First module for GNED 1201 (Aesthetic Experience and Ideas). This one covers how the invention of writing in Mesopotamia and then also examines other writing technologies, including papyrus, parchments, and then the printing press.
This course is a required general education course for all first-year students at Mount Royal University in Calgary, Canada. My version of the course is structured as a kind of Art History and Culture course. Some of the content overlaps with my other Gen Ed course.
3. Across every known writing system,
writing began with two intellectual
breakthroughs.
A third breakthrough did not happen everywhere.
4. First, was symbolic representation,
the discovery that marked lines can
represent something concrete
(bread, sheep, beer) or something
abstract (a number or a concept).
5.
6. Between 8000 and 4000 BCE
(that is, about 10,000 years ago)
a form of accounting developed
that used little clay tokens to
record the sale or purchase of
goods.
7.
8. Payment for:
Work/labour
Envelope
Signature/Seal
1 large measure of barley
+ 2 small measures of
something else
Contents
of 4 days
envelope
4 measures of metal
9.
10.
11.
12.
13. The first clay tokens were symbolic
representations of real things.
Eventually, the tokens were
replaced by symbols representing
the tokens.
14. 1. Tokens pressed into envelope to indicate contents
3. Token impressions replaced with pictograms for
things represented by tokens.
2. Tokens pressed onto flat “sheet”, thereby
eliminating need for tokens in an envelope.
15. Before 2700 BCE,
writing is only
accounting.
It’s only numbers and
the thing counted.
16.
17.
18.
19. The second great intellectual
breakthrough was that a
standardized simplified set of
symbols could be used to preserve
words and ideas across time.
23. The Sumerian language
pictographic logographic
Symbols pictorially Symbols arbitrarily
representing concrete
things
representing concrete
things and concepts
as well as syllables
24.
25.
26. This Assyrian tablet tells
the story of a plan by the
gods to destroy the world
by means of a great flood.
Ut-napishti, like the biblical
Noah, builds a huge boat to
rescue his family and every
type of animal. When this
tablet was first translated in
1872 it caused a sensation.
27.
28. Both cuneiform and Egyptian hieroglyphics
were logosyllabaries that required a great
deal of memorization.
For instance, in Akkadian, the total number
of signs was between 700 and 800. The
earlier Sumerian cuneiform had about 1000.
It had different symbols not only for
different ideas/things but also for different
syllables.
Sumerian Cuneiform Akkadian Cuneiform
30. Linear B – circa 14th C BCE
Linear A – circa 19th C BCE
Linear A and Linear B (used by Minoan and
Mycenaean Greeks) were also logosyllabaries (as
was Chinese with its thousands of symbols)
31. The third great intellectual
breakthrough did not occur
everywhere: it was sound-symbol
correspondence.
This was the recognition that all
words are composed of tiny sound
units and that all words can thus be
represented with symbols for those
sounds: i.e., by an alphabet
32. Greek alphabet used
symbols from the Phoenician
writing system, but added
symbols for vowels, making
it the first alphabet (around
800 BCE).
More recently, some linguists have argued
that other alphabets did in fact exist for
languages that died out and which predate
the Greek alphabet.
34. While stone and clay have excellent
longevity (indeed we probably have more
examples of writing from 2000 BC than we
do from 100 BCE thanks to it), it is not
very transportable or quick to work with.
Papyrus, made from a reed-like plant
native to Egypt, became the writing
medium of choice in the ancient world.
35. Papyrus Fragments
Languages written in clay were right-to-left
Languages written in ink were left-to-write.
Why?
36.
37. Thousands and thousands of papyrus
fragments have been found in the
ancient world. Some are letters, some
are government correspondence, and
some are poems, plays, philosophy, etc.
The vast majority of ancient literary
works are lost, and we only have small
fragments or snippets.
http://www.schoyencollection.com/greeklit_files
40. The Ilias Ambrosiana. The only illustrated Homer from antiquity is thought
to have been produced in Constantinople during the late 5th or early 6th
century, specifically between 493 and 508.
41. After the collapse of the
unified Roman Empire,
papyrus was no longer
readily available.
42. Vellum or Parchment, made from calf,
sheep, or goat skin, became the new
medium for writing. It is laborious to
make and was always an expensive
material.
