History of

Graphic
Design
YQUIN, MELANIE V.
BMMA Instructor
Invention of Writings
and Alphabets
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LESSON OUTLINE LEARNING OUTCOMES

Here’s what I will teach you in this

1. The Early Writings
course material:

2. Earliest form of Writing 1. Knowledgably discuss graphic design

historical styles and movements.
3. Egyptian Hieroglyphs
2. Learn more about the historical periods of
4. Papyrus and Writing graphic design and designers and the origin
of writing and Alphabets.
5. History of Alphabet
3. Analyze and critically respond to example
6. Greek Alphabet of the father of graphic design.

7. Latin Alphabet
RESOURCES NEEDED
8. Evolution of Alphabet & Asian
For this lesson, you would need the
Alphabet
following resources:

1. PowerPoint

2. Drawing materials

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Part 1
The Prologue of Graphic Design:
The Visual Message from pre-history through the medieval era

Invention of Writings and

Alphabets

In this lesson, the system of graphic marks representing the units of a specific language – has been
invented independently in the Greek, Latin and Near East, China. The cuneiform script, created in
Mesopotamia, present-day Iraq, ca. 3200 BC, was first. It is also the only writing system which can be
traced to its earliest prehistoric origin. This antecedent of the cuneiform script was a system of counting
and recording goods with clay tokens. The evolution of writing from tokens to pictography, syllabary and
alphabet illustrates the development of information processing to deal with larger amounts of data in ever
greater abstraction.

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I
The Early Writings

The development of writing and visible language had its earliest origins in simple pictures, for a
close connection exists between the drawing of pictures and the marking of writing. Both are natural
ways of communicating ideas, and early people used pictures as an elementary way to record and
transmit information.

First, let’s talk about “The Invention of writings”.

The earliest written records were found in Mesopotamia, in what is

now known as the Middle East - specifically Syria and Iraq. This
recorded information might include tax records, food inventories,
bills of sale, etc. One theory holds that the origin of written language
was simply to identify contents of pottery and various leather
containers. Prior to early writing, information was memorized and
verbally exchanged or passed down to later generations—obviously,
an unreliable method of accurate record keeping

The Early writing style

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Over 200,000 years ago which called The cradle of Civilization, early visual markings were found in
caves in and around Africa, Europe, and specifically in the Lascaux caves in Southern France. See image
below.

Cave painting from Lascaux, circa 15-10,000 B.C.E.

These markings were not interpreted as “Art” but more as visual images for utilitarian and ritualistic
purposes.

1. Utilitarian - Designed to be useful or practical rather than attractive.

2. Ritualistic - Relating to or characteristic of rituals followed as part of a religious or solemn

ceremony.

Markings represented animals, geometric shapes, or other graphic symbols, and were either smeared or
painted on the cave walls with a finger or a reed “brush,” or etched into the surface.

Earliest form of Writing

II
Sometime before 3000 B.C.E., Where the earliest form of writing begun
(see the image). The Sumerians settled in Mesopotamia. They are
attributed with initiating the path towards civilization, bringing about a
more sophisticated form of writing that greatly impacted social order and economic progress.

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The earliest written records were discovered on clay tablets created with a reed stylus sharpened to a point
to create fine, curved lines. These markings were called Pictographs or Pictograms.

The clay or mud tablet that was dried in the hot sun used to back then for writing. Unlike cave paintings,
these tablets were more portable, albeit fragile and unwieldy to carry. In addition, This clay tablet
demonstrates how the Sumerian symbols for “star” (which also meant “heaven” or “god”), “head,” and
“water” evolved from early pictographs in 3100 B . C .). see image below

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Eventually, in 2500 B.C. Pictographs were created with a wooden or reed stylus that instead of being
drawn onto the surface of the clay, were stamped into it using a variety of combinations to represent
words.

