Position in chronology
MAD 5, 049
About this tablet
An administrative personnel list from the city of Kish in the Old Akkadian period (around 2300 BCE). A scribe counts off men one by one, identifying each by his father's name — the ancient equivalent of a muster roll or work-gang register. Such lists were the backbone of early state administration: labor, rations, and obligations were all tracked by exactly this kind of head-count. The mix of Akkadian names shows the Semitic-speaking population of northern Babylonia under the dynasty of Akkad.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
A head-count of four men, one per line, each identified by his father: Dingir-su-kal, son of Ilulu; Gi-šum, son of Ilī-dan; Ubarum, son of Aḫu-mu-pi; and a fourth man whose name begins Puzur- but whose entry is broken off. It reads like a roster or sign-in sheet — one tally mark per person — from the administrative offices of Kish.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine1 (man): Dingir-su-kal, son of Ilulu; 1 (man): Gi-šum, son of Ilī-dan; 1 (man): Ubarum, son of [A]ḫu-mu-pi; [1 (man):] Puzur-[...] (remainder of the entry broken)
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
1(asz@c) dingir-su-kal dumu i3-lu-lu 1(asz@c) gi-szum dumu i3-li2-dan 1(asz@c) u-ba-ru-um dumu [a]-hu-mu-pi5 [1(asz@c)] puzur4# [...]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Akkadian (ca. 2340-2200 BC)) — MAD 5, 049. This record has no stored scholarly English translation; the existence of published translations has not been checked; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, UK (P215373) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-5 (2026-09-20/v8-evolved).
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