45. Paper invented in China (about 100 CE),
transferred and improved in the Islamic
world (700 CE), eventually made its way
to Europe around (1400 CE). Paper was
significantly less expensive than vellum.
50. This woodcut from 1568 shows the
left printer removing a page from the
press while the one at right inks the
text-blocks.
Such a duo could reach 14,000 hand
movements per working day, printing
around 3,600 pages in the process.
56. Imagine you are stuck here at the
University during the Zombie Apocalypse.
The Zombie virus has the unfortunate side-effect
that it makes paper dissolve. As far
as you know, you may be the only
survivors.
Luckily, someone in your group knows how
to make vellum from the rabbits that are
common around the University but are
unmolested by the zombies.
You figure that you only have perhaps
several weeks before all the paper in the
library dissolves.
Which books will you save by writing them
back out on vellum, much like Dark Ages
Monks did with works from antiquity after
the collapse of the Roman Empire?
Notas del editor
Writing was invented independently in at least three places, Mesopotamia, China, and Mesoamerica. Recent discoveries might also provide evidence that writing was invented in Egypt and Indus independently of Mesopotamia.
Writing system have their genesis in accounting and the need for portable record-keeping.
Clay accounting tokens were used for accounting. Tokens would be placed inside envelopes – which were cumbersome clay pots. On the outside of the envelope would be indented the impressions of the number of tokens inside. The first appearance of such tokens in the archaeological record of the Middle East coincides with the development of agriculture in the period from 8000 to 7500 B.C. The Sumerians, formerly hunters and gatherers, began settling in villages in the fertile valley of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers. Archaeological studies of the period show evidence of grain cultivation in fields surrounding villages, the construction of communal silos for storing grain, and a rapid increase in population. In such a setting, individual farmers needed a reliable way to keep track of their goods, especially the amount of grain stored in shared facilities. It seems they did it by maintaining stocks of baked-clay tokens -- one token for each item, different shapes for different types of items. A marble-sized clay sphere stood for a bushel of grain, a cylinder for an animal, an egg-shaped token for a jar of oil.
Bulla-envelope with 11 plain and complex tokens inside, representing an account or agreement, perhaps wages for 4 days' work, 4 measures of metal, 1 large measure of barley and 2 small measures of some other commodity. The bulla-envelope had to be broken to check the contents hence the very few (only 17) surviving intact bulla- envelopes. This simple system of data storage persisted practically unchanged for almost 4,000 years, spreading over a large geographic area. Eventually, the growth of villages into cities and the increasing complexity of human activities, especially in southern Mesopotamia, forced a shift to a more versatile means of record-keeping. The ungainliness of needing to carry a hundred little clay tokens to signify a 100-bale sale of wheat seems almost ridiculous to modern observers, yet this system lasted for nearly four thousand years. It wasn’t until around 4,000 BC that the plain tokens began to be replaced by detailed ones around the Sumerian region.
These cylinder seals served as both a kind of amulet and as a mark of ownership or identification. Seals were either impressed on clay masses that were used to close jars, doors, and baskets, or they were rolled onto inscribed clay tablets that recorded information about commercial or legal transactions. From Pergamon Museum [Photo: Randy Connolly]
Cylinder seal with schematic workers , 3300–2900 B.C Cylinder seal with Contest Scene , 2350–2150 B.C Cylinder seal and modern impression: hunting scene , 2250–2150B.C. These cylinder seals served as both a kind of amulet and as a mark of ownership or identification. Seals were either impressed on clay masses that were used to close jars, doors, and baskets, or they were rolled onto inscribed clay tablets that recorded information about commercial or legal transactions. Source:Cylinder seal and modern impression: hunting scene [Mesopotamia] (41.160.192) | Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History | The Metropolitan Museum of Art
Markings were added to tokens to provide more meaning.
Once sealed in their clay cocoons, the tokens were hidden from view. It didn't take long for busy bureaucrats to realize that once the clay envelopes were marked, it was no longer necessary to keep the tokens. In fact, the marks by themselves, impressed on a clay tablet, were sufficient. Around 3,100 B.C., someone had the bright idea that, instead of representing, say, 33 jars of oil by repeating the symbol for one jar 33 times, it would be simpler to precede the symbol for a jar of oil by numerals -- special signs expressing numbers. Moreover, the same signs could be used to represent the same quantity of any item. Complex tokens couldn't be stored in clay envelopes as conveniently as simple counters because they often left indecipherable impressions. Instead, perforations allowed such tokens to be strung together, with special clay tags apparently identifying the accounts. In this case, the shortcut the bureaucrats discovered was to inscribe the incised pattern found on the surface of a complex token directly onto a clay tablet. For example, they could replace an incised ovoid token with a neatly drawn oval with a slash across it.
