June 22, 2016

The Nature of Writing (video)

if language = 24 hours, writing = 11 or 10
pm
200 languages with literature
writing is derived

secondary expression language

real one is speaking

writing is not language

representation of language
3500 BC Iraq-Iran

cuneiform pressed into clay

first writing system

clay tokens
Susa in Iran

Shush
Susa is one of the most important cities of the
Ancient Near East. It is located in the lower
Zagros Mountains about 250 km (160 mi) east
of the Tigris River, between the Karkheh and
Dez Rivers.
early cuneiform

literal drawing of things

gradually, abstract
pictograph -> glyph form
pictographic -> ideographic
cuneiform: Sumerian

Sumerian = no known relatives

Akkadian (leading Semitic language)
Hittite

hieroglyphics

may have developed same time as

cuneiform
Coptic: language spoken in ancient Egypt
hieratic script

for everyday use

Rosetta stone 1799
Thomas Young

noticed cartouches
o names of Greek figures
o e.g. Ptolemy
Jean-Francois Champollion

e.g. Rameses
Phoenician

900 BC

invented their alphabet from

Egyptian hieratic script

no vowels
Phoenician -> Greek
e.g. Daleth -> Delta
Greek: real alphabet
Phoenician writing spread fast

easy to learn

Phoenicians traveled far

o to Ireland, Denmark
*major social repercussions

writing systems (video)

alphabetic

not intuitive to humans

logographic
In written language, a logogram or
logograph is a written character that
represents a word or phrase. Chinese
characters and Japanese kanji are logograms;
some Egyptian hieroglyphs and some
graphemes in Cuneiform script are also
logograms.
Turtle shells, oxen bone, etc.

oracle bone script

18th century BC -> 12th century BC

chinese: oldest writing system still in use
pictograms: 4% of the writing system
combine radicals

Arabic

systematic

relatively easy to understand

abjad

signs refer to consonants rather than

vowels
Al Arabiyya The Arab way
*even a syllabary can be difficult
Linear B
Heinrich Schliemann
Heinrich Schliemann had excavated Troy (or a
site compatible with Homers famous city) and
Mycenae and thereby opened the door to
Greek archaeology of the second millennium
BC

Sir Arthur Evans

British archaeologist Arthur Evans discovered
these inscribed tablets in large numbers at
Knossos in the year 1900

semantic radicals

common words

combined with phonetic

determinatives

remains of a greek civilization

Japanese writing system

one of the most complex

combines kanji with syllabaries

o indicated by syllable

hiragana: grammatical material

katakana: foreign words

Alice Kober

alphabet: 20-40 symbols

syllabary: 50-100 symbols

*Japanese: 60% of vocab originated from

Chinese
hangul: made by 1 person (King Sejong)

syllabic based

Mycenaean civilization

script: linear B

linear B: 90, therefore syllabary

Michael Ventris

there must be signs for just vowels

Philippine writing tradition (video)

Palawan and Mindoro
probably from Sanskrit

via Java, Brunei, Malacca

syllabic writing
different types
*writing material shaped it
Laguna Copperplate inscription

old Malay language

old Javanese script

900 AD (822 saka)

loan acquittance
Calatagan pot
Old tagalog text
Butuan paleograph
Buddhist roam around
Script from around the same time as
Laguna Copperplate
high degree of literacy of forefathers
Tagbanua

in Palawan

know and use baybayin

taught Palawan people

Mangyan

in Mindoro
Bansud
national treasure