PREFACE
Reading edition
If this little book does not supply a want, it fills, however imperfectly, a gap; for the only work in the English language on the subject—Canon Isaac Taylor's "History of the Alphabet"—is necessarily charged with a mass of technical detail which is stiff reading even for the student of graphiology. Moreover, invaluable and indispensable as is that work, it furnishes only a meagre account of those primitive stages of the art of writing, knowledge of which is essential for tracing the development of that art, so that its place in the general evolution of human inventions is made clear. Prominence is therefore given to this branch of the subject in the following pages.
In the recent reprint of Canon Taylor's book no reference occurs to the important materials collected by Professor Flinders Petrie and Mr. Arthur J. Evans in Egypt and Crete, the result of which is to revolutionise the old theory of the source of the Alphabet whence our own and others are derived. This opens up a big question for experts to settle; and here it must suffice to present a statement of the new evidence, and to point out its significance, so that the reader be not taken into the troubled atmosphere of controversy. That he may, further, not be distracted by footnotes, references to the authorities cited are printed in the text.
E. C.
Rosemont, 19 Carleton Road, Tufnell Park, N.
CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE
I. INTRODUCTORY 9
II. THE BEGINNINGS OF THE ALPHABET 23
III. MEMORY-AIDS AND PICTURE-WRITING 37
(a) Mnemonic 39
(b) Pictorial 51
(c) Ideographic 72
(d) Phonetic 79
IV. CHINESE, JAPANESE, AND COREAN SCRIPTS 82
V. CUNEIFORM WRITING 89
VI. EGYPTIAN HIEROGLYPHICS 113
(a) Hieroglyphic Writing 115
(b) Hieratic Writing 125
(c) Demotic Writing 127
VII. THE ROSETTA STONE 128
VIII. EGYPTIAN WRITING IN ITS RELATION TO OTHER SCRIPTS 134
IX. CRETAN AND ALLIED SCRIPTS 157
X. GREEK PAPYRI 198
The Diffusion of the "Phœnician" Alphabet—
(a) Aramean 207
(b) Sabean 212
(c) Hellenic 213
XI. RUNES AND OGAMS 223
INDEX 229
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
Indian Petition to the United States Congress Frontispiece
FIG. PAGE
1. Magical Pictograph against Stings 18
2. Magical Device against Skin Disease 20
3. Aboriginal Rock Carvings (Australia) 27
3a. Aboriginal Rock Paintings (Australia) 28
4. Bushman Paintings 30
4a. Bushman Paintings 31
4b. Specimen of Bushmen Rock Sculptures 32
4c. Engravings found on Rocks in Algeria 33
5. Bushman Rain-Charm 34
6. Semang Rain-Charm 35
6a. Record of Expedition 35
6b. Various Types of the Human Form 36
7. Quipu, for Reckoning, &c. 39
8. Double Calumet Wampum 48
9. Double Calumet Council Hearth 48
10. Jesuit Missionary Wampum 49
11. Four Nations' Alliance Wampum 49
11a. Penn Wampum 50
12,13. Indian Grave-posts 53
14. Tomb-board of Indian Chief 54
15. Hunter's Grave-post 54
16. A Cadger's Map of a Begging District 57
17. Ojibwa Love-letter 58
18. Love-song 58
19. Mnemonic Song of an Ojibwa Medicine-man 59
20. Wâbeno destroying an Enemy 61
21. Etching on Innuit Drill-bow 62
22. Ojibwa Hunting Record 62
23. Hidatsa Pictograph on a Buffalo Shoulder-blade 63
24. Alaskan Hunting Record 63
25. Record of Starving Hunter 63
26. Alaskan Hunting Life 66
27. Indian Expedition 66
28. Biography of Indian Chief 66
29. War-song 68
30. Letter offering Treaty of Peace 70
31. Census Roll of an Indian Band 71
32. Record of Departure (Innuit) 72
33. Statue from Palenque 76
34. Itzcoatl 80
35. Rebus of Itzcoatl 80
36. Paternoster Rebus 81
37. Chinese Picture-writing and Later Uncial 83
38. Chinese and Tibetan Triglot 88
39. Rock Inscription at Behistun 94
40. Cylinder Seal of Sargon I. 107
41. Tell-el-Amarna Tablet 109
42. First Creation Tablet 110
43,44. Deluge Tablet (Chaldean Epic) 111
45. Hieroglyphic, Hieratic, and Demotic Signs for Man 115
46. Comparative Ideographs 122
47. Ptolemy 131
48. Cleopatra 131
49. Kaisars (Cæsar)—A. Takrtr (Autokrator) 131
50. Facsimile of Hieratic Papyrus Prisse 140
51. Inscription on the Eshmunazar Sarcophagus 141
52. Inscription on Sacred Bowls (Baal Lebanon) 146
53. The Moabite Stone 147
54. Maneh Weight 151
55. Vase with Incised Characters (Crete) 160
56. Incised Characters on Cup (Crete) 160
57. Characters on Vase (Crete) 160
58. Signs on Bronze Axe (Delphi) 160
59. Signs on Blocks of Mycenæan Buildings (Knôsos) 166
60. Symbols on Three-sided Cornelian (Crete) 166
61. Symbols on Four-sided Stone (Crete) 166
62. Symbols on Four-sided Stones, with larger faces (Central Crete) 166
63. Symbol on Single-faced Cornelian (Eastern Crete) 166
64. Symbol on Stone of ordinary Mycenæan type (Athens) 166
65. Egyptian Scarabs, XIIth Dynasty—Early Cretan Seal-stones 178
66. Signs on Potsherds at Tell-el-Hesy compared with Ægean Forms 178
67. Hittite Inscription at Hamah 181
68. Signs on Vase-handle (Mycenæ) 183
69. Signs on Amphora-handle (Mycenæ) 183
Acknowledgments are gratefully tendered to Messrs. Macmillan, Messrs. Longmans, Mr. John Murray, Messrs. Eyre & Spottiswoode, Mr. Edward Arnold, Messrs. Witherby, the Cambridge University Press, and the Anthropological Institute for permission to reproduce Illustrations from their several publications.