Position in chronology
MVN 03, 089
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P215741.
Transliteration
4(asz@c) gu4 1(asz@c) apin-bi 1(asz@c) u2-da sag-apin-na 1(asz@c) u2-u2 gu4-ra im apin-na-ke4 dah-he-dam iti ezem-munu4 gu7 3(disz@t)? u4 ba-zal
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Akkadian (ca. 2340-2200 BC)) — MVN 03, 089. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Free Library of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA (P215741) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P215741..
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.