Position in chronology
MSVO 3, 73
About this tablet
This is a proto-cuneiform administrative tablet from Uruk (modern Warka, southern Iraq), dating to around 3100–2900 BCE — among the very earliest written documents in human history. It records quantities of commodities, most likely barley and possibly timber or reeds, distributed across storehouses and overseen by named institutional officials including a SANGA (temple administrator) and a chief carpenter. The tablet belongs to the great tradition of Uruk-period bureaucratic record-keeping that gave rise to writing itself: scribes invented cuneiform not for poetry or religion first, but to track grain, goods, and labor. The reverse shows numerical notations in the older impressed-circle system, confirming this is a genuine counting and accounting document.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This tablet tracks allocations of barley (and possibly timber) across one or more institutional storehouses, with entries tied to specific officials — including a senior temple administrator and a chief carpenter — and a named authority called NIN ('Lady' or a title). Several entries record quantities consumed or disbursed. The final lines note further rations under a SI4-AZ designation, but the last line is too damaged to read completely. In modern terms: a multi-line warehouse ledger recording who received what commodity, in what quantity, and under whose authority.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine1(N14) [units], barley — junior storehouse — NIN 2(N14) [units], barley — SI TUN3 — 3(N57) [units of] timber(?) — storehouse 6(N19) [units], storehouse — junior — NIN 2(N04) [units], URI3 — chief carpenter — great SANGA — SANGA [...], NIN — carpenter(?) — junior 1(N19) 3(N41) [units], elder/supervisor — SANGA 2(N04) 1(N41) [units], A RU ZI 2(N04) 1(N41) [units], SZU2 — SZITA 1(N04) [unit], DA — [ZATU694 commodity] — BU — city — overseer 1(N19) [units], 3(N57) [units of] timber(?) — storehouse — SI TUN3 [...], SI4 — AZ — consumed/disbursed [...], SI4 — AZ — [...]
Our translation engine — Sonnet 4.6. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
Transliteration
1(N14)# , SZE~a# TUR3~a# NIN 2(N14) , SZE~a SI TUN3~a 3(N57) GISZ@t E2~a 6(N19) , E2~a TUR3~a NIN 2(N04) , URI3~a NAGAR~a GAL~a SANGA~a SANGA~a [...] , NIN NAGAR~a#? TUR3~a 1(N19) 3(N41) , PAP~a SANGA~a 2(N04) 1(N41) , A RU ZI~a 2(N04) 1(N41) , SZU2 SZITA~a2 1(N04) , DA~a ZATU694~c BU~a URU~a1 PA~a 1(N19) , 3(N57) GISZ@t E2~a SI TUN3~a , SI4~f AZ GU7 , SI4~f# AZ# [...]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Uruk III (ca. 3200-3000 BC)) — MSVO 3, 73. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Land Berlin, Berlin, Germany (P005384) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-4-6 (2026-05-28/v6-glossary-aware).
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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.