Position in chronology
MSVO 1, 104
About this tablet
This is one of the earliest administrative tablets in human history, dating to around 3100–2900 BCE from the site of Jemdet Nasr in southern Iraq. It records quantities of barley and related commodities — possibly including beer rations and fodder — distributed to or associated with named officials and worker groups. The signs belong to proto-cuneiform, the world's oldest writing system, which was invented primarily to track institutional goods, labor, and livestock. Because the script is not yet fully deciphered, many words can be recognized as signs but not translated into known Sumerian words with certainty.
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 beer — to various work groups and officials. One section records twenty units of barley as a remainder or leftover allocation to a work gang, with a portion going to a temple administrator at a place or institution called |NI~a.RU|. Further entries record barley quantities of thirty and ten units distributed to individuals identified by their roles or names. A final accounting line, partially broken, records a large cumulative total involving foot-travel or a path official and a branch or staff symbol. Several lines are too damaged to read in full.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine20 [units], barley remainder (?), beer, workers/gang [...] barley, ration/allocation, SANGA-official, |NI~a.RU| 13# [...] X [...] barley 20 [units], DA, AD 30 [units], IL, grass/fodder 10 [units], remainder, NI, head/chief [...] goats/kids, barley [2+2 large units + 2 small units], LAGAB, barley, ration/allocation [large quantity] [...] [large quantity] + 31+ [units], GIR3 (foot/path?), PA [...]
Our translation engine — Sonnet 4.6. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
Transliteration
2(N14) , SZE~a TAK4~a KASZ~a ERIM~a , SZE~a BA SANGA~a |NI~a.RU| 1(N14) 3(N01)# [...] , X [...] SZE~a 2(N14) , DA~a AD~c 3(N14) , IL U2~b 1(N14) , TAK4~a NI~a SAG , MASZ SZE~a 2(N46) 2(N04) 2(N41) , LAGAB~b SZE~a BA [1(N45) 2(N14) 5(N01)] , [...] 1(N34) 3(N14) 1(N04) 2(N41)# , GIR3@g~b PA~a [...]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Uruk III (ca. 3200-3000 BC)) — MSVO 1, 104. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, UK (P005171) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-4-6 (2026-05-18/v5-modern-rendering).
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.
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.