International Journal of Information Management 29 (2009) 314

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International Journal of Information Management

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijinfomgt

Neolithic informatics: The nature of information

Paul Beynon-Davies
Cardiff Business School, Cardiff University, Senghennydd Road, Cardiff CF24 4AY, United Kingdom

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Keywords:
Informatics
Information
Information technology
Universals
Ancient Sumeria

a b s t r a c t
The term informatics is used as an umbrella term to stand for the overlapping disciplinary areas of information systems, information management and information technology. The current paper is part of a
series which documents an overarching attempt to develop a clearer and more sophisticated systematics
for the area. It examines one of the foundation concepts of informatics that of information and aims to
provide a denition for this concept based upon ideas from semiotics and communication theory. For this
purpose we introduce the concept of a sign-system and consider the role such a system plays in human
communication. We also highlight the fundamental difference between a communication system and an
information system. To help ground our discussion and provide a necessary distance from the presentday concern with digital computing and communication networks we engage with the historiography of
information. We consider the use of information in Neolithic times and describe the case of clay tokens in
Ancient Sumeria as one of the earliest examples of information representation and manipulation. Examination of this case allows us to propose a number of universal features of information and information
technology.
2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Individuals applied their minds to symbols rather than things and

went beyond the world of concrete experience into the realm of
conceptual relations created within an enlarged time and space
universe. The time world was extended beyond the range of remembered things and the space world beyond the range of known places
(Innis, 1950).
1. Introduction
In a previous paper (Beynon-Davies, 2007) we argued that the
locus of the discipline of informatics is the concept of an information system. The term informatics is used as a convenient umbrella
term to stand for the overlapping disciplinary areas of information
systems, information management and information technology.
Within this earlier paper we used the non-traditional case of
information-handling in the Inca Empire to help ground our discussion. Since its publication, the paper was given the Emerald award
for excellence for journal papers published in business and management during 2007. The author has also had correspondence with
a number of academics who have found the article useful not only
as a research paper but as a teaching case. The material also appears
to have been referred to within some practitioner outlets as a useful

E-mail address: Beynon-DaviesP@cardiff.ac.uk.

0268-4012/$ see front matter 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.ijinfomgt.2008.11.001

framing of the distinction between an information system and an

ICT system.
The current paper is part of an attempt to provide more detail
to the agenda set in (Beynon-Davies, 2007). It is the rst of a series
of papers, all of which have the aim of developing a clearer and
more sophisticated systematics for the area which following Kling
(Kling & Allen, 1996) we refer to as organizational informatics. Organizational informatics is interested in the place of information,
information systems and information technology within various
forms of human organization (Beynon-Davies, 2002). Systematics is
that branch of enquiry devoted to taxonomy: the process of describing, dening, identifying, classifying, and naming of things. Gregor
(2006) refers to taxonomic or analytic theory as one of her ve types
of theory in information systems. Taxonomic theory goes beyond
basic description in analyzing or summarizing salient attributes of
phenomena and relationships among phenomena. As such, taxonomic theory can act as a foundation for further work seeking to
provide causal explanations of phenomena, testable propositions
and predictive statements.
There have been a limited number of attempts at systematics
within the discipline of information systems and informatics more
generally (Alter, 2005). However, most such attempts take as their
starting point the development of terminology and classication
from the base-line of modern information and communication
technology (ICT). In this and subsequent papers we wish to take
a different direction. Our overall aim is to attempt to identify a

