Position in chronology
NATN 891
Not yet translated
This tablet is catalogued with its transliteration and photographed, but no published translation exists yet. Our translation engine works through the untranslated corpus every night, oldest first — this page will update the day its turn comes. If you are a specialist and can read it, we would love your help.
The world it comes from
A bureaucratic golden age, the Code of Ur-Nammu.
From the same catalogue range (near P121588)
Transliteration
4(disz) sila3 dabin szu-nin-szubur 2(disz) sila3 szu-i3-li2 2(disz) sila3 gesz-ga-zu 2(disz) sila3 dingir-sukkal 2(disz) sila3 e2-nig2-bi 3(disz) sila3 ma2-lah5 1(disz) sila3 tu-du-u2 1(disz) sila3 ba-za-a# 2(disz) sila3 puzur4-esz-dar szunigin 2(ban2) la2-ia3 1(disz) sila3 zi3 ba-zi iti ku3-SZIM u4 1(u) 4(disz) ba-zal
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — NATN 891. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA (P121588) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P121588..
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.