Position in chronology
CUSAS 03, 0917
About this tablet
A small leather-accounting receipt from Garšana, a private estate in southern Iraq, dated to the reign of King Šu-Suen of Ur around 2035 BCE. It records a handful of tanned sheepskins and leather bags issued from the stock of an official named Iškur-illat for use by weavers, with a scribe acting as the responsible overseer. The final word marks it as an archival duplicate — a reminder that Ur III bureaucrats kept copies of even tiny transactions.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
One tanned sheepskin and four sheepskins tanned with eri'na were handed over for the weavers, along with some leather bags of the ti-bala type (the number is lost). The scribe Ur-E'anna supervised the transfer. The goods were drawn from the account of Iškur-illat. Dated to the month of the Šu-Suen festival, in the year King Šu-Suen of Ur built the great barge for the gods Enlil and Ninlil. This tablet is a copy of the original record.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine1 [sheep] skin, tanned (u₂-ḫab₂-treated), 4 sheep skins, tanned with e-ri₂-na, for the weaver(s); [n] leather bag(s)/containers (du₁₀-gan) of ti-bala type; [Ur-E'an]na the scribe was the deputy (maškim). [From] [Iškur]-illat withdrawn. Month: Festival of Šu-Suen. Year: Šu-Suen, [king] of Ur, fashioned the magnificent barge for Enlil and [Nin]lil. Copy.
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
1(disz) kusz [udu] u2-hab2 4(disz) kusz udu e-ri2-na [usz]-bar-sze3 [n du10]-gan ti-bala [ur-e2-an]-na dub-sar maszkim [ki] [iszkur]-illat#-ta ba-zi iti ezem-szu-suen mu szu-suen [lugal] uri5#-ma-ke4 ma2#-gur8#-mah en-lil2 [nin]-lil2-ra mu-ne-dim2 gaba-ri
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — CUSAS 03, 0917. 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 49-08-013 (Department of Near Eastern Studies, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, USA) — from Garšana (mod. uncertain) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.earth/artifacts, P323438). 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.
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.