zompist bboard

It seems I've managed to remember my password.

I know Greek went from right-to-left -> boustrophedon -> left-to-right. Have other writing systems done something like this? Are there other ways/reasons writing direction might reverse? Why did Greek switch to/from boustrophedon?

Well, the obvious alternative way to reverse would be left-right > top-bottom > right-left. Probably more likely to happen across cultures, though, rather than within one. And given that a plain double rotation would leave a bottom-top secondary order, it would probably have to involve an inversion of secondary order in the TTB phase. But that's probably a lot more likely than a direct inversion of primary order - after all, particularly early on, a lot of writing will only be one column anyway, and secondary order is less psychologically basic. Alternatively, a TTB-RTL script could go straight to RTL-TTB (or the opposite) by conceiving of individual letters as inhabitants of single-character columns, and then extrapolating.

Part of this process might be seen in the Mongolian alphabets, which originated in RTL-TTB Sogdian, and rotated to become TTB-LTR. The second part of this process might be seen in old Japanese signs, which apparently became RTL from TTB-RTL. [and have now reversed to be LTR, though this probably doesn't count for you because the RTL direction was never the main form of writing the language]

Yeah, that could work, too. Isn't the Japanese LTR because of influence from Western alphabets? I was kind of hoping for a reason for this for a script mainly used to write the dominant global language, which might not be as influenced by other languages. Would primary horizontal <-> vertical be less likely with a pure alphabet, rather than a syllabary or something ideographic?

As for why, Epigraphic Egyptian Hieroglyphics seemed to change direction based on the aesthetics of the location being written on, but Hieratic and Demotic were written RTL. So direction can be based on aesthetics or usage. Japanese uses vertical TTB-RTL script for newspapers, and regular books, while it uses horizontal LTR-TTB for textbooks and the like. Advertisements frequently use both. You can even see the horizontal (EDIT:) RTL writing sometimes, generally on the right side of trucks, so that the beginning of the line is at the front of the truck, regardless of which side you're looking at.

Sumerian was written horizontally LTR-TTB in cells that were arranged vertically TTB-LTR. In Akkadian, the cells were eliminated and it was just LTR-TTB, a pattern which continued through all cuneiform descendants, such as Hittite, Hurrian, Urartian, and even Old Persian Cuneiform. So maybe the cell writing was too cumbersome and they simplified it.

I don't know why the Greek alphabet changed direction. Some musty old scholars thought that it had to do with a change in which hemisphere of the brain was being used, but this is, I am certain, old racist people starting out with the conclusion that the West is obviously the best because Greek democracy, and then cherry picking facts to justify it.

Sogdian/Old Uyghur changed direction to conform more closely with written Chinese. Probably this made it easier to write parallel texts on Chinese scrolls (my speculation), while Chinese, Korean and Japanese adopted the horizontal style based on Western influence.

A quick browse through The World's Writing Systems suggests that TTB scripts are quite rare. Egyptian could be written that way but usually wasn't. Chinese is about the only strong example, though of course it exported the idea to Japanese, Korean, and Mongolian. (Maya is LTR but in very narrow 2-character columns.) The book does contain one example of TTB Sanskrit.

So far as I can see there are no scripts whose primary direction is bottom to top. But Rongorongo was written in horizontal lines (themselves boustrophedon), the lines being written bottom to top.

The point being, TTB scripts are so rare that there's just not much data on change to or from TTB. The cases we know about are pretty clear cultural influence (Mongolian going from Central Asian RTL to Chinese TTB; Chinese etc. adopting Western RTL).

It's curious that many early scripts, and no modern ones, mix RTL/LTR/boustrophedon. It seems that a preference evolves, but the initial choice looks random.

Thanks, clawgrip, that's pretty interesting. I guess if writing direction can vary just based on aesthetics like that, the reason could just be something like it went through a phase where either LTR or RTL could be used (or boustrophedon starting in either direction), and someone influential started using it one way and it caught on and became standard, right? And I guess what zompist said makes that scenario more likely than something involving switching to TTB.

zompist wrote:So far as I can see there are no scripts whose primary direction is bottom to top. But Rongorongo was written in horizontal lines (themselves boustrophedon), the lines being written bottom to top.

