{"product_id":"the-greatest-invention-a-history-of-the-world-in-nine-mysterious-scripts-9781250862990","title":"The Greatest Invention: A History of the World in Nine Mysterious Scripts","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eIn this exhilarating celebration of human ingenuity \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eand perseverance--published all around \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003ethe world--a trailblazing Italian scholar sifts \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003ethrough our cultural and social behavior in \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003esearch of the origins of our greatest invention: \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003ewriting.\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eThe L where a tabletop meets the legs, the T between double doors, the D of an armchair's oval backrest--all around us is an alphabet in things. But how did these shapes make it onto the page, never mind form complex structures such as this sentence? In \u003ci\u003eThe Greatest Invention\u003c\/i\u003e, Silvia Ferrara takes a profound look at how--and how many times--human beings have managed to produce the miracle of written language, traveling back and forth in time and all across the globe to Mesopotamia, Crete, China, Egypt, Central America, Easter Island, and beyond. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eWith Ferrara as our guide, we examine the enigmas of undeciphered scripts, including famous cases like the Phaistos Disk and the Voynich Manuscript; we touch the knotted, colored strings of the Inca quipu; we study the turtle shells and ox scapulae that bear the earliest Chinese inscriptions; we watch in awe as Sequoyah single-handedly invents a script for the Cherokee language; and we venture to the cutting edge of decipherment, in which high-powered laser scanners bring tears to an engineer's eye. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eA code-cracking tour around the globe, \u003ci\u003eThe \u003c\/i\u003e\u003ci\u003eGreatest Invention\u003c\/i\u003e chronicles a previously uncharted journey, one filled with past flashes of brilliance, present-day scientific research, and a faint, fleeting glimpse of writing's future.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eSilvia Ferrara \u003c\/b\u003eis a professor of Aegean civilization at the University of Bologna. She studied at University College London and the University of Oxford, and after spending several years researching archaeology and linguistics at Oxford, she returned to Italy. She has taught at University College London, the University of Oxford, the University of Cambridge, and Sapienza University of Rome. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003eTodd Portnowitz \u003c\/b\u003eis the translator of \u003ci\u003eGo Tell It to the Emperor\u003c\/i\u003e, by Pierluigi Cappello; \u003ci\u003eMidnight in Spoleto\u003c\/i\u003e, by Paolo Valesio; and \u003ci\u003eLong Live Latin\u003c\/i\u003e, by Nicola Gardini. He is the recipient of a Raiziss\/de Palchi Fellowship from the Academy of American Poets. He lives in Brooklyn, New York.\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Picador USA","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":50631798423826,"sku":"9781250862990","price":13.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_0b921ff4-52b1-48ab-87b1-31ebe0e0a756.jpg?v=1737265564","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/the-greatest-invention-a-history-of-the-world-in-nine-mysterious-scripts-9781250862990","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}