Position in chronology
ARET 03, 171
About this tablet
A fragment of an administrative textile account from the palace archives of Ebla in western Syria, written around 2350 BCE. It records the distribution of standard sets of garments — cloaks, tunics, and colourful kilts — to named individuals, one of them apparently connected to the city of Armi, along with a belt and a dagger for a man named Iram-malik. Thousands of such tablets survive from Ebla, and together they map out the diplomatic and economic web of one of the earliest great cities outside Mesopotamia: garments like these were the standard currency of royal gift-giving.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This is a clothing-issue record from the Ebla palace stores. Two men from Armi received a matching outfit each: an outer cloak, a tunic, and a fine multicoloured kilt; a man named Išbu-...-du got a similar set. After a gap, the account continues: Ra'ag received cloaks of two grades, two tunics, and two kilts (one fine, one plain multicoloured). Another entry, partly broken, lists a tunic and a fine kilt, then a payment of about forty shekels, a belt, and a sheathed dagger issued to Iram-malik, who may have served as a ritual specialist. Several lines at the top and in the middle are lost to breaks.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine(Obverse, first preserved column) [...] ... 2 (men of) Armi, 2 'a3-da-um cloaks of the second type, 2 aktum-tunics, 2 multicoloured fine kilts (of the íb+III type): (for) Išbu-[x]-du. (Break) [...] 'a3-da-um cloaks of the second type, 1 'a3-da-um cloak of the first type, 2 aktum-tunics, 1 multicoloured fine kilt, 1 multicoloured kilt: (for) Ra-'a-ag. 1 'a3-da-um cloak [...] (Break) [...] 1 aktum-tunic, 1 fine multicoloured kilt, 40 (shekels?) [...], 1 belt, 1 dagger with sheath(?) — (for) the incantation-priest(?): (for) Iram-malik.
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
[...] x 2(asz@c)# ar-mi 2(asz@c) 'a3-da-um 2(disz@t) 2(asz@c@90) _aktum_ 2(asz@c) _|IB2+3(DISZ@t)| dar sa6! tug2_ isz-bu3-[x]-du [...] [...] 'a3-da-um 2(disz@t) 1(asz@c@90) 'a3-da-um 1(disz@t) 2(asz@c) _aktum_ 1(asz@c@90) _|IB2+3(DISZ@t)| dar sa6 tug2_ 1(asz@c) _|IB2+3(DISZ@t)| dar tug2_ ra-'a3-ag 1(asz@c) 'a3-da-um [...] [...] 1(asz@c) _aktum#_ 1(asz@c) _|IB2+n(DISZ@t)|# sa6 dar tug2#_ SZA-PI [x-x] 1(asz@c) _ib2-[la2]_ 1(asz@c) _gir2_ [KUN] MASZ-MASZ ir3-am6-ma-[lik]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ebla (ca. 2350-2250 BC)) — ARET 03, 171. 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 (P242363) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
Related tablets
Related sources
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.