Writing And Civilization: From Ancient Worlds To Modernity
TopicLiterature& Language“Pure intellectual stimulation that can be popped intothe [audio or video player] anytime.”—Harvard MagazineWriting and Civilization“Passionate, erudite, living legend lecturers. Academia’sbest lecturers are being captured on tape.”—The Los Angeles Times“A serious force in American education.”—The Wall Street JournalWriting and Civilization:From Ancient Worldsto ModernityCourse GuidebookProfessor Marc ZenderTulane UniversityProfessor Marc Zender is a Visiting Assistant Professor ofAnthropology at Tulane University and a Research Associatein Harvard University’s Corpus of Maya HieroglyphicInscriptions Program. He received his M.A. and Ph.D. inArchaeology from the University of Calgary. Professor Zenderis the coauthor of Reading Maya Art: A Hieroglyphic Guide toAncient Maya Painting and Sculpture and a contributing editorto Mesoweb, a major Internet resource devoted to studyingClassic Maya civilization. He has done archaeological andepigraphic fieldwork throughout Mexico and Central America,and his research has been featured on The History Channel.Professor Photo: Jeff Mauritzen - inPhotograph.com.Cover Image: Runic almanac, 16th century (carved boxwood), Norwegian School,(16th century) / Ashmolean Museum, University of Oxford, UK / The Bridgeman Art Library.Course No. 2241 2013 The Teaching Company.PB2241AGuidebookTHE GREAT COURSES Corporate Headquarters4840 Westfields Boulevard, Suite 500Chantilly, VA 20151-2299USAPhone: istics
PUBLISHED BY:THE GREAT COURSESCorporate Headquarters4840 Westfields Boulevard, Suite 500Chantilly, Virginia 20151-2299Phone: 1-800-832-2412Fax: 703-378-3819www.thegreatcourses.comCopyright The Teaching Company, 2013Printed in the United States of AmericaThis book is in copyright. All rights reserved.Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above,no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored inor introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted,in any form, or by any means(electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise),without the prior written permission ofThe Teaching Company.
Marc Zender, Ph.D.Visiting Assistant Professor of AnthropologyTulane UniversityProfessor Marc Zender is a Visiting AssistantProfessor of Anthropology at TulaneUniversity and a Research Associatein Harvard University’s Corpus of MayaHieroglyphic Inscriptions Program. He receivedan Honors B.A. in Anthropology from TheUniversity of British Columbia and an M.A. and a Ph.D. in Archaeologyfrom the University of Calgary.Professor Zender’s M.A. thesis on the orthographic conventions of Mayanhieroglyphic writing won the Governor General’s Gold Medal in 1999, andhis Ph.D. thesis on Classic Maya priesthood is widely cited in his field. Asa Postdoctoral Fellow and Lecturer on Anthropology at Harvard Universityfrom 2004 to 2011, Professor Zender taught numerous popular courses.During that period, he was a seven-time recipient of the Harvard UniversityCertificate of Distinction in Teaching, awarded by the Derek Bok Center forTeaching and Learning. He also received the distinguished Petra T. ShattuckExcellence in Teaching Award in 2008.Professor Zender has published extensively on Mesoamerican languagesand writing systems, especially those of the Maya and Aztecs (Nahuatl).His research and teaching interests include anthropological and historicallinguistics; decipherment, comparative writing systems, and the origins ofwriting; and iconography, art, and visual culture. He has done archaeologicaland epigraphic fieldwork throughout Mexico and Central America andcurrently works as an epigrapher for both the Belize Valley ArchaeologicalReconnaissance Project in Belize and the Proyecto arqueológico deComalcalco in Tabasco, Mexico.Professor Zender is the coauthor (with Andrea Stone) of Reading MayaArt: A Hieroglyphic Guide to Ancient Maya Painting and Sculpture, and hei
has written numerous journal articles, book chapters, and review essays onMayan and Aztec hieroglyphic writing. He is the Director of PrecolumbiaMesoweb Press, an associate editor of The PARI Journal (a publicationof the Precolumbian Art Research Institute), and a contributing editorto Mesoweb, a major Internet resource for the study of Classic Mayancivilization. Professor Zender is also a talented illustrator; his drawings arefeatured throughout this course and appear in many books by his colleagues.Committed to spreading popular awareness of his field, Professor Zendergives frequent international workshops on decipherment, and his researchhas been featured in several documentaries on The History Channel and bythe BBC. ii
