Position in chronology
NM 44.0016
About this tablet
A short Old Akkadian administrative account, probably from the Sargonic period (about 2300–2150 BCE). It lists flour, several kinds of a commodity or object called u3, a large batch of 240 cloth strips, and red wool. The goods are said to belong to a large magur-boat and to someone or something written NI-NI, and they come from a named individual. The provenience is unknown, and the tablet is now in the Nicholson Museum in Sydney. It is a small glimpse of how the Akkadian state kept track of supplies, possibly provisions and fittings for river transport.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
The tablet is an inventory. It lists 30 gur of flour (the rest of the line is damaged) and 1 gur 2 barig of a special 'A' flour. It goes on to twelve large and six small items of the type called u3, eight u3-suh5 items (perhaps fir wood) for the ubara'u, 240 cloth strips, twelve items whose name is partly lost, and eighteen units of red wool. All of this is assigned to the big magur-boat and to NI-NI. It comes from Du11-ga-me-AN-til-la-bi, son of the lady (or sister) of Ur-ega.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine1. 30 gur of flour(?) [......] 2. 1 gur 2 barig of A-flour; 3. 12 large u3; 4. 6(?) small u3; 5. 8 u3-suh5 (fir?) of the ubara'u(?); 6. 240 bar-si-cloths (4 × 60); 7. 12 ma-[x]; 8. 18 (lit. 20 minus 2) (units of) red wool; 9. that which belongs to the magur-boat 10. and NI-NI, 11. from 12. Du11-ga-me(?)-AN-til-la-bi, 13. son of the lady (or: sister) of Ur-ega.
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(u@c) zi3#? [x x? gur]_ _1(asz@c) 2(barig@c) zi3# A gur_ _1(u@c) 2(asz@c) u3 gal#_ _6(asz@c)#? u3 tur_ _8(asz@c) u3-suh5_ u-ba-ra#?-u3 _4(gesz2) bar-si_ _1(u@c) 2(asz@c) ma-x_ _2(u@c) la2 2(asz@c) siki si4_ szu-ut _ma2-gur8_ u3 NI-NI isz-te4 du11-ga-me?-AN-til-la-bi3 dumu nin# ur-e-ga
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Old Akkadian (ca. 2340-2200 BC)) — NM 44.0016. 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: Nicholson Museum, University of Sydney, Sydney, Australia (P212412) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-opus-5-5 (2026-09-20/v8-evolved).
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