Position in chronology
RTC 036
About this tablet
An administrative receipt from the city-state of Lagash (found at Girsu, modern Tello), written around 2400 BCE during the Early Dynastic period. Two named saltwater fishermen, Nesag and Lugal-šala-tuku, delivered well over a thousand fish of several species as provisions 'for the table' — the offering and dining service of the ruler's household. The overseer En-iggal, a well-documented official of this archive, booked the delivery into the É-munus, the economic household run by the queen of Lagash. Tablets like this one make the palace fish economy of early Sumer visible in remarkable, name-by-name detail.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This is a delivery slip for a large consignment of fish. Nesag handed over 5 tar-fish, 780 carp, 60 kimu-fish, and 300 freshwater gir-fish; Lugal-šala-tuku added 120 ubi-fish. Both men are registered as sea fishermen, and the whole lot was earmarked as table fish — food for the household's meals and offerings. They made the delivery in the month of sheep-plucking, and En-iggal, the overseer, checked it into the queen's household, the É-munus. Filed in year 4.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine5 tar-fish, 780 suhur-carp, 60 kimu-fish, 300 gir-fish of fresh water: (from) Nesag; 120 ubi-fish: (from) Lugal-šala-tuku. They are sea fishermen. It is fish for the (offering) table. In the month of 'sheep-plucking in the pen' they brought (it). En-iggal, the overseer, into the Women's House (É-munus) brought it in. 4th (year).
Our translation engine — Fable 5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
Spotted an error? Suggest a correction — confirmed corrections feed the engine's knowledge base.
Transliteration
5(asz@c) tar 1(gesz'u@c) 3(gesz2@c) suhur 1(gesz2@c) ki-mu11 5(gesz2@c) gir a-de2 ne-sag 2(gesz2@c) ubi lugal-sza3-la2-tuku szu-ku6 ab-ba-me ku6 banszur-kam iti ga2-udu-ur4-ka mu-de6 en-ig-gal nu-banda3 e2-munus-a i3-kux(DU) 4(|ASZxDISZ@t|)
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED IIIb (ca. 2500-2340 BC)) — RTC 036. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Louvre Museum, Paris, France (P221433) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
Related tablets
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.