P. Beynon-Davies / International Journal of Information Management 29 (2009) 314

number of universal characteristics of information systems. In

other words, we work from the premise that information systems
are a natural consequence of the need for humans to communicate
and coordinate their activity. Hence, we would expect information
systems to exist across time, space and human cultures. This
leads us further to suggest that all information systems have a
number of characteristics in common (universals) and that to
determine the essence of what an information system is, we need
to analyse examples of information systems used by different
human societies at different historical periods.
This has resonance with a familiar problem experienced by
social researchers such as social anthropologists who seek to understand the workings of a society of which they are a part. For
instance, within texts on conducting ethnography (Agar, 1996)
researchers are provided with a number of techniques to help them
make the familiar strange. The most extreme forms of such are
Garnkels breaching experiments (Garnkel, 1967) in which investigators deliberately seek to cause breakdowns in the methods
people employ to act appropriately in particular social situations.
In this series of papers we seek to breach the over-socialised
current conceptions of information, information systems and information technology. Such conceptions are particularly evident in
certain contemporary theories of the Information Society (Castells,
1996) in which the current historical period is seen to be substantially different in information terms from those that have gone
before.
In the current paper we focus on one critical aspect of an information system: that of information. The concept of information is
clearly foundational to informatics but has been much taken-forgranted. Where a denition for information is considered in the
literature it is largely dened in terms of a contrast with data and
knowledge. For instance, Bocij, Chaffey, Greasley, and Hickie (2006)
dene information as data that have been processed so that they
are meaningful. However, we argue that a more sophisticated denition for information is possible built around the concept of a sign
and a sign-system. For this purpose we build upon the pioneering
work of Ronald Stamper (Stamper, 1985).
To help demonstrate the efcacy of considering information
in terms of signs and sign-systems we describe one of the earliest known examples of the recording of information as well as
its use and manipulation in support of collective human activity. During the Neolithic or late stone age period in the Near
East and corresponding with the rise of agriculture, clay tokens
began being used to account for a surplus of commodities amongst
settled human communities. Our description of this Neolithic
information-handling is based largely upon an interpretation of
the pioneering work of Denise Schmandt-Besserat (SchmandtBessarat, 1978, 1992, 1996).
Our aim as described above has much in common with that of
Mason, Mckenney, and Copeland (1997) who argue for the importance of historical studies within the overall methodology of a
discipline such as information systems. However, our aims in interpreting historical material are much broader from those detailed
by Mason et al. From our position, historical cases, and particularly
cases from non-Western societies, are useful for a number of reasons. First, they act as evidence of the universality of information
and information systems across time, space and culture. Second,
they demonstrate the ingenuity of humans in using many different
forms of artefact for record-keeping and communication (Crowley
& Heyer, 2003). This leads us to argue for the universal nature of
information technology (or ICT) in human society. Third, such cases
provide an intellectual distance from considerations of modern ICT
in denitions of information systems and information. They allow
us to begin to determine something of the essence or universal
nature of the core elements of informatics.

Within this planned series of papers we shall bring together

ideas from a range of literatures, many of which are unfamiliar to
academics and practitioners within the informatics area, to bear
upon our interpretation of the nature of informatics. We shall
consider ideas from anthropology, philosophy, linguistics, logic,
communication theory, cognitive science and of course history.
This, of course, is no accident. It is a necessary consequence of the
multi-dimensional nature of information and the trans-disciplinary
nature of informatics.
2. Difculties with the concept of information
Information is commonly seen to be a critical concept for the
21st century because of its importance to the competitiveness of
the private sector globally and even as an important commodity in
modern economies (Currie, 2000). Information is even developing
as an important element of concern within the natural sciences,
particularly within physics and biology, causing some to refer to
information as the new language of science (Von Baeyer, 2003).
However, the concept of information is generally treated in one
of two ways. It is either dened quite narrowly such as in terms
of the transmission of bits, or it is taken-for-granted in the sense
that it is used as an important term but its meaning is very poorly
dened and understood. Hence, for instance, the recent natural
science denition for information only considers certain aspects
of what we shall consider as information. Whereas within general
management information is seen as important to management but
the term is largely left undened by writers on this subject, such
as Porter (Porter & Millar, 1985). Therefore, although information
is critical stuff it is extremely difcult stuff to pin down; it is
probably not even stuff at all.
The following examples demonstrate some of the difculties in
dening information.
If information is a commodity it is a very strange commodity.
As Stamper states, Information is a paradoxical resource: you cant
eat it, you cant live in it, you cant travel about in it, but a lot of
people want it (Stamper, 2001). If somebody sells information the
commodity does not pass from seller to buyer like a traditional
commodity such as food; the seller still retains the information.
The consumption of information is therefore radically different
from the consumption of physical commodities such as food, wine
and electronic goods.
Much modern communication occurs through use of technology. However, technologically mediated communication may
actually suffer from loss of information. Take the example of a telephone conversation in which two people communicate using the
telephone network. Because the persons in the conversation are not
co-present signicant information is lost in the communication.
This is not solely because the electronic signal travelling down the
telephone line conveys only a certain percentage of the frequencies of normal human speech. It is also because people cannot see
each other and hence a great deal of the information conveyed in
bodily gestures is lost to the participants in the telephone conversation.
A person looks across at a fellow person situated at the opposite end of some room. He holds up one hand and points one nger
upwards clenching the remaining ngers in a st. How is person
to interpret what person is trying to tell him? Is it to be interpreted as an insult, as a command to get him one more of something
or is the nger merely being used as a pointer to something perhaps
stuck on the ceiling of the room?
These examples highlight a number of issues which need to be
considered in any truly accurate consideration of what is information. They highlight that information is particularly associated
with human communication, that communication involves signs

