Position in chronology
Nisaba 25, 01
About this tablet
A small fragment of one of the earliest administrative documents from Ur, dating to the Early Dynastic period (early third millennium BCE). It is a simple tally: the numeral 'one' repeated down the tablet, each entry paired with what appears to be a personal name — U-ma, Šul-šul, Šul-la — and, in the last preserved line, a woman. It is most likely a headcount or ration roster of workers, the everyday bookkeeping of a city administration at the dawn of writing.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This is a checklist counting people one by one. The top of the list is damaged — the first entry may mention a field, and the second a person whose name is only partly readable. Then it continues: one — U-ma; one — Šul-šul; one — someone whose name is lost; one — Šul-la; and one woman whose further description is illegible. The rest of the tablet is broken away, and the back carries no readable text. In modern terms: a roster ticking off seven individuals, probably workers being counted or provisioned.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine(obverse) [1?] ... field(?) (GAN2) [1?] Sud-ur(?) 1 — U-ma 1 — Šul-šul 1 — ... [...] 1 — Šul-la 1 — a woman, ... (SAL + illegible sign) (remainder broken; reverse uninscribed/eroded)
Our translation engine — Fable 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
[1(N01@f)?] GAN2#? [1(N01@f)?] sud3#?:ur 1(N01@f) , u2-ma 1(N01@f) , szul-szul 1(N01@f)# , x [x] 1(N01@f) , szul#-la 1(N01@f) , SAL x
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED I-II (ca. 2900-2700 BC)) — Nisaba 25, 01. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: British Museum, London, UK (P448988) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
Related tablets
Related sources
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.