Researchers have uncovered links between the precursor to the world’s oldest writing system and the mysterious, intricate designs left behind by engraved cylindrical seals that were rolled across clay ...

The world's oldest known system of writing was influenced by symbols used for trade — engravings found on cylinders used in the exchange of farming produce and textiles, a new study suggests. The ...

Archaeologists say they have uncovered evidence of what may be the world's oldest known alphabet. The alphabetic writing system was identified on finger-length clay cylinders excavated from a tomb in ...

Cuneiform, the world's oldest form of writing, involved making indentations in clay tablets. Scientists have now developed a data storage system that's like cuneiform on steroids – and it's capable of ...

1. The Sumerian Account of the Invention of Writing -- 2. Time and Place of the Invention -- 3. Received Ideas: The Pictographic Origins of Cuneiform Writing -- 4. Received Ideas: The Origin of ...

Digital Clay: Cuneiform languages represent the earliest known writing systems in human history. The Sumerians used this method by making indentations in clay tablets, a practice later adopted by ...

More than 200 clay cuneiform tablets and 60 seals linked to the Ancient Mesopotamian government were discovered by archaeologists at the ancient Sumerian city Girsu or the present-day site Tello in ...

An Assyrian gypsum cuneiform dedicatory panel, reign of Tukulti-Ninurta I, circa 1243-1207 BC. Of rectangular form, finely engraved on both sides, with 280 lines of text divided into eight columns ...

Machine generated contents note: -- I. Materiality and literacies -- 1. Tablets as artefacts, scribes as artisans, Jonathan Taylor -- 2. Accounting in proto-cuneiform, Robert K. Englund -- 3. Numeracy ...

In a windowless office at UCLA’s Kinsey Hall, professor Robert Englund is translating clay markings into bytes, turning one of the oldest forms of communication into one of the newest. Englund and a ...