Yes, however Sumer were unique in hitting upon the idea of glyphs representing sounds, rather than ideograms, which seem to develop fairly frequently and indepe

Yes, however Sumer were unique in hitting upon the idea of glyphs representing sounds, rather than ideograms, which seem to develop fairly frequently and independently. It did take the better part of 1500 years for them to make that breakthrough, but the result was enormous, and allowed the storage and transmission of information with much greater efficiency and nuance.