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Appendix
276
36.0
32.0
28.0
24.0
28.0
32.0
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Th
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Ale
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Ro
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36.0
40.0
44.0
Ara
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48.0
52.0
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North latitude
Fig
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A.3
Th
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Appendix
277
55.0
45.0
35.0
25.0
15.0
70.0
90.0
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North latitude
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Appendix
278
38.0
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26.0
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Fig
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Appendix
279
46.0
42.0
38.0
34.0
30.0
6.0
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Car
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18.0
22.0
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26.0
30.0
North latitude
Ph
aist
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Fig
ure
A.6
Th
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reek
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Appendix
280
30.0
20.0
10.0 0.0
–10.
0 65.0
75.0
85.0
Sri
Lan
ka
Gu
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Fig
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almanac from Babylon describing the positions of the planetsfor AD 74–5.
Cuneiform continues to enrich us even now: in 1975, overfifteen thousand cuneiform tablets were discovered at Ebla(Syria) which once comprised the official library that had burntaround the year 2300 BC. It will take scholars at least a centuryto read and assess this enormous wealth of information. In usefor about three thousand years – the same length of time thatour complete alphabet has been known – cuneiform is todayappreciated as one of humankind’s premier scripts.
proto-elamite
Perhaps a derivative of an older script that also inspired IndusValley writing, the partly pictographic Proto-Elamite script of c.3000 BC, still undeciphered, was impressed on soft clay to
t a l k i n g a rt . 57
35 Inscription from the palace of Persepolis, c. 500 BC, in Old Persian cuneiform:
‘Darius, the great King, the King of Kings, the King of the countries, son of
Hystaspes, the Achæmenid, who built this palace’. Below the transcription (with
numbers added) are edited transliterations.
Cuneiform: Forgotten Legacy
30
(a) Old Persian
(b) Elamite
(c) Babylonian Akkadian
Figure 2.3 The first sentence of Darius the Great’s trilingual cuneiform
inscription at Behistun in (a) Old Persian, (b) Elamite, and (c) Babylonian
Akkadian. Note that the Old Persian, being partly alphabetic, is the longest,
while the Babylonian version, being logosyllabic, contains more complex
signs. The sentence reads, “I am Darius, the great king, the king of kings,
the king of Persia, the king of the provinces, the son of Hystaspes, the
grandson of Arsams, the Achaemenian.” The Babylonian version is more
succinct than the other two (and, where in brackets, partly restored
through comparison with other inscriptions). For those interested in trying
their hand at decipherment, the first words of the Old Persian can be
transliterated as a-da-m da-a-ra-ja-va-u-S x-Sa-a-ja-T-i-ja va-z-ra-ka (I, Darius,
great king), with signs belonging to the same word separated by hyphens.
The lone angular sign with which the sentence begins is a word divider.
Egyptian Hieroglyphs
40
Symbol Transliteration IPA Object depicted
[ ?] vulture
y or Q [j] or [i] reed leaf
ory [j] (usually
word–final)double reed leaf or archaicdual sign
‘ [¿] forearm
or w [w] or [u] quail chick or curl of rope
b [b] foot
p [p] stool
f horned viper
m owl
n
[f]
[m]
[n] water
r [r], later also [l] mouth
h
q
S
[h] enclosure
[Ó] rope
[x] placenta (?)
" [C] belly and udder
s [s], originally [z] door bolt
s [s]
[S]
bolt of cloth
s pool
q [q] hill
k [k] basket with handle
or g [ g] jar stand or bag
t [t] loaf of bread
† [tS ] tether
d [d] hand
∂ [d Z] snake
Figure 3.2 Egyptian uniconsonantal signs, the so-called hieroglyphic
alphabet, in rightward-facing orientation. The order is modern convention;
the ancient order is not fully known.
Egyptian Hieroglyphs
38
Some biconsonantal signs
qr wn wr pr
mn mw mt ms
z nb sw ∂d
w
(also used for o inforeign names)
rw
(also used for l inforeign names)
k b
Some triconsonantal signs
nfr ‘nS ∂‘m w s
bw n†r Spr bQt
tyw qtm qtp Qwn
n∂m rwd/rw∂ ‘ q‘ Srw
Some determinatives
woman man enemy, foreigner mummy, likeness
]
]
king, god
or
queen, goddess eye, seeing walk, run
fish horse tree house, building
pyramid desert, foreigncountry
sun, light, time book, writing,abstract concept
Figure 3.1 Some of the biconsonantal signs, triconsonantal signs, and
determinatives used in Egyptian hieroglyphs. For the phonetic values of
the transcriptions, see figure 3.2. The signs could face either rightward or
leftward, depending on the direction in which they were intended to be
read. Rightward-facing was the ordinary direction, but leftward-facing
texts were made in the interests of artistic harmony. Hieroglyphs embedded
within the text of this book therefore face leftward, while those in this chart
face rightward.
the vocalic values of ancient Egyptian words are generallyunknown. Some values have, however, been retrieved througheducated guesswork in light of contemporaneous cuneiformand other scripts conveying ancient Egyptian proper names.)One reads hieroglyphs either from right to left or from left toright; some texts follow from top to bottom (illus. 22). Signsalways ‘face’ the start position of each line: if one should readfrom right to left, then the bird’s beak, for example, is facingright. Right-to-left reading was the ‘default’ reading direction,if there was no clear reason to choose otherwise – ease of read-ing, royal respect (demanding transposition of certain royalsigns), artistic symmetry and so forth. Once formalized in suchways, a process that apparently occurred between c. 3500 and2500 BC, hieroglyphs remained little changed for thousands ofyears (illus. 23). Most writing in northern Africa and the MiddleEast has maintained a right-to-left reading direction ever since.
The individual hieroglyphs were taken or elaborated fromthe inventory of traditional Egyptian art.8 (This tendency toborrow only the idea and/or restricted functions of writing,while expressing one’s own language through indigenous signs,
t a l k i n g a rt . 41
22 Reading Egyptian hieroglyphs: ‘the Maat of Re is strong, one chosen for Re’,
one possible translation of the prænomen, or throne name, of Ramesses II on an
inlaid tile, c. 1250 BC.
Wsr-m3‘.t-R‘-stp-n-R‘(User-maatre-setepenre)
Moved forward to show respect, the sun is the
logogram for the god Re.
Kneeling figure is the logogram for Maat,
goddess of justice.
The jackal head is the tri-consonantal sign wsr,
also reproducing the words be strong.
God Re is again moved forward in the second
part of the image.
Adze on a block of wood is the tri-consonantal
sign stp, also reproducing the word chosen.
