Position in chronology
MDP 17, 451
About this tablet
A small proto-Elamite administrative tablet from Susa (ancient Elam, modern southwest Iran), dating to the Uruk period, roughly 3200–3000 BCE. It records quantities of commodities or institutional categories — the exact goods are unknown because proto-Elamite script remains largely undeciphered — entered in a columnar format typical of early accountancy. The repeated structural sign M288 likely acts as a category divider or header, with numerical notations in the sexagesimal and bisexagesimal systems recording amounts. This is one of the earliest forms of bureaucratic record-keeping in human history, predating the decipherment of Sumerian by several centuries.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This tablet lists several entries of unknown commodities or institutional categories, each paired with a numerical count. One entry records 23 units of something (2×10 + 3), another records 2 units of a different item, and a further entry records 3 units. A sign that may serve as a heading or category marker appears repeatedly. The largest subtotal visible is 80 units (8×10), with another partial entry showing at least 10 units. Several lines are too broken or too damaged to read. The sign identities for most commodity terms remain unknown — proto-Elamite has not been deciphered.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine[...] , x , 1(N01) M288 , 2(N14) 3(N01) M050~f , 2(N01) [...] , 3(N01) M217~f M124# , [...] [...] , 3(N39B)# M288 , 8(N14) [...] , 1(N14)
Our translation engine — Sonnet 4.6. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
Transliteration
[...] , x , 1(N01) M288 , 2(N14) 3(N01) M050~f , 2(N01) [...] , 3(N01) M217~f M124# , [...] [...] , 3(N39B)# M288 , 8(N14) [...] , 1(N14)
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Proto-Elamite (ca. 3100-2900 BC)) — MDP 17, 451. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Louvre Museum, Paris, France (P008649) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-4-6 (2026-05-28/v6-glossary-aware).
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.
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.