Hmm, Omniglot claims that Batak, Hanuno'o, and Tagbanwa were BTT-LTR, along with this confusing note:

omniglot wrote:Note
Tagbanwa is traditionally written in vertical columns running from bottom to top and from left to right, however it is read from left to right in horizontal lines.

and that ancient Berber was BTT-RTL. It does seem kind of odd, though.

zompist wrote:Egyptian could be written that way but usually wasn't.

Actually, it was somewhat common, mostly dictated by space considerations.

On Egyptian, WWS says there was a "distinct preference" for RTL.

It looks like Hanunóo is an actual example of BTT (I missed it on my browsing as I assumed the SE Asian scripts would be the same!). WWS says Batak is primarily LTR and that Berber was originally BTT.

zompist wrote:The book does contain one example of TTB Sanskrit.

What the heck? Wow. How does that even work?
ओं
म
णि
प
द्मे
हूं
?

It wasn't in Devanagari; it was in the Siddham script, once popular in Central Asia and still maintained in Japan.

I think Ogham was written in funky ways which may have changed over time. Anyone got any more in depth info on that?

Vijay wrote:

zompist wrote:The book does contain one example of TTB Sanskrit.

What the heck? Wow. How does that even work?
ओं
म
णि
प
द्मे
हूं
?

Yeah i think vertical Sanskrit looks better if you take out the overbars.

faiuwle wrote:
Hmm, Omniglot claims that Batak, Hanuno'o, and Tagbanwa were BTT-LTR, along with this confusing note:

omniglot wrote:Note
Tagbanwa is traditionally written in vertical columns running from bottom to top and from left to right, however it is read from left to right in horizontal lines.

Just guessing. I think they mean that it is LTR if youre writing in columns that are only one letter deep. So essentially the second part of the sentence adds no new info, but simply c clarifies what happens when you write in a cramped space.

SoapBubbles wrote:Yeah i think vertical Sanskrit looks better if you take out the overbars.

But the funny thing is that even in Siddham, they're not completely nonexistent, either.

SoapBubbles wrote:

omniglot wrote:Note
Tagbanwa is traditionally written in vertical columns running from bottom to top and from left to right, however it is read from left to right in horizontal lines.

Just guessing. I think they mean that it is LTR if youre writing in columns that are only one letter deep. So essentially the second part of the sentence adds no new info, but simply c clarifies what happens when you write in a cramped space.

No, you hold the piece of wood one way to carve the text into it, but hold it another way to read it.

Frislander wrote:I think Ogham was written in funky ways which may have changed over time. Anyone got any more in depth info on that?

The basic principle is that it is written bottom to top. However, wrapping gets more complicated.

clawgrip wrote:As for why, Epigraphic Egyptian Hieroglyphics seemed to change direction based on the aesthetics of the location being written on, but Hieratic and Demotic were written RTL.

I believe the neutral direction for hierogylphics is RTL. Hieratic is a cursive form of hieroglyphics, and demotic is an even more cursive form of hieratic, each developing some of their own features as I understand it.

Printed Egyptian Hieroglyphics tend to be LTR, even when the main text is Arabic!

Vijay wrote:

SoapBubbles wrote:Yeah i think vertical Sanskrit looks better if you take out the overbars.

But the funny thing is that even in Siddham, they're not completely nonexistent, either.

The explanation is that the headstroke developed incidentally as an evolution of serifs on the tops of strokes. In the south, these serifs-turned-strokes are prominently visible as the Nike swooshes of Telugu and Kannada, and the rounded tops of Oriya, while in both the Kutila scripts of Western China and the Nagari and Bangla scripts of India et al, they developed into flat tops. They only merged into a single, continuous headstroke in Nagari/Bangla scripts, though; the matras of Kutila scripts, such as Siddham, Tibetan, Tocharian, Khotanese, Ranjana, Soyombo, etc., do not join up.