Table of ContentsINTRODUCTIONProfessor Biography.iTypographical Conventions 1Course Scope.3LECTURE GUIDESLecture 1What Is Writing? 5Lecture 2The Origins and Development of Writing 13Lecture 3Where Did Our Alphabet Come From? 22Lecture 4The Fuþark—A Germanic Alphabet 31Lecture 5Chinese—A Logosyllabic Script 39Lecture 6Japanese—The World’s Most Complex Script 48Lecture 7What Is Decipherment? 57Lecture 8The Five Pillars of Decipherment 65Lecture 9Epigraphic Illustration 74iii
Table of ContentsLecture 10The History of Language 82Lecture 11Proper Nouns and Cultural Context 91Lecture 12Bilinguals, Biscripts, and Other Constraints 98Lecture 13Egyptian—The First Great Decipherment 106Lecture 14What Do Egyptian Hieroglyphs Say? 114Lecture 15Old Persian—Cuneiform Deciphered 121Lecture 16What Does Cuneiform Say? 129Lecture 17Mycenaean Linear B—An Aegean Syllabary 136Lecture 18Mayan Glyphs—A New World Logosyllabary 144Lecture 19What Do the Mayan Glyphs Say? 151Lecture 20Aztec Hieroglyphs—A Recent Decipherment 158Lecture 21Etruscan and Meroïtic—Undeciphered Scripts 166Lecture 22Han'gŭl, Tengwar, and Other Featural Scripts 174iv
Table of ContentsLecture 23Medium and Message 182Lecture 24The Future of Writing 189Supplemental MaterialGlossary 196Bibliography 211v
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Typographical ConventionsThis guidebook uses the following typographical conventions: Italics are used for words cited as words rather than usedfunctionally (e.g., Over time, the pronunciation of the Englishword knight has undergone numerous changes) and for foreignlanguage words. Boldface, lowercase type is used for phonetic signs (e.g., Egyptiann, Mayan na, Sumerian a). Boldface, uppercase type is used for logograms (e.g., BAHLAM). Boldface, italicized type is used for terms that are included in theguidebook’s Glossary (e.g., abbreviation). Brackets are used to represent phones, that is, speech soundscapable of being made by humans (e.g., [p], representing a voicelessbilabial plosive). Forward slashes are used to represent phonemes, that is, speechsounds that are meaningfully used in any given language (e.g., /p/,which can be pronounced either [p] or [ph] in English, depending onthe context). Capital letters are used for Semitic consonantal roots (e.g., ArabicKTB, “writing,” Hebrew RB, “master”) and semantic signs (e.g.,TIME, FEMALE, SWORD). A colon (:) following a vowel indicates that the vowel is long (inthe linguistic sense of being pronounced for about twice as long,not in the popular sense of “saying its own name”). Some languagesconventionally double the vowel to signal this (e.g., aa); others adda macron over the vowel (e.g., ā). Because this course deals with1
dozens of languages, it’s important to remember that [a:], aa, and āare equivalent for our purposes.Typographical Conventions 2Double quotation marks are used for direct quotations, meaningsof words (e.g., The Maya referred to their writing as k’uhulwooj, meaning “holy signs”), translations of sentences, andwords used in a special sense (e.g., What we might think of asthe “Chinese language” is, in fact, eight mutually unintelligibleregional languages).
Writing and Civilization:From Ancient Worlds to ModernityScope:Few human inventions are as pervasive and central to our modernworld as writing. Each and every day, most of us read thousands ofwords, whether in traditional formats, such as books, magazines,or newspapers, or on the increasingly common computers, smartphones,e-book readers, and tablets. But even though writing now seems thoroughlymodern, it can be traced back more than 5,000 years to ancient Egypt andMesopotamia.This course will begin with a consideration of what writing is and preciselyhow it differs from other kinds of graphic communication systems. Writingalways records language, and it does so in surprisingly similar ways in allwriting systems, ancient and modern. The way the ancients wrote millenniaago is not radically different from how we write today.We will then turn to an exploration of the origins and development ofwriting, tracing the birth of our own alphabet and its connections to the earlyGermanic runes. We will also explore the independent invention of writingin China and its adoption and elaboration in Japan.In order to more deeply examine the subject of writing, we will closelyexamine the theory and practice of decipherment. Not all writing systems canbe deciphered, but what are the limitations, and how can they be overcome?We will explore several case studies to put decipherment to the test, includingancient Egyptian hieroglyphics, Old Persian cuneiform, Mycenaean LinearB, Mayan script, and Aztec hieroglyphs. Once we have studied these andother ancient writing systems, you will know why Etruscan and Meroïtichave proven impossible to decipher; you will understand the urge thatnumerous individuals have had to reform writing or to invent a more perfectwriting system; and you will be able to assess Darius the Great’s claim thathe himself invented the Old Persian script.3