This innovation evolved later in

2100 B.C. into abstract sign writing
called “Cuneiform” (Latin for
“wedge-shaped.”). see image
Cuneiform writing was used to record
a variety of information such as

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temple activities, business and trade. Cuneiform was also used to write stories, myths, and personal
letters.

The latest known example of cuneiform is an astronomical text from C.E. 75. During its 3,000-
year history cuneiform was used to write around 15 different languages including Sumerian,
Akkadian, Babylonian, Assyrian, Elamite, Hittite, Urartian and Old Persian.

Eventually, by combining pictographs,

people could create abstract ideas or
emotions called Ideographs. See image

From the first stage, when picture-symbols

represented animate and inanimate objects,
signs became ideographs and began to
represent abstract ideas.

Adverbs, prepositions, and personal names

often could not be adapted to pictographic

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representation. Picture symbols began to represent the sounds of the objects depicted instead of the
objects themselves.

From Cuneiform to ideograph this writing became what we called “Rebus writing”, which is pictures
and/or pictographs representing words and syllables with the same or similar sound as the object
depicted. Pictures were used as phonograms, or graphic symbols for sounds.

The highest development of cuneiform was its use of abstract signs to represent syllables, which are
sounds made by combining more elementary sounds. Which later mostly seen.

Egyptian hieroglyphs

III

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By the time King Menes unified the land of Egypt and formed the First Dynasty around 3100 B.C a
number of inventions from the Sumerians had reached Egypt, including the cylinder seal, architectural
designs of brick, decorative design motifs, and the fundamentals of writing.

Unlike the Sumerians, who evolved their pictographic writing into the abstract cuneiform, the Egyptians
retained their picture-writing system, called hieroglyphics (Greek
for “sacred carving,” after the Egyptian for “the god’s words”), for
almost three-and-a-half millennia

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The earliest known hieroglyphs (dated from about 3100 B.C) and the last known written hieroglyphic
inscription was carved in A.D. 394, many decades after Egypt had become a Roman colony. See image.

Hieroglyphics were written in horizontal rows or vertical columns and were read according to the
direction the images were facing—if the figures are facing left then begin reading from the left. If facing
down, then start at the top and read down, etc.

Ancient Egypt clearly represents the early

phases of Western civilization as we know
it today. Greek culture received much of its
knowledge from the Egyptians. Our use of
visual symbols originated with the
Egyptians; from them we inherited the
zodiac, the scales of justice, and the use of
animals to represent concepts, cities, and
people

The design flexibility of hieroglyphics (see image below) was greatly increased
by the choice of writing direction. One started from the direction in which the living
creatures were facing. The lines could be written horizontally or vertically, so the
designer of an
artifact or
manuscript t had
four choices: left
to right
horizontally; left to
right in vertical
columns; right to

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left horizontally; and right to left in vertical columns. Sometimes, as demonstrated

in the schematic of the sarcophagus of Aspalta, these design possibilities were
Papyrus and
combined writing
in one work.
IV

In ancient times the Cyperus papyrus plant grew along the Nile in shallow marshes and pools. Egyptians
made extensive use of this plant, whose 4.6-meter (about 15-foot) stems grew up above the water.
Papyrus flowers were used for garlands at the temples; roots were used for fuel and utensils; and stems
were the raw material for sails, mats, cloth, rope, sandals, and, most importantly, papyrus.

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The Egyptians were the first to produce illustrated manuscripts where words and pictures were combined
to communicate information. The Book of the Dead, while not literally a book, was a selection of spells,
passwords, and images written in a first-person narrative by the deceased and placed in the burial tomb
along with the body.

Preoccupied with death and afterlife, Egyptian scribes and artists were commissioned to create funerary
texts that would be buried with a person and aid in their transition into the afterlife.

In addition, Wall paintings and papyri used similar design conventions. Men were shown with darker
skin color than women, and important persons were in larger scale than less important persons. The
human body was drawn as a two-dimensional schematic. The frontal body had arms, legs, and head in
profile. The stylized eye reads simultaneously as both profile and frontal image. Even though flatness
was maintained, Egyptian artists were capable of sensitive observation and recording of details.