Water is the uni-consonantal sign n.
24 Selected signs of the three Egyptian scripts and their development.
25 The beauty of Egyptian
hieroglyphs: detail of the
‘reconstructed’ portico of
Isis’ Temple at Philæ.
HIEROGLYPHIC
2800
2600
1900
c.1500
500–1
00
c.1500
1900
1300
c.200
400–1
00
BOOK SCRIPT HIERATIC DEMOTIC
with sound superseding iconicity entirely. (This did not happenwith Egyptian hieroglyphs.) The most important type of writ-ing of the ancient Near East, cuneiform actually constitutes onescript used by different writing systems. (In contrast, Egyptianis one writing system used by three related scripts.) The world’sfirst complete writing, as we have seen, arose in Sumer as aresponse to economic needs. This response became an effectivetool wielded by a bureaucratic hierarchy administering goods,services and social privilege.13 As a result of the dynamism ofMesopotamian merchants, and of the imperialistic regimes thetool served and empowered, cuneiform writing prevailed in theregion for many thousands of years.14
Proto-cuneiform writing, that of the tablets of Uruk andJemdet Nasr, hardly differed from pictographic book-keeping
48 . a h i s t o ry o f w r i t i n g
28 Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs live on, in transmuted fashion, in our own
alphabet.
Egyptian Proto-Sinaitic
Phoenician EarlyGreek
Greek Latin
A
B
G
E
K
M
N
O
R
T
S
61 Stages of the earliest Hebrew alphabet.
Gezer Monumental Cursive Book hand SamaritanCoinscript
ModernHebrew
The Semitic Alphabet: Egypt to Manchuria
154
AramaicSyriac
(Estrangelo)Nabataean Hebrew Transliteration
Modern Hebrew
pronunciation
’ [ ?] or silent
b [b, v]
g [ g]
d [d]
h [h]
w [v]
z [z]
q [x]
w [t]
y [j]
k [k, x]
l [l]
m [m]
n [n]
s [s]
‘ [? ] or silent
p [p, f]
v [ts]
q [k]
r [ ‰]
s [s, S]
t [t]
Figure 9.2 The Aramaic alphabet and three of its descendants, Estrangelo
Syriac, Nabataean, and the Square Hebrew or Jewish script that is used for
Hebrew today. As in most Aramaic descendants, the letters have variant
forms according to where they occur in a word. The variants are shown
only for Hebrew, in which the one on the left is used in word-final position
(all these alphabets read from right to left). At right are the standard
transliteration and the modern pronunciation of the letters in standard
Israeli Hebrew.
elaborated diacritics indicating other vowels, is in many waysvocalically more precise than most modern Latin alphabets.34 Iteven maintains the graphic distinction, lost in modern spokenHebrew, between long and short vowels. (British English dis-plays vowel length only by default, as in ‘cot’ versus ‘cart’.) TheHebrew script is thus archaic, with many redundancies. As anexample, /i/ can be written either as consonant jodh or as a dotunder the preceding consonant; some writers do both. In every-day use, as with Arabic, the Hebrew script is two scripts in one:one highly marked, showing each vowel; the other highlyreduced, leaving vowel identification to context alone.35 Today,Hebrew remains heavily dominated by consonants which, as inall Semitic scripts, constitute the very foundation of writing.
The Nabatæn Arabs used the Aramaic language as a specialcultural second tongue. They also wrote in the Aramaic scriptbetween the first century BC and third centuries AD (illus. 64).The Nabatæns were a gathering of nomadic Arab tribes livingin a region stretching from the Sinai Peninsula to northernArabia and eastern Jordan. In the Hellenistic era followingAlexander the Great’s conquests, they formed a kingdom thatlasted from around 150 BC until conquest by the Romans in 105
AD; their capital was the peerless rock city of Petra. TheirNabatæn form of Aramaic writing became the immediateparent of Arabic writing.
Like Hebrew, Arabic is an important religious script whosesignificance, longevity and expansion are owed to its veneration
98 . a h i s t o ry o f w r i t i n g
63 Genesis 1:1, 2 in the modern Square Hebrew script using the ‘Tiberias
System’ of diacritics: ‘[1] In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
[2] And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of
the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.’
The Semitic Alphabet: Egypt to Manchuria
Some letters, in contrast to the norm, must not be joined to the
following one: the letter ?alif, ª, if joined to a following letter would
look just like the connected version of the letter la:m, ‚. In ÅÇ, al-
kitaab, “the book,” for example, the first (rightmost!) letter is an ?alif,
which does not connect forward, while the next is a la:m. ?alif does join
to a preceding letter, however, and the sequence la:m–?alif is written
with a special ligature, ±.
Another part of the writing system that needed to be addressed
was the writing of vowels. Arabic has six vowels, three of which are
164
Name in IPA Arabic name Final Medial Initial Independent
s:;<=>?~~ÄÅ@_`abcdefghijklëm
ª%&'()*“6‘’+,öö-./01234567Ê8
ªÀÕŒœ–—“6‘’÷◊ÿŸ-.‹›fl‡·‚„‰ÓÊË
?alifba:?ta:?Ta:?dZi:mÓa:?Xa:?da:lDa:lrA:?za:jsi:nSi:n|A:d\A:d[A:?]A:?¿Ajn‰Ajnfa:?qA:fka:fla:mmi:mnu:nha:?wa:wja:?
stvwx|~~ÄÅÇÉ
ÖbcàâäãåçéèêëË
Figure 9.4 The Arabic alphabet with, from right to left, the independent,
initial, medial, and final forms of each letter, plus the letter’s name in Arabic
and its pronunciation in IPA. As compared to the original Aramaic prototype,
Arabic has reordered its letters, putting similarly shaped letters together.
70 Ethiopic script: To consonants already possessing a short /a/ value, regular
series of marks in respective positions are attached to signal other vowels, thus
forming a complete alphabet.
+ a + u- + ı- + a- + e-
+e orwithoutvowel + o-
h
l
h.
m
s
r
s
q
b
t
h.
n
’
k
w
‘
z
j
d
g
t.
p.
s.
d.
f
p
150
Ugaritic Phoenician AramaicHebrew/
Moabite Name
Probable
phonetic value
’alef [?] [ ?a] (Ugaritic)
bet [b]
gimel [ g]
[x]
dalet [d]
he [h]
waw [w]
zayin [z]
qet [Ó]
wet [t¿ ]
yod [j]
kaf [k]
[S]
lamed [l]
mem [m]
[D]
nun [n]
[D¿ ]
samek [s]
‘ayin [¿ ]
pe [p]
vade [s¿ ]
qof [q]
res [r]
[T]
[T]/[S]
[ƒ]
Tan/san/sin
taw [t]
[ ?i]
[ ?u]
[Ç] ?
