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Articles on Cuneiform

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Tablet V of the Epic of Gilgamesh located in the The Sulaymaniyah Museum, Iraq. Osama Shukir Muhammed Amin FRCP/Wikimedia Commons

AI is helping us read ancient Mesopotamian literature

Generations of readers have experienced the frustration of reading fragments when trying to access classics of ancient Mesopotamian literature.
Writing wasn’t just invented once by a single person. Many different ancient societies invented writing at different times and places. www.shutterstock.com

Curious Kids: who came up with the first letters?

Writing has only been a part of the human story for the last 5,000 years. In comparison, humans began to communicate using speech some 50,000 years ago.
A relief at the ancient Persian city of Persepolis (now in modern Iran), including inscriptions in cuneiform, the world’s oldest form of writing. Diego Delso/Wikimedia

Friday essay: the recovery of cuneiform, the world’s oldest known writing

Cuneiform was used for over 3,000 years in the Ancient Near East, but was only decoded in the 19th century. The writing form is still revealing amazing stories, from literature to mathematics.

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