Position in chronology
MS 2396
About this tablet
This tiny lenticular clay tablet from the Uruk period (roughly 3300–3000 BCE) is one of the earliest administrative records in human history — a proto-cuneiform account listing nine commodity entries, each marked with a single tally stroke, followed by a summary line recording their disbursement. The entries cover an unusually varied range: beer, grain, a donkey, sheep, fish rations, and references to an official (EN), a courtyard, and an overseer. It was almost certainly produced by a temple or palace institution in southern Mesopotamia, perhaps Umma, as part of the world's first bureaucratic paper trail — before writing had even developed fully into a language-recording system.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Nine items are recorded here, one unit each: beer with grain; an unidentified commodity; something connected with the city of Uruk; a high official's reed allotment; a donkey and a sheep; a fish ration issued at a distribution point; something at the courtyard; an overseer; and a branch-official. The total — nine units — is then noted as having been distributed, handled by an overseer or guardian. A field or enclosure is mentioned at the end, though that final entry is too damaged to read clearly.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine1(N01) — beer (KASZ~c) [and/with] grain (|SZE~a&SZE~a|) 1(N01) — [commodity: ZATU659, unidentified] 1(N01) — Uruk (UNUG~a) [place/institution] KI [with/at] ZATU773~a [unidentified sign] 1(N01) — EN~a (lord/high official) [with] reeds (|GI&GI|) 1(N01) — donkey (ANSZE~e) [and/with] sheep (UDU~a) 1(N01) — mouth/ration-opening (KA~a) [of/for] fish (KU6~a) 1(N01) — horn/branch (SI) [of/at] courtyard (KISAL~b1) 1(N01) — guardian/overseer (PAP~a) 1(N01) — branch/wing (PA~a) — disbursement/distribution (BA) — [line unclear/blank] Total: 9(N01) — distributed (BA) [via/through] SU~a PAP~a [body/officer: guardian] — field/enclosure (GAN~a#) [damaged/uncertain]
Our translation engine — Sonnet 4.6. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
Transliteration
1(N01) , KASZ~c |SZE~a&SZE~a| 1(N01) , ZATU659 1(N01) , UNUG~a KI ZATU773~a 1(N01) , EN~a |GI&GI| 1(N01) , ANSZE~e UDU~a 1(N01) , KA~a KU6~a 1(N01) , SI KISAL~b1 1(N01) , PAP~a 1(N01) , PA~a , BA , 9(N01) , BA SU~a PAP~a , GAN~a#
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Uruk III (ca. 3200-3000 BC)) — MS 2396. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Schøyen Collection, Oslo, Norway (P006037) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-4-6 (2026-05-18/v5-modern-rendering).
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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.
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.