Figure 9.1 Ancient alphabets. At left, the Ugaritic cuneiform alphabet, with
the original set of 27 consonantal letters plus a three-letter appendix. Next,
the Phoenician 22-letter alphabet and its virtually identical daughter scripts,
early Aramaic and Old Hebrew (as used also for Moabite). Ugaritic was
read from left to right, the others from right to left.
Aramaic
original
Uighur
letter
Phonetic
value
Mongolian
letter
Phonetic
value
Manchu
letter
Phonetic
value
[e] [a] [a]
[a/e] [e] [e]
[w/v] [i] [i]
[γ] [o/u] [o]
[o/u] [Ø/y] [u]
[ö/ü] [u] (after [q, γ, X])
[z] [n] [n]
[ Z] [q] [è]
[x] [γ] [q]
[q] [b] [k]
[j] [s] [γ]
[k/g] [S] [g]
[d] [t/d] [k] (in loanwords)
[m] [d/t] [ g] (in loanwords)
[n] [l] [X]
[p] [m] [x]
[tS ] [t S] [b]
[r] [dZ ] [p]
[s] [j] [s]
[ S] [k/g] [s]
[t] [r] [t] (before [a, o])
[l] [w/v] [d] (before [a, o])
[h] [t] (before [e, u])
[p] [d] (before [e, u])
[f] [l]
[m]
[tS ]
[dZ ]
[j]
[r]
[f]
[w/f]
Figure 9.3 Three Altaic descendants of the Aramaic alphabet. Uighur,
which follows Aramaic alphabetical order, is shown next to the original
Aramaic prototypes. Initial (left) and final (right) forms only are given here,
omitting medial forms, except in a few cases where only medial forms exist.
Altaic scripts are read from top to bottom.
Linear B: The Clerks of Agamemnon
were the same, this identified the t- row and the -i column. The third
syllable of the proposed a-mi-ni-so, 6, should be in the -i column and
the n- row. It was. The second syllable, 4, should also be in the -i
column, and indeed it was. This suggested an identification of the
106
Basic
syllabary
a0 0
\
[
9
D
O
S
W
Z
]
d
g
j
o
7
r
h
k
m
p
i
l
n
q
&
t
u v
z
8
w
5
x
6
s
y
9
8
5
3
7
A
E
P
A
X
[
a
e
L
I
4
B
F
Q
ê
C
E
b
M
6
1
5
2
3
G
R
B
D
F
c
f
9
7
2
6
8
C
H
V
Y
\
N
J
e i o u
da de di do du
ja je jo ju
k = [k], [kh ],or [ g]
ka ke ki ko ku
ma me mi mo mu
na ne ni no nu
p = [p], [ph ],or [b]
pa pe pi po pu
q = [kw],[k hw], [gw ]
qa qe qi qo
r = [r] or [l] ra re ri ro
1
ru
sa se si so su
t = [t] or [t h] ta te ti to tu
wa we wi wo
z = [dz] or [ts] za ze zo
Optional
symbols
a2 (= ha) a3 (= ai) au
dwe dwo nwa
pa3? pu pte
ra2 ra3 ro2
swa? swi?
ta2 two
Unidentified
symbols
Figure 6.2 The Linear B syllabary. At the top are the signs of the basic
syllabary. Also listed are optional symbols that seem to have been used
occasionally to avoid certain ambiguities in spelling. At the bottom are
symbols which occur so rarely that their value has not yet been established.
Greek Serendipity
211
Phoenician Name
’alef [a], [a:]
Archaic Greek Pronunciation Later Greek Name
bet
gimel
dalet
he
waw
zayin
qet
wet
yod
kaf
lamed
mem
[b]
[g] Γ
[d] ∆
[ε(:)]
[w]
[dz], then [zd]
[h], then [ε:]
[th]
[i], [i:]
[k]
[l]
nun [n]
‘ayin
samek
pe
[m]
[O(:)]
[ks]
[p]
vade
qof
res
san/sin
taw
[s]
[k]
(obsolete)
(obsolete)
[r], [r˚]
[s]
[t]
[u], [u:], then [y]
[ph]
[kh]
[ps]
[O:]
A
B
γ
δ
E
(obsolete)
Z
H
Θ
I
K
Λ
N
M
O
Ξ
Π
P
Σ
T
Y
Φ
X
Ψ
Ω
α
β
ε
ζ
η
θ
ι
κ
λ
ν
µ
ο
ξ
π
ρ
σ, ς
τ
υ
ϕ
χ
ψ
ω
alpha
beta
gamma
delta
ei (e psilon)
wau (digamma)
zeta
heta/eta
theta
iota
kappa
labda (lambda)
nu
mu
ou (o mikron)
xei (xi)
pei (pi)
san
qoppa
rho
sigma
tau
hu (u psilon)
phei (phi)
khei (chi)
psei (psi)
o (o mega)
Figure 12.1 The derivation of the Greek alphabet from the Phoenician. The
early Greek alphabet varied in the direction of writing and in the forms of
its letters, as shown. The pronunciation of Modern Greek is rather different
from what is shown here.
94 The Phoenician consonantal alphabet’s borrowing into Greek, each letter
represented by only one of several possible variants.
Phoeniciac. 1000–900 bc
Cretec. 750 bc
Athensc. 700 bc
Ioniac. 400 bc name / value /
’a-lep/ ? /
be-t/b/
gı-mel/g/
da-let/d/
he-/h/
wa-w/w/
zayin/a/
h. e-t/h/
t.e-t/t. /
yo-d/j/
ka-p/k/
la-med/l/
me-m/m/
nu- n/n/
s.a-mek/s./
‘ayin/ /
pe-/p/
ça-de-/sA/
qo-p/kA/
re-s/r/
sı-n/s, s/
ta-w/t/
alpha/a,a-/
be-ta/b/
gamma/g/
delta/d/
epsilon/e/
(digamma/w/)
ze-ta/z/
e-ta/æ- /
the-ta/th/
io-ta/i, ı-/
kappa/k/
lambda/l/
mu/m/
nu/n/
xi/ks/
omikron/o/
pi/p/
(san/s/)
(qoppa/k/)
rho-/r/
sigma/s/
tau/t/
upsilon/y, y-/
phi/ph/
chi/kh
psi/ps/
o-mega/ -/
104 Euboean Greek’s borrowing into Etruscan, with Latin derivatives.
Euboeanc. 700 bc
Etruscanc. 600 bc
Early Latinc. 500 bc
Latinc. 100 bc
A
B
C
D
E
F
G (< C)
Z ( )
H
[none]
I
K
L
M
N
[none]
O
P
[none]
Q
R
S
T
U, V
X
Y (< )
[none]
[none]
[none]
Z
the-ta
(< )
th [none]
[none]
[none]
[none]
[none]
[none]
xi
sh
ph
(>x)
f
The Age of Latin
230
( )
( )
( )
[a]
Archaic GreekEtruscan model
alphabet
Inscriptional
EtruscanRoman
[k]
[e]
[w]
[ts]
[h]
[th]
[i]
[k]
[l]
[m]
[n]
[p]
[k]
[r]
[s]
[t]
[u]
[s] ?
