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Mesopotamia was the birthplace of perhaps the world's oldest system of writing, which we now refer to as cuneiform. It received its modern designation from the wedge-shaped impressions composing its signs (from Latin cuneus "wedge"). Each sign was a combination of tiny "wedges" imprinted on a clay tablet with a triangular-shaped stick. The earliest written documents were administrative records that appeared in the south of Mesopotamia (modern Iraq) at the end of the fourth millennium B.C. Cuneiform was then used for more than three millennia to write texts in the Sumerian and Akkadian languages spoken in Mesopotamia, as well as in Hittite, Ugaritic, and other languages of the Ancient Near East. Many more written records have survived from Mesopotamia than from other ancient civilizations. There are several hundred thousand of them in the world; over two and a half thousand cuneiform tablets can be found in the Hermitage collection alone. Such an abundance of cuneiform sources is explained by the fact that unlike other ancient peoples, Sumerians, Babylonians, and Assyrians used clay as the material for their writing. Clay was not easy to destroy or damage, and became even stronger during fires that were fatal for papyrus, parchment, and paper. Cuneiform texts are quite diverse in genre and content. There are examples
of inventories, lists of laborers and manufactured goods, documents notifying
sale transactions, protocols of court hearings, literary and religious
texts, medical prescriptions, divination reports, plans and maps, letters
of officials and private parties, school "textbooks" and "notebooks",
as well as many other texts. One British archeologist referred to cuneiform
tablets as "ancient television"-indeed, they reveal the long
vanished world of Mesopotamia for us. Mesopotamia was not only the birthplace of writing, but also of bureaucracy, archiving, and libraries. Economic and legal documents were composed in strict accordance with special forms that changed from one period of Mesopotamian history to another. The shape of tablets also varied from one epoch to another. They could be rectangular, long and narrow, or, on the contrary, almost square, sometimes with rounded edges. They could be flat on one side, and convex-shaped on the other, or even pillow-shaped. The genre of the text also influenced its appearance: often it is possible to tell the difference between a letter and an economic record by the shape of the tablet without reading its content. School exercises are easily recognizable by their round shape – such tablets were convenient for children to hold in their hands. Tablets were formed from clay soaked in water and cleaned of impurities. Its size depended on the length and purpose of the text, and varied from one centimeter to half a meter in length. Sometimes, miniature tablets, densely covered in minute signs, could contain a large text (up to thirty lines). For the modern researcher, who often studies the text under a magnifying glass, it is sometimes difficult to imagine how the ancient scribe, who had no such instruments, could write it. Both sides of a tablet, as well as its edges, were used for writing. In order to align the writing, the surface of the tablet was often ruled: a string was used to make horizontal lines on the wet clay, and if the text contained several columns, vertical lines were also used. More than half of all tablets in the Hermitage date back to the epoch
of the third dynasty of Ur. At the end of the third millennium B.C., the
kings of the Sumerian city Ur, who had subjugated many parts of Mesopotamia,
founded a kingdom that was enormous for the time, and established a well-defined
and strict system of government. Everything in their kingdom was accounted
for, each tree and human being. Everything was under the strict control
of officials and written down on clay tablets: the quantities of goods
shipped from one town to another, the number of pots made by each potter
in a potter’s shop, the number of gazelles sacrificed to the gods,
the number of people involved in carrying rushes from the banks of the
river as fodder for sheep, the number of branches and reeds cut down in
a forest, and the number of baskets woven from them, the number of bags
for keeping snakes that were given to snake charmers. It is not surprising
that a large number of such texts exited. The documents of the third dynasty
of Ur account for more than a half of all known cuneiform texts in the
world. Often, the official scribe who composed the document would seal it with
his own seal, or with the seal of his office. Stone seals that had served
as amulets and decorations since ancient times, gradually acquired another
important function – they protected property, and ensured property
rights. Cylinder seals, the surface of which was covered with various
images, were in use in Mesopotamia from the end of the fourth–beginning
of the third millennium B.C. The shape of a cylinder was very convenient:
such a seal could be rolled on clay an infinite number of times. In the
second half of the third millennium and the second millennium B.C., it
was customary to carve inscriptions on seals – names and titles of
the owners. Thus, a seal served simultaneously as an ID and a diploma
of a school for scribes. Beginning in the 6th century B.C., cylinder seals
were gradually replaced by small stamp seals borrowed from the Persians
(these could be inserted into a ring), or pyramidal seals. If a person
did not have a seal, he could leave an imprint of a piece of clothing
or a fingernail on a document, accompanied by his name. In some cases, probably to ensure reliability, a document was put inside
a clay envelope, on which a summary of the text was written. Sometimes,
letters were put into envelopes, but such envelopes also contained a summary
of a letter, not an address. Envelopes were broken when open, but a few
unopened envelopes with tablets inside them have survived to the present
day. As a rule, documents were stored in jugs, or baskets woven from rushes.
