Position in chronology
AUCT 1, 720
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P103565.
Transliteration
1(disz) udu-nita2 siskur2 utu e2-duru5 1(disz) masz2 gaba e2 szara2-sze3 sza3 umma iti szu-numun
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — AUCT 1, 720. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Siegfried H. Horn Museum, Institute of Archaeology, Andrews University, Berrien Springs, Michigan, USA (P103565) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P103565..
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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.