[ph]
[kh]
[f]
[S](?)
A
B
C
D
E
F
G
H
I J
K
L
M
N
O
P
Q
R
S
T
V
X
Y
Z
UW
Figure 13.1 The Etruscan and Roman alphabets, as descended from the
archaic Greek alphabet. The Etruscans learned the whole alphabet and
copied it out (second column), but in inscriptions eliminated some of
the letters (third column). The original Roman alphabet is on the left
in the right-hand column, with later additions to the right. Sources
of the additions are shown with arrows.
Greek Serendipity
St. Cyril was devoted to the cause of vernacularism, pitting himself
against the “Trilingualists,” who believed that only Hebrew, Greek,
and Latin could be used to worship God. Cyril’s alphabet and his
translations served to bring the Christian faith to the Slavic people
227
Greek Gothic Cyrillic (Modern Russian)
Letter Letter Phoneticvalue
Letter
AB
Γ
∆
E
ZH
Θ
IKΛ
MNΞ
OΠ
PΣ
TY
Φ
XΨ
Ω
AB
BΓ
D
E?
Z
I
J
K
L
M
N
O
P
R
S
T
U
F
X
ab
B
g
d
e/
z
i
j
k
l
m
n
o
p
r
s
t
u
f
x
êë
ñ<
î‰Ìó
ÈòöõúùôËüÂÊÁÍïíÎû
[a], [a:][b]
[g]
[d], [D]
[e], [e:][kw][z][h]
[T][i], [i:]
[k][l]
[m][n][j]
[u], [u:][p][r][s][t]
[w], [y]
[f][kh][∑]
[o], [o:]
[a][b][v][g][d]
[(j)E][Z][z][i][j]
[k][l]
[m][n]
[O][p][r][s][t][u][f][x]
C
H
W
Q
Æ
Y
"
:
c
h
w
q
æ
y
'
;
]
[
[ts][tSj][S]
[SjtSj](absence of
palatalization)[é]
(palatalization)[E]
[(j)u][(j)a]
Phoneticvalue
Letter Phoneticvalue
Figure 12.2 Two of the descendants of the Greek alphabet, Gothic and
Cyrillic. Cyrillic has added letters to the end of the alphabet so as to adapt
to the Slavic languages. The Gothic alphabet predates the development of
minuscules, so the Gothic letters have only one form each. Cyrillic uses
minuscules, but they are less different from the capitals than those of the
Greek or Roman alphabet.
The Age of Latin
eleventh century; if anyone was still using the futhorc at the time of
the Norman invasion of 1066, no one did so afterward.
Although runic literacy may never have been high, the Anglo-
Saxons knew that their language could be written down. They also
knew enough not to regard the 23 letters of the Roman alphabet
as immutable (clearly, they were barbarians!). Their language, known
today as Old English or Anglo-Saxon, had a different set of phonemes
than Latin. (They themselves called their language Englisc, pronounced
244
Ogham
b l f n n h d t c q
g p z r
4 3 5 1
0 1 2 3 4
: < = ? g w C n i
Y p z t b e m l F
d > a G B Z H
m
2
f
D
o
[b] [kw]/[k]
[m] [i][e][u][o][r][z]/[st][gw]/[è][g] [a]
[f] [i][n][h][w][k]/[T][o][θ]/[D][u] [g]/[j]
[j] [è][l][m][e][t][ks][p][i]/[C] [b]
[œ] [k][k][ea][æ]
r
E A
;
[r]
[s]
[y][a][d] [g]
[k][t][d][n][s][w]/[f][l] [h]
[k]/[e] appendix: inconsistent vocalic values
Anglo-Saxon runes
Figure 13.2 Non-Roman scripts of the British Isles. Above, the Ogham
alphabet, used to write Old Irish. An appendix was added to the list of
symbols in medieval times, but the values assigned to these vowel letters
were not consistent from one manuscript to the next. Below, the Anglo-
Saxon runic futhorc, derived from the common Germanic futhark, and
named after the first six runes in the alphabetical list. The runic alphabet
was the source of some letters used to write Old English in the Roman
alphabet: the thorn, <, and the wynn, >, as well as the name of =, ash, applied
to æ. Both of these scripts were probably inspired by the Roman alphabet,
but their users felt no obligation to preserve Roman alphabetical order or
(especially for Ogham) letter shapes.
77 Hindi.
78 Gurmukhi.
80 Assamese.
81 Manipuri.
82 Maithili.
79 Bengali.
rated its own script based on the Bengali script (illus. 83). TheGujarati (illus. 84) and Kaithi scripts (illus. 85), conveyingGujarati and Bihari, are closely related to the Bengali script;however, Devanagari is now used to write Bihari instead.
Sarada was another Gupta daughter that yielded the Takriscript. In turn, this generated the Kashmiri script of Kashmir.
A further Gupta daughter, Pali script, was parent to the manyscripts (Siamese or Old Thai, Burmese, Kavi, Sinhalese andothers) that were specifically elaborated for writing Prakrit lan-guages – any one of the vernaculars of northern and centralIndia, arising from or connected with Sanskrit – involved withBuddhism. As Buddhism expanded, so did the many Pali scripts.There are no Pali scripts in India today. The several that surviveare to be found in the Buddhist countries of Central and South-East Asia, as well as in the Indonesian islands, where they haveprovided a model for many new scripts. The Siamese or OldThai script uniquely developed a method for indicating phone-mic tone.50 Because the Thai language changed after writing’s
114 . a h i s t o ry o f w r i t i n g
85 Kaithi.
84 Gujarati.
83 Oriya.
and the Maldives, is based on Pali conventions but is also heavilyinfluenced by the Malayalam script of Southern Indian (illus.87).
