The origin of writing in Ancient Arabia has received no treatment in extenso by the scholars. The origin of alphabetic writing in Arabia is still subject of controversy and an open problem. Several epigraphists and philologists have propounded pre-assumed theories by looking from one side of the picture that writing migrated to Arabia from out side. But they have not considered the point from the other side-the possibility of the origin within Arabia itself. And here is a systematic attempt in this direction, based on the evidence of rock art, epigraphy, archaeological finds with incised Arabian letters, etc. The latter dating to the second millennium B.C. Further an endeavour is made to analyse the New Scripts from Oman.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR Muhammed Abdul Nayeem
Dr. M.A. Nayeem born (1938) and brought up at Hyderabad (India) was educated at Osmania University, Hyderabad, Aligarh Muslim University, Aligarh, and the University of Poona, Poona. From the University of Poona he obtained Doctrorates (Ph.D. and D.Litt.). For nearly two decades he served at the Department of Archaeology and Museology, College of Arts, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. During his stay in Saudi Arabia, he traveled entire length and breadth of the Arabian Peninsula, covering all the seven Arabian States and visited archaeological and rock art sites in order to collect first-hand information. The out-come of several years research is publication of series of books on the ancient history of individual States: Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Oman. Hopefully the author completes the remaining books in the series, on Kuwait and Yemen, in the near future. At the Department of Archaeology he was also associated with the research publications of Al-Fau excavations, a Pre-Islamic site in Saudi Arabia. The author has recently retired on superannuation from the King Saud University; and is hopeful of devoting his time to Arabian archaeology and rock rock.
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