A large account of a basketry and carpentry workshop
Artifact: Clay tablet
Provenience: Umma, modern Jokha
Period: Ur III (ca. 2100-2000 BC)
Current location: Louvre Museum, Paris (AO 6036)
Text genre, language: Administrative text; Sumerian
CDLI page
Description: One of the largest clay tablets ever written, this tablet is divided into 20 columns of which all but one, on the reverse, are inscribed. This makes for almost 800 lines of text. The text is an account listing the debits, credits and balance of Agu the overseer of the artisan's workshop. The debits are made up of the team of workers in the workshop and the raw materials available to Agu; the credits are a summary of the actual production during the year of accounting. The second half of the credits calculate the fictitious value of the finished products splitting them into their constituent parts and calculation the involved labour. Finally, the balance records the complex array of deficits and surpluses. (Jacob L. Dahl, University of Oxford)
Lineart: TCL 5, 6036
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