Another important Northern Indian member perhapsderived directly from Gupta – and thus a sister script to Nagari,Sarada and Pali – is Tibetan (illus. 88).52 However, the Tibetanlanguage wears this foreign Indo-Aryan script most uncomfort-ably. The script retains the Indic consonantal alphabet with dia-critic attachments to indicate vowels – but with only one vowelletter, the /a/, which is the same as the system’s own ‘default’ /a/.This /a/ letter is then used to attach other diacritics in order toindicate further vowels. Because the Tibetan language haschanged greatly since c. AD 700 (when the script was first elabo-rated from Gupta) while the script has remained almostunchanged, Tibetan is extremely difficult to read today. Itsgreatest problem is that it marks none of the tones of its tonallanguage. Though Tibetans have long tried to adapt writtenTibetan to spoken Tibetan, high illiteracy has been the price offailing to achieve this. Tibetan schools in Tibet, by governmen-tal decree, now teach only the Chinese script and in the Chineselanguage.
There are two main Mongolian scripts, both alphabetic:Phags-pa and adapted Uighur. Phags-pa represents a remodel-ling of the Tibetan script by Grand Lama ’Aphags-pa-blo-gros-rgyal-mthsan in 1260, by decree of the Mongol emperor
116 . a h i s t o ry o f w r i t i n g
88 Tibetan.
87 Sinhalese.
of China Kublai Khan. Uighur is ultimately of Aramaic origin;Mongolian scribes borrowed some signs and marks fromTibetan to remodel Uighur in the 1300s in order to create amore serviceable alphabet, called Galik. The modernMongolian script (illus. 89), written in vertical columns fromleft to right, emerged out of this.
The Southern Indian scripts chiefly convey the subconti-nent’s principal native language family, Dravidian, just as theNorthern Group generally, but not exclusively, represents theintrusive Indo-Aryan branch of Indo-European, which arrivedin the region c. 1900 BC. Southern Indian is not as large or influ-ential as Northern, its scripts transmitting Tamil, Telugu,Malayalam, Kanarese and others. Already two hundred yearsbefore Nagari’s elaboration, varieties of more than five differentSouthern scripts were being written. The early Kadamba scriptwas the model for the Old Kanarese, which itself inspired sev-eral scripts with large regional importance in southern India.Around AD 1500, the later form of this, Kannada (illus. 90), andTelugu (illus. 91) began to develop into their modern recogniz-able scripts – southern India’s two most important ones.
Another consequential Southern Indian script was Grantha.Some eight hundred years ago, it served as the model for the
s p e a k i n g s y s t e m s . 117
89 Modern Mongolian.
Malayalam script, which conveyed Malayalam as well as theSanskrit of southern India (illus. 92). (Today, in the south, itconveys only Malayalam, but in the west also Telugu.) Granthahad already generated the Tamil script around AD 750; it is func-tionally similar to the scripts of Northern Indian, perhapsthrough Nagari. The writing of traditional Tamil is known forits simplicity and ease of reading; the writing of modern Tamil isfraught with difficulties (illus. 93).53 The old written language ofTamil did not need to indicate aspirated consonants like /ph/ orspirants like /f/, and so its repertoire of about 20 letters wassmall. (In contrast, Old Kanarese had about 40 letters, andMalayalam 53.)
Northern and Southern Indian share the original Brahmi
118 . a h i s t o ry o f w r i t i n g
93 Tamil.
92 Malayalam.
91 Telugu.
90 Kannada.
The Empire of Sanskrit
181
Vowels (initial form above, added to k below)
Devanagari( )
Kannada
Tamil
Roman/IPA a [å] a [a: ] i [I ] i [i: ]
e [e ] e [e: ] ai [ai] o [o ] o [o: ]
u [u: ] r [j]u[m/rI/rU]
a[m: /ri: /ru: ]u [U]
Devanagari
Kannada
Tamil Diacritics
Roman/IPA au [au] nasal s nasal
( )
q [h] novowel
k [k ] kh [kh] g [g] gh [gí] N [è] c [T] ch [Th] j [D ] jh [D í] ñ [ê]
w [Ê ] wh [Êh] p [Î] ph [Îí] t [≤] t [O] th [Oh] d[è] dh [èí] n [M]
p [p ]
( ) ( )( )
ph [ph] b [b] bh [bí] m [m] y [j] r [Q] l [l] v [V] o [S]
v [ß ] s [s] h [í] zh [„] r [Ò] t- [t]/[Q] n– [n]
Consonants (pronounced with following a)
Devanagari
Kannada
Tamil
Roman/IPA
Devanagari
Kannada
Tamil
Roman/IPA
Devanagari
Kannada
Tamil
Roman/IPA
Devanagari
Kannada
Tamil
Roman/IPA
(Tamil appendixletters in parentheses)
Figure 10.2 The Devanagari, Kannada, and Tamil scripts, all descended
from Brahmi and following the same alphabetical order, though Tamil has
reduced the number of letters.
The Empire of Sanskrit
186
Consonants
InitialFinalClass
InitialFinalClass
InitialFinalClass
Initial
FinalClass
[k][k]M
[kh][k]H
[kh][k]L
[kh][k]L
[è][è]L
[T][t]M
[Th][t]H
[Th][t]L
[s][t]L
[Th][t]L
[j][n]L
[d][t]M
[t][t]M
[th][t]H
[th][t]L
[th][t]L
[n][n]L
[d][t]M
[t][t]M
[th][t]H
[th][t]L
[th][t]L
[n][n]L
[b][p]M
[w]
[w]L
[s]
[t]H
[s]
[t]H
[s]
[t]H
[h]
H
[l]
[n]L
zeroconsonant
M
[h]
L
[p][p]M
[ph][p]H
[f][p]H
[ph][p]L
[f][p]L
[ph][p]L
[m][m]L
[j][j]L
[r][n]L
[l][n]L
[O:] [a](final)
[a]medial
[ua] [a:] [am] [i] [i:] [¨] [¨:] [u] [u:]
[e:] [e] [@:j] [@:] [@] [e] [aw] [O] [@:] [ia] [ia] [¨a]
[E:] [E] [E] [o:] [o] [aj] [aj]
Tonemarks
Tone varies withclass high rising
Vowels (shown on “zero consonant,” )
Figure 10.3 The Thai script, descended from the southern form of Brahmi,
and preserving Sanskrit alphabetical order. The Thai language does not
distinguish all the consonant phonemes of Sanskrit, so many letters are
pronounced alike. Word-finally even fewer consonants are distinguished.
On the other hand, Thai has added symbols for its many vowel phonemes.
