Writing system

A writing system comprises a set of symbols, called a script, as well as the rules by which the
script represents a particular language. The earliest writing appeared during the late 4th
millennium BC. Throughout history, each independently invented writing system gradually
emerged from a system of proto-writing, where a small number of ideographs were used in a
manner incapable of fully encoding language, and thus lacking the ability to express a broad range
of ideas.

Writing systems are generally classified according to how its symbols, called graphemes, relate to
units of language. Phonetic writing systems – which include alphabets and syllabaries – use
graphemes that correspond to sounds in the corresponding spoken language. Alphabets use
graphemes called letters that generally correspond to spoken phonemes. They are typically divided
into three sub-types: Pure alphabets use letters to represent both consonant and vowel sounds,
abjads generally only use letters representing consonant sounds, and abugidas use letters
representing consonant–vowel pairs. Syllabaries use graphemes called syllabograms that
represent entire syllables or moras. By contrast, logographic (or morphographic) writing systems
use graphemes that represent the units of meaning in a language, such as its words or morphemes.
Alphabets typically use fewer than 100 distinct symbols, while syllabaries and logographies may
use hundreds or thousands respectively.

Background: relationship with language

According to most contemporary definitions, writing is a visual
and tactile notation representing language. As such, the use of
writing by a community presupposes an analysis of the
structure of language at some level.[2] The symbols used in
writing correspond systematically to functional units of either a
spoken or signed language. This definition excludes a broader
class of symbolic markings, such as drawings and maps.[a][4] A The relationship between spoken,
text is any instance of written material, including transcriptions written, and signed modes of
of spoken material.[5] The act of composing and recording a language, as modelled by Beatrice
text is referred to as writing,[6] and the act of viewing and Primus et al.[1] While many spoken
interpreting the text as reading.[7] or signed languages are not written,
there are no written languages
without a spoken counterpart that
The relationship between writing and language more broadly
they originally emerged to record.
has been the subject of philosophical analysis as early as
Aristotle (384–322 BC).[8] While the use of language is
universal across human societies, writing is not; writing emerged much more recently, and was
independently invented in only a handful of locations throughout history. While most spoken
languages have not been written, all written languages have been predicated on an existing spoken
language.[9] When those with signed languages as their first language read writing associated with
a spoken language, this functions as literacy in a second, acquired language.[b][10] A single
language (e.g. Hindustani) can be written using multiple writing systems, and a writing system can
also represent multiple languages. For example, Chinese characters have been used to write
multiple languages throughout the Sinosphere – including the Vietnamese language from at least
the 13th century, until their replacement with the Latin-based Vietnamese alphabet in the 20th
century.[11]

In the first several decades of modern linguistics as a scientific discipline, linguists often
characterized writing as merely the technology used to record speech – which was treated as being
of paramount importance, for what was seen as the unique potential for its study to further the
understanding of human cognition.[12]

General terminology
While researchers of writing systems generally use some of the same
core terminology, precise definitions and interpretations can vary by
author, often depending on the theoretical approach being
employed.[13]

A grapheme is the basic functional unit of a writing system. Comparison between double-
Graphemes are generally defined as minimally significant elements storey | a | (left) and single-
which, when taken together, comprise the set of symbols from which storey | ɑ| (right) lowercase
texts may be constructed. [14] All writing systems require a set of forms of the Latin letter ⟨A⟩

defined graphemes, collectively called a script.[15] The concept of the

grapheme is similar to that of the phoneme in the study of spoken languages. Likewise, as many
sonically distinct phones may function as the same phoneme depending on the speaker, dialect,
and context, many visually distinct glyphs (or graphs) may be identified as the same grapheme.
These variant glyphs are known as the allographs of a grapheme: For example, the lowercase letter
⟨a⟩ may be represented by the double-storey | a | and single-storey | ɑ | shapes,[16] or others written
in cursive, block, or printed styles.[17] The choice of a particular allograph may be influenced by the
medium used, the writing instrument used, the stylistic choice of the writer, the preceding and
succeeding graphemes in the text, the time available for writing, the intended audience, and the
largely unconscious features of an individual's handwriting.

