Position in chronology
MS 4512
About this tablet
This small clay tablet is an economic record from the Uruk period (roughly 3300–3000 BCE), one of the earliest phases of writing, found near Umma in southern Iraq. It appears to be an itemized list — probably a ration or labor account — recording numerical quantities against categories that include workers (ERIM) and possibly birds (MUŠEN), closing with a summary line combining a compound numeral with the workers and a totaling notation (KIŠ). Much of the tablet is broken or illegible, so the full scope of what was being counted and why cannot be recovered.
Plain-language summary by the engine — meant as a doorway into the literal translation below.
Written in modern English
This is a tally sheet: the first several lines record small quantities — 4 of something, 1 of something else, 1 more, and 2 units associated with a bird — but the items being counted and the surrounding context are mostly lost to breaks in the clay. A few more lines are too damaged to read at all. Near the end, the surviving text lists '2' units tied to a group of workers, and a final line totals things up with a larger compound number (a '1' of one counting unit plus '5' of another) linked again to workers and closed with what looks like a summary or category marker. It reads like a fragment of a labor or ration accounting sheet, but too much is missing to say exactly what was being distributed or tallied.
A modern paraphrase of the literal translation — same content, contemporary voice.
Translation — our engine
Our engine1. 4(?) [...] , [...] 2. 1(?) [...] , [...] 3. 1(?) , [sign, unclear] 4. 2 , bird(?) [MUŠEN] 5. [...] , [...] 6. [...] , [...] 7. [...] 1(?) , [...] 8. 2 , workers/men (ERIM) [sign, unclear] 9. 1(N14) 5 , workers/men (ERIM), KIŠ [totality/category marker]
Our translation engine — Sonnet 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
4(N01)#? [...] , [...] 1(N01)#? [...] , [...] 1(N01)#? , X 2(N01) , MUSZEN#? [...] , [...] [...] , [...] [...] 1(N01)# , [...] 2(N01) , ERIM~a X 1(N14) 5(N01) , ERIM~a KISZ
Scholarly note
Catalogue entry from CDLI (Uruk III (ca. 3200-3000 BC) ?) — MS 4512. This record has no stored scholarly English translation; the existence of published translations has not been checked; the transliteration is from the ATF (CDLI's Atf-Friendly format).
Attribution
Image: Schøyen Collection, Oslo, Norway (P006312) — Photo via Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative. source
Translation excerpted from engine:claude-sonnet-5 (2026-07-12/v7-evolved).
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Related sources
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