9.4K views · 194 reactions | How to read proto-cuneiform tablets. #cuneiform #writing #linguistics #language #history | Linguistic Discovery | Facebook

We might finally be able to read clay tablets from the birth of written language. Cuneiform was developed by the Sumerians in ancient Mesopotamia over 5000 years ago, and whilst there are actually more surviving cuneiform texts than in other ancient languages like Latin and Greek, we have only ever managed to translate a tiny portion of them. Thanks to a revolutionary breakthrough in imaging technology, that could be about to change. Oxford researchers have applied a technique called Reflectance