Position in chronology
MVN 05, 017
About this tablet
This is a small Ur III administrative receipt from Umma, recording a disbursement of wool. A man named Lugal-itida received nine minas of a wool grade called 'gi-wool' from someone (or some place) called Halla. The date formula at the end ties the transaction to a specific regnal year of King Šulgi, one in which the mountain lands of Simurrum and Lullubum were destroyed for the ninth time — a formulaic way ancient Mesopotamian scribes dated documents by referencing a notable royal military campaign.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
A clerk in Umma logged that Lugal-itida received nine minas of gi-wool, supplied from (or by) Halla. The document is dated by the year name 'Simurrum and Lullubum were destroyed for the ninth time,' one of King Šulgi's recurring campaign years used as a calendar marker at this time. In short: a routine wool-issue receipt, dated by reference to a royal military campaign rather than a numbered year.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine9 minas of gi-wool, from Halla, Lugal-itida received. Year: "Simurrum (and) Lullubum were destroyed for the 9th time."
Our translation engine — Sonnet 5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
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Transliteration
1(u) la2 1(disz) ma-na siki-gi ki hal-la-a-ta lugal-iti-da szu ba-ti mu si-mu-ru-um lu-lu-bu a-ra2 1(u) la2 1(disz)-kam ba-hul
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — MVN 05, 017. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Anonymous 114237 (private: anonymous, unlocated) — from Umma (mod. Tell Jokha) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.earth/artifacts, P114237). source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-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.