Position in chronology
MVN 03, 042
About this tablet
A short personnel list from Girsu, in southern Iraq, written during the Akkadian (Sargonic) period around 2300–2200 BCE. Each entry counts people one by one, with a single group of three children at the top. Most of the names are women's names (Amani, Nin-urni, Nin-barra, Geme-pisan), so this is probably a roster of dependent women and children attached to a household or institution, kept so that rations or work assignments could be tracked. The text gives names and head-counts only, with no total or heading in the part transcribed here.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This is a headcount of people. First come three children of a man or woman named Ušur-amamu (the name is not fully certain). Then seven individuals are listed one at a time: Amani, Nin-urni, Ur-zigumma (partly damaged), [Ur]-nig (the start is broken), someone whose name ends in -il (the beginning is unreadable), Nin-barra, and Geme-pisan. Nothing more survives in the transcription we have, so we do not know the purpose of the list or its total.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine1. 3 (persons): children of Ušur(?)-amamu 2. 1 (person): Amani 3. 1 (person): Nin-urni 4. 1 (person): Ur(?)-zigumma(?) 5. 1 (person): [Ur?]-nig 6. 1 (person): ...-il 7. 1 (person): Nin-barra 8. 1 (person): Geme-pisan
Our translation engine — Opus 5.5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
Spotted an error? Suggest a correction — confirmed corrections feed the engine's knowledge base.
Transliteration
3(asz@c) dumu uszur4?-ama#-mu 1(asz@c) ama-ni 1(asz@c) nin-ur2-ni 1(asz@c) ur#?-zigum#?-ma 1(asz@c) [ur?]-nig2 1(asz@c) x-il# 1(asz@c) nin-bar-ra 1(asz@c) geme2-pisan
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Akkadian (ca. 2340-2200 BC)) — MVN 03, 042. 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: Free Library of Philadelphia, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA (P215696) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-opus-5-5 (2026-09-20/v8-evolved).
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Related sources
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