Man Learns to Write: Early Writing Systems

Early Humans and Writing

• Hominid species timeline: Homo Habilis (over 2 million years ago), Homo Erectus (2 million years ago), showcasing evolution towards bipedalism.
• Cave paintings date back over 200,000 years, transitioning from Paleolithic to Neolithic era (35,000 BCE to 4000 BCE).
• Notable cave painting sites: Lascaux in southern France and Altamira in Spain, created with natural pigments.

Techniques and Materials

• Paints made from charcoal, iron oxide, manganese oxide, yellow ochre, and hematite mixed with animal fat for durability.
• Common themes in cave paintings include animals such as bison, horses, aurochs, and deer.
• These artworks served as communication tools rather than mere artistic expression, often linked to rituals or practical uses.

Early Communication Forms

• Petroglyphs: Rock carvings dating back 10,000 to 12,000 years, serving as ancient signs found from Africa to New Zealand.
• Pictograms: Form of writing that uses images or drawings to represent objects or concepts.
• Ideograms: Symbols that convey ideas, such as mathematical notations or Arabic numerals.
• Logograms: Graphical representations of words or morphemes, facilitating more complex forms of writing.

Rebus and Language Development

• Rebus: Visual wordplay using images to suggest phrases or parts of words, enhancing linguistic creativity.

Ancient Civilizations and Writing

• Writing in Mesopotamia was centered around the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.
• Egyptian writing involved secrecy among temple priests, codifying laws and standardizing measurements to support organized civilization.
• Greek writing evolved from the Phoenician alphabet, an abjad representing sounds and leading to simplified alphabetic systems.

Roman Influence on Writing

• Roman Serif theory suggests letters were adapted from chiseling techniques to clean up initial carving marks, aligning letters along an imaginary baseline for consistency.

Advantages of Alphabetic Systems

• Alphabetic systems provided easier access to knowledge compared to image-based systems, enabling communication of sound and context without ambiguity.

Chinese Writing Systems

• Early Chinese writing developed from simple nouns to complex expressions of feelings, actions, and colors.
• Unlike phonetic systems, Chinese characters symbolize ideas rather than sounds, with significant attention to writing styles.
• Different scripts in Chinese writing include Regular Script (artistic expression), Small Seal Script (precision and formality), and Clerical Script (efficiency in fast writing).

Artistic Aspects of Logograms

• Logograms offer contemplative artistic experiences through beautiful brush strokes, highlighting the cultural significance of Chinese calligraphy.