Sumerian cuneiform is one of the earliest
known forms of written expression. First
appearing in the 4th millennium BC in what
is now Iraq, it was dubbed cuneiform
(‘wedge-shaped’) because of the distinctive
wedge form of the letters, created by
pressing a reed stylus into wet clay. Early
Sumerian writings were essentially
pictograms, which became simplified in the
early and mid 3rd millennium BC to a series
of strokes, along with a commensurate
reduction in the number of discrete signs
used (from c.1500 to 600). The script
system had a very long life and was used by
the Sumerians as well as numerous later
groups – notably the Assyrians, Elamites,
Akkadians and Hittites – for around three
thousand years. Certain signs and phonetic
standards live on in modern languages of
the Middle and Far East, but the writing
system is essentially extinct. It was
therefore cause for great excitement when
the ‘code’ of ancient cuneiform was cracked
by a group of English, French and German
Assyriologists and philologists in the mid
19th century AD. This opened up a vital
source of information about these ancient
groups that could not have been obtained in
any other way.
Cuneiform was used on monuments
dedicated to heroic – and usually royal –
individuals, but perhaps its most important
function was that of record keeping. The
palace-based society at Ur and other large
urban centres was accompanied by a
remarkably complex and multifaceted
bureaucracy, which was run by professional
administrators and a priestly class, all of
whom were answerable to central court
control. Most of what we know about the
way the culture was run and administered
comes from cuneiform tablets, which record
the everyday running of the temple and
palace complexes in minute detail, as in the
present case. The Barakat Gallery has
secured the services of Professor Lambert
(University of Birmingham), a renowned
expert in the decipherment and translation
of cuneiform, to examine and process the
information on these tablets. The following is
a transcription of his analysis of this tablet:
'The tablet is flat on the obverse, but rises in
the middle on the reverse. Each side has
three columns of script, all written in a fine,
large, clear scribal hand. The text is an
account tablet, listing barley produced in a
certain area of Sumer, based on the
quantities threshed at the various threshing
floors. It is dated to the third year of Shu-
Sin, fourth king of the Third Dynasty of Ur,
c. 2035 B.C. The system of measures used
is one of capacity: the two measures being
the gur and the sila, and the gur was 300
sila, the latter being about .85 of a litre. The
ancient scribes had a system of figures for
gur- and sila-measured things, which cannot
be reproduced in our script, and they mostly
wrote the sign for the gur at the end of the
figures, though the sila came last. So we
have converted their system into a simple
one:
413.60 = 413 gur, 60 sila
413. = 413 gur
.60 = 60 sila
Translation:
583.60 of barley: threshing floor, first time
413.60: threshing floor, second time
112.240: threshing floor, third time
1109.60: threshing floor of the Ninmah field
adjacent to Ibba-Sharrum
213.240: threshing floor grain pile of Nin-
Isina
Total: 1323 at the threshing floors
Mr Nissaba-andul, manager
990.: threshing floor, first time
1671.: threshing floor second time
2661: threshing floor of Nin-Isina
440.: threshing floor of E-sukkalmah,
between the grain piles
of Nin-Isina and Ea-ishiak
Total: 3101. (? or 3701?) at the threshing
floors
(gap)
…] threshing floor… […..
1122. [.(…)] threshing floor grain pile of Nin-
[Isina]
Total: 291. at the threshing floors
Mr Lu-Ningirsu, manager
800.: clerk, Mr Apillasha: document of
Malah, the sergeant
(11 broken lines)
[Total:….] + 50.60
Mr Kallamu, manager
744.: threshing floor Ea-ishiak: Mr Arshi’ah,
manager
909.60: king’s gift (to) the soldiers, citizens
of Ur: clerk
Apillasha, document of Malah, the sergeant
909.60: disbursements
996.: threshing floor, first time
2044.: threshing floor, second time
1193.: threshing floor, third time
1042.: threshing floor, fourth time
472.60: threshing floor fifth time
4807.60: threshing floor of the field
KUR.MUS
Total: 6256.120
Mr Akalla, manager
871.60: threshing floor grain pile of
ASHGAN: barley of
the ‘Ox Field’ of ….in Ur
Mr Ilum-bani, manager
1224.180: threshing floor grain pile of Nin-
Isina: barley of
the ‘Ox Field’ of Ea- [..]
Mr Shu-Ea, manager
880.240: threshing floor grain pile of
ASHGAN: barley of the
‘Ox Field’ of Nin-egal
Mr Ur-Baba, manager
396.: threshing floor grain pile of Nin-Isina
Mr Lugal-nilagare, manager
Total:….’Man Field’ disbursements
Total: 18704.240 at the threshing floors
24798.60: winnowed barley of the ‘Ox Field’
Mangers of: the KURMUSH field
the Amhul field
and the Ninmah field
Via Mr Ili-bilanni and Ur-Shulpa’e
Year after: the (boat) Ibex-of-the-Apsu was
caulked
The tablet has been assembled from pieces,
and there are some big gaps in the obverse,
but little missing from the reverse. Normally
these documents are precise and fully
accurate, but here it is not always possible
to check for lack of some figures. However,
the first ‘Total’ is a correct adding of the
preceding correct sub-total and the extra
item. However the second total appears to
be understated. Probably it is a simple scribal
error, but too many figures are lost to be
able to check the grand total at the very
end. In any case the huge quantities of
grain being produced are testimony to the
effectiveness of this civilisation, which had to
irrigate the land to get any crop at all.'
