page_title: History of writing
section_title: Proto-writing
hierarchical_section_title: History of writing / Locations and timeframes / Proto-writing
context_page_description: The history of writing traces the development of expressing language by letters or other marks and also the studies and descriptions of these developments.
  In the history of how writing systems have evolved in different human civilizations, more complete writing systems were preceded by proto-writing, systems of ideographic or early mnemonic symbols. True writing, in which the content of a linguistic utterance is encoded so that another reader can reconstruct, with a fair degree of accuracy, the exact utterance written down, is a later development. It is distinguished from proto-writing, which typically avoids encoding grammatical words and affixes, making it more difficult or even impossible to reconstruct the exact meaning intended by the writer unless a great deal of context is already known in advance. One of the earliest forms of written expression is cuneiform.
context_section_description: The first writing systems of the Early Bronze Age were not a sudden invention. Rather, they were a development based on earlier traditions of symbol systems that cannot be classified as proper writing, but have many of the characteristics of writing. These systems may be described as "proto-writing." They used ideographic or early mnemonic symbols to convey information, but it probably directly contained no natural language.
  These systems emerged in the early Neolithic period, as early as the 7th millennium BC, and include:
  The Jiahu symbols found carved in tortoise shells in 24 Neolithic graves excavated at Jiahu, Henan province, northern China, with radiocarbon dates from the 7th millennium BC. Most archaeologists consider these not directly linked to the earliest true writing.
  Vinča symbols, sometimes called the "Danube script" - are a set of symbols found on Neolithic era (6th to 5th millennia BC) artifacts from the Vinča culture of Central Europe and Southeastern Europe.
  The Dispilio Tablet of the late 6th millennium may also be an example of proto-writing.
  The Indus script, which from 2600 BCE to 1900 BCE was used for extremely short inscriptions.
  Even after the Neolithic, several cultures went through an intermediate stage of proto-writing before they used proper writing. The "Slavic runes" from the 7th and 8th centuries AD, mentioned by a few medieval authors, may have been such a system. The quipu of the Incas (15th century AD), sometimes called "talking knots," may have been of a similar nature. Another example is the pictographs invented by Uyaquk before the development of the Yugtun syllabary for the Central Alaskan Yup'ik language in about 1900.
caption: Examples of the Jiahu symbols, markings found on tortoise shells, dated around 6000 BC. Most of the signs were separately inscribed on different shells.[28]