Consonants fall into three classes, which influence the tone on the upcoming
vowel. Vowels do not have initial forms; when word-initial they are added
to a dummy “zero consonant.” Thai does not use spaces between words.
combination of a wén and one of these two identifiers.By compounding in this way, Chinese writing could express
the full range of Chinese speech. Any character, no matter howcomplex, conveyed a single syllable that, it appears, stood for asingle word. A few characters always stood for the same word,but most offered several possibilities.
However, just as with the wén, scribes soon gave compoundzì characters multiple meanings and multiple sounds. Once thecompounds were themselves compounded, a third level ofcomplexity was added to the system. A solution to this newproblem was to add more character components to a sign inorder to identify its meaning and/or sound. (In this way, asmany as six character components can now occur in onecommon Chinese sign – such as yù for ‘worried’, composed ofsix individual components. And even more than six occur in
t h e e a s t a s i a n ‘ r e g e n e s i s ’ . 171
125 Development of some important Shang Dynasty characters in derivative
scripts.
Swamp
1400 – 800 bc
until 800 bc
800 – 220 bc
until 209 bc
until 200 bc
200 bc – ad 200
c. ad 100
c. ad 400
Fire Thunder Wind Water Mountain Earth Sky
Sh
an
g o
rig
ins
of
mo
dern
ch
ara
cters
His
tori
cal
form
s o
f th
ree c
hara
cters
Sh
an
g“S
tan
dard
”
trad
itio
nal
Pro
nu
nci
ati
on
an
d m
ean
ing
Sim
pli
fied
Ora
cle
bo
ne
ny
“wo
man
”L
arg
e se
al
w
áng
“kin
g”
Sm
all
seal
rì
“su
n”
Cle
rica
l sc
rip
t
yu
è“m
oo
n”
Sta
nd
ard
(tr
adit
ion
al)
y
ä
“rai
n”
Mo
der
n s
imp
lifi
ed
mù
“wo
od
(tr
ee)”
Cu
rsiv
e
g
ui
“tu
rtle
”m
xh
äló
ng
Mo
der
n p
ron
un
ciat
ion
m
xi
“bu
y”
“ho
rse”
“tig
er”
“dra
go
n”
Mea
nin
g
Fig
ure
4.1
At
left
, a
few
of
the
Sh
ang
ch
arac
ters
th
at h
ave
iden
tifi
able
mo
der
n d
esce
nd
ants
. A
t ri
gh
t, t
he
stag
es o
f
evo
luti
on
of
two
ch
arac
ters
fro
m o
racl
e b
on
es t
o m
od
ern
sta
nd
ard
an
d c
urs
ive
scri
pts
. A
bo
ut
2,20
0 ch
arac
ters
rec
eiv
ed
sim
pli
fied
fo
rms
in t
he
Peo
ple
’s R
epu
bli
c o
f C
hin
a in
th
e m
id-t
wen
tiet
h c
entu
ry.
So
me
of
thes
e ch
arac
ters
, su
ch a
s th
at f
or
“tu
rtle
,” s
eem
to
hav
e b
een
beg
gin
g f
or
sim
pli
fica
tio
n.
classification of each character, no matter how complex; andassigned each Chinese character to one of six (four graphic, twousage) different classes.
Xu Shèn’s liù shu, or ‘six writings’, of characters best illustratehow Chinese characters are composed (illus. 128). The firstclass is pictographic: ‘tree’, ‘sun’ and so forth. The second classis symbolic (or ideographic), like the numerals ‘one’, ‘two’,‘three’. The third class is the compound analytic, such as ‘tree’plus ‘sun’ yielding ‘east’. The fourth class comprises the pho-netic loan or rebus, as seen in lai, or ‘a kind of wheat’, which isalso used for ‘to come’ since it was once homophonous (pro-nounced the same). The fifth and most important class includesthe semantic-phonetic compounds – that is, characters thathave a signific for sense and phonetic for sound: ‘sugar’ is writ-ten with the classifier ‘cereal’ and the phonetic táng. The sixthclass contains chuan chù, or ‘mutually interpretative symbols’,whereby a character conveys a word of the identical or similarmeaning but with a different pronunication: for example, theyuè character for ‘music’ could also be used to convey lè, or‘pleasure’. Whereas class five embraces some 90 per cent of allChinese characters, class six is found in only one out of twothousand.
Xu Shèn himself used Li Su’s Small Seal Script as the basis of
176 . a h i s t o ry o f w r i t i n g
128 Xu Shèn’s liù shu, or ‘six writings’.
symbols into their modern forms by a process of simplification and abstraction,
during which details were left out and curves were changed into straight lines.
As a result, modern characters are far removed from their original pictures, al-
though they sometimes still show traces of the objects they represent. Although
these are the most frequently used examples of pictographic characters, modern
people without any knowledge of Chinese characters, when seeing these sym-
bols, would make no connection to their referents before the similarities were
explained. The character rì, “sun,” for example, looks more like a window,
while the character yuè, “moon,” resembles a stepladder. Generally speaking,
without knowing the meaning of these characters, one cannot decode them by
merely looking.
Although pictographic characters are the best known type among people who
are not very familiar with Chinese written signs, their number is much smaller
than one might think. Even in the earliest writing we know of, the Shell and Bone
Script (ca. 1400–ca. 1200 BCE), pictographic signs were a small portion of char-
acters, about 23 percent. Even then the majority of written symbols did not depict
physical shapes of objects. The decline of pictographic signs was well under way by
the Han dynasty. When Xu Shen did his study based on Small Seal characters (see
Chapter 8), pictographic signs comprised only 4 percent of all Chinese characters.2
Picture Evolution Modern character English
Figure 6.1. The evolution of pictographic characters.
In modern Chinese, even fewer characters show their pictographic origin clearly.
A more common function of these “pictographic” signs today is to indicate the
semantic category of a compound character (see below).
INDICATIVES
An indicative is a character made by adding strokes to another symbol in order to
indicate the new character’s meaning. For example,
rèn, “blade.” A dot is added to dāo, “knife.”
dàn, “morning.” A horizontal line is added underneath rì,
“sun” to show the time when the sun is just above the horizon.
běn, “root.” A short line is added to mù, “tree.”
SEMANTIC COMPOUNDS
Semantic compounds are constructed by combining two or more components
that collectively contribute to the meaning of the new character. Examples are
míng, “bright,” is a combination of rì, “sun,” and
yuè, “moon.”
xìn, “trust,” combines rén, “person,” and yán,
“words.”
kàn, “look,” has shou, “hand,” over mù, “eye.”
lín, “woods,” shows two mù, “tree.”
sēn, “forest,” is composed of three mù, “tree.”
qiú, “prison,” is represented by a rén, “person,” in ,
“confinement.”3
The methods of character formation represented by pictographs, indicatives,
and semantic compounds are all iconic. They are limited in that new signs have
to be created for new words. As a result they could not meet the needs of a
fast-developing society and its increasing demand for new written signs. In ad-
dition, abstract ideas and grammatical terms (such as prepositions, conjunctions,
and pronouns) were impossible to represent with pictographic signs. The solu-
tion was to break away from iconic representation and to use existing written
signs to phonetically represent the sounds of new words. This process is called
“borrowing.”
