CUSAS 01, 172

~3100 BCE·Uruk Period·P283917

About this tablet

This is a proto-cuneiform administrative tablet from the Uruk period, one of the earliest forms of writing in the world (roughly 3200 BCE), recording quantities of a commodity — likely grain rations or a mixed foodstuff marked by the sign HI — allocated to or drawn from institutions and labor groups, including a reference to the city of Uruk itself and a storehouse work-force. Tablets like this were the bookkeeping backbone of the world's first cities: scribes tallied goods against people and institutions using a proto-writing system that mixed pictographs with several parallel numerical notation systems. The final line, 'new, one, head,' likely marks a fresh allocation or a newly counted individual/overseer closing out the account.

Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.

Written in modern English

This tally records several batches of a mixed commodity — probably rations of grain — being counted out. One entry involves the city of Uruk. Another concerns the workforce attached to a storehouse. A third entry is broken off and illegible. A fourth records a quantity handed over to a group of dependent workers. Finally, a new allocation is noted, with a count of one person or overseer marking the entry. As is typical of these very early accounting tablets, the reverse side appears to have been left blank or is too worn to read.

A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.

Translation — our engine

Our engine

Low confidence

5(N01) 1(N24), HI (mixed-commodity marker) — (of) Uruk. 1(N01) 1(N24) 1(N16), HI (mixed-commodity marker) — (of) the ERIN (labor-troop/work-force) (of) the E2 (storehouse), UR2. 1(N01) 1(N24) 1(N28) 1(N30~c), HI (mixed-commodity marker) — [...] 4(N01) 3(N39~a) 1(N24), HI (mixed-commodity marker) — in the hand of (ŠU) the UR5 (dependent-worker group). New (batch, GIBIL): 1(N04), SAG (head/person).

Our translation engine — Sonnet 5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.

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Transliteration

5(N01)# 1(N24) , HI@g~a UNUG~a
1(N01) 1(N24) 1(N16) , HI@g~a ERIN E2~a UR2
1(N01) 1(N24) 1(N28) 1(N30~c)# , HI@g~a# [...]
4(N01) 3(N39~a) 1(N24) , HI@g~a# SZU# UR5~a
, GIBIL 1(N04) SAG#

Scholarly note

Catalogue entry from CDLI (Uruk III (ca. 3200-3000 BC)) — CUSAS 01, 172. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).

Attribution

Image: Department of Near Eastern Studies, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, USA (P283917) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).

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