Position in chronology
CUSAS 03, 0088
About this tablet
A one-day labour account from Garšana, a private estate in the Umma region of southern Iraq belonging to the general Šu-Kabta and the princess Simat-Ištaran, written around 2031 BCE. It lists two small gangs of three construction workers each — one group supported by allotments, the other household dependents — and then breaks their day's work down: making and stacking kiln-fired bricks, and building a structure called the E-kibagara. The foreman-administrator Iškur-illat certified the inspection. Tablets like this, produced daily by the hundreds, are the reason the Garšana building project is one of the best-documented construction sites in the ancient world.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Labour report: three builders drawn from the allotment-supported men, and three builders from the household staff. Of these, some were assigned to the brick mould producing kiln-fired brick, some to the mould setting brick in place, and the rest were posted to construction work on the E-kibagara building. That accounts for the day's labour outlay. The muster was inspected and passed. Handled by Iškur-illat, the estate manager. Month of U'bi-gu, day 4, in the year King Šu-Suen of Ur destroyed the land of Zabšali. The individual crew totals in the middle section are broken away.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine3 workmen, [builders], men of the niĝ-ba (gift-allotment) [of Baba?]; 3 workmen, [builders], servants of the household. Therefrom: [n] workmen, builders, at the brick-mould — baked bricks; [n] workmen, builders, at the brick-mould — bricks set in place; [n] workmen, builders, stationed to build the E-kibagara ("House-set-in-its-place"). It is the expenditure (of labour). Inspection carried out. Via Iškur-illat, the chief household administrator (šabra). Month: U'bi-gu. Year: Šu-Suen, king of Ur, destroyed the land of Zabšali. 4th day.
Our translation engine — Opus 5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
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Transliteration
3(disz) gurusz [szitim] lu2# nig2-[ba-ba6] 3(disz) gurusz [szitim] ARAD2 e2-[A] sza3#-bi-ta [n] gurusz# szitim ma-szub-ba sig4 al-urx(BAHAR2)?-ra [n] gurusz# szitim ma-szub-ba sig4 gub-ba [n] gurusz# szitim e2-ki-ba-gar-ra [ke4]-de3 gub-ba zi-ga-am3 gurum2 ak giri3 iszkur-illat szabra iti u5-bi2-gu7 mu szu-suen# lugal uri5-ma-[ke4] ma-da za-[ab-sza]-li[ mu-hul] u4 4(disz)-kam
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — CUSAS 03, 0088. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Šu-Suen y1 — Šu-Suen became king based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.
Attribution
Image: CUNES 48-06-039 (Department of Near Eastern Studies, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, USA) — from Garšana (mod. uncertain) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.earth/artifacts, P322628). source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-opus-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.
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.