BORROWING
Borrowing in this context refers to the use of existing characters to represent ad-
ditional new meanings. Two frequently used examples are
lái, originally a pictograph for “wheat.” The written
character with its pronunciation was later borrowed to mean
“to come.” In time, the borrowed meaning prevailed, and the
original meaning of “wheat” died away.
qù, originally a pictograph for a cooking utensil. Later the
character was borrowed to mean “to go.” The borrowed mean-
ing also prevailed, and the original meaning died away.
In cases such as lái and qù, only the borrowed meaning has survived in
modern Chinese.
SEMANTIC-PHONETIC COMPOUNDS
Semantic-phonetic compounds are a hybrid category constructed by combining
a meaning element and a sound element. This method of character formation
thrived as a means to solve the ambiguity problem caused by borrowing. As can
be easily seen, when a particular character is borrowed to mean more and more
different things, sooner or later, the interpretation of the multiple-meaning writ-
ten sign becomes a problem. To solve the problem and to allow borrowing to
continue, a semantic element is added to indicate the specific meaning of the new
character. This process led to the creation of semantic-phonetic compounds.
Thus, a semantic-phonetic compound has two components, one indicating
meaning and the other pronunciation. Take zhu, “host,” as an example. In
modern Chinese, the character is used as a phonetic element in more than ten
semantic-phonetic compounds, five of which are shown in Table 6.1. The five
characters in the first column are pronounced exactly the same way, zhù, although
they are different in meaning. They share the same phonetic element, zhu,
which is the right-hand side of the characters. The signs on the left are semantic
components, which offer some clue to the meaning of the characters.
The semantic elements, for example, “person,” “water,” and , “tree,”
are pictographs commonly known as “radicals.” Their function is to hint at the
meaning of the characters in which they appear. At the same time, they also
group semantically related characters into classes. For example, all the characters
with , “person,” as a component have to do, at least in theory, with a person or
people; all the characters with , “tree,” as a component have to do with wood
or trees. Traditionally, Chinese characters are categorized under 214 radicals.
TABLE 6.1. Semantic-Phonetic Compounds: zhù
CHARACTER SEMANTIC MEANING PHONETIC PRONUNCIATION
PART PART
person live zhŭ zhù
water to pour (liquid) zhŭ zhù
tree pillar zhŭ zhù
insectboring
(of insects) zhŭ zhù
horse halt, station zhŭ zhù
One way to organize characters in dictionaries is to group them under these
radicals.
Table 6.2 brief ly illustrates the combination of semantic and phonetic elements
in the formation of characters. The vertical columns group characters by phonetic
elements, and the horizontal rows group characters by semantic elements. In other
words, characters in the same column have phonetic similarities and those in the
same row share semantic features. As seen in Table 6.2, the arrangement of the
two elements in a semantic-phonetic compound can be left to right or top to
bottom (as in , , and ). Other patterns not shown here include outside to
inside, as in the character guó, “country.” Radicals may take any position in a
character.
In modern Chinese, the majority of characters in the writing system belong to
the category of semantic-phonetic compounds. From as early as the Han dynasty,
this became the most productive method for creating new characters. It is worth
noting, however, that there are problems with extensive reliance on semantic-
phonetic characters. Languages change over time, and Chinese is no exception.
Both the pronunciation and the meaning of characters are in a state of f lux. While
the written signs remain constant, over time sound change and semantic evolution
have eroded the relationships between characters and their sound and semantic
components, making it more and more difficult to deduce the meaning and pro-
nunciation of a character from its written form. Now, as can be partially seen in
Table 6.2, phonetic elements do not indicate the pronunciation of the characters
clearly and accurately; nor do semantic elements show the exact meaning of char-
acters. In modern Chinese, the value of semantic-phonetic characters resides in
the combination of these two types of information to determine a character’s
meaning and pronunciation.
THE COMPLEXITY AND DEVELOPMENTAL
SEQUENCE OF THE CATEGORIES
The five categories of characters described above represent three stages of de-
velopment in character formation. The first stage is represented by pictographs,
indicatives, and semantic compounds. At this stage, written signs were created
based on a physical resemblance of some sort. This process also corresponds to an
early mode of human cognition, perceiving the world through the senses. Of the
three categories, pictographs are the simplest; indicatives and semantic compounds
involve more complex and abstract concepts.
The second stage is phonetic borrowing. Initially, single-element characters
such as zhu, “host” were borrowed to represent additional meanings. As the
multiple meanings of single characters became a source of enormous confusion,
ZHU KE QI-NG TÓNG
person
zhù,
“live”
hé
(family
name)
qiàn,
“pretty”
dòng
(name of
a minority
group)
water
zhù,
“to pour
(liquid)”
hé,
“river”
qīng,
“clear”
dòng,
“hole”
insect
zhù,
“boring by
insect”
qīng,
“dragonfly”
tree
zhù,
“pillar”
kē,
“stem of
plant”
tóng,
“phoenix tree”
plant kē,
“severe”
jīng,
“lush”
bamboo
qing,
“bamboo
woods”
tong, “things
in bamboo-
tube shape”
TABLE 6.2. Examples of Semantic-Phonetic Compounds
Japanese: Three Scripts are Better than One
121
0 x 2 Ò
k ]
c Ù 1 Ü
& á '
a i u e o
ka ki ku ke ko
sa shi (= [S i]) su se so
ta chi (= [t Si]) tsu te to
na ni nu ne no
ha (wa) hi fu (= [ Fu]) he (e) ho
ma mi mu me mo
ya (= [ja]) yu (= [ju]) yo (= [jo])
ra ri ru re ro
wa (w)o
n(syllable-final nasal)
ga gi gu ge go
za ji (= [dZ i]) zu ze zo
da ji (= [dZ i]) zu de do
ba bi bu be bo
pa pi pu pe po
a p
5 à
? ç
" y
e s
f t
j ı
 a
m w
’ l
o x
b q
P Î
@ î
6
h Z
7 •
A Æ
# z
K Ø
R –
‘ ~
õ g
. ¡
S Î
B ©
8 ›
T œ
/ ‹
9 ≥
d r
L Õ
U ñ
® ^
Á ã
ú h
Í [
E W
: ä
fi Ï
; í
F Ñ
M ø
fl Ö
| j
¶ ¶
G X
< ≤
ê ê
3 Ú
= ª
H æ
* â
N À
ß “
¢ _
ù f
ô i
£ o
ì \
I Y
> º
w Ì
4 Ç
Figure 7.1 The Japanese syllabaries, with hiragana on the left and
katakana on the right. The Romanization follows the Hepburn style,
with IPA interpretation where needed. The basic syllabaries are
above the double line, secondary symbols with diacritics below.
