Position in chronology
TMH NF 1-2, 291
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 P134601)
Transliteration
3(u) 1(disz) geme2 dusu ugula la-gi-ip 3(u) ugula ur-tum-al nu-banda3 ur-iszkur 1(u) 3(disz) gurusz sza3-gu4 nu-banda3 lugal-KU szunigin 3(u) 3(disz) 1/3(disz) gurusz u4 1(disz)-sze3 gurum2 ak a-sza3 en-lil2-e-pa3-da-a u2 ib2-ze2 u3 al i3-ba-a nu-banda3 lugal-KU szabra lugal-ma2-gur8-re iti sig4-a u4 1(disz) ba-zal mu szu-suen-e ma2-dara4-abzu en-ki bi2-in-du8
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)) — TMH NF 1-2, 291. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Hilprecht Collection, University of Jena, Germany (P134601) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from CDLI raw catalogue, no published translation. P-number P134601..
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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.