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HU 2910 Writing Systems Fall ‘10

HU 2910 Writing Systems Fall ‘10. K yrs ago (BCE). 15K Cave drawings as pictograms 4K Cuneiforms 3K Hieroglyphics 1.5 West Sumerian Syllabary of the Phoenicians 1 Ancient Greeks borrow the Ph’n consonant αβ .75 Etruscans borrow Greek αβ

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HU 2910 Writing Systems Fall ‘10

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  1. HU 2910 Writing Systems Fall ‘10

  2. K yrs ago (BCE) • 15K Cave drawings as pictograms • 4K Cuneiforms • 3K Hieroglyphics • 1.5 West Sumerian Syllabary of the Phoenicians • 1 Ancient Greeks borrow the Ph’n consonant αβ • .75 Etruscans borrow Greek αβ • .5 Romans adapt Etruscan-Greco αβto Latin

  3. Seeds of early writing systems • Petroglyphs- early drawings by humans: Altamira (Spain) • Approx 20 K yrs ago • Maybe aesthetic expressions rather than pictorial comm.

  4. Pictograms • Later drawings are clear pictograms

  5. Pictograms • Later drawings are clear pictograms • Unlike modern writing, each picture = a direct image

  6. Pictograms • Later drawings are clear pictograms • Unlike modern writing, each picture = a direct image • A ‘non-arbitrary’ relation b/w form & meaning

  7. Pictograms • Later drawings are clear pictograms • Unlike modern writing, each picture = a direct image • A ‘non-arbitrary’ relation b/w form & meaning • Viz. comic strips sans captions

  8. Pictograms • Later drawings are clear pictograms • Unlike modern writing, each picture = a direct image • A ‘non-arbitrary’ relation b/w form & meaning • Viz. comic strips sans captions • Reps objects directly rather than through linguistic names given to objects

  9. Pictograms • Later drawings are clear pictograms • Unlike modern writing, each picture = a direct image • A ‘non-arbitrary’ relation b/w form & meaning • Viz. comic strips sans captions • Reps objects directly rather than through linguistic names given to objects • They didn’t represent the words & sounds of spoken Lx

  10. Pictograms - universal • Found throughout the world, ancient & modern • Used as int’l road signs • Cf. US Park Service… • “English unnecessary”

  11. Pictograms - universal • Found throughout the world, ancient & modern • Used as int’l road signs • Cf. US Park Service… • “English unnecessary” …or irrelevant

  12. Acceptance extension • Once the representation became ‘standard’ its meaning got extended to attributes of the object or concepts associated with it

  13. Acceptance extension • Once the representation became ‘standard’ its meaning got extended to attributes of the object or concepts associated with it • Pictograms thus began to represent ideas (rather than objects)  ‘ideograms’

  14. Acceptance extension • Once the representation became ‘standard’ its meaning got extended to attributes of the object or concepts associated with it • Pictograms thus began to represent ideas (rather than objects)  ‘ideograms’ • Pict/Id – similar: • Pict: tend to be more literal • Id: less direct

  15. Acceptance extension • Once the representation became ‘standard’ its meaning got extended to attributes of that object or concepts associated with it • Pictograms thus began to represent ideas (rather than objects)  ‘ideograms’ • Pict/Id – similar: • Pict: tend to be more literal • Id: less direct • Cf. No Parking: ‘slanting red line over car’ vs. ‘towtruck removing car’

  16. Standardizing images • Picts/Ids became stylized & formulaic (‘standardizing’) – enabling literacy to expand.

  17. Standardizing images • Picts/Ids became stylized & formulaic (‘standardizing’) – enabling literacy to expand. • The literal reps got so simplified that they lost ‘universality’

  18. Standardizing images • Picts/Ids became stylized & formulaic (‘standardizing’) – enabling literacy to expand. • The literal reps got so simplified that they lost ‘universality’ • Requiring formal study of the system

  19. Standardizing images • Picts/Ids became stylized & formulaic (‘standardizing’) – enabling literacy to expand. • The literal reps got so simplified that they lost ‘universality’ • Requiring formal study of the system • As the ideogram came to stand for the sounds that rep’d the ideas, they became linguistic symbols…

  20. Standardizing images • Picts/Ids became stylized & formulaic (‘standardizing’) – enabling literacy to expand. • The literal reps got so simplified that they lost ‘universality’ • Requiring formal study of the system • As the ideogram came to stand for the sounds that rep’d the ideas, they became linguistic symbols…a revolutionary step

  21. Cuneiform Writing • Sumerians (6K yrs ago) built a civilization in southern Mesopotamia - "meso" < μέσος (middle) + "potamia" < ποταμός (river)

  22. Cuneiform Writing • Sumerians (6K yrs ago) built a civilization in southern Mesopotamia - "meso" < μέσος (middle) + "potamia" < ποταμός (river) • Their W.S. = the oldest one known

  23. Cuneiform Writing • Sumerians (6K yrs ago) built a civilization in southern Mesopotamia - "meso" < μέσος (middle) + "potamia" < ποταμός (river) • Their W.S. = the oldest one known • As commerce grew, so did a need for permanent records

  24. Cuneiform Writing • Sumerians (6K yrs ago) built a civilization in southern Mesopotamia - "meso" < μέσος (middle) + "potamia" < ποταμός (river) • Their W.S. = the oldest one known • As commerce grew, so did a need for permanent records • Elaborate Pict. & system of tallies developed

  25. Cuneiform Writing • Sumerians (6K yrs ago) built a civilization in southern Mesopotamia - "meso" < μέσος (middle) + "potamia" < ποταμός (river) • Their W.S. = the oldest one known • As commerce grew, so did a need for permanent records • Elaborate Pict. & system of tallies developed • They used a wedge-shaped stylus on soft clay tablets • Viz ‘cuneiform’

  26. Logographs • As cuneiform evolved, users started to think of the symbols in terms of the name of the thing being rep’d…

  27. Logographs • As cuneiform evolved, users started to think of the symbols in terms of the name of the thing being rep’d… and not the thing itself.

