Position in chronology
MDP 17, 332
About this tablet
A fragment of a Proto-Elamite accounting tablet from Susa in south-western Iran, written around 3100–2900 BCE in a script that has never been fully deciphered. It lists several entries, each headed by one or more sign groups (probably commodities, persons, or institutions) followed by quantities written with the round and wedge-shaped numeral impressions visible in the photo, and ends with a total on the reverse. Texts like this are the earliest writing from Iran, and they show an administration at Susa keeping ledgers of goods in much the same way as contemporary Uruk in Mesopotamia, even though the signs themselves cannot yet be read.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This is a ledger page, and only part of it survives. The first entry is headed by the signs M317, M297 and M288 and records 60-plus units (six of the 'ten' marks, with more lost). The second entry, its heading broken away, records 30. The third entry is headed by M005, M263, M387 and M219, but its quantity is gone. The fourth, headed by M099 and M102, records about 4 single units and 1 of a sub-unit, with more lost. The fifth records 3 tens and 2 units in a second numeral style. A final heading, M157 with M131, has lost its figure. On the back the scribe wrote the total: one 'sixty' sign. The rest of the tablet is missing.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engineObverse (line 1) [Sign group] M317+X, M297, M288 — 6(N14) [...] (line 2) [...] — 3(N14) (line 3) M005~a, M263~1, M387, M219 [...] — [quantity lost] (line 4) [...] M099, M102~da — 4(N01)? 1(N01@b)? [...] (line 5) [...] — 3(N14@b) 2(N01@b) (line 6) [Sign group] M157+M131 — [quantity lost] Reverse (line 7, total) 1(N34)
Our translation engine — Fable 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
|M317+X| M297 M288# , 6(N14)# [...] [...] , 3(N14) M005~a M263~1 M387 M219 [...] , [...] [...] M099 M102~da , 4(N01)#? 1(N01@b)#? [...] [...] , 3(N14@b) 2(N1@b) |M157+M131|# , [...] 1(N34)
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Proto-Elamite (ca. 3100-2900 BC)) — MDP 17, 332. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Louvre Museum, Paris, France (P008530) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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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.