Position in chronology
BAM 6, 531
About this tablet
A fragment of a medical-magical tablet from the royal library of Ashurbanipal at Nineveh, seventh century BCE. The surviving lines name the classic Mesopotamian disease agents — the 'hand of a god,' the 'hand of Ishtar,' the 'hand of a ghost' — followed by part of Ashurbanipal's famous library colophon, in which the king boasts that the gods gave him broad understanding and that he had every relevant text written out and collated on tablets. It is a small window onto both Assyrian medicine and the world's first systematically collected library.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Only scraps survive. The upper lines belonged to a healing text: something compared to a part of a man, a mention of the head, and a list of the supernatural causes of illness — affliction by a god, by the goddess Ishtar, by a ghost — together with the incantations against them. Then the text shifts to a library note in the king's own voice: 'I collated it. I, Ashurbanipal, to whom the gods granted broad understanding — whatever belongs to this work, as much as exists, I had set down on tablets for my reading.' The remaining lines are too damaged to read.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine(obverse, fragmentary) [...] ... [...] [...] like the ... of a man ... [...] [...] against/to Nergal(?) ... the head [...] [... "Hand]-of-a-god," "Hand-of-Ishtar," "Hand-of-a-ghost" — incantation(s) [...] [...] ... and I collated (it). I, Ashur[banipal ...] [... to whom Nabû(?)] and Anu(?) granted broad understanding, [... for] my reading(?) — whatever (pertains to) that work [...] [...] ... as much as exists, on tab[lets ...] [...] (traces only) [...]
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
[...] x x [...] [...] ki#-ma it-id _lu2#_ x x [...] [...] ana# _u-gur sag-du_ [...] [... _szu]-dingir#-ra szu-inanna szu-gidim-ma en2_ [...] [...] x-ma _igi-kar2_ a-na-ku _an-szar2_ ba-an#?-[ap-x ...] [... _muati?]_ u a-nu _gesztu-min dagal_-tu2 isz-ru-ku-usz# [...] liq#?-szi-ia mim-ma szip-ru szu2-a-tu2 [...] [...] x ki ma-la ba-asz-me ina t,up#-[pa-ni?] [...] x [x] x x x x [x x]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Neo-Assyrian (ca. 911-612 BC)) — BAM 6, 531. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.earth/artifacts, P370910). source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-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.
Marks the boundary between proto-writing and writing. We can see signs being used systematically — but not yet phonetically. The leap to recording speech itself comes a few centuries later.
The earliest historical document in human history. Before this, we have lists, accounts, and dedications. Here, for the first time, a ruler tells us what happened — with names, places, and consequences.