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. His scanned analysis is presented here. The document is a list of official messengers and the rations paid out to them.
Professor Lambert’s translation is provided below:

Clay tablet, 99x47 mm., with 45 lines of Sumerian cuneiform on obverse, reverse, and left edge. The text is an administrative document from the period of the third Dynasty of Ur, dated the 2nd year of Ibbi-Sin, last king of the dynasty, c. 2027 B.C. It is a list of official messengers and the rations paid out to then to sustain them on their travels. The tablet is joined from two pieces, and the surface is somewhat rubbed, but most of the text is legible.

Translatio
5 sila of beer, 5 sila of bread: Ur-baba, king’s messenge
5 sila of beer, 5 sila of bread: . . . , king’s messenge
5 sila of beer, 5 sila of bread: Puzer- . . .
5 sila of beer, 5 sila of bread: Ahu-baqar, king’s messenge
3 sila of beer, 2 sila of bread: Lu-gula, king’s messenger when they went to called up workmen for sesam
3 sila of beer, 2 sila of bread: Nur-Ashtar, king’s messenger when he went for the Akiti offering
3 sila of beer, 2 sila of bread: Amar-Sin-bani, king’s messenger when he went to the governo
5 sila of beer, 5 sila of bread: Ur-Nin-isina, king’s messenge
3 sila of beer, 2 sila of bread: Ummi, king’s messenger when they went for the plough-oxen
5 sila of beer, 5 sila of bread: in the . . .city, to . . Ur-tukul, king’s messenger when he went for ghe
3 sila of beer, 2 sila of bread: Dan-Shulgi, king’s messenger when he went from Der to the kin
3 sila of beer, 2 sila of bread: Shu-Adad, king’s messenger when he went to Sus
5 sila of beer, sila of bread: Lu-melam, king’s messenge
2 sila of beer, 2 sila of bread: Pululu, groom when they went to Anshe-bara
2 sila of beer, 2 sila of bread: Ur- . . . , herald when he went to smash the bandit
2 sila of beer, 2 sila of bread: . . . , . . . when he went to Girs
Disbursement for the month Shugarr
Year: the high priestess of Uruk was chosen by divination 4th da
A sila was a measure of capacity, about .85 of a litre. It is obvious for measuring beer, but not for bread. Perhaps the flour rather than the baked product was measured. The importance of this tablet is that it explains the purpose of these messengers’ trips. The published tablets of this category give the names and quantities, but offer no such explanations.