MS 2438

~3100 BCE·Uruk Period·P006055

About this tablet

This is a small clay accounting tablet from Uruk-period Umma (roughly the later fourth millennium BCE), one of the earliest forms of writing on Earth — a proto-cuneiform tally of livestock and other provisions. It lists successive quantities of ewes, she-goats, goats, and rams, along with entries pairing sheep, fish, and birds, kept by an unnamed institutional household or official. The final line is broken off, so we cannot see how the tally concluded or what commodity closed the list. Tablets like this are the bookkeeping backbone of the earliest cities, recording herds and goods long before writing was used for anything but administration.

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

Written in modern English

The record tallies livestock, entry by entry: two ewes, two she-goats, twenty-eight (or a similar compound number of) goats, and another livestock group marked with a special designation whose exact meaning (perhaps a grade or source pen) isn't clear today. Four units of an unidentified commodity follow, then a batch of rams. A further line groups sheep together with fish and birds under a single count, and the tablet closes with one more numbered entry that is too damaged to read. It's a straightforward inventory of animals and goods kept by some administrative office, but the last item is lost to a break in the clay.

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

Translation — our engine

Our engine

Medium confidence

1. 2(N01), ewes (U8) 2. 2(N14), she-goats (UD5) 3. 2(N14) 8(N01), goats (MAŠ2) 4. 2(N14) 7(N01), NUN(-designated livestock) 5. 4(N01), [UTUA-commodity, uncertain] 6. 1(N14), rams (male sheep, UDUNITA) 7. 1(N34) 3(N14) 1(N01), sheep, fish, bird(s), goat 8. 4(N34) 1(N14) 7(N01), [...] (broken)

Our translation engine — Sonnet 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

2(N01) , U8
2(N14) , UD5~a
2(N14) 8(N01) , MASZ2#
2(N14) 7(N01)# , NUN~b
4(N01) , UTUA~a
1(N14) , UDUNITA~a
1(N34) 3(N14) 1(N01) , UDU~a KU6~a MUSZEN MASZ
4(N34) 1(N14) 7(N01) , X [...]

Scholarly note

Catalogue entry from CDLI (Uruk III (ca. 3200-3000 BC)) — MS 2438. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).

Attribution

Image: Schøyen Collection, Oslo, Norway (P006055) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).

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