The earliest known writing system is thought to be Sumerian cuneiform, which grew up around the region of present-day Iraq, ...

A link exists between 6,000-year-old engravings on cylindrical seals used on clay tablets and cuneiform, the world’s oldest ...

Three researchers from the University of Bologna contributed to this longstanding debate in the latest issue of Antiquity, ...

The history of human writing is being rewritten after archaeologists found the origins of words engraved on 6,000-year-old ...

Making the jump from using symbols to writing is considered a major development in human cognitive abilities. Tracing how and ...

In the half-dark of a third-floor office, Danielle Levy lifted a clay tablet out of its box. Carefully examining it with ...

Scholars consider cuneiform the first writing system, and humans used its wedge-shaped characters to inscribe ancient languages such as Sumerian on clay tablets beginning around 3400 BC.

Researchers have uncovered links between the precursor to the world's oldest writing system and the mysterious, intricate ...

Before Mesopotamian people invented writing, they used cylinder seals to press patterns into wet clay – and some of the ...

Researchers investigating how the first writing arose identified the motifs on preliterate "cylinder seals" used in the trade of agricultural products and textiles.

By comparing early markings used for business purposes to 'proto' cuneiform, we can say language transitioned from symbols to writing.

Designs on stone cylinders dating back six thousand years correspond to some signs of the proto-cuneiform script that emerged in the city of Uruk, in southern Iraq, around 3350–3000 BCE. This ...