I want to test credibility of this important phenomenon:

"Women's handcrafts played a pivotal role in the development of cuneiform signs, serving as the content of the writing system. This is underscored by the significance of the EMESAL dialect, associated with women's speech, in Sumerian religion, where it was believed that the Anunnaki gods coordinated this process. In contrast, the accounting system, invented by men, provided the practical context for the use of cuneiform."

For this OPENAI CHAT GPT 4 has recommended the these resources:

Stephanie Dalley:

Books: "Myths from Mesopotamia: Creation, the Flood, Gilgamesh, and Others" – while this doesn't focus specifically on the role of women's handcraft, Dalley's work on Mesopotamian myths provides valuable context.

Articles: Look for her articles on the role of women in Sumerian society and religious practices.

Article: Ancient Assyrian Textiles and the Origins of Carpet Design

Zainap Bahrani:

Book: "Women of Babylon: Gender and Representation in Mesopotamia" – This book explores the roles and representations of women in ancient Mesopotamia, which can provide insights into their contributions to cultural and artistic developments, including writing systems.

Articles: Bahrani's scholarly articles on gender and art in Mesopotamia.

Joan Goodnick Westenholz:

Book: "Goddesses in Context: On Divine Powers, Roles, Relationships and Gender in Mesopotamian Textual and Visual Sources" – This book explores the religious roles of women and how these may have influenced cultural practices, including writing.

Articles: Westenholz's articles on Sumerian religion and women's roles.

Piotr Michalowski:

Book: "The Correspondence of the Kings of Ur: An Epistolary History of an Ancient Mesopotamian Kingdom" – While this focuses on the administrative side, Michalowski's work often touches on the broader cultural implications of writing and administration.

Articles: His work on Sumerian literature and administration can provide context for the role of men in developing accounting systems.

Jean Bottéro:

Book: "Mesopotamia: Writing, Reasoning, and the Gods" – Bottéro discusses the origins of writing and its cultural significance, including religious aspects that might relate to women's roles.

Articles: Bottéro’s articles on cuneiform writing and its development.

Denise Schmandt-Besserat (I am critical of her approach)

Books: "Before Writing" and "How Writing Came About" – Schmandt-Besserat’s research focuses on the origins of writing and includes discussions on the role of tokens, which can be tied to both accounting and artistic practices.

Articles: Her numerous articles on the evolution of writing from token systems.

I think this is a very good book:

Fischer, S. R. (2020). History of Writing. Reaktion Books. https://www.perlego.com/book/2854459

''Before complete writing, humankind made use of a wealth of graphic symbols and mnemonics (memory tools) of various kinds in order to store information. Rock art has always possessed a repertoire of universal symbols: anthropomorphs (human-like figures), flora, fauna, the Sun, stars, comets and many more, including untold geometric designs. For the most part, these were graphic reproductions of the commonest phenomena of the physical world. At the same time, mnemonics were used in linguistic contexts, too, with knot records (Are not Carpets knot records as well?) , pictographs, notched bones or staffs, message sticks or boards, string games for chanting, coloured pebbles and so forth linking physical objects with speech. Over many thousands of years, graphic art and such mnemonics grew ever closer in specific social contexts''

''Assyrian Carpets in Stone'' by P AULINE ALBENDA

''One category of Assyrian stone reliefs to which little attention has been given is the'decorated stone blocks placed originally in select entrances of royal residences. These slabs are carved with floral and geometric designs set in patterns suitable for rugs and, indeed, they may be stone ver- sions of woven floor coverings manufactured to enhance the palace chambers. In the absence of extant fabric remains, the threshold blocks provide invaluable information concerning the kinds of decorated elements and compositions employed to satisfy Assyrian tastes.1 While a number

of decorated threshold slabs are preserved in various museums, still others are known only from drawings and photographs made at the time of their discovery. In order to trace the development of their decoration, all the known slabs are assembled in this paper according to the reigns of the Assyrian kings, from the 8th through 7th centuries B.C.

As attested in 8th century B.C. administrative texts from Nimrud, among the several categories of textile workers in the service of the king included the kamidu, identified as the carpet maker.2 The production of his craft required the use of a vertical loom or possibly a ground loom} Whether the Assyrian carpets were tapestry woven (kilim) or knotted remains uncertain. We may speculate, however, that the sudden interest in displaying stone versions of rugs and carpets at important entrances after the middle of the 8th century was spurred by the development of pile carpets. A similar conclusion has been made for the apparent invention of the art of floor mosaic- making in Phrygia, which occurred at about the same time.4 The origin for such an innovative

technique of carpet production is unknown, although pictorial evidence suggests that one area of manufacture is to be sought in some region west of Assyria, whence the method was transmitted east to the royal workshops. Three separate art works dated to the reign of Shalmaneser III (858-824 B.C.) illustrate among processions of tribute-bearers carpets of substantial size and weight, rolled and hung over poles carried by two attendants. [n each instance the fabrics are presented by the inhabitants of some locality to the west of Assyria. In the first example, on the so-called Black Obelisk, the carpets which form part of the tribute sent by Marduk-apal-usur of Suhi (a district on the middle Euphrates) possess carefully delineated fringes (fig. 1).5 In contrast, less attention is given to this detail on those carpets borne by the tribute-bearers from the coastal

cities of Tyre and Sidon, depicted on the bronze bands from Balawat, and those transported by attendants from the land of Ungi (the Amuq plain in North Syria), carved on the throne dais excavated in NimrudJ Interestingly, the Balawat gate inscription mentions only that Shalmaneser received "the tribute of the ships of the men of Tyre and Sidon,,,8 while the inscriptions on the Black Obelisk and throne dais give the description "bright-colored (woolen) garments and (linen) garments."Y From this one may suppose that the Assyrian scribe, when listing items of tribute, made no distinction between types of textiles and their uses, preferring the general term "garment." Woven floor coverings do appear in several second millennium B.C. art works, but such examples are rare. It seems to occur on a ca. 14th century B.C. ortho stat from Alaca Hoyuk in Anatolia which depicts a rectangular fabric, one end possessing fringes grouped into three curved clusters, placed on the ground beneath the throne of the deity. And indeed, textual evidence indicates that thrones were set upon a carpet. A second illustration showing a floor covering comes from a Late Kingdom painting. A large red carpet with rows of yellow and blue diamonds in its field is spread under the feet of the pharaoh Ikhnaton and his family''

Would you recommend any other resource?