Orthography (lit. 'correct writing') refers to the rules and conventions for writing shared by a
community, including the ordering of and relationship between graphemes. Particularly for
alphabets, orthography includes the concept of spelling. For example, English orthography
includes uppercase and lowercase forms for 26 letters of the Latin alphabet (with these graphemes
corresponding to various phonemes), punctuation marks (mostly non-phonemic), and other
symbols, such as numerals. Writing systems may be regarded as complete if they are able to
represent all that may be expressed in the spoken language, while a partial writing system cannot
represent the spoken language in its entirety.[18]

History
In each instance, writing emerged from systems of proto-writing, though historically most proto-
writing systems did not produce writing systems. Proto-writing uses ideographic and mnemonic
symbols to communicate, but lacks the capability to fully encode language. Examples include:
 The Jiahu symbols (c. 7th millennium BC) carved into tortoise
shells, found in 24 Neolithic graves excavated at Jiahu in
northern China.[19]
The Vinča symbols (c. 6th–5th millennia BC) found on artefacts of
the Vinča culture of central and southeastern Europe.[20]
The Indus script (c. 2600 – c. 2000 BC) found on different types
of artefacts produced by the Indus Valley Civilization on the
Indian subcontinent.[21]
Quipu (15th century AD), a system of knotted cords used as
mnemonic devices by the Inca Empire in South America.[22]
Writing has been invented independently multiple times in human
history – first emerging between 3400 and 3200 BC as cuneiform, a
system initially used to write the Sumerian language in southern
Mesopotamia; it was later adapted to write Akkadian as its speakers
spread throughout the region, with Akkadian writing appearing in Diagram comparing the
significant quantities c. 2350 BC. [23] Cuneiform was closely followed abstraction of pictographs in
by Egyptian hieroglyphs. It is generally agreed that the two systems cuneiform, Egyptian
hieroglyphs, and Chinese
were invented independently from one another; both evolved from
characters – from an 1870
proto-writing systems with the earliest coherent texts dated
publication by French
c. 2600 BC. Chinese characters emerged independently in the Yellow Egyptologist Gaston
River valley c. 1200 BC. There is no evidence of contact between Maspero[c]
China and the literate peoples of the Near East, and the
Mesopotamian and Chinese approaches for representing sound and
meaning are distinct.[24][25][26] The Mesoamerican writing systems, including Olmec and the Maya
script, were also invented independently.[27]

With each independent invention of writing, the ideographs used in proto-writing were decoupled
from the direct representation of ideas, and gradually came to represent words instead. This
occurred via application of the rebus principle, where a symbol was appropriated to represent an
additional word that happened to be similar in pronunciation to the word for the idea originally
represented by the symbol. This allowed words without concrete visualizations to be represented
by symbols for the first time; the gradual shift from ideographic symbols to those wholly
representing language took place over centuries, and required the conscious analysis of a given
language by those attempting to write it.[28]

Alphabetic writing descends from previous morphographic writing, and first appeared before
2000 BC to write a Semitic language spoken in the Sinai Peninsula. Most of the world's alphabets
either descend directly from this Proto-Sinaitic script, or were directly inspired by its design.
Descendants include the Phoenician alphabet (c. 1050 BC), and its child in the Greek alphabet
(c. 800 BC).[29][30] The Latin alphabet, which descended from the Greek alphabet, is by far the
most common script used by writing systems.[31]

Classification by basic linguistic unit

Writing systems are most often categorized according to what units of language a system's
graphemes correspond to.[32] At the most basic level, writing systems can be either phonographic
(lit. 'sound writing') when graphemes represent units of sound in a language, or morphographic
('form writing') when graphemes represent units of meaning (such as words or morphemes).[33]
Depending on the author, the older term logographic ('word
writing') is often used, either with the same meaning as
morphographic, or specifically in reference to systems where
the basic unit being written is the word. Recent scholarship
generally prefers morphographic over logographic, with the
latter seen as potentially vague or misleading – in part because
systems usually operate on the level of morphemes, not
words.[34]

Many classifications define three primary categories, where

phonographic systems are subdivided into syllabic and
alphabetic (or segmental) systems. Syllabaries use symbols Table of scripts in the introduction to
called syllabograms to represent syllables or moras. Alphabets the Sanskrit–English Dictionary by
use symbols called letters that correspond to spoken phonemes Monier Monier-Williams
(or more technically, to diaphonemes). Alphabets are generally
classified into three subtypes, with abjads having letters for
consonants, pure alphabets having letters for both consonants and vowels, and abugidas having
characters that correspond to consonant–vowel pairs.[35] David Diringer proposed a five-fold
classification of writing systems, comprising pictographic scripts, ideographic scripts, analytic
transitional scripts, phonetic scripts, and alphabetic scripts.[36]

