Position in chronology
DP 364
About this tablet
This is a delivery receipt from the household of Queen Bara-namtara, wife of Lugal-anda, ruler of the city-state of Lagaš. It comes from Girsu in southern Iraq and dates to about 2350 BCE, just before the Akkadian empire. An overseer named Inimdu delivered more than a thousand bundles of manu-wood, a brushwood or shrub timber used for fuel and light building. Enig-gal, the household's chief administrator, received the wood into a storehouse. Hundreds of receipts like this survive from the queen's estate. Together they make it one of the best-documented institutions of the third millennium BCE.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This receipt records 1,020 bundles of manu-wood. Inimdu, a foreman, brought the wood in from KA-geš. Enig-gal, the estate manager, received it into the Mes-andu storehouse. The transaction belongs to the estate of Bara-namtara, wife of Lugal-anda, ruler of Lagaš. It is dated to the third year.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engineObverse 1020 bundles of manu-wood: Inimdu, the overseer, brought them from KA-geš. Enig-gal, the captain (nu-banda), received them into the storehouse of Mes-<an>-du. Reverse Bara-namtara, wife of Lugal-anda, ruler (ensi) of Lagaš. Year 3.
Our translation engine — Opus 5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
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Transliteration
1(gesz'u@c) 7(gesz2@c) sa ma-nu inim-du11 ugula KA-gesz-ta mu-de6 en-ig-gal nu-banda3 ganun mes-<an>-du-ka i3-kux(DU) bara2-nam-tar-ra dam lugal-an-da ensi2 lagasz-ka 3(|ASZxDISZ@t|)
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED IIIb (ca. 2500-2340 BC)) — DP 364. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Louvre Museum, Paris, France (P221014) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-opus-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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