‘Spreadsheets of empire’: red tape goes back 4,000 years, say scientists after Iraq finds

Ancient Mesopotamian stone tablets show extraordinary detail and reach of government in cradle of world civilisations

The red tape of government bureaucracy spans more than 4,000 years, according to new finds from the cradle of the world's civilisations, Mesopotamia.

Hundreds of administrative tablets - the earliest physical evidence of the first empire in recorded history - have been discovered by archaeologists from the British Museum and Iraq. These texts detail the minutiae of government and reveal a complex bureaucracy - the red tape of an ancient civilisation.