Meaning "wedge-shaped," cuneus in Latin, the term refers to any writing system in which the words are formed by impressing a reed stylus onto a soft writing surface, usually clay, but sometimes wax.
Cuneiform inscriptions from Assyria
in the British Museum.
In use in Babylon since about 3100 BC until as late as 1st Cent AD, cuneiform was widely distributed in the ancient Near East, from Iran to Anatolia, Armenia through Syria and Palestine to Egypt.
The modern cipherment of cuneiform was both fortuitous as well as ingenious. The process began when samples of Akkadian cuneiform artifacts were brought to Europe in the 17th Cent. Progress was made when it was discovered that some of the samples were, in fact, trilingual but, more importantly, when long enough inscriptions became available as when the English scholar Henry Rawlingson copied the inscription of Darius I on a cliffside in Bisitun (Iran), and when it was realized that Akkadian was a member of the Semitic family of languages.
Other languages written in cuneiform include Elamite, Sumerian, Hurrian, Hittite, and Ugaritic.
Resources :
The Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative (
) contains some of the most important resources on Assyriology and cuneiform studies.
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