Position in chronology
CUSAS 35, 228
About this tablet
A textile inventory tablet from Adab, a major Sumerian city in what is now central Iraq, dating to the Early Dynastic period — roughly 2600–2350 BCE. A temple or palace scribe tallied seventeen garments of the 'suluh' grade, broken into four subtypes, then listed a further twenty-eight garments of other named varieties, including the well-attested aktum-robe. Adab's archives are rich in exactly this kind of institutional cloth record, which tracked the production, storage, and distribution of textiles — one of the ancient Near East's primary managed commodities. The tablet is notable for preserving several textile-type terms whose precise meanings remain debated among Assyriologists.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
The first section tallies seventeen suluh-quality garments: six of the fine nig2-lam2 grade, six ib2-ba-du3, four nig2-la2, and one du5-gi4. The second section lists twenty-eight more garments of varied types: thirteen nig2-la2, seven ib2-ba-du3, two nig2-lam2, four ha-la-um, and two aktum-robes. In total, a stocktaking of forty-five garments distributed across nine named categories — the kind of precise, granular count a warehouse manager would recognize today.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine6 nig2-lam2 suluh-garments 6 ib2-ba-du3 suluh-garments 4 nig2-la2(!) suluh-garments 1 du5-gi4 suluh-garment 13 nig2-la2 7 ib2-ba-du3 2 nig2-lam2 4 ha-la-um 2 aktum
Our translation engine — Sonnet 4.6. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
Transliteration
6(asz@c) nig2-lam2 tug2 suluhux(|SIKI.GID2|) 6(asz@c) ib2-ba-du3 tug2 suluhux(|SIKI.GID2|) 4(asz@c) nig2-la2! tug2 suluhux(|SIKI.GID2|) 1(asz@c) du5-gi4 tug2 suluhux(|SIKI.GID2|) 1(u@c) 3(asz@c) nig2-la2 7(asz@c) ib2-ba-du3 2(asz@c) nig2-lam2 4(asz@c) ha-la-um 2(asz@c) aktum
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED IIIa (ca. 2600-2500 BC) ?) — CUSAS 35, 228. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Schøyen Collection, Oslo, Norway (P252879) — 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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