WRITING, origin of alphabetical. The history of the origin and progress of writ ten languages is, in most of its stages, less enveloped in obscurity than that of oral language. Difficulties attend it in common with every inquiry into antiquity; but the data are more numerous and pro gressive than the fleeting nature of audible signs would admit. The rudiments of the art of writing are very simple ; its advances towards the present state of im provement, slow and gradual. Visible language first used marks as the signs of things ; and we can trace it through all its stages, from the simple picture, to the arbitrary mark for the elements of sound.
The rudest species of visible commu nication was, the variously coloured knot ted cords of the Peruvians, called the quipos. They have been represented by some authors as regular annals of the em pire; but they might have some signifi cancy by agreement; it is probable that without oral interpretation they would denote nothing more than that something was to be remembered, like the twelve stones in Joshua, iv. 21, 22. Robertson, with more probability, supposes that they were a device for rendering calcula tion more expeditious and accurate ; that by the various colours, different objects were denoted ; and by each knot a dis tinct number. This is rendered still more probable by the circumstance, that picture-writing was used by the Peruvians; and, as the names of numbers must be denoted by arbitrary signs to render cal culation at all extensive, this species of arbitrary sign might be more convenient for their rude arithmetic than any other.
Picture-writing, such as was adopted by the Mexicans, is the first step of the pro gress towards letter-writing. The sim plest species was a mere delineation of the object to be denoted. Thus the North American Indians, when they went to war, painted some trees with the fi gures of warriors, often of the exact number of the party ; and if they went by water, they delineated a canoe. Thus, too, the Mexicans, at the arrival of the Spaniards, sent large paintings on cloth as dispatches to Montezuma. The Mexicans had made some progress be yond simple delineations ; but of these their paintings are principally composed, and by a proper disposition of their fi gures, they could exhibit a more complex series of events in historical order. Some very curious specimens of this picture writing are preserved : the most valuable one has been published, and may be found in Purchas's " Pilgrim," or in Thevenot's "Collection of Voyages." It is divided
into three parts the first is a history of the Mexican Empire ; the second is a tribute-roll ; and the third, a code of their institutions.
The defects of this mode of communi cation must have been early felt. Where applicable, it was tedious, and was con fined to objects of sense. The human in tellect, stimulated by the necessity of im provement,would have proceeded through the same course in the New World as in the Old; but a stop was put to this progress by the destruction of the most cultivated empires. Picture writing, then the sim ple hieroglyphic, then the symbolical hie roglyphic, then the arbitrary character for words, and, lastly, for letters, was the evident progress of the mind. The Mexi cans had actually, in some instances, pass ed through all the intermediate stages ; though the short duration of their empire prevented them from extending these rudiments to a regular system. In the simple hieroglyphic, the principal part or circumstance of a subject is placed for the whole. In the historical painting be fore mentioned, towns are unitbrmly de- i noted by the rude delineation of a house, to which was added some distinguishing emblem : these emblems were debote ments of their names, which were general- ly significant compounds. Kings and ge nerals were in like manner denoted by heads of men, with similar emblematic marks conjoined. They also used the symbolical hieroglyphic to denote a con queror : they placed a target with darts between the characters, for the king, and the cities which he had subdued. Their marks for months and other portions of time, for the air, the earth, &c. were sym bolical ; and their cyphers are arbitrary characters : they painted as many small circles as there were units to 20, which had its proper mark ; by the successive addition of these marks, they denoted numbers to 20 times 20, or 400, which again had its proper mark ; then by the successive addition of these, they denoted . as far as 20 times 400, or 8000, which had a new character. Whatever their advan ces, however, annals so conveyed must have been very imperfect ; and according ly they took great pains to instruct the young to supply the deficiencies, and to remove the ambiguities, by means of tra ditionary explanations. See Robertson's " America," vol. iii. p. 173-180 ; from whom, and Clavigero, this account is de rived.