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What if the writing system was never invented? Could you memorize all the information in your head? Could you solve complex mathematical and logical problems without writing them down? Moreover, how could you pass on information to people who live in a different space and time? Yes, of course, people have been transferring and sharing information from one generation to the next generation through oral language since ancient times. But, how much information can be orally transferred? Our brains have their limits of storing information and remembering that information when needed. Over time we can forget many things. Thus, the invention of a writing system became necessary for keeping records. So, what was the world’s first writing system you may ask? Let us now get to know about the first writing system of the world, the cuneiform script. 

Cuneiform

The Sumerians who lived in the southern parts of Mesopotamia are the inventors of the world’s first writing script. They developed cuneiform over 5000 years ago. According to many scholars, all writings developed from cuneiform and the script changed while travelling different parts of the world. The word cuneiform originated from the Latin word cuneus which means wedge. A wedge-shaped stylus was used in this script.

The writer used a special kind of stylus to create wedge-like shapes on soft clay tablets. The ancient form of cuneiform was pictographic, but later it went through many changes. Archaeologists discovered and deciphered ancient tablets of cuneiform in the late 19th century CE. The discovery of the tablet has changed the concept of understanding the past.

The Invention of Cuneiform Script

When the Sumerians settled in the Tigris-Euphrates valley, they had plenty of water to cultivate the lands and grow crops. More crops meant more food for people. Thus, civilization grew. With the rising number of the population, it became difficult to keep track of the population and the goods. As the number of people increased, so did the amount of information needed to manage daily activities.

In this new society, managing a huge amount of information became a great problem. The residents of Uruk created a solution to the problem. The abundance of crops in the fertile lands of Mesopotamia helped to build prosperous cities there. Some unnamed Sumerians found an impressive way to store a large amount of information. Because of this invention, the Sumerians were able to manage a complex society. 

Mesopotamia was the world’s first land of cities. About ten thousand people lived in the cities and they bounded together by the belief in gods. They built temples for these gods and maintained them seriously. These temples were not only a place of worshiping gods, but also enormous warehouses. When the condition was favourable, donations and gifts came to the temples, and in awful times, the priests distributed the wealth back to the people. Every day the priests had to keep a record of the wealth and grains coming in and going out of the temples. 

So, there were scribes who would write down the details of the grains and goods on a soft tablet made of mud. Then, they dried the tablets under the sun to harden them. The tablets were saved in the temples and the priests were able to keep track of what was going on. The scribes drew pictures of goods and used tallies to count the numbers on the tablets. For example, little pictures of grains next to tally marks mean the amount of the grains. 

Development of Cuneiform Script

Overtime (3,500 BCE. To 2,500 BCE) the writing system of cuneiform script gradually changed from pictograms to more abstract forms. Instead of drawing pictures of every single item stored in the temple, the scribes opted to create symbolic representations. These symbols were not only limited to representing the concept of something but also represented syllables and words. Cuneiform became fully developed around 2500 BCE. 

The writing system had two types of signs. One of the types represented numbers and the other represented people, animals, merchandise, properties, territories, dates and so on. In the early stage of cuneiform, there were over 1,000 word characters. However, the number was reduced to 600 characters to simplify the writing system and made it easier to understand. By adding both numbers and characters, the Sumerians could write complex data and preserve information for future use. 

Changes in The Writing Style of Cuneiform Script

The change of the writing style had also influenced the changes in the characters of the cuneiform script. In the ancient form of cuneiform script, the scribes used to write from top to bottom. The clay tablets took a long time to dry. As a result, if someone accidentally put their hands down, they could wipe out an entire section of the column they just wrote.

The scribes tried to find a solution, and they realized that they could reduce the risk by writing from left to right. However, people who had learned to read the script from top to bottom rejected the new writing style. They did not like the side writings at all.

So, the scribes were in another dilemma. To solve this problem, they decided to just rotate the characters 90 degrees. This way a reader could turn the tablet and read it from top to bottom, just like before. As the characters were flipped, they became even more abstracted from the original photographic style. Soon, the Akkadian and the Elamites adopted the cuneiform script. They changed the script even further.

This is how the pictograms completely vanished and changed into wedge-shaped representations. The cuneiform script was so well developed that the Mesopotamian people were able to write lyrical works of literature like The Epic of Gigamesh and The Enûma Eliš, the Babylonian myth of creation. Thus, the cuneiform script, the first writing system of the world was invented and developed in the ancient civilization of Mesopotamia.    

Bibliography

• Mark, Joshua J. “Cuneiform.” Ancient History Encyclopedia, Ancient History Encyclopedia, 25 Dec. 2020.
• Writing, The British Museum, www.mesopotamia.co.uk/writing/home_set.html.
• Grant, R.G. The History Book: Big Ideas Simply Explained. dkbooks, 2016.
• Michele Cammarosano, How to Write Cuneiform. CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. https://cuneiform.neocities.org/CWT/howtowritecuneiform.html