Archeologists, historians, and other scholars have long been debating on the topic of who created the writing system and why it was invented. It is nearly impossible in this community to get a unanimous decision on what the correct answer is when opposing opinions are always present. John Noble Wilford of The New York Times explains how experts are trying to get an accurate (and agreed upon) “understanding of how and why the invention responsible for the great divide in human culture between prehistory and history had come about.”1 His title, When No One Read, Who Started to Write?, is summing up one of the most debated topics by intellectuals all over the world. This article shows us how important writing is to the development, interaction, …show more content…
Historians are constantly debating on whether writing was “invented once and spread elsewhere or arose independently several times”2. A general chronological order has been developed; Sumerians were first beginning in the third millennium B.C., followed by Egypt, the Indus Valley, China, and lastly Mesoamerica (including the Olmecs, Mayans, and Zapotecs). Archeologists have discovered indications that cultures like the Chinese or Indus Valley have independently created writing systems. But, contradicting statements have been made on this theory and other valid evidence has been found to disprove the accusation. This constant state of flux among experts proves that we do not have an agreed upon answer for this question. We do not know for sure whether writing was invented and spread, or if it was invented all over the world …show more content…
While one side favors “origins in the visual arts, pictograms of things being transformed into increasingly abstract symbols for things, names, and eventually words in speech”3, the other believes that “writing grew out of the pieces of clay in assorted sizes and shapes that Sumerian accountants had used as tokens to keep track of livestock and stores of grain.”4 Cuneiform was initially used for recording economic information such as documents about property, inventory, and even taxes according to Dr. Damerow. He agrees with the idea that “writing appeared to have developed in two stages, first as a new but limited means of recording economic information, later as a broader encoding of spoken language for stories, arguments, descriptions or messages from one ruler to another.”5 One thing that is almost agreed upon by everyone is the realization that writing was not initially a direct delivery of speech. Early records of writing show that the language used in writing was restricted and did not speak in sentences and narratives like spoken language does. Although this agreement may seem beneficial to finally reaching a definite answer to this topic, “ancient writing is a field hot with controversy, and few scholarly conclusions go unchallenged.”6 Disagreements are bound to occur with every new discovery related to early
Cuneiform was the first ever form of writing. The Sumerians were the main inventors of this writing. The symbol as we know them now consist of lines and wedges. One of the
Written language was an important milestone in human history. It enabled the recording of history, dreams and tragedy. It allowed for commercial and historical record keeping. It allowed human beings to imprint thoughts on paper, for sharing, later review or just for fun. What about societies that never developed a written language? Could such a society rival one with that has? When advances of Sumerian city-states are compared to that of Teotihuacan there are a few instances where the Mesoamerican city appears to be more advanced. However, if ranked these appearances do not place Teotihuacan ahead of any one of Sumer's Mesopotamian city-states.
"The Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature." Last modified 12 18, 2002. Accessed March 10, 2014. http://etcsl.orinst.ox.ac.uk/index1.htm.
