Irving Finkel

And I said, I wanted to learn cuneiform.

And he wasn't at all pleased because this was a time in Britain when professors...

resented having students to teach because it butted into their research time.

It was that sort of arrangement.

Anyway, I started it off.

And after about, I don't know, maybe one or maybe two lessons, I knew this was going to be my life's work.

So that's what happened to me.

It was an amazing thing.

So he gave me a list of signs to learn, basic signs.

So I did.

And the next couple of days, and then we came in and we started reading.

Fair question.

There were several factors.

One is the famous factor of inertia.

The second thing is that people who could read and write and were in charge of archives and with the clerks in the temple and the writers for the king and everything, commanded a very great deal of power because most of the public couldn't.

So they reserved to themselves knowledge, understanding.

philosophical inquiry.

I mean, no doubt it went on in pubs and things, but they were in charge.

They had everything under lock and key.

And there were, I think the scribal schools are rather cliquey.