Position in chronology
Akkadica 114-115, 099 21
Not yet translated
This tablet is catalogued with its transliteration and photographed, but no published translation exists yet. Our translation engine works through the untranslated corpus every night, oldest first — this page will update the day its turn comes. If you are a specialist and can read it, we would love your help.
The world it comes from
A bureaucratic golden age, the Code of Ur-Nammu.
From the same catalogue range (near P145514)
Transliteration
3(disz) gu4 niga 1(u) udu niga 1(disz) sila4 niga 2(u) 1(disz) udu 3(disz) masz2 a-ri-a e2 en-lil2 nin-lil2-la2-sze3 mu-kux(DU) ur-en-lil2-[la2?]-ka-ta u3 ha-ba-ba lu2 en-nu lugal-ibila kuruszda i3-dab5 ki ab-ba-sa6-ga-ta ba-zi iti ezem-[me-ki]-gal2#? mu amar-suen lugal 3(u) 8(disz)
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — Akkadica 114-115, 099 21. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format). [year-name] Dated to Amar-Suen y1 — Amar-Suen became king based on canonical year-name formula in the transliteration.
Attribution
Image: Musées royaux d’Art et d’Histoire, Brussels, Belgium (P145514) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P145514..
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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.