The cuneiform script was developed from pictographic proto-writing in the late 4th millennium BC, stemming from the near eastern token system used for accounting. This is thought to be a list of slaves' names, the hand in the upper left corner representing the owner.

See also: Proto-cuneiform and Kish tablet Tablet with proto-cuneiform pictographic characters (end of 4th millennium BC), Uruk III. Until then, there had been no putting words on clay. Īn ancient Mesopotamian poem gives the first known story of the invention of writing:īecause the messenger's mouth was heavy and he couldn't repeat, the Lord of Kulaba patted some clay and put words on it, like a tablet. Writing is first recorded in Uruk, at the end of the 4th millennium BC, and soon after in various parts of the Near-East. The tokens were then progressively replaced by flat tablets, on which signs were recorded with a stylus. These tokens were initially impressed on the surface of round clay envelopes ( clay bullae) and then stored in them. In recent years a contrarian view has arisen on the tokens being the precursor of writing. Writing began after pottery was invented, during the Neolithic, when clay tokens were used to record specific amounts of livestock or commodities. Pre-cuneiform tags, with drawing of goat or sheep and number (probably '10'), Al-Hasakah, 3300–3100 BC, Uruk culture Table illustrating the progressive simplification of cuneiform signs from archaic (vertical) script to Assyrian 130,000 tablets), the Vorderasiatisches Museum Berlin, the Louvre, the Istanbul Archaeology Museums, the National Museum of Iraq, the Yale Babylonian Collection ( approx. The largest collections belong to the British Museum ( approx. An estimated half a million tablets are held in museums across the world, but comparatively few of these are published. The modern study of cuneiform belongs to the ambiguously named field of Assyriology, as the earliest excavations of cuneiform libraries – in the mid-19th century – were in the area of ancient Assyria. Ĭuneiform was rediscovered in modern times in the early 17th century with the publication of the trilingual Achaemenid royal inscriptions at Persepolis these were first deciphered in the early 19th century. The latest known cuneiform tablet dates to 75 AD. The Old Persian and Ugaritic alphabets feature cuneiform-style signs however, they are unrelated to the cuneiform logo-syllabary proper. The other languages with significant cuneiform corpora are Eblaite, Elamite, Hurrian, Luwian, and Urartian. Akkadian cuneiform was itself adapted to write the Hittite language in the early second millennium BC. Akkadian texts are attested from the 24th century BC onward and make up the bulk of the cuneiform record. Over the course of its history, cuneiform was adapted to write a number of languages in addition to Sumerian. Cuneiform is the earliest known writing system. Cuneiform was originally developed to write the Sumerian language of southern Mesopotamia (modern Iraq). It is named for the characteristic wedge-shaped impressions ( Latin: cuneus) which form its signs. The script was in active use from the early Bronze Age until the beginning of the Common Era. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of cuneiform script.Ĭuneiform is a logo- syllabic script that was used to write several languages of the Ancient Near East.

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