Position in chronology
MDP 06, 240
About this tablet
This is a small proto-Elamite economic tablet from Susa, in the very earliest writing system used in the highlands of southwestern Iran around the late fourth millennium BCE — a script that, unlike early Sumerian cuneiform, has never been deciphered. What survives is a short list of entries, each ending in a numeral notation (the sign transliterated N39B, apparently standing for a single unit), suggesting a record of goods, animals, or rations being counted or issued. We can describe its structure — a heading, several rows each closing with a quantity, and a compound sign at the edge that may function as a seal or summary mark — but cannot say what commodity or person is actually being recorded, because the proto-Elamite sign values remain unread.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This is a short tally or receipt: a heading sign opens the record, then a line names a string of unidentified items or categories followed by a numeral that is now broken off. Three more lines each list a short sequence of signs and close with 'one' — apparently three separate entries, each amounting to a single unit of something. The tablet ends with a two-part sign mark, possibly a closing notation or seal impression. Because the proto-Elamite writing system has never been deciphered, we cannot say what goods, animals, or people are actually being counted — only that this is a routine accounting entry recording quantities against several named categories.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engineLine 1: [heading sign] M157 Line 2: M377 — M124 — M048(variant c) — M009 — M371 — M296(variant a, damaged) — [...] , [...] Line 3: [...] — M380(variant b, damaged) — M371 , 1 (unit, notation N39B) Line 4: M347 — M110 — M371 , 1 (unit, notation N39B) Line 5: M024(variant 1) — M035 — M066 (reading uncertain) — M263(variant 1) — M221(variant 1) , 1 (unit, notation N39B) Line 6 (edge/seal notation): compound sign M157(variant a) + M131(variant a)
Our translation engine — Sonnet 5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
Spotted an error? Suggest a correction — confirmed corrections feed the engine's knowledge base.
Transliteration
M157 , M377 M124 M048~c M009 M371 M296~a# [...] , [...] [...] M380~b M371 , 1(N39B) M347 M110 M371 , 1(N39B) M024~1 M035 M066#? M263~1 M221~1 , 1(N39B) |M157~a+M131~a|
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Proto-Elamite (ca. 3100-2900 BC)) — MDP 06, 240. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Louvre Museum, Paris, France (P008037) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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.