These possibly derive from the bulla-envelopes with counting tokens inside. The cubic tablets might represent the next logical step, the adding of pictographs representing the commodities involved, and adapted from the spherical shape of the bullas, to cubic shape, before being reduced to a thinner and more handy tablet.
6 different disk type tokens, actually drawn to represent real counting tokens. This represents the second stage in the development from counting tokens to actual pictographic writing on tablets. The first stage was to depress actual tokens into the wet clay on a bulla or tablet. Apart from the sheep token (cross within the circle, group 3:51), none of these tokens have been found so far. Before 2700, writing is only accounting. It’s only numbers and the thing counted. And then at some point, the name of who it belongs to.
This image shows the development of the sign SAG "head“. Stage 1 shows the pictogram as it was drawn around 3000 BC. Stage 2 shows the rotated pictogram as written around 2800 BC. Stage 3 shows the abstracted glyph in archaic monumental inscriptions, from ca. 2600 BC, and stage 4 is the sign as written in clay, contemporary to stage 3. Stage 5 represents the late 3rd millennium, and stage 6 represents Old Assyrian ductus of the early 2nd millennium, as adopted into Hittite.
Writing cuneiform on wet clay using a reed stylus.
By 2800 BCE the writing system started to exhibit use of phonetic elements. The Sumerian language had a high number of monosyllabic words that sound similar, so symbols that represented one concept could be used to represent a similar sound to that concept. E.g., the sign for arrow (ti in sumerian) was used for life (til in sumerian). Another interesting fact about Sumerian (and later cuneiform systems as well) is that the numeric system is both decimal (base-10) and sexagesimal (base-60). The sexagesimal part of this system survives in the modern era in units of time (seconds and minutes) and of trigonometry (360 degrees). http://www.ancientscripts.com/sumerian.html
Akkadian eventually became the common language of the Mesopotamian area, and completely displaced Sumerian. However, Akkadian scribes continued to use Sumerian cuneiform symbols.
Akkadian: Eventually became the common language of Mesopotamia. Sumerian and Akkadian are vastly different languages (like English and Chinese). Akkadian uses phoentic signs and was an extremely complex writing system. The number of signs used hover from 200 to 400 (although the total number of signs is between 700 and 800).
Greek alphabet used symbols from the Phoenician writing system, but added symbols for vowels, making it the first alphabet (around 800 BCE). More recently, some linguists have argued that other alphabets did in fact exist for languages that died out and which predate the Greek alphabet.
Pretend you were carving the words into stone. Now, grasp the hammer in your right hand and the chisel in your left and start to carve. Which way to you instinctively go? Right to left (assuming you are right handed, which most people are). Otherwise your arm would block what you had just written. But pick up a pen and start to write. Which way do you instinctively go? Left to right, so you don’t smear the ink of what you have just written. The technology dictates the architecture of the language.
Making vellum from sheepskin. Skins were soaked in running water for several days; then immersed in a lime and water solution for as long again, with an occasional 'stir of the pot' to remove hair and dirt. Next they were rinsed, stretched taut over a frame, and dried in the sun and scraped with pumice and water over and over again. When dry, the skin was cut from the frame and ready for use. It was inevitable that manuscripts were taller than they were wide: animal skins were rectangular. Staying true to the rectangle was the most economical way to fold the skins into pages. When paper was later introduced, bookmakers could have chosen any shape, but opted for the convention, and today the tradition continues because a millennium ago monks used natural vellum.
Paper invented in China (about 100 CE), transferred and improved in Islamic world (700 CE), eventually made its way to Europe around (1400 CE).
Gutenberg Press ( Johann Gutenberg, ca. 1400-1468) and metal type
This woodcut from 1568 shows the left printer removing a page from the press while the one at right inks the text-blocks. Such a duo could reach 14,000 hand movements per working day, printing around 3,600 pages in the process.
Lithography press (printing on limestone, then on paper) – 19 th century