Position in chronology
Nisaba 25, 52
About this tablet
A small ration account from archaic Ur, written around 2800–2600 BCE, among the earliest administrative documents from the city. It records jars of good-quality beer (and some bread) issued to a short list of household personnel: an overseer-commissioner, two men connected with the šagan (perhaps a vessel-store or an office), a cupbearer, a donkey herdsman, and a temple cook. It is a snapshot of who staffed an early Sumerian institution and how they were paid — in beer.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Two jars of top-grade beer go to the overseer who is acting as commissioner. One jar each goes to Amar-SZAGAN and Ak-SZAGAN, one jar plus small loaves of bread to Ak the cupbearer, one jar to the man who tends the donkeys, and one jar to the cook. That is the whole account: a day's beer disbursement to the staff of an early Ur household. The back of the tablet was left blank.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine(obverse) 2 (jars) of first-quality beer, me-NAGA(?): the overseer (and) commissioner; 1 (jar): Amar-SZAGAN; 1 (jar): Ak-SZAGAN; 1 (jar), (with) small bread: Ak, the cupbearer; 1 (jar): the donkey herdsman; 1 (jar): the cook (engiz). (reverse: uninscribed apart from the continuation of the sealing/first case; no further text)
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
2(N01@f) , kasz sag me-NAGA ugula maszkim 1(N01@f) , amar SZAGAN 1(N01@f) , ak SZAGAN 1(N01@f) , ninda tur ak sagi 1(N01@f) , |PA.MUNSUB|#-ansze 1(N01@f) , engiz
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED I-II (ca. 2900-2700 BC)) — Nisaba 25, 52. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: British Museum, London, UK (P449039) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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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.