Reckoning Tablet
The Reckoning Tablet was an ancient Bajoran artifact. It was discovered under the ruins of the city of B'hala by a team of Bajoran archaeologists in 2374.

History 
The tablet, which resembled an early version of the Bajoran symbol, was over thirty thousand years old at the time of its discovery, like the ruins in which it was found. The  was inscribed with ancient Bajoran ideograms, many of which weren't immediately translatable; however, at least two symbols were: "Welcome, ."

When the stone was discovered, Captain Benjamin Sisko had it transported to Deep Space 9 so that he and his science officer, Jadzia Dax, could decipher the inscriptions. Although they made some progress in this respect, Kai Winn and First Minister Shakaar Edon both ordered Captain Sisko to return the tablet to Bajor. Frustrated with this and the fact that progress on deciphering the stone's inscriptions was going so slow, Sisko picked up the stone in anger and smashed it against a wall. In doing so, he released both a trapped Prophet and Pah-wraith, and initiated "the  Reckoning", a religious battle between the Prophets and Pah-wraiths. ()

In 2401, either the original Reckoning Tablet, a replica of it, or another very similar Bajoran tablet was on a table in the library of Château Picard. ()

Text 
Parts of the inscriptions translate as follows:
"Welcome, Emissary."
"The time of reckoning is at hand! The Prophets will weep. Their sorrow will consume the gateway to the temple."
"During the Reckoning, the Bajoran people will suffer horribly/eat fruit." (The ideograms for "suffering" and "eat fruit" were apparently indistinguishable.)

Appendices

See also 
Bajoran history
Bajoran prophecy

Background information
The Reckoning Tablet was designed by John Eaves. () The prop was auctioned by Christie's in 2006.

Apocrypha 

In the thirty-eighth issue of IDW Publishing's Star Trek: Ongoing comic series,  and Dr.  find the tablet with the alternate reality versions of  and  after Q transports the  to the 24th century. The Pah-Wraith in the tablet possesses Gul Dukat, while the Prophet – identified as the last of its kind – initially possesses Kira before Dukat kills her. The Prophet initially faces destruction as it is overpowered by the Pah-Wraiths, jumping between hosts to try and escape Dukat, but when it possesses Spock, he inspires it to use Q as a host, the combination of Q and the Prophet proving more powerful than the Pah-Wraiths as a whole.

External link 

Bajor
Religious items