ca 3000 BC: Cuneiform script is one of the earliest known forms of written expression. Created by the Sumerians from ca. 3000 BC (with predecessors reaching into late 4th millennium Uruk IV period), cuneiform writing began as a system of pictographs. Over time, the pictorial representations became
simplified and more abstract. Cuneiforms were written on clay tablets, on which symbols were drawn
with a blunt reed for a stylus.