LING 1000 Lecture Notes - Lecture 2: Abjad, Logogram, Quetzalcoatl
11 Jan 2017
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Islam: believe brought to humans by allah: aztecs: believe given by quetzalcoatl. China: earliest know systems: pictograms from 6600 bc (symbols written on tortoise shells) Mesopotamia: 3500 bc used wedge shapes reed stylus to engrave into clay tablets. First top to bottom, then left to right. From hieroglyphics to the alphabet: hieroglyphics: logographic system: syllabic writing systems, developed a writing system with 22 characters: the west semitic syllabary. Characters stood for constants and readers would provide vowels as they read. Both a syllabary and consonantal alphabet: a(cid:374)(cid:272)ie(cid:374)t greeks tried to (cid:271)orrow pho(cid:374)eti(cid:272)ia(cid:374) writi(cid:374)g s(cid:455)ste(cid:373), (cid:271)ut it did(cid:374)"t work (cid:271)\c greek syllable structure is unsuited for a syllabary. So greeks borrowed the symbol and used some to represent vowels. Result was alphabetic writing (both constants and vowels are symbolized: most alphabetic system derive from the greek system. Pictograms: non-arbitrary relationship between for and meaning: sometimes ambiguous b/c context not known, open interpretation.
