Position in chronology
CUSAS 01, 040
About this tablet
This is a proto-cuneiform administrative accounting tablet from the Uruk period, probably dating to around 3200–3000 BCE — among the earliest writing in human history. It records quantities of commodities and individuals, including sheep, female workers, salt, young animals (calves or lambs), and possibly fodder, tracked by an institutional scribe at what was likely a large temple or palace complex. The entry involving 'Kiš' and several qualifying signs is particularly intriguing, possibly pointing to an inter-city or inter-regional transaction or a category of persons associated with that city. Tablets like this are the very foundation of literacy: not literature, but the bureaucratic impulse that first drove humans to write things down.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
The tablet logs a series of institutional commodities and personnel counts. Ten units of salt; one tally record; various day-unit entries involving young animals; six female workers; five heart/interior-category items; four and three further day-unit entries with young animals and salt; fifteen sheep; thirty-five items under a 'Kiš' or institutional heading involving fodder and additional qualifiers; ten more salt; twenty-five disbursed young animals; ten more salt; eighteen female workers; and finally seven items of highland or foreign-land provenance. The right half of the reverse is too damaged to read in full.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine1(N14) [= 10], MUN~a1 [salt] 1(N01) [= 1], DUB~b [tablet/tally] 3(N01) [= 3], |U4x2(N57)| [day-unit × 2 notch] 3(N01) [= 3], |U4x1(N57)| AMAR [day-unit × 1 notch, calf/young animal] 6(N01) [= 6], SAL [women/female workers] 5(N01) [= 5], SZA3~a2 [interior/heart — commodity or category] 4(N01) [= 4], |U4x2(N57)| [day-unit × 2 notch] 3(N01) [= 3], |U4x1(N57)| AMAR MUN~a1 [day-unit × 1 notch, young animal, salt] 1(N14) 5(N01) [= 15], UDU~a [sheep] 3(N14) 5(N01) [= 35], KISZ NAM2 KAB# U2~b DIN [Kiš-category/institution, NAM2, KAB, fodder/plant, DIN] 1(N14) [= 10], MUN~a1 [salt] 2(N14) 5(N01) [= 25], |DU8~cxAMAR| [release/disbursement of young animals] 1(N14) [= 10], MUN~a1 [salt] 1(N14) 8(N01) [= 18], [SAL] [women/female workers] 7(N01) [= 7], KUR~a [foreign land / highland / mountain origin]
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) , MUN~a1 1(N01) , DUB~b 3(N01) , |U4x2(N57)| 3(N01) , |U4x1(N57)| AMAR 6(N01) , SAL 5(N01) , SZA3~a2 4(N01) , |U4x2(N57)| 3(N01) , |U4x1(N57)| AMAR MUN~a1 1(N14) 5(N01) , UDU~a 3(N14) 5(N01) , KISZ NAM2 KAB# U2~b DIN 1(N14) , MUN~a1 2(N14) 5(N01) , |DU8~cxAMAR| 1(N14) , MUN~a1 1(N14) 8(N01) , [SAL] 7(N01) , KUR~a
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Uruk III (ca. 3200-3000 BC)) — CUSAS 01, 040. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Department of Near Eastern Studies, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, USA (P325350) — 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.
Marks the boundary between proto-writing and writing. We can see signs being used systematically — but not yet phonetically. The leap to recording speech itself comes a few centuries later.
The earliest historical document in human history. Before this, we have lists, accounts, and dedications. Here, for the first time, a ruler tells us what happened — with names, places, and consequences.