Position in chronology
MAD 4, 037
About this tablet
A short administrative memorandum from the Sargonic (Old Akkadian) period, roughly 2300–2200 BCE, now in the Louvre. A scribe notes where certain people and goods currently are: one man is lodging in another's household with a companion, a copper kettle is in one person's keeping, and three gur of barley are held by a named woman, identified through her husband. It is the kind of pocket-sized tracking note that kept household and institutional assets accountable, and it is notable for recording a woman as the responsible custodian of a sizeable grain store.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Status memo. One man, Šeš-sipa, is currently staying at Nanna-ezua's place, and Dugani is living there with him. One copper kettle is in Lu-nimgir's keeping. Three gur of barley (measured by the saggal standard — several hundred liters) are in the custody of Ama-nanam, the wife of Lugal-nigdu. The note closes by labeling itself a record kept under his protection — essentially a receipt showing who is holding what, and where, until it is called in.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine1 (man): Šeš-sipa — he dwells with Nanna-ezua; Dugani lives with him. 1 šen-kettle (copper vessel) is with Lu-nimgir. 3 gur of barley in the saggal-measure are with Ama-nanam, wife of Lugal-nigdu. It is a tablet of his protection (lit. 'his shade').
Our translation engine — Fable 5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
Spotted an error? Suggest a correction — confirmed corrections feed the engine's knowledge base.
Transliteration
1(asz@c) szesz-sipa nanna-e-zu-a i3-tusz du11-ga-ni i3-da-ti 1(asz@c) szen lu2-nimgir-da i3-da-gal2 3(asz) sze gur sag-gal2 ama-na-nam dam lugal-nig2-du7 e-da-gal2 im gissu-na-kam
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Akkadian (ca. 2340-2200 BC)) — MAD 4, 037. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Louvre Museum, Paris, France (P215199) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-5 (2026-09-20/v8-evolved).
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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.