Reading the Past: Ancient Writing from Cuneiform to the Alphabet

by J.T. Hooker (Introduction)

Hardcover with dust jacket. Like New

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Language, Linguistics, Ancient History, Mythology, Cultural Studies

384 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1990

Reviews

[Tim Pendry · Rating 5 out of 5]

This brings together six separate booklets (produced by the British Museum) into one volume. Six expert academic authors cover cuneiform scripts, Egyptian hieroglyphics, linear B, the early alphabets of the Ancient Near East, Greek inscriptions and Etruscan culture.

Naturally, there is not perfect co-ordination of theme and each booklet has its own orientation but there is little to beat this as an account of writing styles in the Ancient World.

The level of scholarship is very high, at times almost too high for the general reader unless one accepts, rightly, that this has immense use as a reference text, but the insights of each academic author into the culture and history of their areas of interest is considerable.

The role of scribes in Mesopotamia, the relationship between hieroglyphics and the later alphabetic system, a remarkable scholarly detective story about the last days of Pylos, the sheer extent of Aramaic and an exhaustive tally of Greek inscriptions are all 'finds' here.

The last section on Etruscan turns into far more than just an account of a language. We are offered a briefing on an entire culture and what we can know of the Oscans to the south through what limited written material is to be found on what has been left behind.

The volume is now well over two decades old and we noted that it was sadly no longer available in the British Museum bookshop but a revised version when all six have been brought up to date (with perhaps a missing booklet on Runes added) would be worth having.

[John Isles · Rating 4 out of 5]

This volume reprints six British Museum booklets on early writing in the Western World and Middle East, with the addition of an introduction by J.T. Hooker. Owing to imperfect editing, occasionally there is an incorrect page number for a cross-reference, or direction to a frontispiece that doesn't exist. I have already reviewed the booklets individually, but for convenience I summarize these reviews here.

CUNEIFORM. Cuneiform is not a script, but a writing technology. The present account tells of its origin in the Middle East, and its evolution from pictographs to syllabaries and alphabets. Cuneiform was used for records and inscriptions in at least fifteen languages; inevitably we don't learn much about each language in this section, but several sample texts are reproduced with transcriptions and translations. An interesting introduction to what could easily become a lifetime study.

EGYPTIAN HIEROGLYPHICS. In a few pages this section takes us a long way into understanding Egyptian hieroglyphs and some aspects of the Egyptian language. Additionally there are short accounts of hieratic and demotic scripts, Coptic, Protosinaitic, and Meroitic. I learned more from this than from other books I've read on the subject.

LINEAR B AND RELATED SCRIPTS. Besides Linear B this section also discusses Linear A, the Cypro-Minoan script, and the Phaistos Disk. I found the account of the decipherment of Linear B hard to follow, especially in the discussion of Knossos tablet Fp1 which is supposed to be a list of various things and the numbers thereof; the illustration doesn't quite match the derived table or support the text, leading me to wonder if something is missing. Incidentally in English we have at least nine different sounds corresponding to the spelling ough, as in plough, lough, hiccough, though, through, thought, borough, tough, and cough (and Wikipedia lists two more less commonly used); not six as stated in Chapter 3.

THE EARLY ALPHABET. This section discusses not just the origins of our alphabet, but every alphabet that was ever used in ancient times. Unfortunately, there were far too many of these to be discussed adequately in just 60 pages. Not all are illustrated, and the illustrations are not all well chosen; for example, the Naskhī and Kūfic scripts of Arabic are hard to read in the photographs chosen. There are abrupt changes of subject here and there; for example, a paragraph begins: "Apart from its cumbersomeness, the Akkadian system was unsatisfactory for another reason" - but the Akkadian system has not previously been mentioned.

One interesting point that was new to me is the fact that the Arabic alphabet is ordered largely on the basis of the shapes of the letters. Consequently it's very different from most others, but curiously the letters corresponding to k, l, m, n are still in the same order as ours.

GREEK INSCRIPTIONS. You have to know quite a lot of ancient Greek to benefit from this section, which seems rather a primer for potential epigraphers than suited to the non-specialists to whom other booklets in the series are addressed. Early Greek inscriptions come in many variants of the alphabet, which broadly fall into two categories, the 'red' alphabets of the west and the 'blue' of the east - a terminology that's explained in Chapter 1, and not used again until the final pages when you might have forgotten it. The objects illustrated, with their inscriptions transcribed and translated, include jugs and vases, gravestones, architectural fragments, statues, wooden tablets, and objects dedicated in temples. The Greeks seem to have written on just about everything about them, and to have found many ways to do it.

