Position in chronology
NRVN 1, 096
About this tablet
A silver loan contract from Nippur, dated to the sixth year of King Šu-Suen of the Third Dynasty of Ur (around 2031 BCE). A woman named Geme-lisina lends 32 shekels of silver at the standard 20% interest rate to Ama-saga and her son Maš-gula, with a joint-liability clause making whichever borrower survives responsible for repayment. Three witnesses seal the deal — a vivid glimpse of everyday credit, and of women as active lenders, four thousand years ago.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Ama-saga and her son Maš-gula have borrowed half a mina and two shekels of silver — 32 shekels in all — from Geme-lisina, at the going rate of one shekel of interest for every five borrowed, twenty percent. The loan carries a survivorship clause: whichever of the two borrowers remains alive and available must pay it back. Three men witnessed the transaction — Azida, Adda-kalla, and a third whose name is partly broken away. Signed in the ninth month of the calendar, on a day whose exact number is damaged, in the year King Šu-Suen erected his Great Stele.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine½ mina 2 shekels of silver, its interest: 1 shekel per 5 shekels (i.e., 20%). From Geme-lisina, Ama-saga and Maš-gula, (her) son, received (it). It is to be repaid by whichever (of the two) is present/alive. Before Azida; before Adda-kalla; before Ur-[...]. Month: Gan-gane (month IX), [day x+]7 having passed. Year: "Šu-Suen, the king, erected the Great Stele" (= Šu-Suen year 6).
Our translation engine — Fable 5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
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Transliteration
1/2(disz) ma-na 2(disz) gin2 ku3-babbar masz2 5(disz) gin2 1(disz) gin2-[ta] ki geme2-li-si4-na-ta ama-sa6-ga u3 masz#-gu-la dumu-nita szu ba-an-ti-esz ki lu#-ti-ba gi4-gi4-dam igi a2-zi-da# igi ad!-da-kal-la# igi ur-[...] iti# gan-[gan]-e3# [u4 x] 7(disz) zal-[la] mu szu-suen lugal na-[ru2]-a-mah mu-du3
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — NRVN 1, 096. 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: Ist Ni 00425 (cast: CBS 09754 ?) (Arkeoloji Müzeleri, Istanbul, Turkey) — from Nippur (mod. Nuffar) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.earth/artifacts, P122311). 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.