Читать книгу Introducing Anthropology - Laura Pountney - Страница 49

Around 70,000–80,000 years ago, there is evidence of markings that indicate information was being recorded. Their meanings are not easy to understand, and anthropologists do not always agree over what this early recorded material signifies. However, it is generally agreed that, by around 8,000 years ago, humans were using symbols to represent words and concepts. Specific forms of writing developed over the next few thousand years. But it should be clear that written language is a purely cultural construct and that its origin required no changes in cognition. People living in pre-literate societies, such as hunter-gatherer groups, are as cognitively competent as the agriculturalists who invented written language.