I don't exclude that some vowelless script predatesTrue, but we do have epigraphic West Semitic, and its
cuneiform. I know this is an unorthodox view. But we have
too little epigraphic material to be certain otherwise.
derivation from Egyptian is fairly well established.
I thought that the relationship is established, but derivation? We are very
uncertain even about the spelling of Egyptian texts. I was under impression
that West Semitic and Egyptian are branches, not consequtive stages. In
fact, there is much controversy even on relation of East and West Semitic.
So it's all speculation.
Epigraphic West Semitic of possibly pre-cuneiform origin (at least,
pre-syllabic cuneiform) is, to my knowledge, scarce.
It seems to me that West Semitic is much closer to cuneiform (or, perhaps,Looks are subjective, but the objective historical evidence proves that you are almost certainly wrong.
vice versa) than to hieroglyphs. Cuneiform looks like cursive West Semitic.
This is subjective, of course.
Nothing, not least because we know quite a lot about the A-C relation.If our comparatively significant body of evidence for Egyptian and
cuneiform script development makes it nearly impossible to
say which came first, then it seems like a stretch to
suppose that West Semitic script predates either one.
We have A (Egyptian), B (cuneiform), and C (West Semitic). We know little of
A-B relation. What does this imply about B-C relation?
...
It seems to me that your theory requires an
explanation of this point. If a vowelless writing system can
only be explained by an absence of vowel differentiation,
then significant phonemic differentiation of vowels would
have created enormous pressure to adapt the writing system.
It did. Masoretic vowel marks, Arabic diacritics.
...Because Sumerian cuneiform predates Ugaritic by well over a millennium.
Indeed, Ugaritic script does seem to have been influenced by cuneiform inits
wedge-formation.
Why are you sure about the direction?
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