Position in chronology
AAS 024
About this tablet
A field-labor account from the great agricultural bureaucracy of Umma, in southern Iraq, dated to the year after King Šu-Suen of Ur built his famous wall against the Amorites (about 2033 BCE). It records how much land a gang of state workers reaped and harrowed, converting the area into a total labor bill of 150 workdays at fixed daily quotas. The overseer Ur-Emah, a scribe and son of Dada, rolled his personal seal across the tablet to certify the account — a snapshot of how the world's first centralized state audited farm work down to the fraction of a field per man per day.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
Work report: 15 iku of field (roughly 5.4 hectares) were harvested — reaped and stacked — at a quota of half to a quarter iku of field per man per day, and the land was harrowed three times over at a rate of four and a half iku per day. Total labor charged to the work crew: 150 workdays. The work took place at the field whose name is partly broken away; the foreman's name, beginning Šeš-, is also damaged. Certified under the seal of Ur-Emah. Dated to the year after King Šu-Suen built the Amorite wall. His seal reads: Ur-Emah, scribe, son of Dada.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engineObverse: [2 eše] 3 iku of field, reaped and stacked, at 1/2 (and) 1/4 iku (of field per workday); harrowed with the beam-harrow, 3 times, at 4 1/2 iku (of field per workday); the labor of the work-troop involved: 150 days. Field: KWU729-...[...]. [Foreman:] Šeš-[...]. [Sealed tablet] of Ur-E[mah]. Year: "The year after Šu-Suen, [the king], built the Amorite wall." Seal inscription: Ur-Emah, scribe, son of Dada.
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.
Engine notes
read from photo8 uncertain terms ↓
- tug2-gurx(|SZE.KIN|) tug2-gur8 — The exact meaning of tug-gur / tug-gurx in this context is debated; likely refers to a type of textile work, possibly 'fulling' or 'pressing' cloth. The sign complex |SZE.KIN| for gurx is a known but uncommon variant.
- gesz-ur3-ra — Literally 'timber-roofing'; refers to the work of laying roof beams. Standard Ur III labor category.
- a2 erin2-na — Literally 'labor of the troops/workers'; standard Ur III term for corvée or conscripted labor force.
- u4 2(gesz2) 3(u)-kam — 2×60 + 30 = 150 days, or possibly read as 2(gesz2) 3(u) = 150. The exact numeral parsing depends on the sign grouping in the original, which cannot be fully confirmed from the photo.
- KWU729-x-[...] — KWU729 is a rare sign catalogued in the Krebernik-Waetzoldt sign list; the field name here is only partially preserved and the reading is uncertain.
- szesz? — Reading of the overseer's name is tentative; the šeš element (brother) may be part of a compound name; the rest is broken.
- bad3 mar-tu — The 'Amorite Wall' (Sumerian: bad3 mar-tu), a defensive fortification built by Šu-Suen; well attested in Ur III date formulas.
- mu us2-sa — Standard Ur III formula meaning 'the year after (the year in which)'; the full date formula identifies the administrative year.
Reasoning ↓
Layer 1 — visual examination: The photograph shows a multi-sided tablet (labeled GF3 / CF3 in modern pen), displayed from several angles. The obverse/face view (middle-left cluster) reveals densely impressed cuneiform wedges on a dark-fired clay surface. The tablet is fragmentary: the upper-left corner and lower portions show clear breakage and erosion, consistent with the square brackets in the transliteration. Individual sign clusters are visible but at this resolution most individual wedges cannot be confidently resolved into specific sign readings — the surface is deeply impressed and relatively well-preserved in the central area, but the edges are lost. The reverse face (bottom image) shows additional sign columns, also with wedge impressions visible but not fully legible at this resolution. Layer 2 — transliteration-based: This is a standard Ur III labor/field account from Umma. The text records field areas assigned to textile-fulling and timber-roofing labor at given area-rates, with a total corvée labor in days, followed by field name, overseer, and seal notation. The date formula 'mu us2-sa šu-suen lugal-e bad3 mar-tu ba-du3' is the well-known year name for the year after Šu-Suen built the Amorite wall (Šu-Suen year 4 or 5 equivalent formula). Cross-check: The photo confirms a fragmentary tablet with multiple lines of text and edge damage matching the lacunae in the transliteration, but individual sign resolution is insufficient to confirm or dispute specific readings; 'cannot verify' the broken passages from the photo alone. The sign KWU729 is a rare or damaged reading and cannot be verified visually.
Generated by Claude Sonnet 4.6 · prompt 2026-05-11/v3-conventions · May 11, 2026 · 3167 in / 1196 out tokens
Transliteration
[2(esze3)] 3(iku) GAN2 tug2-gurx(|SZE.KIN|) tug2#-gur8 1/2(iku) 1/4(iku) GAN2-ta gesz-ur3-ra a-ra2 3(disz) 4(iku) 1/2(iku) GAN2-ta [a2] erin2-na-bi u4 2(gesz2) 3(u)-kam [a]-sza3 KWU729-x-[...] [ugula] szesz?-[...] [kiszib3] ur-e2-[mah] mu# us2-sa szu-suen [lugal]-e bad3 mar-[tu ba]-du3 ur-e2-mah dub-sar dumu da-da
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — AAS 024. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Šu-Suen y2 — Year after: Šu-Suen became king based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.
Attribution
Image: College de France, Paris, France (P100012) — 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.