ScopeIn comparing the world’s writing systems, we slip the shackles ofparochialism, recognizing that our alphabet is but one of many similarwriting systems, all of which capably serve the needs of their users. Writingis deeply conservative and resistant to change. It may undergo adaptationduring borrowing, but a culture will never abandon or radically modifyits writing system except in the direst instances of cultural transformationthrough conquest or assimilation. We will also come to understand thedeeply interdependent relationship of writing and civilization, including thesocial, political, and economic forces that led to the adoption of new mediaand technology for writing. These forces not only shaped the form, function,and distribution of writing, but through it, they have transformed civilizationitself. In the concluding lecture, we consider all that we have learned aboutthe interplay between writing and civilization and use it to predict onepossible future of writing. 4
What Is Writing?Lecture 1It’s almost impossible to imagine a technology more central than writingto the way we live and communicate. We use writing every day, and it’sall around us all the time. But precisely because of its ubiquity, we takewriting for granted, as if it has always been here and always will be. Weshould recall, however, that writing was a human invention. At some pointin the remote past, some inspired individual or small group first hit on theidea of writing. In this lecture, we’ll look at ancient ideas about writing as adivine gift, and we’ll arrive at a modern definition of writing to enable us toembark on our comparative study.A Gift of the Gods Some ancient civilizations regarded writing as a divine gift. TheEgyptians, for example, believed that writing was created by thegod of wisdom, Thoth. The Egyptians called their god-givenhieroglyphs mdwt nṭr (“speech of the gods”), a term that Greekhistorians translated as “hieroglyph,” from Greek hieros (“sacred”)and glyphē (“carving”). In nearby Mesopotamia, the ancient Sumerians believed thatwriting was invented by the head of their pantheon, Énlil. Thelater Assyrians and Babylonians borrowed their writing from theSumerians, but they attributed its invention to their own god Nábû. In the New World, the Classic Maya of Mexico and Guatemalaattributed the invention of writing to their sky god, Itzamnaaj. TheMaya referred to their writing as k’uhul wooj (“holy signs”); thus,scholars also refer to them as hieroglyphs. In the Bible, the books of Exodus and Deuteronomy report thatthe Ten Commandments were written with “the finger of God”and were set down in “the first writing.” In the Book of Daniel,disembodied fingers wrote a cryptic message of doom on the walls5
of Babylon. These are just two of many biblical stories in whichwriting serves as a vehicle of divine inspiration or judgment.Lecture 1: What Is Writing? Updating a writing systemmay seem like a good idea,especially if the languagehas changed and the writingsystem doesn’t accuratelyreflect it, but there are practicalreasons for the inertia ofwriting systems. Consider the Englishword knight, for instance,with its silent initial k Later pharaohs attempted to eraseand silent internal gh. King Tutankhamun from history,When this spelling first but his name and some of hisbecame the standard, the accomplishments are known to usnow from the written records leftword was pronounced behind in his tomb.[knixt]. But over time,spoken English lost thesesounds, and the word knight underwent other changes. It’snow pronounced [nait] but still written as if it werepronounced [knixt]. Updating such spellings would radically change the appearanceof written English and limit access to literature written in EarlyModern English, such as the work of Shakespeare or the KingJames Bible, to all but a few experts.6 Getty Images/Jupiterimages/liquidlibrary/Thinkstock.The Stability of Writing One of the reasons that early writing systems remained stable forso long is precisely because they were sacred. To abandon or alterthem would have been sacrilegious. Thus, Egyptian hieroglyphicwriting persisted in the samecomplex mixture of word,sound, and semantic signs formore than 3,000 years.