In practice, writing systems are classified according to the primary type of symbols used, and
typically include exceptional cases where symbols function differently. For example, logographs
found within phonetic systems like English include the ampersand ⟨&⟩ and the numerals ⟨0⟩, ⟨1⟩,
etc. – which correspond to specific words (and, zero, one, etc.) and not to the underlying
sounds.[32] Most writing systems can be described as mixed systems that feature elements of both
phonography and morphography.[37]

Logographic systems
A logogram is a character that represents a morpheme within a language. Chinese characters
represent the only major logographic writing systems still in use: they have historically been used
to write the varieties of Chinese, as well as Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, and other languages of
the Sinosphere. As each character represents a single unit of meaning, thousands are required to
write all the words of a language. If the logograms do not adequately represent all meanings and
words of a language, written language can be confusing or ambiguous to the reader.[38]

Logograms are sometimes conflated with ideograms, symbols which graphically represent abstract
ideas; most linguists now reject this characterization:[39] Chinese characters are often semantic–
phonetic compounds, which include a component related to the character's meaning, and a
component that gives a hint for its pronunciation.[40]

Syllabaries
A syllabary is a set of written symbols (called syllabograms) that represent either syllables or
moras – a unit of prosody that is often but not always a syllable in length.[41] Syllabaries are best
suited to languages with relatively simple syllable structure, since a different symbol is needed for
every syllable. Japanese, for example, contains about 100 moras, which are represented by moraic
hiragana. By contrast, English features complex syllable
structures with a relatively large inventory of vowels and
complex consonant clusters – for a total of 15–16 thousand
distinct syllables. Some syllabaries have larger inventories: the
Yi script contains 756 different symbols.[42]

Alphabets
An alphabet uses symbols (called letters) that correspond to
the phonemes of a language, e.g. its vowels and consonants.
However, these correspondences are rarely uncomplicated, and
spelling is often mediated by other factors than just which
sounds are used by a speaker.[43] The word alphabet is derived
from alpha and beta, the names for the first two letters in the
Greek alphabet.[44] An abjad is an alphabet whose letters only
represent the consonantal sounds of a language. They were the
first alphabets to develop historically,[45] with most used to
write Semitic languages, and originally deriving from the A bilingual stop sign in English and
Proto-Sinaitic script. The morphology of Semitic languages is Cherokee in Tahlequah, Oklahoma
particularly suited to this approach, as the denotation of vowels
is generally redundant.[46] Optional markings for vowels may
be used for some abjads, but are generally limited to applications like education.[47] Many pure
alphabets were derived from abjads through the addition of dedicated vowel letters, as with the
derivation of the Greek alphabet from the Phoenician alphabet c. 800 BC. Abjad is the word for
"alphabet" in Arabic: the term derives from the traditional order of letters in the Arabic alphabet
('alif, bā', jīm, dāl).[48]

An abugida is a type of alphabet with symbols corresponding to

consonant–vowel pairs, where basic symbols for each
consonant are associated with an inherent vowel by default,
and other possible vowels for each consonant are indicated via
predictable modifications made to the basic symbols.[49] In an
abugida, there may be a sign for k with no vowel, but also one
for ka (if a is the inherent vowel), and ke is written by
modifying the ka sign in a way consistent with how la would be
modified to get le. In many abugidas, modification consists of
the addition of a vowel sign; other possibilities include rotation
of the basic sign, or addition of diacritics. A passage from the Bible printed
using Balinese script
While true syllabaries have one symbol per syllable and no
systematic visual similarity, the graphic similarity in most
abugidas stems from their origins as abjads – with added symbols comprising markings for
different vowels added onto a pre-existing base symbol. The largest single group of abugidas is the
Brahmic family of scripts, however, which includes nearly all the scripts used in India and
Southeast Asia. The name abugida was derived by linguist Peter T. Daniels (b. 1951) from the first
four characters of an order of the Geʽez script, which is used for certain Nilo-Saharan and Afro-
Asiatic languages of Ethiopia and Eritrea. [50]
Featural systems
Originally proposed as a category by Geoffrey Sampson (b. 1944),[51][52] a featural system uses
symbols representing sub-phonetic elements – e.g. those traits that can be used to distinguish
between and analyse a language's phonemes, such as their voicing or place of articulation. The only
prominent example of a featural system is the hangul script used to write Korean, where featural
symbols are combined into letters, which are in turn joined into syllabic blocks. Many scholars,
including John DeFrancis (1911–2009), reject a characterization of hangul as a featural system –
with arguments including that Korean writers do not themselves think in these terms when
writing – or question the viability of Sampson's category altogether.[53]

