Position in chronology
MS 1952/37
About this tablet
An Early Dynastic tablet, possibly from Umma in southern Iraq, written before Sumerian spelling had settled into fixed conventions. It is not an ordinary account: there are no numbers, only strings of signs — fish, yoke, dagger, water, builder — that may belong to an archaic literary or ritual text, or a scribal exercise, written in a cryptic early orthography that modern scholars still cannot read continuously. Tablets like this show writing in transition: the signs are recognizable, but the message behind them remains locked. Its themes of birth, fate-signs, and craftsmen hint at something beyond bookkeeping.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
What survives is a sequence of word-signs rather than sentences: a fish and something born; a doubled sign for office or destiny; a dagger; someone or something delivered under heaven, with water; a yoke, twice, once with the dagger again; fire, daylight, water; a builder and his footing; carrying on the left side; a dog(?) sitting; and finally something mixed with water. Because the scribe wrote in a very early, telegraphic style with no grammar spelled out, we can name the pieces but not reconstruct the message. The back of the tablet is mostly blank except for a few signs in one corner.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine(obverse, single column; sign-groups without numerals — an archaic text of uncertain genre, rendered sign by sign) 1. Fish ... TU ("born"?) 2. NAM2 NAM2 (a doubled title/category sign) 3. NAM2(?) — dagger (GIR2) 4. Delivered(?) (DU) — AN — water (A) 5. Yoke(?) (ŠUDUN) — RI 6. Yoke(?) (ŠUDUN) — dagger (GIR2) 7. ... — water (A) — NI 8. Fire(?) (NE) — day (U4) — RA 9. NI — RA 10. ŠE3 — BU 11. Day (U4) — builder/mason (ŠIDIM) — foot(?) (GIR3, damaged) 12. To carry(?) (IL) — left(-hand)(?) (GUB3) — ... 13. ... — (an archaic sign of unidentified value) — dog(?) (UR) — NI — to sit(?) (DUR2) 14. Mixed(?) (ḪI) — water (A, damaged) (reverse largely uninscribed; a few signs at the upper right edge continue or repeat elements of the obverse)
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
, KU6~a TU~b , NAM2 NAM2 , NAM2? GIR2~b , DU AN A , SZUDUN? RI , SZUDUN? GIR2~b , X A NI~b , NE~a U4 RA , NI~b RA , SZE3 BU~a , U4 SZIDIM GIR3@g~b#? , IL GUB3~c X , X ZATU726~a? UR~a? NI~b DUR2? , HI A#?
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (ED I-II (ca. 2900-2700 BC) ?) — MS 1952/37. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Schøyen Collection, Oslo, Norway (P006020) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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