Syllabic writing

In the last example, the symbol that is used for the pronunciation of parts of a word represents a unit (ba) that consists of a consonant sound (b) and a vowel sound (a). This unit is one type of syllable. When a writing system employs a set of symbols each one representing the pronunciation of a syllable, it is described as syllabic writing. There are no purely syllabic writing systems in use today, but modern Japanese can be written with a set of single symbols representing spoken syllables and is consequently often described as having a (partially) syllabic writing system, or a syllabary.

In the early nineteenth century, a Cherokee named Sequoyah, living in North Carolina, invented a syllabic writing system that was widely used within the Cherokee community to create written messages from the spoken language. In these Cherokee examples,(ho),(sa) and (ge), we can see that the written symbol in each case does not correspond to a single consonant (C) or a vowel (V), but to a syllable (CV).

Both the ancient Egyptian and the Sumerian writing systems evolved to the point where some of the earlier logographic symbols were being used to represent spoken syllables. However, it is not until the time of the Phoenicians, inhabiting what is modern Lebanon between 3,000 and 4,000 years ago, that we find the full use of a syllabic writing system. Many of the symbols that the Phoenicians used were taken from earlier Egyptian writing. The Egyptian form(meaning “house”) was adopted in a slightly reoriented form as. After being used logographically for the word pronounced beth (still meaning “house”), the symbol came to represent other syllables beginning with a b sound. Similarly, the Egyptian form (meaning “water”) turns up asand is used for syllables beginning with an m sound. So, a word that might be pronounced as muba could be written as, and the pronunciation bima could be written as. Note that the direction of writing is from right to left. By about 3,000 years ago, the Phoenicians had stopped using logograms and had a fully developed syllabic writing system.