Page:A Short History of the World.djvu/97

 Sumeria, Early Egypt and Writing n Sumerian language was a language made up of accumulated syllables rather like some contemporary Amerindian languages, and it lent itself very readily to this syllabic method of writing words expressing ideas that could not be conveyed by pictures directly. Egyptian writing underwent parallel developments. Later on when foreign peoples with less distinctly syllabled methods of speech, were to learn and use these picture scripts, they were to make those further modifications and simplifications that developed at last into alphabetical writing. All the true alphabets of the later world derived from a mixture of the Sumerian cunei- form and the Egyptian hiero- glyphic (priest writing). Later in China there was to develop a conven- tionalized picture writing, but in China it never got to the alphabetical stage. The invention of writing was of very great importance in the development of human societies. It put agreements, laws, com- niandments on record. It made the growth of states larger than the old city states possible. It made a continuous historical consciousness possible. The command of the priest or king and his seal could go far beyond his sight and voice and could survive his death. It is interesting to note that in ancient Sumeria seals were greatly used. EBONY CYLINDER SEALS OF DYNASTY FIRST EGYPTIAN Recovered from the Tombs at Abydos in 1921 by the British School of Archaeology. They give evidence oFearly form of block printing.