Position in chronology
MDP 31, 033
About this tablet
An accounting tablet in the proto-Elamite script, written at Susa in southwestern Iran around 3000 BCE — one of the world's earliest writing systems, and one that remains undeciphered. A scribe opens with a heading sign, then lists seven entries of counted items (2, 2, 5, 4, 1, 1, 2 units), each tagged with sign combinations that likely name commodities, people, or institutions, followed by a grain-measure entry in fractional units and a closing total. We can read the numbers perfectly; we still cannot read the words.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This is a ledger. Under a general heading, the clerk records seven line items, each identified by a label we can no longer read: two units of one category, two of another, five of a third, then four, one, one, and two units of further categories — most entries sharing a common classifier sign, so they probably belong to one family of goods or personnel. A final entry records an amount of grain in fractional measures (roughly four large fractions plus two smaller ones), and the account closes with a summary figure of one large unit, apparently the grand total. Parts of two entry labels are broken away; the back of the tablet is blank except for a trace at the edge.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine(Heading:) [compound sign M327+X] — (rubric, no numeral) M157 … M305 M057 M263: 2 (units, N01) [...] M263: 2 (units, N01) … M263: 5 (units, N01) M387 M263: 4 (units, N01) [...] M263: 1 (unit, N01) M004 [M218+M288] M066 M263: 1 (unit, N01) M024 M004 M218 M263 M038 M263: 2 (units, N01) M243: 4 (N39B) 1 (N24) 1 (N30C) — (fractional grain-measure notation) (Total line:) 1 (N34) (The reverse is uninscribed apart from traces at the upper edge; the sign-values themselves are proto-Elamite and remain undeciphered — only the numerals can be read with confidence.)
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.
Transliteration
|M327+X| , M157 x M305~f M057~e M263~b1 , 2(N01) [...] M263~b1# , 2(N01) x M263 , 5(N01)# M387~a M263~b1 , 4(N01) [...] M263~a , 1(N01) M004 |M218+M288~f| M066 M263~b1# , 1(N01) M024 M004 M218 M263~b1# M038~a1 M263~a , 2(N01) M243~eg , 4(N39B) 1(N24) 1(N30C) 1(N34)
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Proto-Elamite (ca. 3100-2900 BC)) — MDP 31, 033. No scholarly translation has been published; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Louvre Museum, Paris, France (P009373) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-fable-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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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.