Clay tablet

Tens of thousands of written tablets, including many fragments, have been found in the Middle East.

In this cultural region, tablets were never fired deliberately as the clay was recycled on an annual basis.

In Mesopotamia, writing began as simple counting marks, sometimes alongside a non-arbitrary sign, in the form of a simple image, pressed into clay tokens or less commonly cut into wood, stone or pots.

This convention began when people developed agriculture and settled into permanent communities that were centered on increasingly large and organized trading marketplaces.

[5] These marketplaces were purposed for the trade of sheep, grain, and bread loaves, where transactions were recorded with clay tokens.

[7] Pictographs then began to appear on clay tablets around 4000 BCE, and after the later development of Sumerian cuneiform writing, a more sophisticated partial syllabic script evolved that by around 2500 BCE was capable of recording the vernacular, the everyday speech of the common people.

[6] Text on clay tablets took the forms of myths, fables, essays, hymns, proverbs, epic poetry, business records, laws, plants, and animals.

By the end of the 3rd Millennium BCE, (2200–2000 BCE), even the "short story" was first attempted, as independent scribes entered into the philosophical arena, with stories like: "Debate between bird and fish", and other topics, (List of Sumerian debates).

[10] Tablets on Babylonian astronomical records (such as Enuma Anu Enlil and MUL.APIN) date back to around 1800 BCE.