Early written languages

Early written languages

One of the marks of progress in early human civilizations was the development of the early written languages, which involved the construction of alphabets, logograms, and ideograms. Some early languages included the following (sorted alphabetically):

List of early written languages

* Akkadian
* Arabic
* Aramaic
* Armenian
* Avestan
* Aztec
* Bengali
* Brahmi
* Bugis
* Burmese
* Byblos
* Cherokee
* Chinese
* Coptic
* Cuneiform
* Cypriot
* Cyrillic
* Devanagari
* Egyptian
* Elamite
* Epi-Olmec
* Etruscan
* Futhark
* Ge'ez (Ethiopic)
* Georgian
* Glagolitic
* Gothic
* Grantha
* Greek
* Gujarati
* Gupta
* Gurmukhi
* Hebrew
* hPhags-pa
* Iberian scripts
* Indus Script
* Japanese
* Javanese
* Jurchen
* Kadamba
* Kalinga
* Kannada
* Kashmiri
* Kharosthi
* Khitan
* Khmer
* Korean
* Landa
* Latin
* Lepcha
* Linear A
* Linear B
* Luwian
* Malayalam
* Maya
* Meroïtic
* Mesoamerican Writing Systems
* Mixtec
* Modi
* Mongolian
* Nagari
* Naxi
* Nushu
* Ogham
* Old Hebrew
* Old Kannada
* Old Persian
* Oriya
* Oscan
* Pahlavi
* Phaistos Disc
* Phoenician
* Proto-Sinaitic
* Samaritan
* Sarada
* Sinhala
* South Arabian
* South Asian Writing Systems
* Sumerian
* Syriac
* Takri
* Tamil
* Telugu
* Thai
* Thamudic
* Tibetan
* Tocharian
* Turkic runes
* Ugaritic
* Venetic
* Yi Scripts
* Zapotec

Importance of written language

Written languages allow historians to speculate on the entertainment, lifestyles, and cultures of peoples long after they have died. Thus, the knowledge and wisdom of past civilizations is made immortal and passed down many generations.

External links

* [http://www.english.uga.edu/~hypertxt/040699sci-early-writing.html Theories concerning early writing]
* [http://www.ancientscripts.com/ More on ancient scripts]

ee also

* History of writing


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