Position in chronology
MSVO 1, 116
About this tablet
This is a proto-cuneiform administrative tablet from the Jemdet Nasr / Uruk III period (roughly the last centuries of the 4th millennium BCE), one of the earliest forms of writing in the world. It is essentially an inventory or tally list — recording small livestock (sheep), quantities of a fish commodity (called suhur, possibly carp), a measured quantity involving reed and a container or category sign, and barley — grouped under the authority of a high-status official or institution (EN). Tablets like this come from the earliest bureaucratic recordkeeping in southern Mesopotamia, tracking the movement of food and goods through emerging city administrations at sites like Jemdet Nasr.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This tablet is a tally sheet. It lists: one sheep; two units of carp (or a fish-based measure); one more sheep; five units of carp; then an entry involving an uncertain container or category term together with a reed-measure; a quantity of barley; two more sheep; seven units of carp; one entry in a different counting notation; and finally, after a break, an entry naming or invoking a lord or presiding official, with one further unit recorded in yet another numeral notation. In short: a running account of sheep, fish, and grain moving through some institution's stores, overseen by an official whose name or title is only partly preserved.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine1 (N01-unit): sheep. 2 (N01-units): suhur-fish (carp). 1 (N01-unit): sheep. 5 (N01-units): suhur-fish (carp). KAB(?) — LAGAB — reed(-measure). barley(?). 2 (N01-units): sheep. 7 (N01-units): suhur-fish (carp). 1 (N40-unit): [...]. [...] lord/official (EN): 1 (N57-unit).
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
1(N01) , UDU~a# 2(N01) , SUHUR# 1(N01) , UDU~a 5(N01) , SUHUR , KAB#? LAGAB~b GI , SZE~a#? 2(N01) , UDU~a 7(N01) , SUHUR 1(N40) , , [...] EN~a# 1(N57)
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Uruk III (ca. 3200-3000 BC)) — MSVO 1, 116. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, UK (P005183) — 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.