Sorry for bumping this thread.

It is surprising to me that no one has mentioned what I learned (who knows where?) in my childhood as one reason for writing direction reversal.

What I remember from way, way, way back is:

Especially with the advent of ink and paper/parchment/papyrus flat writing surfaces, the problem of a right-handed person writing RTL is that the writing hand can easily smudge the freshly written text as the writer moves to the left. Switching to LTR obviates that problem. A right-handed person sometimes, when writing Hebrew, e.g., contorts the right-wrist a bit so that the hand remains below the baseline, avoiding the contact that could lead to smudging.

If the custom was TTB-RTL, the smudging problem could occur. Simply rotating the surface 90 degrees counter-clockwise changes the same text to LTR-TTB, eliminating the smudging.

I have seen some people, left-handed mainly, contort their writing hand to hold the pen/pencil above the baseline to avoid the same-line smudging problem (hoooray for quick-drying ball-point and felt-tip pens!), and I have also seen some left-handed people turn the paper 90 degrees to the right so that for them the direction is TTB-RTL, again avoiding smudging.

Having never written on clay, I don't know if smudging the just-written text was a problem with that medium. It seems like it could have been, as the entire tablet had to be moist throughout the operation (maybe not had to be, but I don't know if you could continue impressing line 14 if the clay of adjacent line 13 is already dry enough to prevent accidental erasure).

Did cuneiform scribes suffer from carpal tunnel syndrome or other forms of tendonitis?

A future topic (may have already been discussed): what determines handedness? I feel for the left-handed in our right-handed world. The abuse they still to this day suffer for a condition that is surely not of their choosing is awful.

garysk wrote:It is surprising to me that no one has mentioned what I learned (who knows where?) in my childhood as one reason for writing direction reversal.

What I remember from way, way, way back is:

Especially with the advent of ink and paper/parchment/papyrus flat writing surfaces, the problem of a right-handed person writing RTL is that the writing hand can easily smudge the freshly written text as the writer moves to the left. Switching to LTR obviates that problem. A right-handed person sometimes, when writing Hebrew, e.g., contorts the right-wrist a bit so that the hand remains below the baseline, avoiding the contact that could lead to smudging.

If the custom was TTB-RTL, the smudging problem could occur. Simply rotating the surface 90 degrees counter-clockwise changes the same text to LTR-TTB, eliminating the smudging.

I have seen some people, left-handed mainly, contort their writing hand to hold the pen/pencil above the baseline to avoid the same-line smudging problem (hoooray for quick-drying ball-point and felt-tip pens!), and I have also seen some left-handed people turn the paper 90 degrees to the right so that for them the direction is TTB-RTL, again avoiding smudging.

Having never written on clay, I don't know if smudging the just-written text was a problem with that medium. It seems like it could have been, as the entire tablet had to be moist throughout the operation (maybe not had to be, but I don't know if you could continue impressing line 14 if the clay of adjacent line 13 is already dry enough to prevent accidental erasure).

Did cuneiform scribes suffer from carpal tunnel syndrome or other forms of tendonitis?

Being left-handed myself, I can tell you that I have had problems with smudging my handwriting. I had never paid attention to where I hold the pen/pencil relative to the baseline before reading this post (I wrote a couple test sentences to check it and seem to hold my writing instrument at approximately x-height), but I do have an atypical way of holding mine that's been compared to the way you hold chopsticks.

I usually cross letters right-to-left, but I'm one of those that cross my sevens and do it left-to-right, interestingly enough. (Less space to move my hand across, maybe?)

You could have a script that is normally written one way, but another way in a small minority of contexts (say 5 or 10% or something). Then, for some reason, the minority option becomes more popular and eventually comes to dominate. This would - very superficially - give the impression of a shift from one order to another, though in fact both have always been possibilities.