Humans have communicated with one another in some shape or form ever since time immemorial. But to understand the history of communication, all we have to go by are written records that date as far back as ancient Mesopotamia. And while every sentence starts with a letter, back then people began with a picture.
The B.C. Years
The Kish tablet, discovered in the ancient Sumerian city of Kish, dated to 3500 BC, has inscriptions considered by some experts to be the oldest form of known writing
- Similar to this early form of writing are the ancient Egyptian Hieroglyphs, which date back to around 3200 BC.
- Elsewhere, written language appears to have come about around around 1200 BC in China and around 600 BC in the Americas.
Communication Comes to the Masses
In the year 14 AD, the Romans established the first postal service in the western world
- Meanwhile, in the far east, China was making its own progress in opening channels for communication among the masses
- With a well-developed writing system and messenger services, the Chinese would be the first to invent paper and papermaking
- Han Chinese inventor Bi Sheng was credited with developing the porcelain device
Beyond Writing: Communicating Through Photography, Code, and Sound
People wanted photographs, except they didn’t know it yet
- French inventor Nicephore Niepce captured the world’s first photographic image in 1822
- The foundation for the invention of electric telegraphy was laid by inventors Joseph Henry and Edward Davey
- In 1835, both had independently and successfully demonstrated electromagnetic relay, where a weak electrical signal can be amplified and transmitted across long distances
- Samuel Morse developed the Morse code
- Then, the next hurdle was to figure out a way to transmit sound to far off distances
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