An important feature of writing generally is that it allows ournames and words to outlive us. Our own tombstones and epitaphs,like those of ancient kings, are designed to recall our names, dates,and cherished family connections for future generations. The way we write today is not fundamentally different from theway the Mesopotamians and Egyptians wrote more than 5,000years ago; this means that we can learn quite a lot about the origins,development, and significance of writing by comparing our ownalphabet with other writing systems, both ancient and modern.Defining Writing In defining words, we often look to dictionaries for help, but in thecase of the word writing, dictionary definitions are a bit misleading.They are either too general, describing the appearance of writingwithout concern for its structure, or too specific, focusing onalphabets to the exclusion of other types of writing. For instance, one common dictionary definition of writingis “marks (letters, words, or other symbols) inscribed on asurface, often paper, with a suitable implement.” This definition captures the form and medium of some writingsystems, and it correctly conveys the graphic nature of writing,but it’s narrow in its focus on paper, and it’s much too vaguewhen it comes to what writing actually is. A second common definition of writing is “a system of visiblemarks used to transmit ideas.” This meaning seems overly broad.There are many systems of visible marks that can convey ideasand information, including maps, musical notation, mathematicalformulas, pictographic street signs, and so on. Some scholars argue in favor of a broad definition of writingthat includes all forms of graphic communication. But bythis definition, the comparative field would be vast, includingeverything from cave paintings to pictographic street signs.Even art and iconography would become, in this definition, akind of writing.7
Such a broad definition seems counterintuitive. Most of usrecognize that there are similarities between our own alphabetand Egyptian hieroglyphic writing that simply aren’t sharedwith cave paintings and street signs.Lecture 1: What Is Writing? For example, both our alphabet and Egyptian have signs forsounds, and those signs convey information only to the extentthat they match words in the English and Egyptian languages.Further, the order of these signs has to match the order of thesounds in the language; otherwise, the message is nonsensical.Other graphic communication systems, such as cave paintingsand pictography, don’t have phonetic signs, don’t match theorder of spoken words, and don’t rely on language at all totransmit information. In contrast to pictography—a system of nonlinguistic graphiccommunication conveying information through imagery andcontext—writing is a system of graphic marks conveyinginformation through language. It does this by using phonetic signsto communicate the sounds of a language and by putting those signsin an order that reflects the order of elements in the language. Nonlinguistic graphic communication systems have no unifyingfeatures or structural principles in common. Cave paintings,musical notation, and pictographic street signs just don’t form anatural set—not with one another and not with writing.The Link between Writing and Civilization The real motivation for linking nonlinguistic graphic communicationsystems with writing seems to stem more from empathy andpolitical correctness than from the demands of objective evidence.The connection of the two systems can be traced to the late-19thcentury anthropologists Edward Burnett Tylor (1832–1917) andLewis Henry Morgan (1818–1881) and their unilinear view ofcultural evolution. Tylor and Morgan argued that human societies had progressedthrough several stages of social complexity, which they labeled8
bands, tribes, chiefdoms, and states. They listed criteria thatthey saw as characterizing each of these social stages. One of the hallmark traits listed for the state level ofsocial organization was writing. In other words, cultureswith a writing system were civilized; cultures without onewere uncivilized. The anthropologist Franz Boas (1858–1942) systematicallydismantled this simplistic view in the early 20th century,pointing out numerous counterexamples to Tylor and Morgan’spredictions. He noted that some state-level societies had existedwithout writing, such as the Inka Empire of South
Ancient Maya Painting and Sculpture and a contributing editor to Mesoweb, a major Internet resource devoted to studying Classic Maya civilization. He has done archaeological and epigraphic eldwork throughout Mexico and Central America, and his research has been featured on The History Channel. Literature & Language Topic Linguistics Subtopic
The Indus Valley Civilization Civilization began in India around 2500 B.C., about 1000 years after the start of civilization in Sumer. The first Indian civilization arose on the northern plain in the valley of the Indus River. Historians call that civilization the Indus Valley, civilization.
only for culture, while civilization uses the term tahdhib. The word civilization is often associated with culture, even many western writers identify the "culture" and "civilization" of Islam. Often times Islamic civilization is associated with Arab civilization, although actually between Arabic and Islam can still be distinguished.
DISCOURSE ON COLONIALISM . by Aime Cesaire . A civilization that proves incapable of solving the problems it creates is a decadent civilization. A civilization that chooses . to . close its eyes to its most crucial problems is a stricken civilization. A civilization that uses its principles for trickery and deceit is a dying civilization.
What is Western Civilization? . can be understood and controlled (science and defined religious powers like Gods) Looks forward to the future rather than dwelling on the glories of the past Empowers people rather than rulers . Western Civilization The traditions of Ancient Greece are seen as the beginnings of Western Civilization since it is .
civilization is built on the use of water. India is a country with more than five thousand years of civilization, with great contributions to the field of hydrology. Ancient Indian civilization, referred to as Indus Valley Civilization
1.Culture is by definition smaller than a civilization. 2.Culture can grow and exist without residing in a formal civilization whereas a civilization will never grow and exist without the element of culture. 3.Culture can be tangible or intangible whereas civilization is something that is more tangible because it is what you see as a whole
civilization and culture. Before any discussion on clash of civilizations, it is important to understand the essential features of western civilization. Many American and European universities have (at least they used to have till a few years ago) courses on Western civilization. Most of these courses state that Western civilization has
Civilization The Great War of the 21st Century Richard Hobbs Republican Men’s Club 20 October 2015 20Oct#2015 RMC#Islam#vs#Civilization 1. 20Oct#2015 RMC#Islam#vs#Civilization 2 Special 20 Handling and Tax included. 20Oct#2015 RMC#Islam#vs#Civilization 3. 20Oct#2015 RMC#Islam#vs#
