The History of Communication
Parker Rose
The history of communication spans millions of years, starting out as oral stories, now turning into internet communications and social messaging today. Communication has been around for millions of years in the form that we know it- from oral stories 5-7 M B.C, evolving through cave paintings, smoke signals, carrier pigeons, the printing press, the telegram, the radio, TV, e-mail, instant messaging, and social networks.
About 5-7 million B.C, oral languages and stories started to spread. This was the only way of communicating back then. People would come up with stories and tales and pass them down through generations. Around 33,000 B.C, neandrathrol cave paintings in France were made. This used pictures to depict events, like men hunting or fighting in wars. In 3,300 B.C, written languages, Sumerian and Akkadian, were invented in Iraq. Both languages are now extinct. Only slightly later, in 3100 BC, another form of written language, called Coptic, was developed in Egypt and used till the late 1600's. A form of Chinese language which is similar to modern Chinese, used pictographs, which are pictures as symbols. This form of language was developed around 1500 B.C. People in the ancient world needed an efficient, light, and cost effective medium for commenting. Papyrus was used to write on as it was cheap and portable.
Next, in 1600 B.C, people in Israel and Lebanon started using the alphabet. This was a major innovation in written communication. In many ancient countries like Egypt, Assyria, Persia, Rome and China, there were efficient postal systems to spread messages across their country and into the surrounding regions.
These forms of communication were used for many years until new innovations were invented to change communication. In about 150 B.C, smoke signals were invented. A smoke signal is using smoke from a fire and making basic shapes with it to spread long term messages without a messenger. However, one downside is that you can only use very limited predetermined messages with that system.
In around 301-800 A.D, the first hand-written manuscripts of things like the Bible and other books came around. These were written without lifting the pen or spaces. These were very expensive as they had to be copied by hand and took a lot of work and man-power to copy books. Books and manuscripts used to only be limited to the extremely rich and powerful.
Next, around the 1150 A.D's, carrier pigeons started to become popular. They could transfer letters on paper and were fast and efficient. Carrier pigeons quickly became a big phenomena around the world, being used from Europe to Gengis Khan using them to spread news of his conquests back to his home country of Mongolia.
However, in 1440 A.D, a big revolution happened in communication with the invention of the printing press. This changed the way that books were only for the rich and made them available to everyone. This revolution was the printing press. Invented by Gutenberg, this machine could print 3600 pages a day by the 1600's. Semaphore, invented in 1684, is using flags to communicate basic messages. Invented by Robert Hooke, they were widely used with sailors in the 1700's and are still used up to today in emergency situations when other things like lights don't work.
In 1836, Morse code and the telegram were invented. This allowed for super fast communication and news, as you did not need to wait for messengers or carrier pigeons anymore. Telegrams could send news and information across the country in a matter of seconds, where it used to take hours before. This allowed for newspapers and things to print things that happened the next morning.
Then, in 1876, the telephone was invented, making communicating with friends or family easier and more casual. The telephone was a major new form of communication, allowing people to talk to each other easily instead of having to use complicated morse code. They could simply talk, making the telephone a mass success everywhere, and causing major economy boosts.
In 1920, commercial radio was launched, making music easier to find and cheaper. Also, news could be spread faster an easier than ever before. This lead to the discovery of new artists and a revolution in music. Only 4 years later, TV was invented and we started watching events instead of just reading or hearing about them. It also made us more entertained. In 1965, e-mail was invented. This was revolutionary because you no longer needed to be on at the same time as your colleague.. You could for free instantly send them a message and they could reply to it whenever they wanted to. The Internet made online news possible so news could be published minutes after it happened. Later, in the late 1990's to the early 2000's, online video became a medium that people could communicate their ideas through. Also, new innovations like instant messaging make it easier and more convienent to talk to each other. Also, there are online blogs that make everyone able to publish news. Things like Twitter and Facebook also help people share things about their lives.
From the Stone Age to Twitter, communication had been a key part of many peoples' lives and has made history itself possible. Without communication, society itself would not be where it is today. We would be stuck hunting and gathering forever and would never discover science, medicine,writing, computers, entertainment, and all the things we take for granted today.
Bibliography
https://www.atlassian.com/communication-through-the-ages-infographic
http://www.historyworld.net/wrldhis/PlainTextHistories.asp?historyid=aa93
http://www.localhistories.org/communications.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_Iraq
http://www.crystalinks.com/egyptlanguage.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Printing_press
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_semaphore