Position in chronology
LB 0932
About this tablet
This small clay tablet from Girsu (modern Tello), dating to the Early Dynastic period, is a balanced-account (nig2-ka9 ak) document — the ancient equivalent of a settled ledger entry. It records an outstanding balance of refined silver connected to a field called Huburuma, charged against an overseer named Ur-igi-ama in the presence of a surveyor's office. Texts like this are the routine paperwork of a large temple or estate administration, tracking who still owed what after an account was reconciled — a glimpse into one of the world's earliest bureaucratic accounting systems.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
The tablet opens with a note of a shortfall — some amount of refined silver still owed — connected to a document or record. The matter concerns the field known as Huburuma. The balance is charged to Ur-igi-ama, an overseer, and the transaction was recorded in the office of the surveyor (the official in charge of the measuring rope). Once the account was reconciled with him, the outstanding amount — 6 units — was formally entered as his debt.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine[Deficit: x shekels of refined] silver. ... document/tablet of ..., it is the field of Huburuma. To Ur-igi-ama, the overseer (nu-banda3), in the house of the man of the measuring-rope (the surveyor), it was declared. When the account was rendered with him, it was placed upon his account (as debt): 6 (units).
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
[la2-a x gin2 ku3 luh]-ha# x im-dub-ba-[x] GAN2 hu-bu7-rum2-ma-kam [ur-igi-ama]-sze3# nu-banda3 e2 lu2 esz2-gid2-ka-ka al-[mu]-ni-du11-da nig2-ka9 [e]-da-[ak]-a gu2#-na# e-[ne2]-gar 6(|ASZxDISZ@t|)
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED IIIb (ca. 2500-2340 BC)) — LB 0932. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: de Liagre Böhl Collection, Netherlands Institute for the Near East, Leiden, Holland (P247615) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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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.