SUMERIAN CUNEIFORM 1NScRI••tONA. There are five chief forms of cuneiform alphabets— Sumerian or Aecadian, Assyro-Babylonian, New Susian, Old Persian, and Armenian. Of these by far the oldest is the Sumerian, also called the hieratic, which was employed by the pre-Semitic inhabitants of INIesopotamia. This alphabet is in character, that is, the signs ex press not syllables, but concepts, and are, conse quently, frequently pictorial in origin, as in the case of * ,heaven, god, which later became or , dagger, later The numerical system, as in all the cuneiform alphabets, consists of simple wedges, , for units, and angles , < , for tens. After sixty, which, like the first digit, is represented by the simple vertical wedge, the system becomes sexa gesimal.
The second alphabet, which is at once the most important and the most complicated of all, is the Assyro-Babylo nian. This is the system. moreover, which had by far the longest use and the widest extent. Not only was it the medium of communication for the kingdoms of Assyria and Babylon, which for centuries controlled Mesopotamia, but it was employed by the kings in their messages to Egypt. as is shown by the rich discovery in 1S87 of three hundred and twenty bricks inscribed with these characters at Tel-el-Amarna, which lies on the east hank of the Nile about one hun dred and eighty miles south of Memphis. The citing is syllabic in character, and with the homophones, or different signs for the same sound, polyphones, or signs with various values, and ideograms, or pictorial representations, num bers some five hundred characters. The read ing of these signs has been rendered possible by the discovery at Babylon of the so-called syl labaries. This class of tablets contains in the centre the phonogram, which is explained syl labically on one side and ideographically on the other. The reading of the in scriptions is further simplified by determina tires, which are found also in all the other cunei form systems except Old Persian, as well as in Egyptian hieroglyphics. By these signs, which precede the word they determine, the noun is shown to denote a country. deity, or the like. Thus, in the Sumerian alphabet, one vertical wedge is the determinative for a man. three lon gitudinal wedges for a country, while in Assyro Babylonian the sign for god, above noted, is the determinative for the name of a deity, and two vertical wedges indicate the dual number. Tho substances on which those inscriptions were cut were numerous. Not only clay bricks, as in the Tel-el-Amarna tablets, but also seals, stone obelisks, statues of hulls and lions. and the walls of the palaces were favorite places for texts to be inscribed. The writing is often exceedingly
minute, some tablets having six lines to the inch, so that the complex characters must be read with the help of a magnifying, glass. It is probable that the letters were cut with such assistance. as lenses of considerable power hate been found among the ruins of the Mesopotamian cities. In writing on sculpture the details of the carving were often entirely neglected, so that the lines of text are frequently carried over representations of portraiture or drapery. The clay tablets are of various sizes, some being as large as nine by six inches, while others are little more than an inch square. The character of the writing nat urally varies, and there is of course a slight but constant change, so that the later .Assyro-Baby Ionian cuneiform letters are distinctly (hirer ent from the earlier. It would not be easy to overestimate the importance of the solution of the literature of Babylonia and Assyria. Not only in its contribution to our knowledge of the East, which had been almost a sealed hook, is it of value. Almost more momentous still is the light lvhicL it has cast on the ereation and deluge legends of Genesis, and its resultant value for Old Testament students.
Now SUSIAN. The third variety of the cunei form inscriptions, while ultimately derived from the system, is very much simpler. The name which should be assigned to it is somewhat doubtful. It has been called by no less than ten names—Median, Proto-Median, Medo-Seythian, Scythian, Elamitic, New Elam itie, Susian, Amardian, Anzanian, 'and New Susian. It is also termed the `language of the second form,' in allusion to the fact that the only monument of it which has yet been discov ered is the second of the three versions of the inscriptions of the Persian Aelicemenians. The name which seems preferable and is adopted by the majority of scholars at present is New Susian. This system contains ninety-six syllabic signs, which at times. however, show a distinct approach to alphabetic values. Like the other cuneiform alphabets, the New Susian ideograms and determina-tives, having sixteen of the former and five of the latter. It is note worthy that each ideogram, excepting for zun kuk, king, which already has one determinative, is followed by the determinative , id. The readings of the New Susian characters are in general fairly clear, although there is uncer tainty about many words. The 01(1 and Middle Susian inscriptions are still little known. Their study, should it prove successful, may help to solve some of the difficulties which still beset our knowledge of New Susian.