Why was the need of a script felt? When did writing evolve
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IN CHINA, SCRIPT BEGAN DURING THE SHANG DYNASTYAROUND THE YEAR 1200 BCE THROUGH THE USE OF ORACLE BONES IN THE PRACTICE OF DIVINATION.
In China, script began during the Shang Dynasty (1600-1046 BCE) around the year 1200 BCE through the use of oracle bones in the practice of divination. Questons were carved into the shell of a turtle or bone of an animal and that object would then be exposed to intense heat. The resultant cracks in the shell or bone would provide the diviner with an answer to the question posed. This answer, however, came not from the mortal diviner but from the divine realm and, thus, was irrefutable truth. From this beginning, script evolved into the written expression of the spoken language of China which, once set down, became the truth, as in the truth of historical events as interpreted and set down by a writer such as Sima Qian or the records of the court or those of merchants' transactions.

Dead Sea Scrolls
In Greece, writing begins with the Myceneaen Civilization and the only partially decipherable Linear B script of Crete. The Linear A script, which was the written language of the Minoans of Crete, remains undecipherable. Written language, which originated in Mesopotamia, spread first to Egypt and then to other regions, including Crete and then Phoenicia. The alphabet of most modern languages originated in ancient Phoenicia and first came to Greece sometime before the 8th century BCE, from whence it spread. Homer’s Illiad and Odyssey, written around the 8th century BCE, are early examples of the Greek use of the Phoenician alphabet, as are the classics Theogony and Works and Days by Hesiod. Durant provides insight into the dissemination of script in noting:
As trade connected tribes of diverse languages, some mutually intelligible mode of record and communication became desirable. Presumably the numerals were among the earliest written symbols, usually taking the form of parallel marks representing the fingers; we still call them fingers when we speak of them as digits. Such words as five, the German funf and the Greek pente go back to a root meaning hand; so the Roman numerals indicated fingers, `V' represented an expanded hand and `X' was merely two `V's' connected at their points. Writing was in its beginnings a form of drawing, an art. (76).
This art of script would come to produce some of the most meaningful pieces of writing in the history of the world. From The Epic of Gilgamesh to the Hymns of Enheduanna to the Egyptian Book of the Dead, the great Greek epics of Homer, The Mahabharata of India, the Aeneid of Virgil and, more modestly, the letters written by the people of Mesopotamia, Egypt, China, Greece, India, Rome, and all the other nations of the ancient world, script has communicated the most important, most heroic, and also the most practical and basic, aspects of the human condition.
In China, script began during the Shang Dynasty (1600-1046 BCE) around the year 1200 BCE through the use of oracle bones in the practice of divination. Questons were carved into the shell of a turtle or bone of an animal and that object would then be exposed to intense heat. The resultant cracks in the shell or bone would provide the diviner with an answer to the question posed. This answer, however, came not from the mortal diviner but from the divine realm and, thus, was irrefutable truth. From this beginning, script evolved into the written expression of the spoken language of China which, once set down, became the truth, as in the truth of historical events as interpreted and set down by a writer such as Sima Qian or the records of the court or those of merchants' transactions.

Dead Sea Scrolls
In Greece, writing begins with the Myceneaen Civilization and the only partially decipherable Linear B script of Crete. The Linear A script, which was the written language of the Minoans of Crete, remains undecipherable. Written language, which originated in Mesopotamia, spread first to Egypt and then to other regions, including Crete and then Phoenicia. The alphabet of most modern languages originated in ancient Phoenicia and first came to Greece sometime before the 8th century BCE, from whence it spread. Homer’s Illiad and Odyssey, written around the 8th century BCE, are early examples of the Greek use of the Phoenician alphabet, as are the classics Theogony and Works and Days by Hesiod. Durant provides insight into the dissemination of script in noting:
As trade connected tribes of diverse languages, some mutually intelligible mode of record and communication became desirable. Presumably the numerals were among the earliest written symbols, usually taking the form of parallel marks representing the fingers; we still call them fingers when we speak of them as digits. Such words as five, the German funf and the Greek pente go back to a root meaning hand; so the Roman numerals indicated fingers, `V' represented an expanded hand and `X' was merely two `V's' connected at their points. Writing was in its beginnings a form of drawing, an art. (76).
This art of script would come to produce some of the most meaningful pieces of writing in the history of the world. From The Epic of Gilgamesh to the Hymns of Enheduanna to the Egyptian Book of the Dead, the great Greek epics of Homer, The Mahabharata of India, the Aeneid of Virgil and, more modestly, the letters written by the people of Mesopotamia, Egypt, China, Greece, India, Rome, and all the other nations of the ancient world, script has communicated the most important, most heroic, and also the most practical and basic, aspects of the human condition.
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