RTC 263

• na4-mah-ta — Literally 'from the great/superior stone(-weight)'; conventionally translated as indicating a premium or top-grade wool quality classification, or possibly referring to the weight standard used. The exact nuance of na4-mah as a quality grade versus a weight instrument is debated.
• ba-la2 — Standard Ur III passive verbal form: 'it was weighed out' or 'weighed/disbursed.' Could in some contexts mean 'balanced' (as in accounting). Here 'weighed out' is most apt for wool distribution.
• la2-ia3 — Literally 'the deficit' or 'shortfall'; the amount owed or missing from an expected total. Common term in Ur III balanced accounts.
• sig-ta igi-nim-sze3 giri3 si bi2-sa2-a — Literally 'from the lower land to the upper land, the roads he made straight/correct.' This is a standard year-name formula for one of Ur-Namma's regnal years, but the exact year number within his reign assigned to this formula varies in the scholarly literature.
• ensi2 — Rendered 'governor'; the ensi2 was the city-governor under the Ur III imperial administration, subordinate to the king. Some contexts allow 'city-ruler' but 'governor' is the conventional English equivalent here.
• x x [...] x — Three to four signs in the middle of the tablet are illegible or broken; content of this line cannot be determined from the transliteration or photo.

The photograph shows a small, roughly rectangular clay tablet in multiple views: obverse, reverse (with Louvre accession number AO 3531 visible — note the transliteration header gives AO 03331, a likely transcription variant for the same object), left and right edges, and top. The obverse (upper main face) preserves several horizontal ruled lines with cuneiform wedges clearly visible, though surface abrasion and minor chipping affect some signs, particularly in the upper left corner and lower edge. The reverse (bottom fragment in the image) is more worn but retains legible vertical wedge clusters consistent with the year-name formula. The wedge patterns on the obverse are consistent with the numerical signs for talents (asz) and minas (ma-na) and the verb ba-la2 ('weighed out'), which are among the most common formulas in Ur III wool accounts. The sign na4-mah-ta ('from premium/top-grade stone-weight standard') is partially abraded but the reading is supported by the transliteration. The la2-ia3 ('deficit/shortfall') line and the personal name lu2-dumu-zi are consistent with what can be discerned in the mid-section of the tablet. The year-name in the final line — Ur-Namma's road-straightening formula — is a well-attested date formula for his reign and is readable in the lower portion of the reverse, though individual signs cannot be confirmed at this resolution. The accession number visible in the photograph reads 'AO 3531', which diverges slightly from the catalog entry 'AO 03331'; this is likely a photographic label discrepancy or variant notation for the same object.