Mesopotamia - The Birth of Writing

Ancient Sumerians Invented Cuneiform, the First Langauge

Oct 1, 2009

Pictorial symbols, used for religious purposes, would become phonetic characters out of necessity for something simpler, leading to the first written language, and epic

The previous article talked about some of Sumer’s greatest contributions to world civilization - namely the wheel, pottery, and metallurgy. However, the greatest gift the Sumerians would give to the world would be writing, without which modern society would not be able to function, and the second greatest gift from the Sumerians, written law, would not be possible.

In addition, the first ever written warrior epic, The Epic of Gilgamesh, still considered a great classic of antiquity, would be born in the time period when writing began to take hold in mainstream society.

An important thing to note is that from here on, the word “Sumer” or “Sumerian” will be used to refer to the area known as “Mesopotamia.” As mentioned here, Sumer refers to the southern half of Mesopotamia, which encompassed many city-states.

The First Writing

As Sumerian society became more advanced, the need to keep accurate records became more and more crucial. In the beginning, tiny clay tokens were used to represent certain objects, and the size of the tokens would often represent a quantity. It was not precise, but it gave a general idea of amount where commerce was concerned. These tokens would often be included as bills of lading with shipments of goods.

The first ever instances of writing involved records by the temple, written on clay tablets, which pictorially depicted donations. Over time, administrators began to use these pictorial glyphs for their own purposes, specifically for bookkeeping purposes. The city-state of Uruk had at least 2,000 different characters in use to represent different things, leading to much difficulty when translating and recording. Although this would be the first incarnation of the Sumerian language, it would change, as something more specific was needed.

Cuneiform

Slowly, the pictorial system began to change to a more phonetic system of writing, one where a single mark was equal to a sound, and a combination of marks would equal a word, a word which happened to correspond to a word in their spoken language used to describe something. They now had the ability to create a written representation in their language of regular items used in trade, or donated to temple. As a result, the 2,000 pictorial symbols were condensed into around 600 phonetic symbols, making life much easier for the Sumerian bean counters.

As mentioned, the Sumerians used clay tablets for their writing, and rapidly discovered that scratching the surfaces of the tablets with the stems of a reed, which had a wedged “V” shape, allowed them to write neatly and legibly, thus cuneiform, or “wedge-shaped” writing, was born. Like Western scripts, it was read and written from left-to-right. In addition, it proved to be very adaptable, as people all over the Middle East would use it.

Despite this great innovation, it took many years of schooling and practice to master writing and reading cuneiform, so mainstream society was largely unable to read or write it. However, this did not stop it from being used to produce hymns, stories, as well as be used in business dealings. The greatest aesthetic benefit derived from cuneiform was the creation of the first work of literature.

The Epic of Gilgamesh

The Iliad, attributed to Homer, was written around 1000 BC – The Epic of Gilgamesh was already an ancient work by that period of time, written between 2000 BC and 1500 BC as a collection of oral stories put to writing, much like The Iliad. The epic was not written in the native language of Sumerian, but in Akkadian (or Babylonian), a Semitic language that became more mainstream around 1800 BC in Sumer as time passed, thus allowing this epic to gain a wider audience.

The story is about a king of Uruk named Gilgamesh, who was a bit of a tyrant, particularly when it came to virgin girls, whom he enjoyed de-flowering with impunity. The people of Uruk complained to the gods, who created a man named Enkidu, a wild-man that lived in the wilderness, and could commune with animals. Enkidu was created to kill Giglamesh.

When Gilgamesh learned of Enkidu, he sent a prostitute to seduce the man. After a night of passion with the woman, Enkidu lost his ability to speak with animals, and thus became drawn to civilization. Thus, he came to Uruk and challenged Gilgamesh to a wrestling match, which ended in a draw. The two men became fast-friends, almost like brothers, out of mutual respect for each other’s skills.

Together, they slew the Guardian of the Forest, the vile giant Huwawa, in addition to the Bull of Heaven, sent by the god Anu to terrorize Uruk after Gilgamesh refused the advances of Anu’s daughter, Ishtar.

Eventually, the gods conspired and killed off Enkidu, thus sending a grief-stricken Gilgamesh on a quest to obtain immortality. This quest led him to Utnapishtim, an immortal man himself, who many believe was the biblical Noah who built the Ark. Utnapishtum told Gilgamesh that he should stay awake for seven days and seven nights if he wanted to be immortal, but Gilgamesh failed that test. Afterward, Utnapishtum told him to find a rare plant on the bottom of the ocean. Gilgamesh found the plant, but a serpent stole it.

Frustrated, Gilgamesh accepted that death was inevitable, and instead erected a monument in his honor, knowing that was the only sure way to immortality.

Hitti, Philip K. The Near East In History. Canada: D. Van Nostrand Company (Canada), Ltd., 1961

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