**First Time At Auction**

Ancient Near East, Sumer, Third Dynasty of Ur, ca. 2080 to 2030 BCE. A petite clay tablet with rounded, lateral upper and lower sides, and slightly convex faces. The tablet bears thirteen lines of inscribed cuneiform text which is formed by impressing a sharpened reed or stick into the still-wet clay just before firing. The translation of this tablet records a delivery of sheep and goats. Cuneiform was a generally a pictographic style of writing in its infancy, though it became a more abstract style of letter-based script around the 3rd millennium BCE. Size: 1.125" W x 1.25" H (2.9 cm x 3.2 cm).

This tablet and five others hammered for GBP 1,500 ($1,957) at Bonhams, London, Knightsbridge Antiquities Auction (May 8, 2013, lot 147 [top left]): https://www.bonhams.com/auctions/20667/lot/147/?category=grid

Provenance: private Houston, Texas, USA collection; ex-Bonhams, London, Knightsbridge Antiques Auction (May 8, 2013, part of lot 147); ex-Joseph Klein collection, formed in New York, New York, USA between 1941 and 1980, thence by descent

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#132903

Surface wear and minor abrasions commensurate with age, very minor nicks to peripheries and faces, with light fading to some cuneiform characters, otherwise intact and very good. Light earthen deposits throughout.