Position in chronology
CUSAS 01, 111
About this tablet
One of the oldest types of administrative records known to humanity, this small clay tablet dates to the Uruk period of ancient Mesopotamia — roughly 3300–3000 BCE — before writing had fully evolved into the Sumerian language we can read fluently. It records quantities of barley and at least one other commodity (possibly rations or a fiber product) using a numerical notation system that preceded standard numerals. The tablet is part of the earliest experiment in human record-keeping: temple or palace officials pressing numbers and commodity signs into wet clay to track flows of goods. Its exact origin is unknown, but tablets of this type typically come from southern Iraq, from the great urban center of Uruk itself or nearby sites.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
The tablet records several large quantities of barley — running into the hundreds of units by the proto-cuneiform number signs used — along with at least one other commodity that appears to involve some kind of ration or fiber product (the sign read as GU, possibly thread or neck-rations). Several lines are damaged or broken away entirely, making the full accounting impossible to reconstruct. What survives is a fragment of a much larger tally: quantities measured, commodities named, the rest lost.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine4(N14) 2(N01) 3(N39~a) 1(N24) 1(N30~c) — barley (SZE~a) [...] 1(N04) 1(N41) [...] , [...] 2(N18) 4(N03) 1(N30~c) 1(N39~a) 1(N24) 1(N28) — [commodity:] |HI×N57| GU~a [...] , [...]
Our translation engine — Sonnet 4.6. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
Transliteration
4(N14)# 2(N01) 3(N39~a) 1(N24) 1(N30~c) , SZE~a [...] 1(N04) 1(N41) [...] , [...] 2(N18) 4(N03) 1(N30~c) 1(N39~a) 1(N24) 1(N28) , |HIx1(N57)| GU~a [...] , [...]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Uruk III (ca. 3200-3000 BC)) — CUSAS 01, 111. 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 (P325485) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-4-6 (2026-05-18/v5-modern-rendering).
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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.