This contextual approach to writing is at the heart of the CREWS Project (Contexts of and Relations between Early Writing Systems), led by Dr Philippa Steele and based in the Faculty of Classics at the University of Cambridge. Our research interests cover much of the East Mediterranean and Levant during the second and first millennia BCE. My own research as a member of CREWS has focused on one of the most fascinating and important sites in the region for the history of writing, the Syrian coastal city of Ugarit (modern Ras Shamra), about 10km from modern Latakia.
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