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Tokens As Precursor of Writing

Tokens were originally used as counters to track goods in Mesopotamia as early as 8000-3000 BC, representing the earliest system of signs for transmitting information. Around 3500 BC, tokens began to be impressed on clay envelopes to indicate the items inside, which was the first stage of writing. Then around 3000 BC, the creation of phonetic signs marked the shift to writing representing sounds of speech. Finally around 1500 BC, the invention of the alphabet segmented sounds into individual letters, establishing a system that modern alphabets are all descended from.

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94 views

Tokens As Precursor of Writing

Tokens were originally used as counters to track goods in Mesopotamia as early as 8000-3000 BC, representing the earliest system of signs for transmitting information. Around 3500 BC, tokens began to be impressed on clay envelopes to indicate the items inside, which was the first stage of writing. Then around 3000 BC, the creation of phonetic signs marked the shift to writing representing sounds of speech. Finally around 1500 BC, the invention of the alphabet segmented sounds into individual letters, establishing a system that modern alphabets are all descended from.

Uploaded by

Marj Banias
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© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Tokens as Precursor of Writing

The direct antecedent of the Mesopotamian script was a recording device consisting of clay
tokens of multiple shapes (Schmandt-Besserat 1996). The artifacts, mostly of geometric forms
such as cones, spheres, disks, cylinders and ovoids, are recovered in archaeological sites dating
8000–3000 BC (Fig. 1). The tokens, used as counters to keep track of goods, were the earliest
code—a system of signs for transmitting information. Each token shape was semantic, referring
to a particular unit of merchandise. For example, a cone and a sphere stood respectively for a
small and a large measure of grain, and ovoids represented jars of oil. The repertory of some
three hundred types of counters made it feasible to manipulate and store information on multiple
categories of goods (Schmandt-Besserat 1992).

Pictography: Writing as Accounting Device


After four millennia, the token system led to writing. The transition from counters to script took
place simultaneously in Sumer and Elam, present-day western Iran when, around 3500 BC, Elam
was under Sumerian domination. It occurred when tokens, probably representing a debt, were
stored in envelopes until payment. These envelopes made of clay in the shape of a hollow ball
had the disadvantage of hiding the tokens held inside. Some accountants, therefore, impressed
the tokens on the surface of the envelope before enclosing them inside, so that the shape and
number of counters held inside could be verified at all times (Fig. 1). These markings were the
first signs of writing. The metamorphosis from three-dimensional artifacts to two-dimensional
markings did not affect the semantic principle of the system. The significance of the markings on
the outside of the envelopes was identical to that of the tokens held inside.

Logography: Shift from Visual to Aural


About 3000 BC, the creation of phonetic signs—signs representing the sounds of speech—marks
the second phase in the evolution of Mesopotamian writing, when, finally, the medium parted
from its token antecedent in order to emulate spoken language. As a result, writing shifted from a
conceptual framework of real goods to the world of speech sounds. It shifted from the visual to
the aural world.
The Alphabet: The Segmentation of Sounds
The invention of the alphabet about 1500 BC ushered in the third phase in the evolution of
writing in the ancient Near East (Sass 2005). The first, so-called Proto-Sinaitic or Proto-
Canaanite alphabet, which originated in the region of present-day Lebanon, took advantage of
the fact that the sounds of any language are few. It consisted of a set of 22 letters, each standing
for a single sound of voice, which, combined in countless ways, allowed for an unprecedented
flexibility for transcribing speech (Powell 2009). This earliest alphabet was a complete departure
from the previous syllabaries. First, the system was based on acrophony—signs to represent the
first letter of the word they stood for—for example an ox head (alpu) was ‘a,’ a house (betu) was
b (Fig. 6). Second, it was consonantal—it dealt only with speech sounds characterized by
constriction or closure at one or more points in the breath channel, like b, d, l, m, n, p, etc. Third,
it streamlined the system to 22 signs, instead of several hundred.

The Modern Alphabets


Because the alphabet was invented only once, all the many alphabets of the world, including
Latin, Arabic, Hebrew, Amharic, Brahmani and Cyrillic, derive from Proto-Sinaitic. The Latin
alphabet used in the western world is the direct descendant of the Etruscan alphabet (Bonfante
2002). The Etruscans, who occupied the present province of Tuscany in Italy, adopted the Greek
alphabet, slightly modifying the shape of letters. In turn, the Etruscan alphabet became that of the
Romans, when Rome conquered Etruria in the first century BC. The alphabet followed the
Roman armies. All the nations that fell under the rule of the Roman Empire became literate in
the first centuries of our era. This was the case for the Gauls, Angles, Saxons, Franks and
Germans who inhabited present-day France, England and Germany.

Writing: Handling Data in Abstraction


Beyond the formal and structural changes undergone by writing in the course of millennia, its
evolution also involved strides in the ability to handle data in abstraction. At the first stage, the
token system antecedent of writing, already abstracted information in several ways. First, it
translated daily-life commodities into arbitrary, often geometric forms. Second, the counters
abstracted the items counted from their context. For example, sheep could be accounted
independently of their actual location. Third, the token system separated the data from the
knower. That is to say, a group of tokens communicated directly specific information to anyone
initiated in the system. This was a significant change for an oral society, where knowledge was
transmitted by word of mouth from one individual to another, face to face. Otherwise, the token
system represented plurality concretely, in one-to-one correspondence. Three jars of oil were
shown by three tokens, as it is in reality. At the same time, the fact that the token system used
specific counters to count different items was concrete—it did not abstract the notion of item
counted from that of number. (Certain English numerical expressions referring to particular sets,
such as twin, triplet, quadruplet and duo, trio or quartet, are comparable to concrete numbers.)

Conclusion: The Stability of Writing Systems


The origin of the Chinese script and the development of Mesoamerican writing are still obscure.
The Mesopotamian script, however, offers a well-documented evolution over a continuous
period of 10,000 years. The system underwent drastic changes in form, gradually transcribed
spoken language more accurately, and handled data in more abstract terms. The most striking
universal feature of all writing systems, however, is their uncanny endurance, unmatched among
human creations. The Chinese script never needed to be deciphered because the signs have
changed little during the 3400 years of its recorded existence (Xigui 2000). It also always
remained ideographic, merely inserting rebus-like phonetic complements in some characters. The
Mesoamerican Maya phonetic glyphs preserved the symbolism initiated by the Olmecs in the
previous millennium (Coe and Van Stone 2005). Finally, when the last clay tablet was written in
the Near East, c. 300 AD, the cuneiform script had been in use for three millennia. It replaced an
age-old token system that had preceded it for over 5000 years; it was replaced by the alphabet,
which we have now used for 3500 years.

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