Position in chronology
MS 2843
About this tablet
This is a proto-cuneiform numerical tablet from the Uruk period (roughly 3200–3000 BCE), one of the earliest forms of writing in human history — not a sentence but a livestock account. Each line pairs a small pictographic sign for an animal type (ewe, she-goat, ram, goat, and one unclear commodity marked UTUA~a) with an impressed numeral showing how many head were counted. The final line appears to total the sheep and mark them as disbursed or allotted, suggesting this tablet tracked herd inventory or redistribution for a temple or large household economy in one of the world's first cities.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This tally records a small herd: 4 ewes, 7 she-goats, 11 units of an unidentified commodity or animal category, 16 rams, 11 head marked with a special qualifier, and 38 goats (though that last number is damaged and partly restored). A final line totals up the sheep and notes that a portion was handed out or allotted. It reads like a warehouse or herd-manager's inventory slip — a running count of animals by type, with a closing note about distribution — rather than a story or letter.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine4(N01), U8 (ewes) 7(N01), UD5~a (she-goats) 1(N14) 1(N01), UTUA~a (commodity: 11) 1(N14) 6(N01), UDUNITA~a (rams/male sheep: 16) 1(N14) 1(N01), NUN~b (qualifier category: 11) 3(N14)# 8(N01), MASZ2 (goats: 38, numeral partly damaged) 1(N34) 2(N14) 7(N01), UDU~a 1(N57) BA (sheep, total: disbursed/allotted) ,
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
4(N01) , U8 7(N01) , UD5~a 1(N14) 1(N01) , UTUA~a 1(N14) 6(N01) , UDUNITA~a 1(N14) 1(N01) , NUN~b 3(N14)# 8(N01) , MASZ2 1(N34) 2(N14) 7(N01) , UDU~a 1(N57) BA ,
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Uruk III (ca. 3200-3000 BC)) — MS 2843. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Schøyen Collection, Oslo, Norway (P006146) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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.
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.