what tools did the sumerians use for writing
Clay tablet The clay tablet was thus being used by scribes to take down the events of what was happening during his time. Tools that these scribes used were styluses with sharp triangular tips, making it easy to leave markings on the clay,[5] the clay tablets themselves came in a variety of colors such as bone white, chocolate, and charcoal.[6] Pictographs then began to appear on clay tablets around 4000 BC, and after the later development of Sumerian cuneiform writing, a more sophisticated partial syllabic script evolved that by around 2500 BC was capable of recording the vernacular, the everyday speech of the common people.[6]
Slate (writing) The exact origins of the writing slate remain unclear. References to its use can be found in the fourteenth century and evidence suggests that it was used in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The central time period for the writing slate, however, “appears to begin in the later eighteenth century, when developments in sea and land transport permitted the gradual expansion of slate quarrying in Wales and the growth of a substantial slate workshop industry.”[4] By the nineteenth century, writing slates were used around the world in nearly every school and were a central part of the slate industry. At the dawn of the twentieth century, writing slates were the primary tool in the classroom for students. In the 1930s (or later) writing slates began to be replaced by more modern methods.[5] However, writing slates did not become obsolete. They are still made in the twenty-first century, though in small quantities.