Position in chronology
Princeton 1, 109
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P126798.
Transliteration
2(u) udu 1(u) masz2 kiszib3 ur-nin-gubalag sukkal 4(disz) sila4 kiszib3 nam-ha-ni szusz3 mu-kux(DU) gaba-ri mu amar-suen lugal-e ur-bi2-lum mu-hul 3(u) 4(disz)
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — Princeton 1, 109. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Amar-Suen y2 — Urbilum destroyed based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.
Attribution
Image: Princeton Theological Seminary, Princeton, New Jersey, USA (P126798) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P126798..
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.