Position in chronology
MDP 17, 090
About this tablet
A proto-literate accounting tablet from Susa (southwestern Iran), dated to the Uruk period — roughly 3300–3000 BCE, among the very earliest stages of writing anywhere in the world. The tablet records quantities of undeciphered commodity types using proto-cuneiform sign combinations paired with numerical notations in the archaic impressed-number system. The signs themselves are not yet fully deciphered, but the structure — sign + quantity, repeated across multiple lines — is unmistakably that of an institutional ledger tracking goods, perhaps rations, livestock, or craft products. This object belongs to a family of early administrative tablets found at Susa that closely parallel contemporary records from Uruk in southern Mesopotamia, testifying to a shared bureaucratic culture across a wide region at the dawn of writing.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This tablet is a ledger of quantities assigned to various commodity categories, most of which remain undeciphered. The surviving entries read roughly: [broken entry] for the sign-combination M195+M057; then M206~f: 40 units; M206~fa: 21 units; an unread item: 1 large unit plus 1 medium unit; M252~qa: 46 small units; M206~f: 4 large units; M039~b: 3 small plus 1 large unit; a combined entry for M005~a with M195+M057 and M206~f: 24 units; M206~fa: 50 units; an unread item: 3 large units; and M252~qa: 12 units. The rest of the tablet is either lost or too damaged to read.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine[...] |M195+M057| , M206~f , 4(N14) M206~fa , 2(N34) 1(N14) [x] , 1(N39B) 1(N24) M252~qa , 4(N14) 6(N01) M206~f , 4(N39B) M039~b , 3(N01) 1(N39B) M005~a? |M195+M057| M206~f , 2(N34) 4(N14) M206~fa , 5(N34) [x] , 3(N39B) M252~qa , 1(N34) 2(N14)
Our translation engine — Sonnet 4.6. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
Transliteration
[...] |M195+M057| , M206~f# , 4(N14) M206~fa , 2(N34) 1(N14) x , 1(N39B) 1(N24) M252~qa , 4(N14) 6(N01) M206~f , 4(N39B) M039~b# , 3(N01) 1(N39B) M005~a? |M195+M057| M206~f , 2(N34) 4(N14) M206~fa , 5(N34) x , 3(N39B) M252~qa , 1(N34)# 2(N14)
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Proto-Elamite (ca. 3100-2900 BC)) — MDP 17, 090. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Louvre Museum, Paris, France (P008288) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-4-6 (2026-05-28/v6-glossary-aware).
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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.
Marks the boundary between proto-writing and writing. We can see signs being used systematically — but not yet phonetically. The leap to recording speech itself comes a few centuries later.
The earliest historical document in human history. Before this, we have lists, accounts, and dedications. Here, for the first time, a ruler tells us what happened — with names, places, and consequences.