Changes

If the Sea Peoples and the related disruptions did not occur, would it have been possible for the Ugaritic alphabet to become our own? Obviously we will never know but immediately before the collapse of Ugarit it was clear that this city was influential and important. The alphabet they invented did not seem to have spread very far, however, when the city was destroyed, which is likely what it went extinct. However, if the city survived, then it is possible that a cuneiform-based script may have spread. Nevertheless, we should also consider that the script was essentially made to be written in clay, where the wedges are created because of using a stylus on clay. Thus, it is possible that even if the cuneiform-based alphabet survived, then it would have had to evolve to make it more amenable to other writing systems and tools that later developed. Specifically, parchment and later paper would have possibly made the cuneiform symbols not as easy to write. However, as the Canaanite alphabet has shown, the symbols, because they were simplified to begin with, could have evolved rapidly to new developing writing systems and tools. Thus, despite being initially limited to being written on clay tablets, it is possible that the Ugaritic alphabet could have changed and evolved to other media used for writing. One only has to look at how cuneiform was often used in stone inscriptions, for instance, to notice that the script could change to a relevant media.<ref>For more on the tools and media of ancient writing, see: Crowley, D. J., and Paul Heyer, eds. 2011. <i>Communication in History: Technology, Culture, Society.</i> 6th ed. Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon/Pearson.</ref>