9 min listen
Cuneiform
ratings:
Length:
9 minutes
Released:
Apr 29, 2017
Format:
Podcast episode
Description
The Egyptians thought literacy was divine; a benefaction which came from the baboon-faced god Thoth. In fact the earliest known script – “cuneiform” – came from Uruk, a Mesopotamian settlement on the banks of the Euphrates in what is now Iraq. What did it say? As Tim Harford describes, cuneiform wasn’t being used for poetry, or to send messages to far-off lands. It was used to create the world’s first accounts. And the world’s first written contracts, too.
Producer: Ben Crighton
Editors: Richard Knight and Richard Vadon
(Image: Close-up of clay tablet, Credit: Kotomiti Okuma/Shutterstock)
Producer: Ben Crighton
Editors: Richard Knight and Richard Vadon
(Image: Close-up of clay tablet, Credit: Kotomiti Okuma/Shutterstock)
Released:
Apr 29, 2017
Format:
Podcast episode
Titles in the series (100)
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