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History of Alphabet
V

So far, were are done in the history of writing. Now, let’s

have some discussion about the “History of Alphabets”.

Numerous and often conflicting theories have been advanced
about the origins of the alphabet; suggested sources include
cuneiform, hieroglyphs, prehistoric geometric signs, and early
Cretan pictographs. The subsequent invention of the alphabet (a
word derived from the first two letters of the Greek alphabet,
alpha and beta ) was a major step forward in human
communications.

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Evolution of Alphabets
VI “The Geek Alphabet”

The Phoenician alphabet (see image below) was the first written Alphabet in the history. It made
up of twenty-two characters, was in use by 1500 B.C. Written right to left, the alphabet was both carved
in stone as well as written on papyrus with a reed brush or pen. In addition,
the Phoenician culture originated in the Eastern Mediterranean region of the Levant (Southern Syria,
Lebanon and Northern Israel).

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In latter part, The Phoenician alphabet was adopted by the ancient Greeks around 1000 B.C. Five of the
consonants were changed to vowels. From a graphic design standpoint, the Greeks applied geometric
structure and order to the uneven Phoenician characters. (see image below)

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Initially, the Greeks adopted the Phoenician style of writing from right to left, but later they developed a
writing method called boustrophedon. meaning “to plow a field with an ox.” In other words, text was
written and read from left to right, the next line left to right, and then right to left, etc. (see images below)

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Then, During the second century A.D., the Greeks developed a more rounded style called uncials. Using
these characters, text could be written more quickly with fewer strokes. Uncials also demonstrated how
writing tools and substrates influence written forms.

After, it was first witnessed around 850 B.C., the Aramaic alphabet was written with a wide pen, held at
a 45 degree angle that produce d heavy horizontal and thin vertical strokes.

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Common writing materials in Greek

Scrolls made of papyrus (see image below) were commonly used as the preferred substrate for writing
lots of related text content. Unfortunately, most of the knowledge and information recorded about Greek
civilization has been lost due to the fragile nature of papyrus scrolls and the damp Greek climate.

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Evolution of Alphabets
VII “The Latin Alphabet”

The Greek alphabet was altered by the Romans by adding the letter G to replace the Z (zeta),
which had little value to the Latin language. The Latin alphabet then, had 21 characters—A, B, C, D, E, F,
G, H, I, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, T, V and X.

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The Greek letters Y and Z were added because the Romans were appropriating Greek words and sounds.
Three additional letters, J, U, and W were added, completing the 26-character alphabet used today in
western culture.

In the study of the Roman alphabet, there has been

much discussion concerning the serifs on the ends of
the character strokes.

One theory holds that they were made by the

stonemasons’ chisels as a way to “clean up” the
stroke ends. Others would argue that they were first
drawn on the stone by the scribes with a flat brush to
sharpen the terminals.

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The written Roman hand had two prominent forms—the most important:

1. Capitalis Quadrata (square capitals) - an ancient Roman form of writing, and the basis for
modern capital letters.

2. Capitalis Rustica - These letterforms were condensed to take up less space and were quickly
written. Substrates were expensive, and rustica enabled scribes to write half again as many letters
as was possible with the square capitals.

Charlemagne attempted to standardize page layout, writing style, and decoration. With Celtic influences,
including the use of guidelines, ascenders and descenders, letters were ordered into a uniform script called
Caroline minuscules

Caroline minuscules are the forerunner of

our contemporary lowercase alphabet. This
new alphabet restored legibility and were
more practical and easier to write.

The Romanesque period between 1000 and

1500 A.D. brought about renewed religious
fervor. The need for large liturgical books,
bibles, Gospels and psalters reached its
peak and for the first time, universal design
characteristics were possible.

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Gothic lettering and illumination, influenced by the elaborate architectural spires in Germany,
demonstrated strong verticals capped with pointed serifs. Space between letters and words was condensed
and rounded letters were all but eliminated. Textura is the name for this type of Gothic lettering due to
the dense black texture of the pages.

