Position in chronology
MAD 4, 045
About this tablet
An everyday barley ledger from the Old Akkadian (Sargonic) period, around 2300 BCE, now in the Louvre. It records grain measured in the old 'saggal' gur handed over to a person named Nin-mes, and smaller lots booked as fodder for donkeys and for plough- or work-oxen attached to what seems to be a weaving establishment, each entry signed off under a named official. Tablets like this are the raw accounting behind Mesopotamia's state-run farms and workshops: even the animals' feed was weighed, written down, and assigned to someone responsible.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This is a feed-and-grain account. Roughly 32 gur and 2 barig of barley, measured by the saggal standard, were received by Nin-mes. Seven gur of barley went as fodder for the donkeys. Three gur and 4 ban of barley were used to feed the oxen belonging to A-nimgirza's weaving operation, booked under Lugal-tir; a further 2 ban of barley fed the same oxen of A-nimgirza's weaving operation, booked under Ur-Nin-ildu.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine32(?) gur 2 barig of barley (in) the saggal-gur (measure) — Nin-mes received (it). 7 gur of [barley]: barley consumed by the donkeys (fodder). 3 gur 4 ban₂ of barley: barley consumed by the oxen of the weaving(-establishment?) of A-nimgirza — (responsible:) Lugal-tir. 2 ban₂ of barley: barley consumed by the oxen, (of) the weaving(-establishment?) of A-nimgirza — (responsible:) Ur-Nin-ildu.
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
3(u) 2(asz)? 2(barig) sze gur sag-gal2 nin-mes-e szu ba-ti 7(asz) [sze] gur sze ansze gu7-a 3(asz) 4(ban2) sze gur gu4-e gu7 tug2 tag a-nimgir-za lugal-tir 2(ban2) sze gur sze gu4-e gu7 tug2 tag a-nimgir-za ur-nin-ildu3
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Akkadian (ca. 2340-2200 BC)) — MAD 4, 045. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Louvre Museum, Paris, France (P215207) — 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.