Position in chronology
CAB.G.3.137-7
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 P424440)
Transliteration
1(gesz'u) 5(gesz2) 1(u) 4(disz) geme2 u4 1(disz)-sze3 geme2 nig2-ar3-ra e2-amar-ka 5(gesz2) 1(u) 2(disz) geme2 u4 1(disz)-sze3 geme2 kikken x-x 3(gesz2) geme2 u4 1(disz)-sze3 e2#-bappir e2#-kas4 a-pi4-sal4 ki szesz-saga-ta kiszib3 lu2-kal-la a2 u4 du8-ha-bi i3-ib2-gar mu gu-za en-lil2-la2 ba-dim2!(HUL) lu2-kal-la dub-sar dumu ur-e11-e szusz3
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — CAB.G.3.137-7. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Ur-Nammu y14 — The throne of Enlil was fashioned based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.
Attribution
Image: Boston Public Library, Boston, Massachusetts, USA (P424440) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P424440..
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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.