 7. 2(geš₂) loaves of bread, 2 (units) — 8. Ur-nu; 9. 2(geš₂) loaves of bread, 2 (units) — 10. Ilala. 11. Month: Šu-gar. 12. The overseer: 13. at (lit. toward) the field Gaba-gigal 14. he stationed (them) / they stood on duty (there with him).
Our translation engine — Fable 5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
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Transliteration
2(gesz2@c) ninda 2(asz@c) e2-tur 2(gesz2@c) ninda 2(asz@c) ma-u2 2(gesz2@c) ninda 2(asz@c) ur-szer7-da 2(gesz2@c) ninda 2(asz@c) ur-nu 2(gesz2@c) ninda 2(asz@c) i3-la-la iti szu-gar nu-banda3 GAN2 gaba-gi-gal-sze3 an-da-gub
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Akkadian (ca. 2340-2200 BC)) — Anonymous 271229. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: private: anonymous, unlocated (P271229) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-5 (2026-09-20/v8-evolved).
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Related sources
One of the earliest specimens of human writing. Not literature, not law — accounting. The need to keep track of grain in a temple bureaucracy is what pushed marks-on-clay into a system that could one day carry epics.
A window into the world's first total state. The Ur III administration tracked every animal, every worker, every shekel — for a population in the millions. The level of paperwork was not exceeded until the modern era.