In the port cities of Phoenicia, such as Byblos, Tyre and Sidon, scribes used a set of 22 signs, each standing for a consonant, from about 1050 BC, a script that traced back to experiments by Semitic-speaking workers in Egypt and Sinai around 1800 BC. Learning 22 signs was much easier than thousands of hieroglyphs or cuneiform signs. Phoenician traders took it around the Mediterranean, where the Greeks added vowels, around 800 BC. Greek gave rise to the Latin and Cyrillic scripts, while Aramaic and Hebrew letters and Arabic come from the same source.
Before and after
- from c. 1,189 BCE to 1,077 BCETwentieth Dynasty of Egypt
- from 12th century BCE to 7th centuryOrigins of Utica
- from c. 1,077 BCE to 943 BCETwenty-first Dynasty of Egypt
- c. 1,051 BCESiege of Jebus
- c. 1,051 BCEThe Phoenician alphabet spreads
- from c. 1,050 BCE to 930 BCEUnited Kingdom of Israel
- c. 1,050 BCEEruption of Pinatubo
- from c. 1,046 BCE to 256 BCEZhou dynasty
- from 11th century BCE to 7th century BCEChaldea
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- 13th century BCEAncient Celts
- from c. 753 BCE to 476 CEAncient Rome
- 7th century BCEConstruction of Hanging Gardens of Babylon
- from 312 BCE to 63 BCESeleucid Empire
- from 279 BCE to 1480Construction of Lighthouse of Alexandria
The era
This moment belongs to the Ancient civilizations (3,200 BCE to 500 CE), writing, cities and empires. You can also browse everything in the 11th century BCE.