Position in chronology
Nik 1, 219
About this tablet
This small clay tablet, from the Nikolski collection excavated at ancient Girsu (Tello) and now in the Hermitage Museum, is an Early Dynastic administrative record — one of thousands of such tags that tracked livestock moving through the temple economy of the city-state of Lagash. It logs a single two-year-old female animal handed over as a 'mashdaria,' a periodic offering or contribution owed to the temple, during the month of the Festival of Baba, the city's patron goddess. The names that follow are the officials and herdsmen — under the authority of the sanga, chief administrator of the E-babbar temple — who were responsible for receiving or delivering the animal, an everyday bookkeeping entry from a bureaucracy already highly organized by 2400 BCE.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This is a bookkeeping receipt: one two-year-old female animal was handed over as a 'mashdaria' offering, a regular contribution owed to the temple, under the authority of the sanga (chief administrator) of the E-babbar temple. The delivery happened in the month of the Festival of Baba. Several people are named as involved in the transaction — Sasage; A-en-ra-gub, son of E-naba; Uu; and Igizi — and the record notes that the cowherd(s) brought the animal in, with a final tally of '2' closing out the entry.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine1 female gir-animal, 2 years old, mashdaria-offering, (under) the sanga (temple administrator) of the E-babbar temple — month: "Festival of Baba." Sasage, A-en-ra-gub, son of E-naba, Uu, Igizi — with the cowherd(s), he/they brought (it); 2.
Our translation engine — Sonnet 5. Reads the photo, translates the cuneiform, and writes a plain-language interpretation. See methodology for limits.
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Transliteration
1(asz@c) munus gir mu 2(disz@t) masz-da-re-a sanga e2-babbar2-ka-kam iti ezem-ba-ba6-ka sa6-sa6-ge a-en-ra-gub dumu e-na-ba U2-U2 igi-zi unu3-da e-da-lu5 2(|ASZxDISZ@t|)
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED IIIb (ca. 2500-2340 BC)) — Nik 1, 219. This record has no stored scholarly English translation; the existence of published translations has not been checked; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg, Russian Federation (P221988) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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