riods of
Babylonian history, but the signs and characters impressed upon them
offer the greatest contrast to the Sumerian and early Babylonian
characters with which we are familiar. Although they cannot be fully
deciphered at present, it is probable that they are tablets of accounts,
the signs upon them consisting of lists of figures and what are
probably ideographs for things. Some of the ideographs, such as that for
"tablet," with which many of the texts begin, are very similar to the
Sumerian or Babylonian signs for the same objects; but the majority are
entirely different and have been formed and developed upon a system of
their own.

[Illustration: 230.jpg CLAY TABLET, FOUND AT SUSA, BEARING AN
INSCRIPTION IN THE EARLY PROTO-ELAMITE CHARACTER.]

The photograph is taken from M. de Morgan's _Delegation en
Perse, Mem._, t. vi, pi. 23.

On these tablets, in fact, we have a new class of cuneiform writing in
an early stage of its development, when the hieroglyphic or pictorial
character of the ideographs was still prominent.

[Illustration: 231.jpg CLAY TABLET, RECENTLY FOUND AT SUSA, BEARING AN
INSCRIPTION IN THE EARLY PROTO-ELAMITE CHARACTER.]

The photograph is reproduced from M. de Morgan's _Delegation
en Perse, Mem._, t. vi, pi. 22.

Although the meaning of the majority of these ideographs has not yet
been identified, Pere Scheil, who has edited the texts, has succeeded
in making out the system of numeration. He has identified the signs for
unity, 10, 100, and 1,000, and for certain fractions, and the signs for
these figures are quite different from those employed by the Sumerians.

[Illustration: 231a.jpg Fractions]

The system, too, is different, for it is a decimal, and not a
sexagesimal, system of numeration.

That in its origin this form of writing had some connection with that
employed and, so far as we know, invented by the ancient Sumerians
is possible.* But it shows small trace of Sumerian influence, and the
disparity in the two systems of numeration is a clear indication that,
at any rate, it broke off and was isolated from the latter at a very
early period. Having once been adopted by the early Elamites, it
continued to be used by them for long periods with but small change or
modification. Employed far from the centre of Sumerian civilization, its
development was slow, and it seems to have remained in its ideographic
state, while the system employed by the Sumerians, and ad