A smaller version of the tsu character is used for the first part of
a double consonant.
Japanese: Three Scripts are Better than One
A text in mixed kanji–kana conveys a considerable amount of informa-
tion that would be lost in a purely phonological script like hiragana.
At a glance, the content words – which convey what the text is actually
about – are distinguished from the grammatical words and suffixes,
the former written in kanji and the latter in hiragana (see figure 7.2).
The contrast between content words and grammatical words like the,
in, at, with, and it is one that is nowhere marked in English orthography,
but it is nevertheless a linguistically real distinction. By visually marking
it, Japanese orthography gives clues to the syntactic function of its indi-
vidual words. Skimming a text is made much easier, as the important
words stand out from the grammatical window dressing.
Users of kanji also value the ability of the logograms to distinguish
between homophones, of which Japanese has a large number, especially
in its formal, Sino-Japanese vocabulary. If written in hiragana, the words
Ë “four,” È “city,” Í “paper,” Î “arrow,” plus 43 other Sino-
Japanese words would all be rendered simply as >, shi. Understandably,
writers resist such “simplification,” realizing that written language,
divorced as it is from the interactive context of speech, must work harder
to avoid ambiguity. In kanji, even if it isn’t obvious whether the on or
kun reading is intended, the basic meaning will be clear. The Japanese
128
1)2)3)4) Fufu genka wa, inu mo kuwanu.5) couple quarrel (topic) dog even eat not.6) Even a dog doesn’t eat a couple’s quarrels.7) A dog, who will eat just about anything, will not eat a couple’s quarrels – so you shouldn’t get involved either.
«»ÒnëOÓ‹¢›’LÔ
U&U2ò+OÓ#L¢/’LÔ
ñáñÒnëÃÓ°Õ_‹lÕÔ
(mixed kanji–hiragana–katakana)(hiragana only)(katakana only)(Romanization – romaji)(word-for-word translation)(English translation)(interpretation)
Figure 7.2 A Japanese proverb written in (1) a mixture of kanji, katakana,
and hiragana, (2) hiragana only, (3) katakana only. Also given are the
Romanization (known as romaji in Japanese), a word-for-word translation,
English translation, and interpretation. To a Japanese reader, the kanji
words for “couple,” “dog,” and “eat” stand out as content words. The use
of katakana for the word for “quarrel” indicates emphasis; in kanji it would
be æø. The grammatical words and particles (topic marker, “even,” and
negative particle) are in hiragana. Thus the first version provides more
linguistic clues than the second or third (kana-only) versions.
King Sejong’s One-Man Renaissance
198
Basic letter Added stroke Added stroke Doubled
Labial mA G K Q
P
R
T
S
L
U
M
O
F
H
∆
N
E
B
C
D
p ph p*
Lingual/Alveolar n t t h t*
r/l
z (obsolete)
Dental/Sibilant s T Th s* T*
Molar/Velar k kh
è
k*
Glottal/Laryngeal (Ø) ? (obsolete) h
Figure 11.1 The derivation of the han’gãl letters from their pronunciations.
Above, the positions of the lips, tongue, and throat that Sejong used to
derive the basic shapes of the consonants. Below, the derivation of further
consonants from the basic ones. Note that and E are now a single letter.
copies the way in which the sound is formed in the mouth: the/k/, for example, depicts a tongue touching the palate. Therewere 28 basic letters in original Hankul, 24 of which are still inuse today. Diacritics are used systematically to provide thosephonemes not represented by letters.
As King Seycong wrote in his edict of 1446: ‘The [Hankul] isable to make a clear distinction between surd and sonant, and torecord music and song. It is good for any practical use, and eventhe sound of the wind, the chirp of birds, the crowing of cocks,and the barking of dogs can be exactly described with it.’29 Thisis almost true. Hankul’s consonants are organized according tofive different places of articulation: bilabial (lips), dental (teeth),alveolar (roof of mouth), velar (soft palate) and glottal (throat).Its three vowel shapes, however, were ‘metaphysically’ orga-nized into Heaven (round dot), Earth (horizontal line) and Man(vertical line) – ostensibly to legitimize the system philosophi-cally to Korean scholars who demanded a Chinese-fashion con-
t h e e a s t a s i a n ‘ r e g e n e s i s ’ . 191
133 How Korea’s Hankul script combines consonants (left column) and vowels
(top row) in each ‘syllabic letter’.
The First IT Revolution
like cat has a single morpheme and a single syllable, but a word like
undesirable contains three morphemes and five syllables. Thus a logo-
graphic writing system would give cat one symbol and undesirable three,
while a syllabary would give cat one and undesirable five. That lengthens
the spelling of undesirable, but lessens the number of symbols needed
in all, as there are fewer distinct syllables in a language than there are
distinct morphemes.
So King Njoya converted a number of his symbols into syllabograms,
standing for syllables – just a pronunciation, unconnected to any
meaning. The meaning would come only when the syllabograms were
put together to make up words. He worked on his script over a period
of many years, ending with a syllabary of 73 signs, plus 10 numerals.
He put the writing system to good use, compiling a law code, design-
ing a calendar, and founding schools.
8
Word undesirable
Morphemes un-desir-able
Meaning Pronunciation
Syllables
u n d e s i r a b l e
Aspect of language Example Script type Chapters
un-de-si-ra-ble
Phonemes
(None)
Logograms
Syllabary
Alphabet
Consonantalalphabet(abjad)
Ak ara(alphasyllabary)
v
Voweled (true)alphabet
n d s r b l
u nd s r ble a e
i
Chapters 2–5
Chapters 6–8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapters 11–14
Co
nso
nan
ts
Vo
wels
Figure 1.1 How different writing systems represent language. Logograms
represent morphemes, both their meaning and pronunciation, while
syllabaries and alphabets represent only pronunciation. In the column of
examples, the word undesirable is used to illustrate how the various writing
systems would divide up such a word. A morphemic (logographic) system
would use three symbols, a syllabary five, and so forth. In an akvara system,
the vowels are written as appendages to the consonants.
