Position in chronology
AoF 41, 010-014
About this tablet
A land register from Shuruppak (modern Fara) in southern Iraq, written about 2500 BCE, when Shuruppak was a leading Sumerian city. A scribe has ruled the clay into boxes and listed five named plots of farmland — a field called "the roof-beams," two settlement mounds, an irrigation ditch — each with its surface area, and then stated who owns them: a man named Ur-lugal-gub. The closing lines record that a further parcel, described as a gift, passed to five brothers and to a man called Ĝišgal-si. Texts like this are among the oldest surviving documents of private landholding and inheritance anywhere in the world.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Schedule of fields: 8 bur₃ at the plot called Ĝeš-ur-ra; 2 bur 1 eše₃ at KA-banda; 3 bur₃ 1 eše₃ at Salla Mound; 3 bur 1 eše₃ at Allu's Ditch; 2 bur 1 eše₃ at Namgi Mound. All of the above belong to Ur-lugal-gub. A further parcel was handed over as a gift to five brothers, and the field by the embankment, likewise a gift, is the property of Ĝišgal-si. The back of the tablet was left blank.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine8 bur₃ of field: ĝeš-ur₃-ra ("the roof-beam field"). 2 bur 1 eše₃ of field: KA-banda₃. 3 bur₃ 1 eše₃ of field: du₆ sal₄-la ("the mound of Salla"). 3 bur 1 eše₃ of field: sur₃ al-lu₂ ("the ditch of Allu"). 2 bur 1 eše₃ of field: du₆ nam-gi ("the mound of Namgi"). (These) fields belong to Ur-lugal-gub. Five brothers — a gift — it was delivered (ba-de₆). The field of the levee, a gift: it belongs to Ĝišgal-si. (Reverse: uninscribed.)
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
8(bur3@c) GAN2 gesz ur3-ra 2(bur@c) 1(esze3@c) GAN2 KA-banda3 3(bur3@c) 1(esze3@c)# GAN2 du6 sal4-la 3(bur@c) 1(esze3@c) GAN2 sur3 al-lu2 2(bur@c) 1(esze3@c) GAN2 du6 nam-gi GAN2 ur-lugal-gub-kam szesz 5(disz@t) nig2-ba ba-de6 GAN2 e nig2-ba giszgal-si-kam
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED IIIa (ca. 2600-2500 BC)) — AoF 41, 010-014. 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: Museum Forum der Völker (Völkerkundemuseum der Franziskaner), Werl, Germany (P416134) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-opus-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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