P. Beynon-Davies / International Journal of Information Management 29 (2009) 314

and that the use of such signs involves human interpretation. The
examples also demonstrate that information is inherently bound
closely with numerous phenomena language, action, logic and
technology; to name but a few. Hence, an understanding of the place
of information in human organization demands a multi-layered or
multi-levelled perspective.
3. Signs and communication
To help us construct a fruitful denition of the concept of
information we build upon Stampers (1973) seminal work on Information in Business and Administrative Systems published close to 30
years ago. In particular, we use the framework of semiotics to help
understand the multi-faceted nature of information. The study of
information is necessarily a boundary-spanning activity since information inltrates a multitude of areas; all of which are important
to organizational informatics.
Broadly, semiotics or semiology is the study of signs. Signs are
seen as the core element of concern serving to link issues of human
intentions, meaning, the structure of language, forms of communication transmission, data storage and collaborative action.
We would argue that the concept of information revolves around
this concept of a sign; being anything that is signicant. In a sense,
everything that humans have or do is signicant to some degree.
Sometimes not having or doing anything is regarded as signicant. The world within which humans nd themselves is therefore
resonant with systems of signs.
Steven Pinker (Pinker, 2001) argues that our genetic makeup
predisposes humans to be excellent manipulators of sign-systems.
A sign-system is any organized collection of signs. Everyday spoken language is probably the most readily accepted and complex
example of a sign-system. Signs however exist in most other forms
of human activity since signs are critical to the process of human
communication and understanding (Stamper, 1973).
Mention of linguistics and language should not however restrict
our conception of a sign to spoken language. For example, and as
indicated in the examples above, in traditional forms of face-toface communication, humans communicate through non-verbal as
well as verbal sign-systems; colloquially referred to as body language (Morris, 1979). Hence, humans impart a great deal in the
way of information by facial movements and other forms of bodily gesture. Such gestures are also signs. An example here is the
hand gesture in which the rst two ngers are used to create a V.
If this gesture is made with the palm facing toward the person(s)
communicated with, it might typically signify victory or possibly
peace. The gesture made with the knuckles facing towards the person(s) normally means something entirely different, at least in the
UK!
Note the link between the words sign and signicant in English;
they have the same root. Hence, the signicance of signs cannot be
divorced from people. Different people nd different things signicant. Many such differences in interpretation are due to differences
in the context and culture of communication.
Charles Morris (Morris, 1964) originally proposed three
branches of semiotics pragmatics, semantics and syntactics. In
(Stamper, 1973) signs and sign-systems are considered in terms of
four inter-dependent levels, layers or branches of semiotics: pragmatics, semantics, syntactics and empirics. These four layers serve
to connect the social world on the one hand with the technical
world on the other (see Fig. 1) (Stamper, 2001). Hence, this layered
model, which is sometimes referred to as the semiotic ladder, serves
to represent the concept of information as necessarily a sociotechnical phenomenon interposing between three different levels
of system of interest to organizational informatics: activity systems,
information systems and ICT systems. It also provides greater clar-

Fig. 1. Levels of semiotics.

ity and precision to the common-place distinction made between

data and information.
Signs are used within social systems. The social layer is
important because it forms the general context and culture of
communication or the shared assumptions underlying human
understanding. For communication to occur between human
beings signs must exist in a context of shared understanding. Much
of this social layer can be considered as the study of culture as
it affects communication the common expectations underlying human communicative behaviour in a particular context. The
reverse is also true the way in which signs are used within social
systems both reproduce and help to change such social systems
(Walsham & Han, 1991).
We would argue that within informatics we are particularly
interested in a sub-type of a social system which Checkland (1999)
refers to as a human activity system. Human activity systems, or
activity systems for short, consist of an inter-related set of activities designed to fulll some purpose. Signs are used within activity
systems as means of supporting collaborative or coordinated action.
Activity systems are linked to sign-systems through purposive
acts of communication. Pragmatics is concerned with such purpose
of communication. Pragmatics links the issue of signs with that
of intention. The focus of pragmatics is on the intentions of human
agents underlying communicative behaviour. In other words, intentions link language to action.
Semantics is concerned with the content or meaning of a message conveyed in a communicative act. Semantics is the study of the
meaning of signs the association between signs and the world
and hence can be considered as the study of the link between symbols and their referents or concepts.