Later, there were whole rooms with tablets stored on clay shelves –
prototypes of libraries. The lids of vessels and doors of rooms with documents
(as well as with food products and other valuables) were often sealed.
A lid was tied with a string, with pieces of moist clay put around it
or applied at its ends. A seal was then applied to the moist clay, and
an inscription was made with a list of stored documents or goods. Now
it was impossible to reach the contents without breaking the dry clay.
Today, such clay seals are called bullae. Their shapes varied: spheroids,
three or four-sided, sometimes resembling a rectangular tablet, or olive-shaped.
A distinguishing property of bullae is a hole, through which a rush string
once ran. Sometimes, the clay contains well-preserved imprints of such
ropes. The Hermitage collection contains also royal inscriptions that were incorporated
into foundations of buildings. Some of them have a peculiar shape from
our point of view: they look like large clay nails with heads. Sumerian
rulers laid such nails into the walls of temples and other buildings.
The nails contained information about which ruler built the temple. The
building inscriptions did not always look like nails; they could have
the shape of bricks or small tablets. In the first millennium B.C., the
kings preferred the shape of a cone or prism. To master cuneiform writing was an extremely difficult undertaking. For this reason, the would-be scribes studied their art for many years. They began their education as little children, probably at the age of five or six, and finished when they were young men. Only boys attended classes. Very rarely, however, the texts mention women scribes, but we do not know whether they studied at school or at home with their fathers. As a rule, the profession of scribe was hereditary. It is not unlikely that schools in Mesopotamia disappeared over the course of time, and teaching was carried out exclusively in private or at home. While schools existed, however, the educational program was quite difficult. For the first three to four years, the students learned the cuneiform writing (the number of signs reached six or seven hundred). The Sumerian language was mandatory, even when it was no longer used as a spoken language. The beginner scribes used tablets that had a distinguishable round shape. They wrote single characters, Sumerian words and names, then short sayings: proverbs, for example. In addition to copying and reading tablets, other educational methods were used, for example, dictation, and, most important, cramming. Even mathematical problems were learned by heart. Deducting common rules that could be applied for solving specific problems, as was common among the Greeks, and is practiced up to the present day, did not exist in Mesopotamia. In the higher grades, students learned more difficult subjects: they copied long literary texts and codes of law, practiced dividing fields into smaller areas and sharing rations between laborers, composed balanced accounts and business letters. The program included making copies of various lists of words: plants, birds, fish, animals, metals, and constellations. Such lists were probably attempts to grasp and regulate the surrounding world, i.e. akin to scientific works. We do not know what Mesopotamian schools were like. Most likely, students
sat on mats, holding tablets in their left hands. Small children and older
students were in the same room; they were assigned different tasks, however.
Students were called “sons of the school,” assistant teachers
“big brothers,” and the teacher himself was the “father
of the school.” There was very strict discipline at school. Children
were punished when they misbehaved. The methods of punishments varied:
60 stick lashes, or the order to wear copper chains around the legs, for
example. The students conveyed their grudges to the tablets: they smashed
them, deformed them, broke off their corners, or drew scrawls and scribbles
on them. After finishing school, young men took their final exams and
received the title of scribe. |
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