The Cuneiform Writing System

(Babylonian and Assyrian Cuneiform Texts) Writing is one of the essentials and characteristics of civilization. Urbanization, capital formation and writing are closely related. Writing developed at the end of the 4th millennium in the Middle East. The prime motivation was of an economic nature: the desire to administer economical and trade transactions. Almost all of the early cuneiform texts and a very large fraction of the 2nd millenium texts concern economy and administration. A comprehensive theory concerning the origin of writing was developed by Denise Schmandt-Besserat, University of Texas.