Sumerian Pictograph Tablet

I was interested in the idea of communication through different era as it was very interesting and well crafted over many centuries and how words are being transformed into letters. In the prehistoric times, they will leave a trace of memory or documentation, through engraves and paint on the wall or crafts on pottery. After the Homo sapiens become more civilised they started using symbols, anagrams to communicate.

I learnt that the Sumerian language was created in ancient Mesopotamia and it was the earliest written language. The Sumerians used to engrave pictographs and symbols to represent the trades goods and livestock. The early Sumerian pictograph tablet was constructed by the grid work, and symbols of seeds, plants, tools and other information.

 

 

At first, they use clay tokens to create the symbols but later on evolve to make symbols instead. Symbols develop into the writing system.  

The early direction of writing was from top to bottom but soon after the direction could be read from left to right in horizontal rows. At the same time, the symbols of text reduce too.

The Sumerian language uses the cuneiform that has a ‘wedge-shaped’. it has an appearance of the strokes, which were made by pressing a reed stylus into the clay.

I felt that it was an impressive start of communication with engraves on the tablets. Without the method of “writing” on the clay pieces, the Egyptians and Phoenician would have never evolved their way of writing and to develops further.

https://www.omniglot.com/writing/sumerian.htm

http://www.ancientscripts.com/sumerian.html