Position in chronology
BIN 08, 054
About this tablet
An Early Dynastic land-and-barley register, roughly 2400 BCE, from southern Mesopotamia. A scribe has ruled the small tablet into cases and entered, one parcel at a time, the size of a field in iku and eše, the quantity of barley assessed on it, and the person answerable for it: a chief merchant, a temple administrator's man supervised by an overseer named Lugal-ezem, several land-surveyors — literally 'men of the long measuring rope' — a surveyor's wife named Munus-tur, and a potter called Ur-TAG. It is a snapshot of how a temple or palace estate parcelled out arable land among its own professional staff, and it quietly records a woman holding a field in her own name.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Field allotments and the barley due on them. Four iku of land, assessed at 12 gur 2 barig of barley, assigned to E-ki the chief merchant. Two and a half iku, at 10 gur less 2 barig, to the temple administrator's man, with Lugal-ezem as overseer. One eše two iku, at 40 gur less 2 gur 2 barig, to the surveyors Ama-bara-si and Lugal-ildu. Three iku, at 12 gur 2 barig, to E-lu, also a surveyor. Three and a quarter iku, at 15 gur 2 barig, to Munus-tur, a surveyor's wife. And one and a half iku, at 5 gur, to Ur-TAG the potter.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine4 iku of field — its barley: 12 (gur) 2 barig: (for) E-ki, the chief merchant. 2 1/2 iku of field — 10 less 2 barig of barley: the man of the temple administrator; Lugal-ezem is the overseer. 1 eše 2 iku of field — 40 less 2 (gur) 2 barig of barley: Ama-bara-si (and) Lugal-ildu, the surveyors. 3 iku of field — 12 (gur) 2 barig of barley: E-lu, the surveyor. 3 1/4 iku of field — 15 (gur) 2 barig of barley: Munus-tur, the wife of the surveyor. 1 1/2 iku of field — 5 (gur) of barley: Ur-TAG, the potter.
Our translation engine — Opus 5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
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Transliteration
4(iku@c) GAN2 1(u@c) 2(asz@c) 2(barig@c) sze-bi e2-ki dam-gar3-gal 2(iku@c) 1/2(iku@c@v) GAN2 1(u@c) la2 2(barig@c) sze lu2 sanga lugal-ezem ugula 1(esze3@c) 2(iku@c) GAN2 4(u@c) la2 2(asz@c) 2(barig@c) sze ama-bara2-si! lugal-ildu3 lu2 esz2-gid2 3(iku@c) GAN2 1(u@c) 2(asz@c) 2(barig@c)! sze e2-lu2 lu2 esz2-gid2 3(iku@c) 1/4(iku@c@v) GAN2 1(u@c) 5(asz@c) 2(barig@c) sze munus-tur dam lu2 esz2-gid2 1(iku@c) 1/2(iku@c@v) GAN2 5(asz@c) sze# ur-TAG bahar2!
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED IIIb (ca. 2500-2340 BC)) — BIN 08, 054. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Nies Babylonian Collection, Yale Babylonian Collection, New Haven, Connecticut, USA (P221559) — 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.