Developing of writing

The Arabic script: from the 5th century BC

A stele, or inscribed column, is set up at Tema in northwest Arabia. Dating from the 5th century BC, its inscription is the earliest known example of the writing which evolves a millennium later into the Arabic script. 

The script is developed from the 1st century BC by the Nabataeans, a people speaking a Semitic language whose stronghold atPetra, on a main caravan route, brings them prosperity and the need for records. Writing is not much needed by thenomads of Arabia, but when it becomes urgently required for the Qur'an(to record accurately the words of God in the 7th century AD), the Nabataean example is to hand. ThroughIslam and the spread of Arabic, it becomes one of the world's standard scripts. 

The first American script: 2nd c. BC - 3rd c. AD

Of the various early civilizations of central America, the Maya make the greatest use of writing. In their ceremonial centres they set up numerous columns, or stelae, engraved with hieroglyphs. But they are not the inventors of writing in America. 

Credit for this should possibly go back as far as the Olmecs. Certainly there is some evidence that they are the first in the region to devise acalendar, in which writing of some sort is almost essential. The Zapotecs, preceding the Maya, have left the earliest surviving inscriptions, dating from about the 2nd century BC. The first Mayan stele to be securely dated is erected at Tikal in the equivalent of the year AD 292. 
The Mayan script is hieroglyphic with some phonetic elements. Its interpretation has been a long struggle, going back to the 16th century, and even today only about 80% of thehieroglyphs are understood. They reveal that the script is used almost exclusively for two purposes: the recording of calculations connected with the calendar and astronomy; and the listing of rulers, their dynasties and their conquests. 

Thus the priests and the palace officials of early America succeed in preserving writing for their own privileged purposes. In doing so they deny their societies the liberating magic of literacy.