Position in chronology
ARET 03, 199
About this tablet
A small clay tablet from the palace archives of Ebla in northern Syria, written around 2350 BCE. It is a garment-issue record: three pieces of clothing — a robe, a length of aktum-cloth, and a fine coloured kilt — handed out in the name of the ruler of Ḫalšum, a neighbouring city, with named officials listed as the responsible commissioner and the man who took delivery. Thousands of such textile records survive from Ebla, and together they map the network of gifts, diplomacy and tribute that bound the Syrian city-states to one another. This example is broken on the left, so the beginning of each line and the closing entries are lost.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Enna-NI of Surda-maḫu acted as commissioner; Išgi-Ba'ir took receipt. Three items of clothing were issued — one a'daum-robe, one length of aktum-cloth, and one fine multicoloured belt-kilt — assigned to the king of Ḫalšum. Two further entries follow, naming A-ag and Sagusi, but the lines around them are broken away and the rest of the account cannot be read.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engineEnna-NI, Surda-maḫu(?), commissioner; Išgi-Ba'ir, receiver (šu-du₈). 1 a'daum-garment, 1 aktum-cloth, 1 belt-kilt (IB₂+3) of fine multicoloured cloth — (for) the king of Ḫalšum. A-ag [...] Sagusi [...]
Our translation engine — Opus 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-na-NI sur2-da-ma-hu _maszkim_ isz11-gi-ba-ir3 _szu-du8_ 1(asz@c) 'a3-da-um 1(asz@c@90) _aktum_ 1(asz@c) _|IB2+3(disz@t)| dar sa6 tug2_ _en_ hal-szum2 a-ag [...] sa2-gu-si [...]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ebla (ca. 2350-2250 BC)) — ARET 03, 199. 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 (P242392) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-opus-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.