Position in chronology
MSVO 3, 17
About this tablet
This is a small proto-cuneiform administrative tablet from the Uruk period (roughly 3200–3000 BCE), likely from the city of Uruk in southern Iraq. It records quantities of goods or rations — perhaps reeds or grain — associated with named institutional categories such as a high official (SUKKAL), a supervisor or elder (PAP~a), a dependent worker or Subarian person (SZUBUR), and an institutional lord or head (EN~a). The sign GU7 suggests a disbursement or consumption entry. Tablets like this are among the earliest written documents in human history, representing the Uruk bureaucracy's attempt to track the flow of goods through large institutional households — the very birth of writing as an accounting tool.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
One unit [of commodity — type damaged or lost]: for the vizier/official (SUKKAL) and the elder/supervisor (PAP~a) — reeds (GI). One unit [from or for the storehouse]: for the Subarian worker/servant (SZUBUR). Three units for the lord/institutional head (EN~a): given/deposited — [remainder broken]. [Entry for] rations consumed (GU7). One larger unit plus one smaller unit [— rest too damaged to read]. Several lines are too broken or worn to recover.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine1(N03) [commodity/sign lost], SUKKAL, PAP~a, GI 1(N03) [storehouse?] SZUBUR 3(N03) EN~a RU [...] [...] GU7 1(N18) 1(N03) [...] [...]
Our translation engine — Sonnet 4.6. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
Transliteration
1(N03)# , [...] SUKKAL# PAP~a# GI 1(N03) , |E2~ax1(N57)@t| SZUBUR 3(N03)# , EN~a RU [...] , GU7 1(N18)# 1(N03)# [...] , [...] , [...]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Uruk III (ca. 3200-3000 BC)) — MSVO 3, 17. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Land Berlin, Berlin, Germany (P005328) — 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
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.