As hangul was consciously created by literate experts, Daniels characterizes it as a "sophisticated

grammatogeny"[54] – a writing system intentionally designed for a specific purpose, as opposed to
having evolved gradually over time. Other grammatogenies include shorthands developed by
professionals and constructed scripts created by hobbyists and creatives, like the Tengwar script
designed by J. R. R. Tolkien to write the Elven languages he also constructed. Many of these
feature advanced graphic designs corresponding to phonological properties. The basic unit of
writing in these systems can map to anything from phonemes to words. It has been shown that
even the Latin script has sub-character features.[55]

Classification by graphical properties

Linearity
All writing is linear in the broadest sense – i.e., the spatial arrangement of symbols indicates the
order in which they should be read.[56] On a more granular level, systems with discontinuous
marks like diacritics can be characterized as less linear than those without.[57] In the initial
historical distinction, linear writing systems (e.g. the Phoenician alphabet) generally form glyphs
as a series of connected lines or strokes, while systems that generally use discrete, more pictorial
marks (e.g. cuneiform) are sometimes termed non-linear. The historical abstraction of logographs
into phonographs is often associated with a linearization of the script.[58]

In Braille, raised bumps on the writing substrate are used to encode non-linear symbols. The
original system – which Louis Braille (1809–1852) invented in order to allow people with visual
impairments to read and write – used characters that corresponded to the letters of the Latin
alphabet.[59] Moreover, that Braille is equivalent to visual writing systems in function
demonstrates that the phenomenon of writing is fundamentally spatial in nature, not merely
visual.[60]

Directionality and orientation

Writing systems may be characterized by how text is graphically divided into lines, which are to be
read in sequence:[61]

Axis
Whether lines of text are laid out as horizontal rows or vertical columns
Lining
How each line is positioned relative to the one previous on the medium – in practice only
vertical scripts vary whether columns are read in a left- or rightward order, as all horizontal
 scripts sequence rows from top to bottom[62]
Directionality
How individual lines are read – whether starting from the left or right on a horizontal axis, or
from the top or bottom on a vertical axis

In left-to-right scripts (LTR), horizontal rows are sequenced from top to bottom on a page, with
each row read from left to right. Right-to-left scripts (RTL), which use the opposite directionality,
include the Arabic alphabet.[62]

Egyptian hieroglyphs were written either left-to-right or right-to-left, with the animal and human
glyphs turned to face the beginning of the line. The early alphabet did not have a fixed direction,
and was written both vertically and horizontally; it was most commonly written
boustrophedonically: starting in one horizontal direction, then turning at the end of the line and
reversing direction.[63]

The right-to-left direction of the Phoenician alphabet initially stabilized after c. 800 BC.[64] Left-
to-right writing has an advantage that, since most people are right-handed,[65] the hand does not
interfere with what is being written (which, when inked, may not have dried yet) as the hand is to
the right side of the pen. The Greek alphabet and its successors settled on a left-to-right pattern,
from the top to the bottom of the page. Other scripts, such as Arabic and Hebrew, came to be
written right to left. Scripts that historically incorporate Chinese characters have traditionally been
written vertically in columns arranged from right to left, while a horizontal direction from left to
right was only widely adopted in the 20th century due to Western influence.[66]

Several scripts used in the Philippines and Indonesia, such as Hanunoo, are traditionally written
with lines moving away from the writer, from bottom to top, but are read left to right;[67] ogham is
written from bottom to top, commonly on the corner of a stone.[68] The ancient Libyco-Berber
alphabet was also written from bottom to top.[69]

See also

Languages portal

Literature portal

Writing portal

Bidirectional text
Complex text layout (CTL)
Defective script
Digraphia
Epigraphy
Formal language
ISO 15924
Pasigraphy
Penmanship
Palaeography
Script (Unicode)
Transcription (linguistics)
 X-SAMPA

Notes
a. This view is sometimes called the "narrow definition" of writing. The "broad definition" of writing
also includes semasiography – i.e. meaningful symbols without a direct relationship to
language.[3]
b. This is to be distinguished from the use of notation systems designed to record signed
languages, such as SignWriting.
c. Maspero, Gaston (1870). Recueil de travaux relatifs à la philologie et à l'archéologie
égyptiennes et assyriennes (http://archive.org/details/recueildetravaux27masp/page/244/mode/
2up) (in French). Librairie Honoré Champion. p. 243.

