The Story of Writing (A Story for Children)

 

The Story of Writing

The art of writing is so common now that we do not understand its importance. It is one of the most wonderful inventions of man. We cannot live without it. If there were no writing, there would be no newspapers, no books. no libraries There would be no school or college. We would not be able to write letters to our friends and relatives living far away from us. There would be no books on engineering. medicine, accounts, business etc.

There would be no banks to keep our accounts of money. Nations will not be able to trade with one another. Human progress would stop in every field of life. On the contrary, the standard of life will fall to such a degree that we will be living like animals. There would be no sign of art, science, or industry. We would live like the cavemen six thousand years back.

In very early times men understood each other and expressed their ideas and feelings, through signs. The Scythians, a group of ancient nomadic warriors who lived in what is now southern Siberia and the Persians of olden times understood each other in this way. The Scythians sent a bird, a mouse, a frog and five arrows to the Persians. They wanted to tell the Persians that they would attack them with arrows to defeat them. The meaning of this all-in writing was: "O Persians! Can you fly like birds? (i.e., to escape from arrows). Can you dig into the earth and hide in holes like mice? Can you jump and swim over water or wetlands like frogs? If you cannot do any of these three things, you should not try to fight with us. When we shall strike you with arrows, you will not be able to face them you will be defeated." However, this method was troublesome and incomplete.

The Egyptians invented a kind of writing known as hieroglyphics. This word means 'sacred carving. It was something like picture-writing. Many countries used this method in ancient times. Even today it is used in some places in the world as in China.

The invention of the alphabet or letters in place of pictures is a great achievement. Now almost the whole world makes use of an alphabet. Of course, different people have different alphabets. As a result of this system of writing, there are printing presses everywhere in the world now.

 "Hieroglyphics" is a kind of picture writing invented by the ancient Egyptians. They used it in temples and tombs. Therefore, it was called sacred. They drew pictures of objects like the sun, the moon, the birds, the animals etc. At first, each picture was a sign only of the object drawn. But as time passed the picture was meant not only for the object drawn but also to suggest the idea for which the object stood. For example, at first, the picture of an arm stood for a part of the human body. Later it came to mean or suggest 'strength. Sometimes pictures of two or more objects were combined to express a new idea.

In very early times picture-writing was used in many countries. It has not disappeared even today altogether.

The Chinese will make use of some picture writing. But most countries gave it up when the alphabet was invented. The Chinese language is difficult to learn. It consists of thousands of characters or signs which stand for not only an object but also for an idea. For example, there are characters for an eye and a hand. But when they are combined, they stand for a look. The same characters are spoken differently in different parts of China. The Chinese language is written vertically and not from left to right or from right to left.