  28. Logographs • As cuneiform evolved, users started to think of the symbols in terms of the name of the thing being rep’d… and not the thing itself. • When a script begins to represent the words of a language (and not the thing itself), it’s called logographic …the oldest type of writing.

  29. Logographs • As cuneiform evolved, users started to think of the symbols in terms of the name of the thing being rep’d… and not the thing itself. • When a script begins to represent the words of a language (and not the thing itself), it’s called logographic …the oldest type of writing. • Here, the graph stands for both the word & the concept …which it still may resemble

  30. Logographs • As cuneiform evolved, users started to think of the symbols in terms of the name of the thing being rep’d… and not the thing itself. • When a script begins to represent the words of a language (and not the thing itself), it’s called logographic …the oldest type of writing. • Here, the graph stands for both the word & the concept …which it still may resemble • Logograms = ideograms + the word in the Lx for that concept

  31. Cuneiform Writing • This W.S. spread throughout the Middle East & Asia Minor. • Babylonians, Assyrians & Persian borrowed it

  32. Cuneiform Writing • This W.S. spread throughout the Middle East & Asia Minor. • Babylonians, Assyrians & Persian borrowed it • Often using the characters to represent the sounds of syllables in their own Lx.  cuneiform thus evolved into a syllabic W.S.

  33. Cuneiform Writing • This W.S. spread throughout the Middle East & Asia Minor. • Babylonians, Assyrians & Persian borrowed it • Often using the characters to represent the sounds of syllables in their own Lx.  cuneiform thus evolved into a syllabic W.S. • Syllabic W.S • Each syllable is rep’d by its own symbol • Words are written syllable-by-syllable

  34. Cuneiform as syllabic • Though had evolved a syllabic function, it retained many symbols that stood for whole words.

  35. Cuneiform as syllabic • Though had evolved a syllabic function, it retained many symbols that stood for whole words. • Assyrian could write ‘nation’ with one logogram or with syllabic letters. (Cf. modern Japanese)

  36. Cuneiform as syllabic • Though had evolved a syllabic function, it retained many symbols that stood for whole words. • Assyrian could write ‘nation’ with one logogram or with syllabic letters. (Cf. modern Japanese) • In the 6th c. BCE, under Darius, Persia had simplified the ‘alphabet’ (w/ little use of word symbols) …internal logic? (Cf. Hangul)

  37. The Rebus Principle • As a graph loses its visual relationship to the concept it represents, it becomes a phonographic symbol

  38. The Rebus Principle • As a graph loses its visual relationship to the concept it represents, it becomes a phonographic symbol • One graph can then represent all homophones (words with the same sound) • E.g. English? Japanese?

  39. The Rebus Principle • As a graph loses its visual relationship to the concept it represents, it becomes a phonographic symbol • One graph can then represent all homophones (words with the same sound) • E.g. English? Japanese? • A representation of words by pictures of objects whose names sound like the word = a rebus

  40. From Hieroglyphics to the αβ • Circa 4K BCE, as Sumerian pictography thrived, Egypt was using a similar system of their own.

  41. From Hieroglyphics to the αβ • Circa 4K BCE, as Sumerian pictography thrived, Egypt was using a similar system of their own. • H’glyphs (pictograms) came to rep. a concept & the word for said concept …viz. ‘logographic’

  42. From Hieroglyphics to the αβ • Circa 4K BCE, as Sumerian pictography thrived, Egypt was using a similar system of their own. • H’glyphs (pictograms) came to rep. a concept & the word for said concept …viz. ‘logographic’ • Phoenicians (NB a Semitic Lx) lived north of Egypt & west of Sumeria and were likely influenced by both of them. • Circa 1500 BCE – they develop an abjad: • Cs not Vs

  43. From Hieroglyphics to the αβ • Circa 4K BCE, as Sumerian pictography thrived, Egypt was using a similar system of their own. • H’glyphs (pictograms) came to rep. a concept & the word for said concept …viz. ‘logographic’ • Phoenicians (NB a Semitic Lx) lived north of Egypt & west of Sumeria and were likely influenced by both of them. • Circa 1500 BCE – they develop an abjad: • Cs not Vs • Greeks tried to borrow Ph. W.S. but Vs were a problem.

  44. Phoenicia to Greece • In Semitic Lx like Phoenician, vowels can be determined by grammatical context – Greek (like English) is different

  45. Phoenicia to Greece • In Semitic Lx like Phoenician, vowels can be determined by grammatical context – Greek (like English) is different • Phoenician had more consonants than Greek, so they were used as vowels.

  46. Phoenicia to Greece • In Semitic Lx like Phoenician, vowels can be determined by grammatical context – Greek (like English) is different • Phoenician had more consonants than Greek, so they were used as vowels. • Alphabet ‘not invented’ – ‘discovered’ • We brought our intuitive knowledge of the Lx sound system to consciousness: we discovered what we already knew

  47. K yrs ago (BCE) • 15K Cave drawings as pictograms • 4K Cuneiforms • 3K Hieroglyphics • 1.5 West Sumerian Syllabary of the Phoenicians • 1 Ancient Greeks borrow the Ph’n consonant αβ • .75 Etruscans borrow Greek αβ • .5 Romans adapt Etruscan-Greco αβto Latin

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