Cuneiform script

Cuneiform script, one of the earliest systems of writing, was invented by the Sumerians. It is distinguished by its wedge-shaped marks on clay tablets, made by means of a blunt reed for a stylus. The name cuneiform itself simply means "wedge shaped". The word "cuneiform" was coined in 1700 by the English orientalist Thomas Hyde (1663–1703): According to (Meade, 1974), p. 5, the German naturalist, physician, and explorer Engelbert Kaempfer (1651–1716) is often credited with having coined the word "cuneiform"; see: However, on pp. 317–318, Kaempfer states that he had read Thomas Hyde's book Historia Religionis Veterum Persarum:
 * Thomas Hyde, Historia Religionis Veterum Persarum, … [History of religion of the ancient Persians … ] (Oxford, England: Sheldonian Theater, 1700), p. 526. [in Latin] On pages 526–527, Hyde discusses the cuneiform found at Persepolis. From p. 526:  "Istiusmodi enim ductuli pyramidales seu Cuneiformes non veniunt in Gavrorum literis, nec in Telesmaticis, nec in Hieroglyphicis Ægypti; sed tales ductus (tam inter seinvicem juxta positi quam per seinvicem transmissi) sunt peculiares Persepoli ..." (Because such thin pyramidal or wedge forms do not occur in the letters of the Gavres [variously spelled Gabres, Guebers, Ghebers, or Chebers, was an old English name for Zoroastrians, an ancient cult of fire worshippers; the word Gavres was derived from the Persian word gaur for "infidel"], nor in talismans, nor in Egyptian hieroglyphs; but such drawings (so closely placed among each other as [intended to] be conveyed by means of each other) are peculiar to Persepolis, ... )
 * (Meade, 1974), p. 5.
 * Kaempfer, Engelbert, Amoenitatum Exoticarum … [Of Foreign Charms … ] (Lippe (Lemgoviae), (Germany): Heinrich Wilhelm Meyer, 1712), p. 331. On p. 331 Kaempfer describes cuneiform as: " … formam habentibus cuneolorum; … " ( … having the form of wedges; … ).  [Note:  A sample of the cuneiform from Persepolis appears on the plate following p. 332.]
 * From pp. 317–318: "Cl. Thomas Hyde, Anglus, Vir in linguis & rebus exoticis præclare doctus, in Hist. Relig. vet. Pers. & Med. …  " (The famous Thomas Hyde, an Englishman, a man well trained in languages and in exotic things, in [his] Historia Religionis Veterum Persarum … )

Emergance

 * Main: Sumerian writing

Cuneiform writing of the Sumerian language, began as a system of pictographs from the late fourth millennium BCE (the Uruk IV period), which stemmed from an even earlier system of shaped tokens used for accounting. In the third millennium, the pictorial representations became simplified and more abstract as the number of characters in use grew smaller (Hittite cuneiform). The system consists of a combination of logophonetic, consonantal alphabetic and syllabic signs.

Usage
Cuneiform script was used in many ways in ancient Mesopotamia. It was used to record laws, like the Code of Hammurabi. It was also used for recording maps, compiling medical manuals, and documenting religious stories and beliefs, among other uses. Studies by Assyriologists like Claus Wilcke and Dominique Charpin suggest that cuneiform literacy was not reserved solely for the elite but was common for average citizens. According to the Oxford Handbook of Cuneiform Culture, cuneiform script was used at a variety of literacy levels: Average citizens needed only a basic, functional knowledge of cuneiform script to write personal letters and business documents. More highly literate citizens put the script to more technical use, listing medicines and diagnoses and writing mathematical equations. Scholars held the highest literacy level of cuneiform and mostly focused on writing as a complex skill and an art form.

Adaptation
The original Sumerian script was adapted for the writing of the Semitic Akkadian (Assyrian/Babylonian), Eblaite and Amorite languages, the language isolates Elamite, Hattic, Hurrian and Urartian, as well as Indo-European languages Hittite and Luwian; it inspired the later Semitic Ugaritic alphabet as well as Old Persian cuneiform. Cuneiform writing was gradually replaced by the Phoenician alphabet during the Neo-Assyrian Empire (911–612 BC). By the second century AD, the script had become extinct, its last traces being found in Assyria and Babylonia, and all knowledge of how to read it was lost until it began to be deciphered in the 19th century.

Transcription

 * Main: Cuneiform signs

Cuneiform transcription is the process in which an epigraphist makes a line art drawing to show the signs on a clay tablet or stone inscription in a graphic form suitable for modern publication. Not all epigraphists are equally reliable, and before a scholar publishes an important treatment of a text, the scholar will often arrange to collate the published transcription against the actual tablet, to see if any signs, especially broken or damaged signs, should be represented differently.

Transliteration

 * Main: Cuneiform transliteration

Transliteration is the process in which a Sumerologist decides how to represent the cuneiform signs in Roman script. Depending on the context, a cuneiform sign can be read either as one of several possible logograms, each of which corresponds to a word in the Sumerian spoken language, as a phonetic syllable (V, VC, CV, or CVC), or as a determinative (a marker of semantic category, such as occupation or place). (See the article Transliterating cuneiform languages.) Some Sumerian logograms were written with multiple cuneiform signs. These logograms are called diri-spellings, after the logogram 'diri' which is written with the signs SI and A. The text transliteration of a tablet will show just the logogram, such as the word 'diri', not the separate component signs.

Decipherment

 * Main: Decipherment historiography

Cuneiform script are logographic symbols that were generalized using a wedge-shaped stylus to impress shapes into wet clay. The archaic "wedge-shaped" mode of writing was adapted to the Akkadian writing system in the mid third millennium BCE. Deciphering cuneiform is based on Akkadian glossaries, the “Rosetta Stone” for Sumerian. By the time of the "Sumerian Renaissance" (Ur III) of the 21st century BCE, Sumerian was written in already highly abstract cuneiform glyphs directly succeeded by Old Assyrian cuneiform.