Though the scripts look completely different, hieroglyphs emerged after cuneiform was established. This suggests Egyptian travelers or diplomats encountered the *idea* of writing in Mesopotamia. They then developed their own system using culturally relevant pretty pictures instead of adopting abstract cuneiform signs.

A recently translated tablet revealed that the Babylonian flood story specified a round boat, like a giant coracle. This design, common on Mesopotamian rivers, is nearly impossible to sink. It prioritizes stability and capacity over navigability, making it the perfect vessel to survive a flood.

Similar to the Rosetta Stone, scholars cracked cuneiform using a monument with the same text in three languages. They first decoded the simpler Old Persian script by identifying repeating patterns like kings' titles, then used that knowledge to unlock the more complex Babylonian text.

Our fascination with danger isn't a flaw but a survival mechanism. Like animals that observe predators from a safe distance to learn their habits, humans consume stories about threats to understand and prepare for them. This 'morbid curiosity' is a safe way to gather crucial information about potential dangers without facing direct risk.

Studying history can be a calming practice. It reveals that past eras were often far worse than the present, providing a soothing perspective that humanity has endured and overcome similar or greater challenges before. This counters the modern feeling of unique, terminal decline.

While writing enabled literature, its initial large-scale driver was administration. The Sumerians quickly developed sophisticated numeracy and bookkeeping to manage tithes, track goods, and run their city-states. This established accounting as a foundational use of the written word.

People watched the movie 'Contagion' during the pandemic rather than reading scientific papers because the human brain is wired to learn through first-person stories, not lists of facts. Narratives provide a simulated, experiential perspective that taps into ancient brain mechanisms, making the information more memorable, understandable, and emotionally resonant.

An ancient tablet recounting the flood story omits phrases like "he said," which are standard in later texts. This suggests it was a script for a live narrator performing different character voices, capturing literature at the exact moment it was transitioning from oral performance to written text.

Cuneiform began as pictographs for simple records like "three bottles of milk." Its revolutionary leap was using those symbols to represent sounds (syllables), enabling the writing of abstract thought, complex grammar, and literature that pictures alone could not capture.