P. Beynon-Davies / International Journal of Information Management 29 (2009) 314

Fig. 2. The process of communication.

Syntactics is concerned with the formalism used to represent a

sign. Syntactics as an area studies the form of communication in
terms of the logic and grammar of sign-systems. Hence, syntactics
is devoted to the study of the form rather than the content of signs
and sign-systems.
Empirics is the study of the signals used to carry or code the
signs of a message; the physical characteristics of the medium of
communication. Empirics is devoted to the study of communication channels and their characteristics, e.g., sound, light, electronic
transmission, etc.
Each sign has a material form independent of the observer.
Because of this material form each sign generates costs for its storage, transmission and processing. This is the level of technology for
data storage, transmission and processing. In broad terms we refer
to this as information and communications technology, but we use
the term to refer to a variety of historical and technological forms;
from the clay token to the modern digital computer.
Fig. 1 also helps clarify the subtle distinction between data and
information. Data cross the empirics and syntactics levels of signs
and are concerned with the form and representation of symbols in
storage and transmission. Information crosses the semantics and
pragmatics levels of signs and is concerned with the meaning of
symbols and their use within human action. Hence, information is
data plus sense-making.
4. Information and communication
From the discussion above it should be apparent that information is inherently related to the process of communication and
that signs are tools of communication. In the classic Shannon and
Weaver model (Shannon, 1949), communication is a process that
has the following characteristics (Fig. 2). It involves two or more
parties or agents. One or more of the parties in a communication
process will be the sender with intentions to convey. The intentions
of the sender will be expressed in a message using elements from
a particular language; the language will have an agreed syntax. The
message will be transmitted by the sender in terms of signals along
some communication channel. One or more of the other parties will
be a receiver. Receivers have the ability to interpret signals as a

message in the sense that the meaning of the message becomes

apparent.
The key elements of communication are therefore agents
(senders and receivers), intentions, messages, language (with an
agreed syntax and semantics), signals and communication channels. It is evident from this description that there is a clear
relationship between the layers of the semiotic ladder discussed
in Section 3 and the model of the communication process.
Communication normally exists within the context of some
social situation. The social situation sets the context for the intentions conveyed (pragmatics) and the form in which communication
takes place. In a communicative situation intentions are expressed
through messages which comprise collections of inter-related signs
taken from a language which is mutually understood by the agents
involved in the communication. Mutual understanding implies that
agents involved understand the chosen language in terms of its
agreed syntax (syntactics) and semantics. The sender codes the
message in the language and sends the message as signals along
some communication channel (empirics). The chosen communication channel will have inherent properties which determine
outcomes such as the speed with which communication can take
place and over what distance.
Another way of looking at this is that the four levels of semiotics
dene elements of a protocol between agents or actors in communication activity. A protocol is a convention or a set of conventions
which controls the communication process. This means that both
sender and receiver must agree or negotiate a protocol for communication before such communication can occur. In terms of this
communication protocol, pragmatics concerns the intentions conveyed in a message, semantics the meaning of a message, syntactics
the formalism used to represent the message and empirics the signals used to code and transmit the message.
However, Shannon and Weavers model of communication has
been seen as decient as a model of human dyadic communication because of its linear nature (Burgoon, Hunsaker, & Dawson,
1994). In contrast, human communication involves the use of feedback and is consequently transactional in nature. Human verbal
communication, for instance, typically occurs in the form of dialogue, discourse or conversations; in which the agents within the

P. Beynon-Davies / International Journal of Information Management 29 (2009) 314

Fig. 3. Plain tokens.

discourse adjust their messages in response to a history of previous

messages conducted within a particular dialogue (Clark, 1996).
We would argue that the model of communication illustrated in Fig. 2 also under-emphasises the role of records and
record-keeping within human communication. When human communication occurs between more than two people and particularly
when messages have to be transmitted across time and space, the
persistent record is an essential feature of human communication.
Hence, it is to the artefact of the record and the activity of recordkeeping that we devote the greatest attention in our description of
the case that follows.
5. Tokens in Ancient Sumer
Sumer was one of the earliest known civilizations and was
located in southern Mesopotamia meaning in Greek The land
between the two rivers. This is an area geographically located
between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, largely corresponding to
modern Iraq, north-eastern Syria, south-eastern Turkey, and the

