ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Middle Bronze Age alphabets

Okay kiddo, so in the middle bronze age, there were a lot of people who wanted to write things down like stories and messages to their friends. But they didn't have computers or phones like we do today. Instead, they used something called an alphabet.

An alphabet is a special set of letters that people use to create words and sentences. Just like how we use the letters A, B, C, and so on to write words like "apple" and "banana," people in the middle bronze age had their own set of letters to use.

Now, these alphabets weren't exactly like the ones we use today. They looked different and had different letters than what we're used to. But the idea was the same - to have a way to write down words and read them later.

One of the most famous middle bronze age alphabets is called the Proto-Sinaitic alphabet. It was used by people who lived in a place called the Sinai Peninsula, which is in Egypt. This alphabet had around 22 letters, which was enough to write down all the sounds in their language.

Another middle bronze age alphabet was the Ugaritic alphabet. This one was used by people who lived in a place called Ugarit, which is now part of modern-day Syria. It had about 30 letters and was used to write down stories and important information.

These alphabets were really important for people back then because it allowed them to communicate more easily with each other. They could write letters and messages and send them to people who were far away. And even though these alphabets look different than what we use today, they helped lay the foundation for the written language we have today.