Position in chronology
RIME 1.15.add036.01, ex. 01
About this tablet
A fragment of an inscribed stone object from Nippur, dating to the Early Dynastic period (mid-third millennium BCE). Though catalogued among royal inscriptions, its surviving lines read like an account or record of valuables: quantities of barley, two shekels of silver, and goods being delivered. Stone was an expensive writing surface, so this was likely a document meant to last — perhaps recording a purchase, endowment, or transfer of property. Too little survives to identify the parties involved.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Only the tail end of this record survives. After several lines too broken to read, the legible portion lists: seventy measures of barley; goods of some kind that were delivered; two shekels of silver; and two gur and two barig of barley received into storage by the standard lid-ga measure. Another entry begins with a figure of ten-plus of something, followed by more goods, but the text breaks off there. The names of the people giving and receiving these commodities are lost.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine(Beginning broken) [...] [...] ... (trace) [...]-... (trace) [...] ... (trace) [...] ... (trace) ... [...] 70 (units of) barley [...] from the ...-goods, delivered [...] 2 shekels of silver, 2 (gur) 2 barig of barley, received (by the lid₂-ga measure), [n] + 10 [...] ...-goods [...] (Remainder broken)
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 [...]-x [...] x [...] x x [...] 1(gesz2@c) 1(u@c) sze# [...] nig2-x-ta du [...] 2(asz@c) ku3 gin2 2(asz@c) 2(barig@c) sze lid2-ga [n] 1(u@c) [...] nig2-x [...]
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED IIIb (ca. 2500-2340 BC)) — RIME 1.15.add036.01, ex. 01. 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: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA (P264928) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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