Position in chronology
DP 261
About this tablet
An administrative memorandum from the city-state of Lagash, written at Girsu around 2350 BCE, in the first year of the reformer-king Urukagina. Two wool sheep had strayed from their shepherd, En-DU; the queen Sasa, while traveling to the new-moon festival shrine in the sacred city of Nigin, recovered them and had them returned. The note adds that the sheep's hides belong to the goddess Baba, patron deity of the ruling household — a glimpse of how closely the palace, the temple, and everyday livestock accounting were intertwined.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Two wool sheep went missing from En-DU, the shepherd in charge of the wool flock. During the month of gu4-ra2-bi2-mu2, Queen Sasa, on her trip to the new-moon shrine in the city of Nigin, found the animals there and had them handed back. For the record: the hides of these sheep are the property of the goddess Baba. Filed in year one of Urukagina, king of Lagash.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine2 wool-bearing sheep — from En-DU, the shepherd of the wool sheep, they strayed away. In the month 'gu4-ra2-bi2-mu2' (when the oxen are yoked/grown), Sasa, when she had gone to the new-moon (crescent) house [of] Nigin, in Nigin returned them (restored them into hand). The hides of the sheep are the property of Baba. Urukagina, king of Lagash. Year 1.
Our translation engine — Fable 5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
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Transliteration
2(asz@c) udu siki en-DU sipa udu siki-ka-da na ba-da-ri iti gu4-ra2-bi2-mu2 sa6-sa6 e2 u4-sakar NINA-[na-sze3] e-gen-na-a NINA-na szu-a bi2-gi4 kusz udu u2-rum ba-ba6 URU-KA-gi-na lugal lagasz 1(|ASZxDISZ@t|)
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED IIIb (ca. 2500-2340 BC)) — DP 261. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Louvre Museum, Paris, France (P220911) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-5 (2026-07-12/v7-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.