Position in chronology
ARET 03, 054
About this tablet
A fragment of an administrative textile account from the royal archives of Ebla in Syria, written around 2350 BCE. It records the distribution of garments — cloaks, belts, and fine cloths — to the king, to named individuals such as the overseer Hutimu and Ruzi-Malik, and to their agents, with some items designated as offerings. Thousands of such tablets from Ebla's palace show how a Bronze Age state used textiles as currency, salary, and diplomatic gift; this piece is one page of that vast ledger.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This is a page from the palace clothing ledger. An entry for the king: one NI.NI-textile and some fine garments (the count is broken off), set aside as an offering. Three multicolored belts went to Dubi-ab and another man whose name is damaged. After a gap, the record resumes: the overseer Hutimu is listed, and his agent received one cloak, two NI.NI-textiles, and two fine garments. Ruzi-Malik appears next with a broken entry, followed by ten women's zara-garments and a count of 'twenty minus' some lost number. The rest of the tablet is broken away.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engineThe king (en). 1 NI.NI-textile, [n] fine (SAL) garments, [...] — offering (nidba). 3 multicolored íb-belts: (for) Dubi-ab (and) [..]-za. [...] overseer: Hutimu. 1 gu-dul cloak, 2 NI.NI-textiles, 2 fine (SAL) garments: (for) his agent (maškim). x [...] (for) Ruzi-Malik. 10 zara-garments, 20 minus [n ...]
Our translation engine — Fable 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
_en_ 1(asz@c) TUG2-|NI&NI| [n] _SAL_ [...] _nidba2_ 3(asz@c) _|IB2+3(DISZ@t)| dar tug2_ du-bi2-ab [x x]-za [...] _ugula_ hu-ti-mu 1(asz@c) _gu-dul3_ 2(asz@c) TUG2-NI-NI 2(asz@c) _SAL_ _maszkim_-su3 x [...] ru12-zi-ma-lik 1(u@c) _zara6_ 2(u@c) _la2_ [n ...]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ebla (ca. 2350-2250 BC)) — ARET 03, 054. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: National Museum of Syria, Idlib, Syria (P242239) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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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.