Position in chronology
OIP 092, 0044
About this tablet
An administrative receipt from the Persepolis Fortification archive, written in Elamite by a clerk of the Persian imperial economy under Darius I, around 503 BCE. It records a large shipment of wine — 500 measures — drawn from the stock managed by an official named Marriyaddana and transported to Batrakataš, the Elamite name for Pasargadae, Cyrus the Great's old capital. Thousands of such tablets survive, together forming the day-to-day ledger of how the Achaemenid state moved food and drink across the Persian heartland.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Shipment record: 500 units of wine, drawn from the supplies under Marriyaddana's responsibility. Zirazabbe transported the wine to Pasargadae. Logged in year 19 of the king's reign.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine500 (measures of) wine, the allocation of Marriyaddana. Zirazabbe carried (it) to Batrakataš (Pasargadae). 19th year.
Our translation engine — Fable 5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
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Transliteration
_5(disz) me# gesztin-mesz_ kur-min2 mar-ri-ia-ad-da-na zi2-ra-zab-be bat-ra-ka4-tasz ku-ti-isz be#-ul 1(u) 9(disz@v)-um-me-ma
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Achaemenid (547-331 BC)) — OIP 092, 0044. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: OIM L— (PFAP, Oriental Institute, University of Chicago, Chicago, Illinois, USA) — from Pārśa (mod. Persepolis) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.earth/artifacts, P382730). source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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