Manuscripts

Hand-written and illustrated books gave rise to

what are called illuminated manuscripts.

Gold leaf and beautifully rendered letters and

images gave the sensation of each page being
literally illuminated.

During the Christian era in Europe, manuscripts were

created in monastic scriptoriums or writing rooms.
The monks painstakingly lettered and illustrated
these manuscripts primarily depicting religious

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themes and teachings. Many were small enough to fit into a saddlebag and this portability enabled
knowledge and ideas to be spread from one region or time period to another.

A consistent design approach to these illuminated manuscripts was

the use of crisp rustic lettering, wide margins, and justified text
columns. Generally the first letter on the page was intricately
illustrated, and the text was framed by an equally elaborate border.
Religious iconography or images from nature were often the
subject of the illustrations. Full pages of decorative design were
called carpet pages because of their intricate patterning associated
with oriental carpets.

Lastly, The hundreds of symbols used by cuneiforms and

hieroglyphics were replaced by twenty or thirty easily-learned
characters. The similarities in the Cretan pictographs, and Phoenician, Greek, and Roman alphabets
clearly show the evolution of the western alphabet we use today.

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Evolution of Alphabets
VIII “The Asian Alphabet”

In East Asia, The Chinese writing system is the most widespread writing system in East Asia.
Vietnamese used to use it; Korean still does in some contexts; and Japanese uses it too, but augments it
with two other writing systems.
Chinese characters were designed
to be written with straight or
gently curving brush strokes,
which means even something that
depicts a circle is more like a box
— here's the sun: 日 . There are
actually two versions of the
Chinese characters now; in the People's Republic of China, some characters have been simplified, while
in Taiwan and some other places, the traditional forms remain. Here's a traditional horse: 馬 . Here's a
simplified one: 马.

Calligraphy is considered the highest art form in China. Oriental painting and calligraphy are executed
with ink on paper or silk using gestured strokes of the brush.

During the Han Dynasty (third century A.D., seals

called chops were made by carving calligraphic
characters in a flat surface of jade, silver, gold, or
ivory—similar to that of a present day rubber stamp.
These were used to make identification imprints, and
are considered to be the first form of printing.

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The Korean alphabet, known as Hangul, is

considered one of the most scientific writing
systems ever invented. It is designed to indicate
the shape and position of the lips and tongue for
the different sounds that combine into a syllable.
Look for characters made up of combinations of
circles, straight lines, and upward points.

Fourteen consonants are represented by abstract

depictions of the position of the mouth and tongue
when they are spoken, and are placed in five
groups of related sounds.

Mongolian:
Mongolian tends to use the Cyrillic alphabet now, but you might still see the Mongolian script on signs,
books, CDs, and similar display items. It is extremely distinctive, because it is written vertically, top to
bottom, and with a line down the right side. It's vaguely reminiscent of very sharp Arabic writing turned
on its side, or the mane of a wild horse.

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In addition to papyrus as a standard substrate for writing, parchment became popular around 190 B.C. in
Asia It was made from the skins of domestic animals—calves, sheep, and goats.

Unlike papyrus, parchment could be

folded, stitched, and written on both
sides. The codex replaced the scroll for
a variety of reasons—it eliminated the
clumsy rolling and unrolling of the
scrolls, was much stronger than fragile
papyrus, could be written on both sides,
and saved storage space.

KEY TERMS

Calligraphy

Capitalis Quadrata
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References

Algaze, Guillermo (2005) "The Uruk World System: The Dynamics of Expansion of Early Mesopotamian
Civilization", (Second Edition, University of Chicago Press.

Harbeck, James (2019). How to identify Asian, African, and Middle Eastern alphabets at a
glance.
The Week Publication Inc.
Megss, P & Purvis, A (2006). Meggs’ History of Graphic Design. Fourth Edition. John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
Canada.

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