Deciphering Secrets of Ancient Civilizations, Noah's Ark, and Flood Myths | Lex Fridman Podcast #487

Introduction to Irving Finkel00:00

Irving Finkel is a scholar of ancient languages, curator at the British Museum for over 45 years, world expert on cuneiform script and ancient languages like Sumerian, Akkadian, and Babylonian. Expert on ancient board games, Mesopotamia magic, medicine, literature, and culture.

Origin of Writing01:00

First attempts at writing around middle of fourth millennium, ~3500 BC, in Middle East between Euphrates and Tigris Rivers. Mesopotamians used clay as writing support. Basis of writing: agreed system of symbols where one person makes a sign on a surface, another sees it and knows the sound it represents, like a gramophone record.

Oldest evidence ~3500 BC, but unlikely the actual start. Began with simple pictographic messages: foot is foot, leg is leg, barley is barley. Gradually added numerals, then realized pictures could represent sounds (e.g., picture of foot means sound of word for foot). This liberated from pictographs to recording language, grammar, proverbs, literature.

Fluent scribes could write Sumerian or Babylonian, or any other language by sound, including funny Bronze Age languages written by ear. Examples of scribes recording dictation they couldn't understand, but others could read.

Cuneiform system: complex, bewildering-looking, beautiful, flexible, lasted over 3-4 millennia. Alphabet more useful but took long to displace it.

Invention of Lexicography05:05