A mission led by the British Museum and the Iraqi State Board of Antiquities has unearthed a unique administrative archive in the ancient city of Ur. The cache of over 150 cuneiform tablets belonged to an official known as the 'Master of the Royal Fish-Ponds.' These records provide a granular look at the management of aquaculture in Mesopotamia, detailing the numbers of carp and eels bred in artificial ponds and their distribution to the temple of Nanna.
The tablets include detailed breeding schedules, inventories of fish-feed—mostly consisting of processed grain—and records of labor assigned to maintaining the canal inlets that fed the ponds. This discovery highlights the importance of freshwater fish as a major protein source for the urban population and the highly organized nature of Sumerian resource management. The find is particularly significant as it offers a rare glimpse into the specialized bureaucratic roles that sustained the city's food security during the 3rd millennium BCE.