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Yes, there must have been a long pre-history of writing proper, like, leaving marks on trees or soil as a guide, a warning, etc. But it takes a civilization to
by Koshkin 2y ago
Yes, there must have been a long pre-history of writing proper, like, leaving marks on trees or soil as a guide, a warning, etc. But it takes a civilization to start writing on a scale comparable to that of the Sumerians, and such a civilization cannot be lost to time so completely as to leave behind some evidence if its writing - especially given that they would likely use different media, including clay and stone.
- hosh 2y agoIt depends on the material. Incas uses knots for record keeping. Those are not as durable as burned clay. In our current global civilization with advanced computing tech, magnetic tapes, cdroms, and hard drives won't last very long. Maybe SSDs have greater durability, but they will also require computing tech to dicipher. I do not think the existence of surviving writing materials is a strong argument for evidence of civilization, and speaks more to the limitations of the technology.
- adastra22 2y agoLeaving marks on trees and such is not writing. It is not the transcription of spoken language. We have examples of this kind of symbol-placement on ancient cave art stretching far back into the ice age. It is not considered writing.
- shakna 2y agoWritten language is rarely just a transcription. It usually has a number of distinct differences in both lexicon and syntax. There are languages that are only written. Art is not writing, true. Distinct symbols and syntax are required for writing. But it need not be transcription of anything spoken.
- Koshkin 2y agoWell, hieroglyphs are not exactly a “transcription”, either…
- adastra22 2y agoThey are in the same way that Chinese is.
- Koshkin 2y agoYes - not exactly a transcription.
- adastra22 2y agoWritten chinese is a direct transcription of the spoken language. It is not (entirely) phonetic, but it is still a 1:1 transcription.
- Koshkin 2y agoWell, now imagine a mark on a boulder that means ‘danger’ (left there because, say, a tiger lives nearby). Same thing. (And it would not be unreasonable to suspect that that’s how writing began.)
- adastra22 2y agoWhich is not a transcription of language. Yes writing systems evolved from earlier symbols used to indicate general concepts without a linguistic context. And those symbols go far back into the ice age -- we see such symbols on the walls of cave paintings in Europe, for example. In the case of Sumer, we certainly know that the writing system derived from accounting symbols for livestock and grain and such. But going from simple context-free symbols to transcribing spoken language or thought with grammar and structure is a conceptual leap worth tracking.