Tablet

Sumerian administration document from the city PD = Puzri¸s-Dagan.“Livestock from Urkununna received by various individuals.”; Year account. Translation: Obv. I: 20 female kids, Nur-Adad received; 1 two-year-old ox, 8 two-year-old cows, 49 grass-fed sheep, 31 grass-fed ewes, 161 grass-fed full-grown goats, 31 lambs,for the bala service, Lugal-Utu received; 125 grass-fed sheep, 11 grass-fed full-grown goats, for E2.AB of the god Enlil, Lugal-azida, the ¯Sabra administrator, received; 259 grass-fed sheep, 244 grass-fed full-grown goats, 30 grass-fed she-goats, 7 lambs, 103 goats, for the bala service, Aradmu, the governor of the city of Girsu, received;
II: 2 two-year-old oxen, 29 two-year-old cows, for the bala service,¯Sama¸s-bani, the governor (of) the city of Sippar received; 15 grass-fed oxen, 20 three-year-old oxen, (for) a royal (votive) gift, 8 grass-fed oxen, 411 grass-fed sheep, 213 grass-fed full-grown goats, 81 lambs, for the regular offering to the temple of the god Ninsun of the city of Usuh, Imlik-Ea, the governor of the city of Marad, received; 420 grass-fed sheep, 43 grass-fed full-grown goats, for the regular offering to the goddess Inanna of the city of Uruk, Dayya, the ¯Sabra administrator, received; 10 grass-fed sheep,
III: 148 grass-fed full-grown goats, for the regular offering to the god Ninsun of the city of Uruk, ¯Su-Ea, the ¯Sabra administrator, received; 36 grass-fed full-grown goats, for the regular offering to the goddess Annun¾tum of the city of Uruk, Ur-I¸skur, the ¯Sabra administrator, received; 18 grass-fed oxen, 23 three-year-old oxen, for the field Im (of) Ur-¯Su-Suen, Amur-Suen, the ¯Sabra administrator, received; 654 grass-fed sheep, 20 grass-fed ewes, 1111 full-grown goats,58 breast lambs, 88 breast goats, Habaluge, the governor (of) the city of Adab, received;
Rev. IV: –
V: (total:) 124 mixed oxen (and) cows, 4364 mixed sheep (and) goats;
VI: Sealed by the men responsible for the nig2-dab5-ba, in the account(?), from Urkununna; From the month of the barley harvest (i), to the intercalary month of the festival of the god Mekigal (xiiII), that is 13 months; The year: ¯Su-Suen, the king of Ur, erected the grand stele of the god Enlil (and) of the goddess Ninlil. (¯SS 6)

Ex. case no 7c.
The text is an annual record of the amount of livestock distributed from Puzri¸s-Dagan near Nippur to different cities in the central part of the Ur III state. Puzri¸s-Dagan, founded by king ¯Sulgi, played an essential part in the extensive taxation system (the so-called bala service), likewise introduced by ¯Sulgi, which served to collect, process and distribute the state revenues. Puzri¸s-Dagan, working as a livestock fund for the Ur III state, delivered livestock to the cities in the core of the Ur III state and could in return expect to receive different products, such as cereals, reeds, timber, from other centers specializing in those products. It should be noted that the livestock brought to Puzri¸s-Dagan came from different cities on the periphery of the state and it seems as if the Ur III state exercised some kind of political control over these cities.
M. Sigrist has recently argued that the animals recorded in the Puzri¸s-Dagan archive were not necessarily brought to the city, but rather transported from their breeding places directly to their final destinations, and that Puzri¸s-Dagan only served as an administrative center for the accounts of the animals. If this reasonable theory has any merit, it would mean that only some animals were physically brought to the city. These would include e.g. the ones destined for the kitchens of the city (see text 3 and 4 below), whereas others probably never entered the city more than as economic figures in its huge bureaucratic archives.