Position in chronology
MVN 13, 877
Translation — curated editorial
EditorialEditorial entry — translation cited from: CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P200400.
Transliteration
1(u@c) 5(asz@c) udu-nita2 1(u@c) 5(asz@c) u8 nin-gir2-su lu2-ba dumu ur-szu-KID i3-dab5
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Lagash II (ca. 2200-2100 BC) ?) — MVN 13, 877. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Free Library of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA (P200400) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P200400..
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.
A window into the world's first total state. The Ur III administration tracked every animal, every worker, every shekel — for a population in the millions. The level of paperwork was not exceeded until the modern era.