Scripts: (developed independently)
Mesopotamian/Sumerian cuneiform (3500 BC)
Egyptian Hieroglyphics (3000 BC)
Minoan or Mycenean “Linear B” (1200 BC)
Indus Valley script (3000-2400 BC)
Chinese script (1500 BC)
Mayan script (AD 50)
Aztec script (AD 1400)
| 3,500-3,000 B.C.E | Pictograms for accounting | Uruk (Sumer) |
| 3,000 B.C.E | Combined pictograms, ideograms & phonograms | China |
| 3,000 B.C.E | Parallel writing on stone and copper tablets | India |
| 3,000-2,500 B.C.E | Hieroglyphs | Egypt |
| 1,000-700 B.C.E | Phoenician alphabet (Semitic abjad) spreads, paving the way for the Greek alphabet (Phoenician concasonants + Aramaic consonants signs used as vowels (A, E, O, Y) and I (an innovation) |
Greece |
| 1,000-700 B.C.E | Further East, the Aramaic alphabet (descended from the Phoenician alphabet) is the forerunner of Hebrew and Arabic scripts. | |
| 600 B.C.E. | Greeks and Etruscans settle in Rome. Latin appears. | |
| Middle Ages | Carolingian, Gothic, and humanist scripts record Latin in Western Europe, while Cyrillic, derived from Greek, develops further east |