Position in chronology
OIP 115, 154
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 P123375)
Transliteration
4(disz) udu niga 1(disz) sila4 niga amar-da-mu 1(disz) sila4 ensi2 mar2-da 1(disz) sila4 ensi2 adab 1(disz) masz2 en-um-i3-li2 1(disz) sila4 hu-un-gu-ur2-bi 1(disz) sila4 [ur]-en-lil2-[la2] 3(disz) gu4 niga 3(u) udu niga ur-nigar ka-guru7 mu-kux(DU) iti a2-ki-ti# mu en nanna# masz-e i3-pa3 u4 1(u) 6(disz)-kam
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — OIP 115, 154. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Oriental Institute, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA (P123375) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P123375..
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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.