Position in chronology
MVN 03, 110
About this tablet
A food-and-drink ration account from the Old Akkadian (Sargonic) period, roughly the 23rd–22nd century BCE. A scribe listed allotments of bread and beer to a handful of named people — Ibni-šarrum, Šeš-šeš, U-barrum, I-mi-Utu and one whose name is broken — then totalled the bread and the beer by jars. A closing mention of Agade, the capital of the Sargonic kings, ties the account to the imperial administration, though where the tablet was actually written is unknown.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This is a list of bread and beer handed out to several people. Someone whose name ends in '-ka' heads the list, but that line is mostly lost. Ibni-šarrum gets the biggest share: 120 loaves plus several measures of two grades of beer. Šeš-šeš, U-barrum and one more person each get 60 loaves with a ban of each beer grade, and I-mi-Utu gets 30 loaves and one ban of beer. The total comes to 510 loaves and 50 more of another bread type, with the beer counted out in jars. The last lines mention Agade and give a date in year 6, but they are too damaged to read in full.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engineObverse (?) 1. [...]-ka 2. 120 (loaves of) bread; 1 barig 1 ban; 1 ban beer; 1 barig 1 ban; 1 ban beer, 5 ban; 3. 2 ban beer, 3 ban: Ibni-šarrum. 4. 60 (loaves of) bread; 1 ban beer, 5 ban; 1 ban beer, 3 ban: 5. Šeš-šeš. 6. 60 (loaves of) bread; 1 ban beer, 5 ban; 1 ban beer, 3 ban: 7. U-barrum. 8. 60 (loaves of) bread; 1 ban beer, 5 ban; 1 ban beer, [n ban] (name lost or omitted). 9. 30 (loaves of) bread; 1 ban beer, 5 ban: I-mi-Utu. 10. [Total]: 510 (loaves of) bread, 50 du8-loaves (?); 11. [...] bread; 1 barig 1 ban 2 (?); 2 ban beer, 5 ban, (in) jars; 12. [...] 1 ban beer, 3 ban, (in) jars. 13. [... flour (?) of A]gade. 14. [...] year 6 (?), [month ...].
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
[...]-ka# 2(gesz2@c) ninda 1(barig@c) 1(ban2@c) 1(ban2@c) kasz 1(barig@c) 1(ban2@c) 1(ban2@c) kasz 5(ban2@c) 2(ban2@c) kasz 3(ban2@c) ib-ni-lugal 1(gesz2@c) ninda 1(ban2@c) kasz 5(ban2@c) 1(ban2@c) kasz 3(ban2@c) szesz-szesz 1(gesz2@c) ninda 1(ban2@c) kasz 5(ban2@c) 1(ban2@c) kasz 3(ban2@c) u-bar-ru-um 1(gesz2@c) ninda 1(ban2@c) kasz 5(ban2@c) 1(ban2@c) kasz# [n(ban2@c)] 3(u@c) ninda 1(ban2@c) kasz 5(ban2@c) i-mi-utu [szunigin] 8(gesz2@c) 3(u@c) ninda 5(u) du8 [x x?] ninda 1(barig@c) 1(ban2@c) 2(asz@c) 2(ban2@c) kasz 5(ban2@c) dug [x x?] 1(ban2@c) kasz 3(ban2@c) dug [... zi3 a]-ga#-de3 [n] mu 6(disz) [iti ...]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Akkadian (ca. 2340-2200 BC)) — MVN 03, 110. 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 (P215758) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-opus-5-5 (2026-09-20/v8-evolved).
Related tablets
Related sources
An early example of administrative writing from Uruk. Its fragmentary numerical entries and commodity signs document record-keeping during the formative period of writing.
A surviving administrative record of named people and livestock in the Ur III period. Together with other archives, such accounts reveal the work of managing animals, deliveries and institutional responsibility.