Boustrophedon Writing

Question 1

What is Boustrophedon writing? (Definition)

Answer

Boustrophedon-style writing consists of writing every other line upside down alternately. The text thus follows a kind of serpentiform furrow from left to right then from right to left (similar to the movement/turns/zigzag of an ox plowing a field).

Question 2

How to write using Boustrophedon?

Answer

Write the first line from left to right then, once reached the end of this line, write the next line from right to left. Continue to alternate this sequence with each successive row until the text is finished.

Example: Reading/writing direction:
━D━C━O━D━E━┓ ┏━Ǝ━ᗡ━O━Ɔ━ᗡ┛ ┗D━C━O━D━E━┓

Writing in reverse (mirror) is complicated due to the technical limitations of fonts on web browsers, sometimes the letters remain written right side up. dCode offers specular writing (like in a mirror) and upside down writing modes.

Question 3

What are the variants of the Boustrophedon?

Answer

One can reverse/flip multiple lines at once, one can begin to line N, or ignore multiple line that are non-reversed.

If the text is short, the inversion can be performed for each word instead of each line.

Question 4

What does Boustrophedon means?

Answer

Boustrophedon comes from greek language, the word is made with beef (bous) and the verb to turn (strophos).

Question 5

When was Boustrophedon used?

Answer

Boustrophedon Scripture was commonly used on media such as clay tablets, parchments, stelae, and other engravable or writable materials. These media allowed bidirectional writing and saved space.

Question 6

When was Boustrophedon invented?

Answer

Traces of Boustrophedon writing system have been found some centuries before Christ, both among the ancient Greeks, the Etruscans, or in Mesopotamia.

Boustrophedon Writing