A Typographic Workbook: Ch 1 Review

A written language of characters formed by the arrangement of small wedge-shaped elements and used in ancient Sumerian, Akkadian, Assyrian, etc. writing.

...Cuneiform.

An Egyptian script that lasted for about 1000 years following hieratic script, and belongs to the last period of ancient Egyptian history. This script was used for business and literary purposes. It has a cursive form, signs are more flowing and joined, and the signs themselves are more similar to one another, making it slightly more difficult to read.

...Demotic Script

Tortoise shells etched with symbols have been excavated from the Jiahu site in Henan province in central China. Shells found appear to be part of funerary ritual in Neolithic graves that have been dated to approximately 12000-7800 BCE

...FALSE, Shells have dated back to 7000-5800 BCE.

The year 5100 BCE is considered the peak of arts and learning during the Golden Age of Greece, approximately 300 years after the adoption of the Phoenician alphabet.

...FALSE. 500 BCE is the peak of arts and learning during the Golden Age of Greece.

Found in 1908 at the ruins of the Minoan palace, the Phaistos Disk is dated to app. 3700 BCE. The text is made of 51 words with 85 different symbols occurring a total of 24 times.

...FALSE. Dated to 1700 BCE. Made up of 61 words with 45 different symbols occurring a total of 241 times.

With the expansion of the Greek Empire under the rule of Frederick the Great, Greek Culture spread.

...FALSE. Greek culture spread under the rule of Alexander the Great 356-323 BCE.

Hieroglyphics commonly run in horizontal rows, read from right to left. All the people and animals face the left in any given passage.

...FALSE. Read from whatever direction the animals or people are facing... From top to bottom.

Some historians assume that writing began with small tags of parchment inscribed with pictographs that were attached to jugs by string intended to represent the contents of the vessels during shipping.

...FALSE. They assume it was small tags of clay inscribed with pictographs that were attached to jugs by strings.

Around 500 BCE the hieratic script eventually evolved into demotic script (of the people). This writing style is visually complicated compared to hieratic script.

...FALSE. Visually simplified compared to Hieratic script.

Pictorial material relating to or illustrating a subject or the traditional or conventional images or symbols associated whit a subject and especially a religious or legendary subject; the imagery or symbolism of a work of art, an artist, or a body of art.

...Iconography

A sign or character that represents and idea or concept often comprised of two or more pictographs.

...Ideograph

To sound or utter any of the abstract units of the phonetic system of a language that correspond to a set of similar speech sounds.

...Phoneme

Representing speech sounds by means of symbols that have one value only' of or relating to spoken language or speech sounds

...Phonetic

A character or symbol used to represent a word, syllable, or phenome.

...Phonogram

A symbol that is used to wholly communicate a simple message without words, such as in traffic signs and restroom door signage. This may be used as a signature, otherwise known as distinctive mark indicating identity.

...Pictograph

A name used to designate a group of Asiatic and African languages, namely: Hebrew and Phoenician, Aramatic, Assyrian, Arabic, etc.

...Semitic Languages

Because of their diverse trade and travel, the culture of the Phoenicians was influenced by many other people show lived around the Mediterranean sea, including the Greeks Minoans, Etruscans, and Sumerians.

...True.

Most original parchment texts no longer exist, as they deteriorated in the moist Mediterranean climate, while many of the copies on papyrus survived.

...True.

Repetition of agreed-upon shapes is the essence of a writing system.

...True.

The Assyrians were quick to adopt cuneiform as a practical writing system. Cuneiform writing has been used in several languages, and was in use for about 3000 years.

...True.

Today many spoken languages that exist have no written form.

...True.

Of or relating to a time early in history, or to those living in such a period or time; especially of or relating to the historical period beginning with the earliest known civilizations and extending to the fall of the western roman empire in 476 CE.

Ancient

Writing with alternating lines in opposite directions; one line is written from left to right, then the next line is reversed.

Bousterephedon

The oval band symbolizing continuity encloses hieroglyphs of a gods or pharaohs name into one visual entity.

Cartouche

Before the discovery of the Rosetta Stone, hieroglyphics had been completely and correctly deciphered.

False

A writing system developed in ancient Egypt that used pictographs to represent words and sounds.

Hieroglyphic

A device, such as a formula, verse or rhyme, used as an aid in remembering.

Mnemonic

The pith of a plant cut in strips and pressed into a paper-like substrate or material to write on.

Papyrus.

Pictures and/or pictographs assembled in an order so as to represent the syllables in a word or words, from which meaning can be deciphered.

Rebus

A black basalt stone found in 1799 that bears an inscription in hieroglyphics, demotic characters, and Greek and is celebrated for having given the first clue to the decipherment of Egyptian hieroglyphics.

Rosetta Stone

The smallest conceivable expression or unit of speech. a unit of spoken language that is next bigger than a speech sound and consists of one or more vowel sound alone or of a syllabic consonant alone or of either with one or more consonant sounds preceding or following.

Syllable

Anthropologists believe that the domestication of animals was a strong factor in the development of human societies.

True

The Semitic languages comprise those of the Far East (Syria, Lebanon, israel, China, Palestine, Jordan, Cyprus, etc)

True

Greek culture spread. The growth of the Hellenistic culture caused the spread of the Greek alphabet.

True.

The style, arrangement, and appearance of typeset matter; typography is sometimes seen as encompassing many separate fields from the type designer who creates letter forms to the graphic designer who selects typefaces and arranges them on the page.

Typography