Position in chronology
SAA 07 118. Record of Various Items, 663-661 B.C. (ADD 0993)
Translation · reference
High confidence(i 1) 1 perforated cylinder seal for 4 gems of a torc. (i 3) 1 (for) 3, ditto of rock crystal. (i 4) 1 piece of rose jasper, half of it for one gem, half of it went back. (i 7) 1 piece of jasper for 3 gems. (i 9) 1 ditto for one gem of a braid of gold. (i 10) 1 piece of abašmu-stone for one gem; (i 12) 2 ditto of glass for 2 gems of a braid of gold. (i 13) 1 (for) 1 ditto including a braided datepalm of ditto, for 3; (i 15) 1 (for) 4 gems of a torc ditto; (i 16) 1 cylinder seal of ašgikû-stone, for 4 (gems) of a braid of gold. (i 18) 1 piece of saggilmud-stone; 1 (gem) was taken from it; the…
Source: Fales, F.M. & Postgate, J.N. 1992. Imperial Administrative Records, Part I: Palace and Temple Administration. SAA 7. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa07/P335815/
Why it matters
Transliteration
01 NA₄.KIŠIB GAR.U.U / a-na 04 NA₄-MEŠ ḪAR / 01 03 ⸢:.*⸣ duḫ-ši-e* / 01 DÀG.GAZ ⸢dLAMA!⸣ / me-šil-šú* a-na 01 NA₄ / me-šil-šú i-su-ḫur / 01 DÀG.GAZ aš*-pu*-u* / ⸢a-na⸣ 03 NA₄-MEŠ / 01 ⸢:.⸣ a-na 01 NA₄ gi-dil KUG.GI / 01 DÀG.GAZ ⸢AD-aš-mu⸣ / a-na 01 NA₄ / 02 :.* me-ki* a-na 02 NA₄ gi-dil KUG.GI / 01 01* :. ⸢EN?⸣ gi-dil* GIŠIMMAR :. / a-na 03 / 01 ⸢04*⸣ NA₄ ḪAR :. / 01 NA₄.KIŠIB AŠ.GÌ.GÌ a-na 04…
Scholarly note
Neo-Assyrian administrative record (palace or temple), edited by F.M. Fales & J.N. Postgate (SAA 7, 1992). ORACC text P335815.
Attribution
Image: BM — (British Museum, London, UK) — from Nineveh (mod. Kuyunjik) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (cdli.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/artifacts, P335815). source
Translation excerpted from Fales, F.M. & Postgate, J.N. 1992. Imperial Administrative Records, Part I: Palace and Temple Administration. SAA 7. Helsinki: Helsinki University Press. https://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/saao/saa07/P335815/.
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.