Position in chronology
WF 122
About this tablet
A personnel roster from Šuruppak (modern Fara in southern Iraq), one of ancient Sumer's most important early cities, dating to roughly 2600–2500 BCE. The tablet lists ten or eleven named individuals, each counted as a single person, in two groups — the first five under an overseer named Nin-ur-sag, the second five apparently under Utu-ur-sag. Many of the names are theophoric, invoking the sun god Utu or using terms for divine kinship, giving a vivid snapshot of personal naming conventions in early Sumer. This is exactly the kind of routine labor or ration roster that underpins the entire edifice of Mesopotamian administrative record-keeping.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Ten workers are listed one by one. The first group — Amar-PA, Illu-sar, Nin-ukken-a, Lu-lu (with additional signs now broken away), and Dingir-šeš-mu — falls under the supervision of an overseer named Nin-ur-sag. A second group then follows: Adda, Mes-[the middle of this name is lost], Lu-na-nam, Utu-a-mu, and Nani, with Utu-ur-sag named at the close, most likely as the presiding official for this second roster. Every entry is marked as a single individual — real people whose names a Sumerian scribe took the trouble to record, in careful early cuneiform, roughly 4,600 years ago.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine1 Amar-PA 1 Illu-sar 1 Nin-ukken-a[?] 1 Lu-lu [...] 1 Dingir-šeš-mu Nin-ur-sag — overseer 1 Adda 1 Mes-[...]-x 1 Lu-na-nam 1 Utu-a-mu 1 Nani Utu-ur-sag
Our translation engine — Sonnet 4.6. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
Transliteration
1(asz@c) amar-PA 1(asz@c) il-lu-sar 1(asz@c) nin-ukken-a# 1(asz@c) lu-lu! x(-x) [(...)] 1(asz@c) dingir-szesz-mu nin-ur-sag ugula 1(asz@c) ad-da 1(asz@c) mes-[x]-x 1(asz@c) lu2-na-nam 1(asz@c) utu-a-mu 1(asz@c) na-ni utu-ur-sag
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED IIIa (ca. 2600-2500 BC)) — WF 122. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Vorderasiatisches Museum, Berlin, Germany (P011080) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-4-6 (2026-05-28/v6-glossary-aware).
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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.