Position in chronology
MAD 4, 164
About this tablet
A short surveyor's note from the Old Akkadian period, c. 2300–2150 BCE, now in the Louvre. Its findspot is unknown. It records the measurements of a piece of land, probably an irregular plot of sown field: two side measurements that differ, followed by a length and a width. Records like this let officials of the Sargonic state work out field areas for allocating land and estimating seed and harvest. They show how practical geometry was used in everyday administration.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Field measurements: the lower side measures 110½ units and the upper front of the sown land measures 85 units plus 2 cubits. The overall length is 490 units, written as 540 less 50, and the width is 30. The unit is never named but is presumably the standard rod (nindan, about 6 metres).
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine1. 110½ (nindan?), <the (measure)> of (?) from the lower side (?); 2. 85 (nindan?) (and) 2 cubits, the (measure) of the upper front of the seeded (land); 3. 540 minus 50 (= 490 nindan?), length; 4. 30 (nindan?), width.
Our translation engine — Opus 5.5. 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(gesz2) 5(u) 1/2(disz)# <nig2> sig?-ta? 1(gesz2) 2(u) 5(disz) nig2 2(asz@c) kusz3 numun igi-nim-ma 9(gesz2) la2 5(u) us2 3(u) sag
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Akkadian (ca. 2340-2200 BC)) — MAD 4, 164. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Louvre Museum, Paris, France (P215324) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-opus-5-5 (2026-09-20/v8-evolved).
Related tablets
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.