Position in chronology
CUSAS 35, 098
About this tablet
A small bread-ration distribution record from Adab (modern Bismaya, southern Iraq), dating to the Early Dynastic period, roughly 2600–2350 BCE. A scribe tallied allocations of bread loaves — and, for most recipients, ceramic jars as well — issued to four named institutions and one individual on a specific day in the barley-harvest month. Recipients range from a children's house and a priestly household to two personal names, revealing the layered social structure of a Sumerian city's institutional economy. Small enough to fit in a palm, this is the kind of daily accounting slip Sumerian administrators produced by the thousands; a drilled hole through the tablet allowed it to be strung together with others in an archive.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
On roughly the 21st day of the barley-harvest month (the exact day is damaged), the following rations were issued: 120 loaves of bread to the children's house; 180 loaves and 3 jars to the gudu-priest's institution; 120 loaves and 2 jars to the house of Igi-si4; 120 loaves and 2 jars to Ur-nu personally; and 60 loaves to the house of Nin-mug. A routine daily distribution slip, sealed with a date and filed away.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine120 [loaves of] bread — House of the Children. 180 [loaves of] bread, 3 jars — House of the Gudu-priest. 120 [loaves of] bread, 2 jars — House of Igi-si4. 120 [loaves of] bread, 2 jars — Ur-nu. 60 [loaves of] bread — House of Nin-mug. [Day 2]1(?) — Month of [barley-]harvest.
Our translation engine — Sonnet 4.6. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
Transliteration
2(gesz2@c) ninda e2-dumu 3(gesz2@c) ninda 3(asz@c) dug e2-gudux(AH) 2(gesz2@c) ninda 2(asz@c)# e2 igi-si4 2(gesz2@c) ninda 2(asz@c) ur-nu 1(gesz2@c) ninda e2# nin-mug [u4 2(u@c)?] 1(disz@t)#?-kam [iti sze]-sag11-ku5-kam
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED IIIb (ca. 2500-2340 BC)) — CUSAS 35, 098. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Schøyen Collection, Oslo, Norway (P252717) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-4-6 (2026-05-28/v6-glossary-aware).
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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.