Position in chronology
SACT 2, 079
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P129036.
Transliteration
6(disz) gurusz u4 7(disz)-sze3 umma-ta unu-sze3 ku6 nisi il-la ugula gu2-tar kiszib3 a-kal-la ra2-gaba giri3 lugal-za-e3 iti [pa4]-u2-e mu si-ma-num2 ba-hul a-a-kal-[la] ra-gaba umma# dumu ur-[utu]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — SACT 2, 079. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Spurlock Museum, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, Illinois, USA (P129036) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P129036..
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.