Cuneiform tablet and case: quittance for a loan in silver

What you see

What you see

Two parts of one clay object: a tablet measuring 4.6 by 4.7 cm and 1.5 cm thick, and a case measuring 5.2 by 5.4 cm and 2.5 cm thick, which contained the tablet. According to the record, impressions of four different cylinder seals appear on both sides and the edges of the case. On the front of the case two seals with presentation scenes, carved in an Anatolian style that emphasizes features such as the large eyes of the figures, were rolled out; one of them is inscribed with the name Ashur-taklaku. The reverse carries two more impressions, of seals carved in a visual hybrid that mixed elements. This page has no photograph: the museum has open images of both parts, which are not included in this round. Source 1.

What the record says

According to the record, the tablet documents the discharge from debt for a silver loan owed to Ashur-taklaku: the text, which reads from left to right, indicates that the silver has been paid and any further claims are void. Witnesses are listed in the text, and their seals appear on the case. The contents of the tablet were repeated on the case, "perhaps in order to verify" the decision about the repayment, and the record adds that the text on the case "must have been written" after the tablet was placed inside; both are the museum's inferences. The record does not name the person who repaid the debt or the witnesses, and does not explain whether the seal inscribed with the name Ashur-taklaku was his or a witness's. Source 1.

The trading network

According to the museum's description, Kültepe, the ancient city of Kanesh, was part of the network of trading settlements established in central Anatolia by merchants from Ashur, in northern Mesopotamia, in the early second millennium B.C. The merchants traded vast quantities of goods, primarily tin and textiles, for Anatolian copper and other materials, and brought with them Mesopotamian tools for recording transactions: cuneiform writing, clay tablets and envelopes, and cylinder seals. At Kültepe thousands of these texts stored in household archives were preserved when fire destroyed the city in ca. 1836 B.C. The seal bearing the name Ashur-taklaku is presented as showing how Assyrian merchants adopted local styles, and the seals on the reverse as further evidence of cultural interaction between Anatolia and Assyria. Source 1.

Placement on the timeline

The record dates the object "ca. 20th-19th century BCE" and assigns it to the period "Middle Bronze Age-Old Assyrian Trading Colony". That is this site's row, "The Middle Bronze Age in Anatolia: the Assyrian Colony period", so the object is placed there by the period named in the source. On the Met's timeline for Anatolia the Middle Bronze Age is about 2000-1600 BCE and the "Assyrian Trading Colony period" about 1950-1750 BCE; the record's range begins fifty years before the colony period, which the record does not address. Certainty of place is lower than certainty of period: "probably" from Kültepe, with no excavation context. Sources 1, 2.

Where it is now

Both parts are held by The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the tablet as 66.245.16a and the case as 66.245.16b, with the credit line "Gift of Mr. and Mrs. J. J. Klejman, 1966". On 24 October 2026 both records stated "Not on view". The records document no excavation or date of finding, so the object's history before 1966 is not known from them. Source 1.