Inventions of writing[edit]

See also: List of languages by first written accounts

Sumer, an ancient civilization of southern Mesopotamia, is believed to be the place where written

language was first invented around 3100 BC

Writing was long thought to have been invented in a single civilization, a theory named
"monogenesis".[3] Scholars believed that all writing originated in ancient Sumer (in Mesopotamia)
and spread over the world from there via a process of cultural diffusion.[3] According to this
theory, the concept of representing language by written marks, though not necessarily the
specifics of how such a system worked, was passed on by traders or merchants traveling
between geographical regions.[4][5]
However, the discovery of the scripts of ancient Mesoamerica, far away from Middle Eastern
sources, proved that writing had been invented more than once. Scholars now recognize that
writing may have independently developed in at least four ancient civilizations: Mesopotamia
(between 3400 and 3100 BC), Egypt (around 3250 BC), [6][7][3] China (1200 BC),[8] and lowland
areas of Southern Mexico and Guatemala (by 500 BC).[9]
Regarding Egypt, several scholars[6][10][11] have argued that "the earliest solid evidence of Egyptian
writing differs in structure and style from the Mesopotamian and must therefore have developed
independently. The possibility of 'stimulus diffusion' from Mesopotamia remains, but the influence
cannot have gone beyond the transmission of an idea." [6][12]
Regarding China, it is believed that ancient Chinese characters are an independent invention
because there is no evidence of contact between ancient China and the literate civilizations of
the Near East,[13] and because of the distinct differences between the Mesopotamian and Chinese
approaches to logography and phonetic representation.[14]
Debate surrounds the Indus script of the Bronze Age Indus Valley civilization,
the Rongorongo script of Easter Island, and the Vinča symbols dated around 5,500 BC. All
are undeciphered, and so it is unknown if they represent authentic writing, proto-writing, or
something else.
The Sumerian archaic (pre-cuneiform) writing and Egyptian hieroglyphs are generally considered
the earliest true writing systems, both emerging out of their ancestral proto-literate symbol
systems from 3400–3100 BC, with earliest coherent texts from about 2600 BC. The Proto-
Elamite script is also dated to the same approximate period. [15]

Writing systems[edit]
Main article: Writing system
Accounting tokens

Pre-cuneiform tags, with drawing of goat or sheep and number (probably "10"): "Ten goats", Al-Hasakah,
3300-3100 BCE, Uruk culture.[16]

Clay accounting tokens. Susa, Uruk period

Clay envelope and its tokens. Susa, Uruk period

Symbolic communication systems are distinguished from writing systems. With writing systems,

one must usually understand something of the associated spoken language to comprehend the
text. In contrast, symbolic systems, such as information signs, painting, maps, and mathematics,
often do not require prior knowledge of a spoken language. Every human community possesses
language, a feature regarded by many as an innate and defining condition of humanity
(see Origin of language). However the development of writing systems, and their partial
supplantation of traditional oral systems of communication, have been sporadic, uneven, and
slow. Once established, writing systems on the whole change more slowly than their spoken
counterparts and often preserve features and expressions that no longer exist in the spoken
language.

Early Proto-cuneiform (4th millennium BCE) and cuneiform signs for the sexagesimal system (60, 600,

3600, etc.).
There are considered to be three writing criteria for all writing systems. The first being that writing
must be complete. It must have a purpose or some sort of meaning to it. A point must be made
or communicated in the text. Second, all writing systems must have some sort of symbols which
can be made on some sort of surface, whether physical or digital. Lastly, the symbols used in the
writing system must mimic spoken word/speech, in order for communication to be possible. [17]
The greatest benefit of writing is that it provides the tool by which society can record information
consistently and in greater detail, something that could not be achieved as well previously by
spoken word. Writing allows societies to transmit information and to share and preserve
knowledge.

Recorded history[edit]
Main articles: Recorded history and Early literature

The Kish tablet from Sumer, with pictographic writing. This may be the earliest known writing, 3500
BC. Ashmolean Museum

The origins of writing appear during the start of the pottery-phase of the Neolithic, when clay
tokens were used to record specific amounts of livestock or commodities. [18] These tokens were
initially impressed on the surface of round clay envelopes and then stored in them.[18] The tokens
were then progressively replaced by flat tablets, on which signs were recorded with a stylus.
Actual writing is first recorded in Uruk, at the end of the 4th millennium BC, and soon after in
various parts of the Near-East.[18]
An ancient Mesopotamian poem gives the first known story of the invention of writing:
Because the messenger's mouth was heavy and he couldn't repeat (the message), the Lord of
Kulaba patted some clay and put words on it, like a tablet. Until then, there had been no putting
words on clay.

— Sumerian epic poem Enmerkar and the Lord of Aratta. Circa 1800 BC.[19][20]

Scholars make a reasonable distinction between prehistory and history of early writing[21] but have

disagreed concerning when prehistory becomes history and when proto-writing became "true
writing." The definition is largely subjective.[22] Writing, in its most general terms, is a method of
recording information and is composed of graphemes, which may, in turn, be composed
of glyphs.[23]
The emergence of writing in a given area is usually followed by several centuries of fragmentary
inscriptions. Historians mark the "historicity" of a culture by the presence of coherent texts in the
culture's writing system(s).[21]
The invention of writing was not a one-time event but was a gradual process initiated by the
appearance of symbols, possibly first for cultic purposes.

Developmental stages[edit]
Standard reconstruction of the development of writing. [24][25] There is a possibility that the Egyptian script was
invented independently from the Mesopotamian script.[20]

Comparative evolution from pictograms to abstract shapes,

in Mesopotamian cuneiforms, Egyptian hieroglyphs and Chinese characters.

A conventional "proto-writing to true writing" system follows a general series of developmental

stages:

 Picture writing system: glyphs (simplified pictures) directly represent objects and
concepts. In connection with this, the following substages may be distinguished:
o Mnemonic: glyphs primarily as a reminder.
o Pictographic: glyphs directly represent an object or a concept such as (A)
chronological, (B) notices, (C) communications, (D) totems, titles, and names, (E)
religious, (F) customs, (G) historical, and (H) biographical.
o Ideographic: graphemes are abstract symbols that directly represent an idea or
concept.
 Transitional system: graphemes refer not only to the object or idea that it represents but
to its name as well.
 Phonetic system: graphemes refer to sounds or spoken symbols, and the form of the
grapheme is not related to its meanings. This resolves itself into the following substages:
 o Verbal: grapheme (logogram) represents a whole word.
o Syllabic: grapheme represents a syllable.
o Alphabetic: grapheme represents an elementary sound.
The best known picture writing system of ideographic or early mnemonic symbols are:

 Jiahu symbols, carved on tortoise shells in Jiahu, c. 6600 BC

 Vinča signs (Tărtăria tablets), c. 5300 BC[26]
 Early Indus script, c. 3100 BC
In the Old World, true writing systems developed from neolithic writing in the Early Bronze
Age (4th millennium BC).