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It is debated whether writing systems were developed completely independently in [[Egypt]] around 3200 BCE and [[China]] around 1200 BCE, or whether the appearance of writing in either or both places were due to [[cultural diffusion]] (i.e. the concept of representing language using writing, if not the specifics of how such a system worked, was brought by traders from an already-literate civilization).
[[Chinese characters]] are most probably an independent invention, because there is no evidence or a common proto-language nor of contact between China and the literate civilizations of the Near East,{{Citation<ref>David needed|dateN. Keightley, Noel Barnard. The Origins of Chinese civilization. [http://books.google.com/books?id=March4-vdP2aZWhUC&pg=PA415 Page 2012}}415-416]</ref> and because of the distinct differences between the Mesopotamian and Chinese approaches to logography and phonetic representation. [[Egyptian hieroglyphs|Egyptian script]] is dissimilar from Mesopotamian cuneiform, but similarities in concepts and in earliest attestation suggest that the idea of writing may have come to Egypt from Mesopotamia.<ref>Peter T. Daniels, "The First Civilizations", in ''The World's Writing Systems'', ed. Bright and Daniels, p.24</ref> In 1999, ''[[Archaeology (magazine)|Archaeology Magazine]]'' reported that the earliest Egyptian glyphs date back to 3400 BCE which "...challenge the commonly held belief that early logographs, pictographic symbols representing a specific place, object, or quantity, first evolved into more complex phonetic symbols in Mesopotamia."<ref name=Mitchell1999>{{cite web|last=Mitchell|first=Larkin|title=Earliest Egyptian Glyphs|url=http://www.archaeology.org/9903/newsbriefs/egypt.html|work=Archaeology|publisher=Archaeological Institute of America|accessdate=29 February 2012}}</ref>
Similar debate surrounds the [[Indus script]] of the [[Bronze Age]] [[Indus Valley civilization]] in Ancient India 2200 BCE, with the additional provisos that the script is still undeciphered and that there is debate over whether the script is true writing at all, or instead some kind of proto-writing or non-linguistic sign system.
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