Unit 1: History of Writing

Pictogram

• Cave drawings exist that are over 20,000 years old These drawings depict portrayals of life at the time (hunting, animals, etc) 

• Each picture is a direct reproduction of what it represents (they are non-arbitrary) 

Ideograms

• Idea pictures" or "idea writing" 

• Type of pictogram that represented ideas rather than actual objects 

• Used symbols 

Cuneiforms

• Used by the Sumerians, over 5000 years ago (modern Iraq, Israel) 

• Written onto/into clay tablets, using wedge shaped pictures 

• Pictures represented a single word ,therefore became a word-writing system

Hieroglyphics

• "Sacred carvings"

• Used by Egyptians at the same time as the Sumerians

• Pictography that represented a single word

Alphabet

• Derived from "alpha" and "beta", the first letters of the Greek alphabet 

• Created and used by the ancient Greeks 

• Symbol represents one sound unit