Position in chronology
Princeton 2, 387
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 P201386)
Transliteration
1(disz) masz2 zu-la-ti ra2-gaba 2(disz) masz-da3 i3-la-lum 1(disz) sila4 zabar-dab5 1(disz) masz2 i-di3-e2-a nu-banda3 1(disz) amar masz-da3 bu-bu-[...] 2(disz) masz2-gal niga szimaszgi 2(disz) masz2 s,e-lu-usz-da-gan 2(disz) sila4 ensi2 nibru mu-kux(DU) na-sa6 i3-dab5 iti ses-da-gu7 mu amar-suen lugal u4 1(u) 7(disz)-kam
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — Princeton 2, 387. 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: Princeton Theological Seminary, Princeton, New Jersey, USA (P201386) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P201386..
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.