oyunjik tablet [--] . It has
been conjectured that the object here represented is "a sarcophagus."
But the true account seems to be that it is a _double-toothed comb,_ a
toilet article peculiar to women, and therefore one which might well be
taken to express "a woman," or more generally the feminine gender. It is
worth notice that the emblem is the very one still in use among the Lurs,
in the mountains overhanging Babylonia. And it is further remarkable
that the phonetic power of the character here spoken of is _it_ (or
_yat_)the ordinary Semitic feminine ending.

The original writing, it would therefore seem, was a picture-writing as
rude as that of the Mexicans. Objects were themselves represented, but
coarsely and grotesquely--and, which is especially remarkable, without
any curved lines. This would seem to indicate that the system grew up
where a hard material, probably stone, was alone used. The cuneiform
writing arose when clay took the place of stone as a material. A small
tool with a square or triangular point, impressed, by a series of
distinct touches, the outline of the old pictured objects on the soft
clay of tablets and bricks. In course of time simplifications took
place. The less important wedges were omitted. One stroke took the
place of two, or sometimes of three. In this way the old form of objects
became, in all but a few cases, very indistinct; while generally it was
lost altogether.

Originally each character had, it would seem, the phonetic power of the
name borne by the object which it represented. But, as this namee was
different in the languages of the different tribes inhabiting the
country, the same character came often to have several distinct phonetic
values. For instance, the character [--] representing "a house," had the
phonetic values of _e, bit,_ and _mal,_ because those were the words
expressive of "a house," among the Hamitic, Semitic, and Arian
populations respectively. Again, characters did not always retain their
original phonetic powers, but abbreviated them. Thus the character which
originally stood for _Assur,_ "Assyria," came to have the sound of _as,_
that denoting _bil_, "a lord," had in addition the sound of _bi,_ and so
on. Under these circumstances it is almost impossible to feel any
certainty in regard to the phonetic representation of a single line of
these old inscriptions. The meaning of each word may be well known; but
the articulate sounds which were