Since the discovery of pottery marks at the Neolithic settlement at Banpo, Shaanxi, in 1954, more than 2000 signs painted, incised or impressed on ceramic, bone, stone and jade artefacts have surfaced from numerous Neolithic sites across China. These finds sparked heated debates on how—if at all—they relate to the Shang script of the thirteenth century BC, the earliest undisputed form of what is today known as the Chinese writing system. While there are voices already interpreting the abstract or geometric signs of the sixth to fourth millennia BC as proto-writing ancestral to the Shang script, more substantiated debates revolve around the third millennium BC evidence. At that time, a small number of pictographic signs and, importantly, signs comprising two or more pictographic elements appeared in addition to the abstract marks. Some scholars argue that the prehistoric signs are unrelated to the Shang script because similar marks remained in use for millennia in parallel with the Chinese script; others perceive them as direct precursors to the Shang script; and still others maintain that some of these early signs were incorporated into the Shang script, serving as sources for writing numerals, clan or personal names.

Paola Demattè is one of the scholars who advocate Late Neolithic origins of Chinese writing, which is a position she has maintained in her 1996 PhD dissertation and several subsequent publications. The greatest value of The origins of Chinese writing thus lies not so much in its main thesis as in providing the first-ever comprehensive overview in a Western language of all major discoveries of Chinese Neolithic signs, considering them in their archaeological context, and correlating them with increasing urbanism as well as political, social and ritual organisation.

To support her key argument, Demattè sets the stage in the first three chapters of the book, presented as ‘Part I: Theories and philosophies of writing’. Chapter 1 provides basic information about the nature of Chinese script, with particular interest in some of its non-glottic properties. Chapter 2 reviews the ancient Chinese discussions on the origins and role of writing. Chapter 3 offers a theoretical perspective on the origins of writing, with a comparative outlook on other primary writing systems of Egypt, Mesopotamia and Mesoamerica. Demattè contends that writing did not originate specifically to record spoken language; rather, glottographic writing originated from pre-existing non-glottic sign systems (proto-writing), which were upgraded via phoneticisation of signs and applying spoken language as their organising principle. Since the fully fledged hieroglyphic and cuneiform scripts needed centuries to emerge out of proto-writing, she concludes that script as mature as the Shang script of the thirteenth century BC must have also required hundreds of years of gradual development; the beginning of the second millennium BC is proposed as the initial point of this development.

With 200 pages, the next two chapters constitute ‘Part II: The Neolithic evidence’ and represent the real core of the book. In Chapter 4, Demattè surveys signs dating to the sixth through to the fourth millennium BC unearthed from various Early and Middle Neolithic sites of the Peiligang, Hemudu, Songze, Shuangdun, Daxi, Yangshao, Dadiwan, Majiayao, and Hongshan cultures. Chapter 5 focuses on evidence from the third millennium BC yielded from Late Neolithic sites of the Dawenkou, Liangzhu, Qujialing-Shijiahe and Longshan cultures. Presenting these materials, Demattè pays special attention to archaeological context for both the sites and individual artefacts, artefact typology, placement of signs, inscription technique and their overall frequency; commendably, the discussion also extends to painted pottery designs. The analysis of Dawenkou signs is truly exemplary; but the discussion on Liangzhu materials would have benefited from similar scrutiny.

Three further chapters form ‘Part III: The Bronze Age evidence’. Chapter 6 surveys signs unearthed from the Erlitou culture and Shang-period sites, showcasing the breadth of writing media in the Late Shang period and attempting to explain the relative dearth of complex signs that would bridge the Late Neolithic evidence and the Shang script. Chapter 7 summarises basic characteristics of the Shang script. Chapter 8 brings the archaeological, anthropological and historical strands of the narrative together with the conclusion that the Chinese writing system originated in non-glottic pictorial signs of the Dawenkou, Liangzhu and Shijiahe cultures that were incorporated into a writing system in the Erlitou culture at the beginning of the second millennium BC.

The book features many highlights, yet also a few issues. Clearly, the conclusions are driven more by theoretical considerations than by material evidence. More caution should have been applied concerning terminology, which is sometimes imprecise or even misleading. For instance, the ‘ash pits’ (Chinese huikeng) are not always ‘ritual pits’ as the author claims in an attempt to link Neolithic signs to ritual practices—many of them were simply waste pits. Surprisingly, Demattè is much more comfortable interpreting Neolithic signs we cannot read than the Bronze Age inscriptions that are fairly well understood—the transcriptions and translations provided are generally marred by incomprehension and mistakes. Finally, such an ambitious book would have deserved more care in copyediting (particularly, paradoxically, of dates and Chinese characters), a more thorough literature review and a more comprehensive bibliography, especially in respect of works by Chinese colleagues published over the past 15 years.

The study of Chinese Neolithic signs is still in its infancy. Much of these materials remains unpublished and a serious attempt at relating them to the Chinese writing system requires a thorough archaeological investigation of related artefacts and their signs as systems in their own right, without the teleological prism of Chinese script. Such an approach has only recently gained sway and its potential has not been fully harnessed in this book. Still, while its conclusions must remain tentative, the great asset of The origins of Chinese writing is in laying out all the evidence together with over a hundred illustrations for the readers’ assessment. Without doubt, this publication will serve as an indispensable resource for both students and scholars inside and outside the field of Chinese studies and will provide an important impetus for further investigations of the origins of Chinese writing.