Includes bibliographical references and index.

Contents : The origins of alphabetic writing: a summary of the salient features -- The use of the Phoenician script during the Iron Age and the rise of the Levantine national scripts -- The nature of the Northwest Semitic epigraphic record: form and function -- The status of the scribe and the tools of the trade -- Scribal education in ancient Israel: the old Hebrew epigraphic evidence -- Monumental buildings for education, scribal practice texts, and print exposure in the scribal home -- The extent of literacy in ancient Israel -- Inscriptions from the market: a precarious basis for statements about the nature of the epigraphic record, scribal practices and literacy.