Position in chronology
MSVO 1, 179
About this tablet
This is a proto-cuneiform administrative tablet from the Uruk period, most likely from Jemdet Nasr in southern Iraq, dating to roughly 3100–2900 BCE — among the very earliest written records in human history. It records quantities of commodities — including a jar type, beer, containers or boats (MA), apples or fruit, fish, and milk or dairy products — apparently distributed or consumed under the authority of an institutional official (EN). The tablet belongs to a class of early economic documents in which a temple or palatial administration tracked the flow of goods through its storerooms. Its interest lies precisely in its antiquity: this is bureaucracy before any known literary tradition, writing deployed purely to manage institutional resources.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This tablet logs a series of commodity disbursements overseen by a high official. One jar-unit and one unit of beer are noted, along with six containers (possibly boats used as measures) and six apples or fruit. A larger entry — forty-four units — records something connected with a cattle-stall, followed by thirty units of carp or fish from the same institution. The official (EN), a supervisor (PA), and jar-containers are listed together. Two large units go back to the cattle-stall category, and three units under the official's authority are marked as half-portions or disbursements. The final readable lines record consumption or ration allocations involving milk or dairy, some fresh or newly processed, in quantities the damage prevents us from fully reading.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine1(N01) [vessel/unit] — DUG~b (a jar type) 1(N01) [unit] — beer (KAŠ~c) 6(N01) — MA (boat/container?) 6(N01) — apple/fruit (ḪAŠḪUR) 4(N14) 4(N01) — [commodity X], cattle-stall (AB~a) 3(N14) — cattle-stall (AB~a), carp/fish (SUHUR) [...] — EN~a (lord/official), PA~a (overseer?), DUG~a (jar/container) 2(N52) — cattle-stall (AB~a) 3(N21) — EN~a (lord/official), DUG~a (jar), BAR (half-portion/disbursement) [blank/damaged] — GU7 (consumed/rationed), GA~a (milk?), [X] [blank/damaged] — GIBIL (fresh/new), 3(N57), SU~a, GU7 (consumed/rationed), GA~a (milk?) [...]
Our translation engine — Sonnet 4.6. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
Transliteration
1(N01) , DUG~b# 1(N01) , KASZ~c# 6(N01)# , MA# 6(N01)# , HASZHUR# 4(N14)# 4(N01)# , X AB~a 3(N14)# , AB~a# SUHUR# [...] , EN~a# PA~a# DUG~a# 2(N52)# , AB~a 3(N21) , EN~a DUG~a BAR , GU7 GA~a X , GIBIL# 3(N57) SU~a GU7# GA~a# [...]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Uruk III (ca. 3200-3000 BC)) — MSVO 1, 179. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, UK (P005246) — 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.