Position in chronology
UET 2, 0273
About this tablet
An accounting tablet from the very dawn of Sumerian city life at Ur, written around 2700 BCE — before cuneiform could fully record spoken language. A scribe has tallied a short list of goods, animals, and probably people: young female workers or girls, ewes, a measure of sheep fat, and items connected with a household, some entries marked with what looks like a recurring personal name. Excavated by Leonard Woolley at Ur (the excavation number U 14723 is still inked on its face), it is a snapshot of everyday bookkeeping a few centuries before the city's famous royal tombs.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This is a short inventory. It counts, item by item: one vessel or container of some product; an entry for a senior figure; two young girls (or female workers); one item credited to a person whose name we might read as Zi-a-hub; one measure of sheep tallow; two 'mixed' items belonging to the household; one further item whose description we can no longer make sense of; two ewes; and two more items for Zi-a-hub. The final compartment was left blank and the back of the tablet was never written on — the account simply ends there.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine(obverse) 1 ...-vessel(?) (sign MUD3×GU), (with) a MAR-container(?); — the great one(?) ..., A-SA(?); 2 young female(s); 1 (for/of) Zi-a-ḪUB(?); 1 (measure of) sheep tallow; 2 mixed(?) ... of the house; 1 ... (DUR2-RA, block(?), DA, DAR?); 2 ewes (female sheep); 2 (for/of) Zi-a-ḪUB(?); (final case blank) (reverse uninscribed)
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) , |MUD3~a@gxGU| MAR~a , GAL~a A SA~a 2(N01@f) , SAL TUR 1(N01@f) , ZI~a A HUB2 1(N01@f) , NI~b UDU~a 2(N01@f) , HI E2~a 1(N01@f) , DUR2 RA LAGAB~b DA~a DAR~a? 2(N01@f) , SAL UDU~a 2(N01@f) , ZI~a A HUB2 ,
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED I-II (ca. 2900-2700 BC)) — UET 2, 0273. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: British Museum, London, UK (P005863) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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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.