About the Sumerian Writing System
The writing system is a physical display of a spoken language. It’s told that the human beings developed the language 35,000 BCE (before common era) as evidenced by cave paintings from the period of the Cro-Magnon Man (50,000-30,000 BCE) (Discovered in 1868, Cro-Magnon Man was one of the first fossils to be recognized as belonging to our own species—Homo sapiens.) . They were also one of the first people to Start the Writing system or also known as cuneiform.
These images propose a language. This is because, to some people they seem to tell a story. The writing system was so important to the Sumerians. After a while they came up with a name for it named Cueniform. The name comes from the Latin word cuneus for 'wedge' owing to the wedge-shaped style of writing. In cuneiform, a carefully cut writing implement known as a stylus is pressed into soft clay to produce wedge-like impressions that represent word-signs (pictographs).
All of the civilizations in Mesopotamia used Cuneiform. (the Sumerians, Akkadians, Babylonians, Elamites, Hatti, Hitties, Assyrians, Hurrians and others) until it was abandoned when the alphabetic script came along. The earliest cuneiform tablets, known as proto-cuneiform, were graphic, they were more real and visible, but developed in difficulty as the subject matter became more intangible.
Cuneiform can be hard to write but once you get the hang of it you will get used to it. In this video it shows you how to write Cuneiform and what to use to do it. The term "cuneiform" is very deceptive, in that it tricks people into thinking that it's some type of writing system. The truth is that cuneiform symbolizes not one but several kinds of writing systems, including logosyllabic, syllabic, and alphabetic scripts. In fact, "cuneiform" came from Latin cuneus, which means "wedge". So, any script can be called cuneiform as long as individual signs are composed of wedges.
Want to learn how to write Cuneiform numbers? Watch this video below!
Citations:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuneiform
http://www.ancientscripts.com/sumerian.html
http://edsitement.neh.gov/lesson-plan/cuneiform-writing-system-ancient-mesopotamia-emergence-and-evolution
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuneiform
http://www.ancientscripts.com/sumerian.html
http://edsitement.neh.gov/lesson-plan/cuneiform-writing-system-ancient-mesopotamia-emergence-and-evolution