MSVO 3, 14

~3100 BCE·Uruk Period·P005325

About this tablet

This is an early proto-cuneiform administrative tablet from Uruk (modern Warka, southern Iraq), dating to roughly 3200–3000 BCE — among the very oldest written records in human history. It records allocations or rations disbursed to different categories of workers or dependents, including male workers, female workers, and a group identified as SZUBUR (possibly servants or people of northern origin). The closing signs GU7 ('rations consumed') and SAGSZU ('head-count') are typical of institutional food-distribution ledgers kept by early Mesopotamian temple bureaucracies. The tablet is photographed in multiple fragments showing obverse, reverse, and edge views, confirming it was a small multi-sided accounting document.

Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.

Written in modern English

This tablet records a distribution of rations across several categories of institutional workers. One entry covers a group associated with a building or storehouse; another lists female workers of a particular rank or designation; a third covers SZUBUR dependents housed in a specific building. Smaller quantities of mixed commodities are noted under several entries. The closing lines give a grand total of rations consumed and a head-count of the recipients. The remainder of several lines is too damaged or broken to read.

A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.

Translation — our engine

Our engine

Low confidence

1(N40) 1(N24~a) — UR2, GISZ 2(N40) 1(N24~a) — male workers, storehouse 4(N40) — MUSZ3~a (snake/winding sign), female, precious/silver 2(N40) 1(N24~a) — SZUBUR, [house + 1(N57)@t] 3(N40) 1(N24~a) — AN, BA (disbursed/allotted) 3(N03) — MUD, AN, TE 3(N03) — HI (mixed?), KA~a 3(N03) — NIR~a# [...] 4(N03) — [...] 3(N40) — SZU, BU~a 2(N03) 2(N40) — HI (mixed?), KA~a [...] — GU7 (rations consumed/disbursed) 3(N18) 4(N40) — GU7 (rations consumed/disbursed) [...] — SAGSZU (head-count / total persons)

Our translation engine — Sonnet 4.6. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.

Transliteration

1(N40) 1(N24~a) , UR2 GISZ
2(N40) 1(N24~a) , GURUSZ~a E2~a
4(N40) , MUSZ3~a SAL KU3~a
2(N40) 1(N24~a) , SZUBUR |E2~ax1(N57)@t|
3(N40) 1(N24~a) , AN BA
3(N03) , MUD AN TE
3(N03) , HI KA~a
3(N03) , NIR~a# [...]
4(N03) , [...]
3(N40) , SZU BU~a
2(N03) 2(N40) , HI KA~a
, GU7#
3(N18) 4(N40) , GU7#
, SAGSZU

Scholarly note

Catalogue entry from CDLI (Uruk III (ca. 3200-3000 BC)) — MSVO 3, 14. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).

Attribution

Image: Land Berlin, Berlin, Germany (P005325) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-4-6 (2026-05-28/v6-glossary-aware).

Related tablets

Related sources

~3200 BCE

Proto-Cuneiform Account Tablet

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.

~3500 BCE

Kish Tablet

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.

~2450 BCE

Stele of the Vultures

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.