I noticed a few errors: the dialect spoken in Athens was akin to Ionian, not Dorian; the line dividers in Figures 18 and 19 are leaves, not wreaths; Figure 27 shows an inventory of treasures, not of treasurers; and Figure 40 names Dionusios, not Dionisios. All in all a fascinating subject, but the present account was not such an easy read.

ETRUSCAN. Larissa Bonfante has written several books about the Etruscans and their language, which is not well understood and whose remains are fragmentary, but this account covers what is known clearly for the most part. Also included is a chapter on an unrelated Italian language, Oscan, which was spoken by the ancient Samnites. The illustrations are in black and white, and several of the photographs are reproduced too darkly for the inscriptions to be read.

I noticed a few errors, as follows. The modern pronunciation of "Coca Cola" in Tuscany that is supposed to reproduce the Etruscan aspirated ch is "hoha hola," not "hola hola." The discussions of the Etruscan digamma and Etruscan vowels confuse u, v, and w, long and short vowels, and open and closed vowels. The second genitive ending in Figure 34 is -s, not -ś, and in Figure 36 the name Thanchvilu does not end in -ss as shown in the transcription.

[Augustus · Rating 4 out of 5]

Those of us who hang around the British Museum bookstore will recall that the museum published a series of slim paperback books on ancient languages. Half a dozen of those books are collected together in this combined hardcover publication. They are richly illustrated, mostly with artifacts from the British Museum.

The chapters cover cuneiform, Egyptian hieroglyphs, Linear B, the early alphabets, Greek inscriptions, and Etruscan. They are written by different authors and do not follow a fixed pattern, although they have much in common. In general, they explain how each language evolved, a short history of the peoples who used it, and the story of its decipherment.

The chapters contain many bits of interesting information. For example, the chapter on cuneiform demonstrates Mesopotamian counting methods that mixed decimal systems with sexagesimal systems. For those who might be interested in collecting a cuneiform tablet, it also includes a section on how to detect fakes.

The chapter on Egyptian hieroglyphics tells the familiar story of Champollion deciphering the royal cartouches of Ptolemy and Cleopatra, but another important part of the translation was to realize that female nouns add a "t" at the end of the word.

The chapter on Linear B is less satisfying because that language was almost exclusively used for dry inventories of animals and goods.

The chapters on early alphabets and Greek inscriptions are somewhat more interesting, explaining the evolution of phonetic writing. For example, the authors point out that the word "alphabet" itself derives from words for ox (aleph) and house (beth), which eventually came to represent the "a" and "b" sounds.

The chapter on Etruscan explains how Greek letters influenced Latin, adding an interesting digression on decorated Etruscan mirrors.

For readers with an interest in writing as it has evolved and influenced modern languages, this book will be appreciated.

[Nikos Karagiannakis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Το βιβλίο αυτό αποτελεί συνένωση 6 διαφορετικών έργων, με θέματα :

1) Σφηνοειδής γραφή
2) Αιγυπτιακά ιερογλυφικά
3) Γραμμική Β
4) Το πρώιμο αλφάβητο
5) Ελληνικές επιγραφές
6) Ετρουσκικά

Υπάρχουν ακόμα 3 μέρη που κυκλοφορούν μεμονωμένα (όπως και τα παραπάνω) :

7) Μαθηματικά και μέτρηση
8) Γλυφικά των Μάγιας
9) Ρούνοι

Δεν μπορούσα να φανταστώ πόσο μπορεί να με συναρπάσει η μελέτη της εξέλιξης της γραφής ανά τους αιώνες, το πως συνδέονται τα αλφάβητα (είτε συλλαβικά είτε φωνητικά) μεταξύ τους και πως σχετίζονται με τα αρχαιότερα γλυφικά.

Νιώθοντας τον εγκέφαλο μου ακόμα χορτάτο από την τροφή που του προσέφερε η συλλογική αυτή δουλειά, το συνιστώ σε όλους.

[Colin · Rating 4 out of 5]

An excellent book on ancient writing systems. If you're into that sort of thing, you ought to read it.