Position in chronology
CUSAS 01, 062
About this tablet
A proto-cuneiform fish-accounting tablet from the Uruk period, roughly 3300–3000 BCE, and one of the earliest written records ever produced by human civilization. It logs quantities of fish — principally carp and a generic fish category — in the columnar case-by-case format typical of early Mesopotamian institutional bookkeeping, with entries ranging from 4 to 94 units per line. The tablet most likely belonged to the archive of a large temple or palace household, recording either incoming fish deliveries, stored stocks, or rations issued to dependent workers. The mention of Uruk at the end is a rare explicit geographical anchor, probably naming the city or institution that managed these goods.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Four carp in one consignment, four more measured by a different unit; eight carp of a variant type; ninety-four fish of a general category; fifty units of something whose exact type is unclear. Several further entries follow — one mentioning a city institution, another apparently a delivery or storage marker — but those lines are too damaged to read confidently. A handful of signs in the middle of the tablet remain unidentified altogether. The last legible entry names Uruk, presumably the institutional center that held or received these fish stocks.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine[...] 4 [units], 4 [N57-measure] of carp; 8 [units], carp (variant type); 94 [units], fish; 50 [units], [(SUKUD+SUKUD) — type uncertain]; [...], [city / city institution]; [...], [...]; [BU+DU6 — disbursement marker or storage location?]; [GIR3 — delivery / route marker?]; [ZATU714 — unidentified sign]; [...], [...]; [...], [...]; [two unidentified signs]; Uruk.
Our translation engine — Sonnet 4.6. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
Transliteration
[...] 4(N01) , 4(N57) SUHUR 8(N01) , SUHUR@t 1(N34) 3(N14)# 4(N01) , KU6~a 5(N14) , |(SUKUD+SUKUD)~b| [...] , URU~a1 [...] , [...] |BU~a+DU6~a| GIR3~a ZATU714 [...] , [...] [...] , [...] X X UNUG~a
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Uruk III (ca. 3200-3000 BC)) — CUSAS 01, 062. 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 (P325739) — 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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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.