Sheets of metal were rarely used for writing or are rarely found. For one, they were expensive to manufacture and secondly, the metal was often re-smelted for use as weapons in times of war, so few sheets remain. Royal houses sometimes used silver or gold and examples of writing on gold has been excavated from the Second Temple period in Jerusalem. More commonly, bronze tablets and copper sheets were used to provide semi-permanence and could be stored more easily than cumbersome rock. Archaeologists have discovered row upon row of bronze tablets from ancient Roman archives that contain details about treaties and decrees.
written forms of language slowly developed the materials upon which the text was applied also changed to become more user friendly. Early writing materials consisted of stone, metal sheets, wooden boards, wax tablets and ostraca. All of these materials are rigid and rather primitive in kind. As the need for better communication and recording occurred so too developed better forms of writing materials.
Clay tablets are probably the invention of the Sumerians of southern Babylonia. The use of soft clay tablets was popular right up until the Christian Era. Use of clay tablets became widespread and was the general means of written communication throughout Mesopotamia and the entire ancient East.
The system of use involved two parts: The tablet proper, that was fashioned as a letter and formed the inner core of the communication. Shrouding the inner tablet was a folded clay envelope that completely enclosed the inner tablet. The message to be sent was first written on the smaller, inner tablet, while the clay was soft using a thin, sharpened tool to inscribe wedge-shaped cuneiform letters that comprised the text. This tablet was then fired to harden it and make the message permanent.
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