Position in chronology
MVN 18, 747
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P120108.
Transliteration
[a-sza3? uku2?]-nu-ti [...] [...] x x in-uru4 gu4# su-ga 1(disz)-am3 x sila3 [...] x x-sze3 ib2-ta-an-bala [a-sza3] sipa-da kas4-e in-uru4 [...]-bi nig2-gal2-la-am3 [...] x x-am3 UD@g su7 szuku-ra [...] i3-in-[...] [...] x x KA [...] [...] gi-in#? [...] mu# us2-[sa] szu-suen lugal#-e bad3 mar-tu [mu-du3-a] mu us2-sa-bi en-kas4 dub-sar dumu ur-isztaran#
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — MVN 18, 747. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Šu-Suen y2 — Year after: Šu-Suen became king based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.
Attribution
Image: Montserrat Museum, Barcelona, Spain (P120108) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P120108..
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.