In the article "the persistence of the word" written by James Gleick, he argues that writing is the hardest technology to erase from our mind. Writing made knowledge more durable stuff, which represented the roots of human history. The author used one-to-one correspondence methods, link examples with explanations to introduced writing into three categories. First, the way of writing. Writing as a technology requires premeditation and special art, it is a competence forever bodying itself in a series of concrete performance. In ancient times writing usually exists on paper or stone, show our respect to the culture, paper and stone is a kind of tools which can inspired immediate detractors, writing on stone is
Writing is one of the many factors which can lead to an unequal world. Writing was “One of the most important inventions in human history” (Prososki, “Writing”). It was believed to come from the Fertile Crescent called Sumer around 5,000 years ago. Over the years, writing has advanced as people created writing and printing systems, which were able to reach
To start out, the Sumerians invented cuneiform, which had a major impact on the future. It was invented 5,000 years ago (Doc. 1). They used it to keep records about their crops, business dealings, and occasionally love letters (OI). They also used cuneiform to write myths (OI). Cuneiform was written on clay tablets, then baked
Everyday writing has been done since the Sumerians created cuneiform. Postcards, diaries, letters, to-do lists are all included in everyday writing. Although some people claim we are faced with an inundation of information, and trivial writings should be discarded for the sake of space, it is important to preserve and study these everyday writings, as these everyday writings are part of the United States’ heritage, and studying them enriches our knowledge of rhetorical and historical concepts. (Source F)
Writing is perhaps the most important building block of communication - after verbal speech, of course. Writing, like most of human civilization, has its roots in ancient Mesopotamia. The first writing systems began in a style known as cuneiform (Cuneiform, 2013). These wedge-shaped markings have their roots in Sumerian culture and were used predominantly for record keeping and accounting. At the archaeological site of Uruk in what is modern day Iraq, a great wealth of knowledge has been gained from the artifacts located there. Uruk was a ceremonial site and is home to the world’s oldest known documented written documents (Price and Feinman, 2013). The documents discovered list quantities of goods that may have been stored at Uruk, leading archaeologists to believe that writing in this part of the world was developed primarily to keep lists of transactions and stockpiled quantities of goods located at the site.
were not the first to use writing and several areas such as Mesopotamia developed writing
Humans have been using written language to communicate ideas with one another since as early as 3200 BCE in Mesopotamia. Since then, every great civilization has had a written language, each with its own unique characteristics. However, it was the writin...
The earliest writing in Mesopotamia was a picture writing invented by the Sumerians who wrote on clay tablets using long reeds. The script the Sumerians invented and handed down to the Semitic peoples who conquered Mesopotamia in later centuries, is called cuneiform, which is derived from two Latin words: cuneus , which means "wedge," and forma , which means "shape." This picture language, similar to but more abstract than Egyptian hieroglyphics, eventually developed into a syllabic alphabet under the Semites (Assyrians and Babylonians) who eventually came to dominate the area.
Gilgamesh is introduced as knowing all things and countries including mysteries and secrets that went on a long journey and had his story engraved on stone. This gives us a little information on the writing technique in Sumeria. Sumerian art was complex. Clay was the Sumerians' most widely used material. Sumerian available because of the invention of cuneiform writing before 3000 B.C. The characters consist of wedge-like strokes, impressed on clay tablets. This system of writing developed before the last centuries of the 4th millennium B.C. in the lower Tigris and Euphrates valley, probably by the Sumerians The history of the script is strikingly like that of the Egyptian hieroglyphic. This must have been the technique that Gilgamesh uses in order to transcribe his story onto these clay tablets. It was reinforced in the story by mentioning it at the beginning and end of the Epic.
... helped the architecture to have accurate measurements . Another civilization that also developed a system of writing was China. The written language could be easily to read and understand, but when they spoke it it was difficult to understand. This civilization had a big advantage with the system of writing because all parts of china everyone could learn the language even if they already spoke a different language. This helped make a great civilization because it unifies a large and diverse land and this helped to control it easier. One disadvantage it has is that the writing system has a lot of things to memorize. So if you were a wealthy kid and went to a good school you could memorize the major part of the language, but if you were in the lower class and went to a cheap school then you had trouble learning the language because they didn’t teach the whole language
However, when writing the language used becomes contradictory to speech as it is very much formal in most situations and it leaves less opportunity... ... middle of paper ... ... dge of from a very young age. The tools needed to write are a pen and paper however in medieval times writings were usually written upon stones.
When the term “literature” crossed the mind, one may immediately think of a classical definition of literature. Large libraries with stacks upon stacks of books may enter the mind. However, literature in the broad, informal sense can be traced back much further. In order to trace the evolution of literature, the evolution of human communication must first be considered. For thousands of years, humans have told stories through verbal and written communication. The first written communications are attributed to drawings on writings on prehistoric cave walls. Many of these works however are not considered true literature. Epic of Gilgamesh is one of the earliest known literary works and dates to around 2000 BC in Mesopotamia.