References

1. Meletis & Dürscheid (2022), p. 17; Primus (2003), p. 6.

2. Coulmas (2002), pp. 151–152.
3. Powell (2009), pp. 31, 51.
4. Meletis & Dürscheid (2022), p. 14.
5. Crystal (2008), p. 481.
6. Bußmann (1998), p. 1294.
7. Bußmann (1998), p. 979.
8. Rutkowska (2023), p. 96.
9. Rogers (2005), p. 2.
10. Meletis & Dürscheid (2022), p. 17; citing Morford et al. (2011)
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12. Sampson (2016), p. 41.
13. Condorelli & Rutkowska (2023), p. 4.
Joyce (2023), p. 141, citing Gnanadesikan (2017), p. 15.
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15. Coulmas (2002), p. 35.
16. Steele & Boyes (2022), p. 232.
17. Meletis & Dürscheid (2022), pp. 153–155.
18. Ottenheimer (2012), p. 194.
19. Houston (2004), pp. 245–246.
20. Condorelli (2022), pp. 20–21; Daniels (2018), p. 148.
21. Sproat (2010), p. 110.
22. Coulmas (2002), p. 20.
23. Krispijn (2012), p. 184.
24. Bagley (2004), p. 190.
25. Boltz (1999), p. 108.
26. Keightley (1983), pp. 415–416.
27. Gnanadesikan (2023), p. 36.
28. Robertson 2004, pp. 21–24.
29. Fischer (2001), pp. 84–86.
30. Millard (1986), p. 396.
31. Haarmann (2004), p. 96.
32. Gnanadesikan (2023), p. 32.
33. Rogers (2005), pp. 13–15; Meletis (2020), p. 144.
34. Joyce (2023), pp. 152–153.
35. Joyce (2023), p. 142.
36. Diringer (1962), pp. 21–23.
37. Meletis & Dürscheid (2022), p. 219.
38. Coulmas (2002), pp. 40–41.
39. Coulmas (1991), pp. 62, 103–104; Steele (2017), p. 9.
40. Rogers (2005), p. 34.
41. Meletis & Dürscheid (2022), pp. 240–241.
42. DeFrancis (1989), p. 147.
43. Coulmas (2002), pp. 99–100, 113–114.
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50. Meletis & Dürscheid (2022), p. 222.
51. Sampson (1985), p. 40.
52. Collinge (2002), p. 382.
53. Coulmas (2002), p. 165; DeFrancis (1989), p. 197.
54. Daniels (2013), p. 55.
55. Primus (2004), pp. 242–243.
56. Rogers (2005), p. 9; Coulmas (2002), p. 152.
57. Rogers (2005), pp. 9–10; Daniels (2018), pp. 194–195.
58. Powell (2009), pp. 155–161, 259; Dobbs-Allsopp (2023), pp. 28–30; Coulmas (1991), pp. 23–
24, 94.
59. Sproat (2010), pp. 183–186; Scholes (1995), p. 364.
60. Harris (1995), p. 45.
61. Condorelli (2022), p. 83.
62. Meletis & Dürscheid (2022), p. 112.
63. Powell (2009), p. 235.
64. Fischer (2001), p. 91.
65. de Kovel, Carrión-Castillo & Francks (2019), p. 584; Papadatou-Pastou et al. (2020), p. 482.
66. Fischer (2001), pp. 177–178.
67. Gnanadesikan (2009), p. 180.
68. Fischer (2001), pp. 53–54.
69. Daniels & Bright (1996), p. 112.

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Further reading
Robinson, Andrew (2009). Writing and Script: A Very Short Introduction. Very Short
Introductions. Oxford University Press. ISBN 978-0-19-956778-2.

External links
The World's Writing Systems (https://www.worldswritingsystems.org/) – all 294 known writing
systems, each with a typographic reference glyph and Unicode status
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