Position in chronology
CUSAS 35, 097
About this tablet
A small pierced clay tag from Adab in southern Iraq, written some 4,500 years ago, recording bread handed over by three men — Ma'u, Ur-šerda and Ilala — as their obligatory delivery. Together they account for 300 loaves in five loads, and the scribe notes that the consignment was duly carried in on the 27th day of the month called ab-e₃. The hole drilled through the tablet shows it was strung on a cord and tied to the goods or filed with other dockets. It is the ancient equivalent of a delivery slip: names, amounts, a confirmation that the goods arrived, and a date.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Bread delivery: Ma'u, 120 loaves (2 loads); Ur-šerda, 60 loaves (1 load); Ilala, 120 loaves (2 loads). This was the consignment he was required to bring, and it has been delivered. Recorded on the 27th day of the month ab-e₃-zi-da.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine120 loaves, 2 (loads) — Ma'u; 60 [loaves], 1 (load) — Ur-šerda; 120 loaves, 2 (loads) — Ilala. It is the load that he is to bring; it has been delivered. Month: ab-e₃-zi-da, day 27.
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
2(gesz2@c)# ninda 2(asz@c) ma#-u2 1(gesz2@c) [ninda] 1(asz@c) ur-szer7-da 2(gesz2@c) ninda# 2(asz@c) i3-la-la gu2 DU tum2-ma-ni-kam al-de6 iti ab-e3 zi-da u4 2(u@c) 7(disz@t)
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED IIIb (ca. 2500-2340 BC)) — CUSAS 35, 097. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Schøyen Collection, Oslo, Norway (P252716) — 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.