Position in chronology
DP 438
About this tablet
This is a small cushion-shaped Early Dynastic account tablet from Girsu (ancient Tello), part of the archive of the great household of the goddess Bau under governors Lugalanda and Urukagina, roughly 2400 BCE. It tallies wooden beams or roof-poles — new ones cut as timber from a marsh grove and shipped in by boat, and older ones transferred from another storehouse — now held in the workshop of the wool-workers under the goddess Nin-inimzida's patronage. The overseer En-iggal, a well-known administrator who appears on hundreds of these Lagash tablets, personally verified the count, and the scribe notes the record was kept on two tablets (this being one of the pair). It is a routine but vivid glimpse of how a Sumerian temple estate tracked its building materials and craft workshops.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Thirty-five new roof-beams — timber belonging to Dam-dingirmu, cut from the marsh thicket — were loaded onto a boat for delivery. Forty-three older beams were brought in from the storehouse known as the 'mound of Me-kulaba.' All of these beams are now kept in the wool-workers' workshop, which belongs to the goddess Nin-inimzida. The overseer En-iggal checked and counted what was on hand in that building, confirming the total, and the clerk notes that this record was written up on two tablets.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine35 new ur3-beams (roof-poles) — timber of Dam-dingirmu — from the ambar-thicket (marsh grove) — were loaded onto the boat. 43 old ur3-beams — from the "du6" (mound-storehouse) of Me-kulaba — were delivered (received in). (They) are held in the house of the wool-workers (é-ki-siki-ka) of Nin-inimzida. En-iggal, the overseer (nubanda), counted what is present in the house: 2. Its tablets: 2.
Our translation engine — Sonnet 5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
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Transliteration
3(u@c) 5(asz@c) ur3 gibil gesz dam-dingir-mu tir ambar-ta ma2-a e-me-gar-ra-am6 4(u@c) 3(asz@c) ur3 sumun e2 du6 me-kul-aba4-ta-ka-ta i3-kux(DU)-a-am6 e2 ki-siki-ka nin-inim-zi-da-ka-ka e-gal2 en-ig-gal nu-banda3 e2-a gal2-la-bi bi2-szid 2(|ASZxDISZ@t|) dub-bi 2(disz@t)-am6
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED IIIb (ca. 2500-2340 BC)) — DP 438. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Louvre Museum, Paris, France (P221088) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-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.