Province of south-western Iran. The civilization lasted

Khuzest
an
from the late sixth millennium bc through to the rise of Babylon in
the early second millennium bc.
The cities of Sumer were not the rst human cities. However, they were the rst urban conurbations to practice intensive,
year-round agriculture. It has been proposed that this Neolithic
revolution created a surplus of foodstuffs which could be stored for
later consumption (Rudgley, 1999). This allowed the population to
settle in one place instead of migrating with the movement of crops
and herds. Intensive agriculture also allowed for a much greater
population density. This, in turn promoted developments such as
forms of hierarchical social organization, an associated division of
labour, the invention of record-keeping and the development of
writing.
Small clay tokens ranging between 1 and 5 cm across, of multiple shapes, and apparently falling into distinct categories have
been found in Near Eastern sites dating between 8000 and 3000 bc
(Schmandt-Bessarat, 1978). Schmandt-Besserat hypothesises that
such tokens constitute some of the earliest evidence for recordkeeping (Schmandt-Bessarat, 1992). Inherently, she proposes that
these tokens are some of the earliest examples of signs used to
record economic information. She suggests that these tokens were
used as symbols to signify two concepts. First, they served as counters and as such represented quantities or measures of things.
Second, they served to stand for some particular economic good

or commodity. Hence, a given token signied both a type of commodity and the quantity of this commodity.
Schmandt-Bessarat (1996) suggests that the way in which
tokens signied goods and quantities changed over the millennia
as a reection of social change. At rst tokens were used to signify
staple agricultural commodities. Later, tokens were used to signify
goods manufactured by craftsmen in cities. In other words, simple tokens were initially used to signify unprocessed commodities.
Over time, complex tokens evolved to signify processed commodities.
When the token system came about in the pre-Sumerian era,
circa 8000 bc, the rst tokens consisted mainly of abstract shapes
formed in clay such as cones, spheres, tetrahedrons, discs and cylinders. She suggests that these earliest tokens probably recorded the
most basic staples such as quantities of grain and livestock. These
so-called plain tokens continued to be used until the end of the
third millennium bc (Fig. 3).
In about 4400 bc, what Schmandt-Besserat refers to as complex
tokens started appearing in the early cities of Sumer. These tokens
consisted of new shapes and the use of incised markings (Fig. 4).
She proposes that these complex tokens stood for nished products,
such as bread, oil, perfume, wool and rope, and for items produced
in workshops such as metal, bracelets, types of cloths, garments,
mats, pieces of furniture, tools and a variety of stone and pottery
vessels. It is noteworthy that these complex tokens did not replace
the earlier plain tokens but were merely added to form a larger
system of signs.
Schmandt-Bessarat (1996) categorises tokens into 16 main
types based primarily upon shape (Fig. 5). These include cones,
spheres, discs, cylinders, tetrahedrons, ovoids, rectangles, triangles, biconoids, paraboloids, bent coils and ovals/rhomboids. She
also identies a number of sub-types based upon variations in
sizes and markings. For example, cones, spheres, disks and tetrahedrons are typically represented in two sizes small and large.
Many shapes also have incised markings consisting of incised lines,
notches, punches and pinched appendices. The numbers assigned
to each type in Fig. 5 represent the number of sub-types in each
category identied by Schmandt-Bessarat.
The evolution of the token system therefore appears to reect an
ever-increasing need for accuracy. For example, in tokens dealing
with livestock, early plain cylinders and lentoid disks apparently
stood for heads of livestock. In contrast, in the fourth millennium
bc complex tokens signied different species of livestock such as
fat-tail sheep, the sex of the animal such as ewe and the age of the

P. Beynon-Davies / International Journal of Information Management 29 (2009) 314

Fig. 4. Complex tokens.

sheep such as lamb. This increase in the number of token types and
sub-types, which occurred in large cities of Sumer about 3500 bc,
seems therefore to indicate a concern for more precise data and
consequently a more sophisticated form of record-keeping.
The clustering of tokens in groups varying in size from two to
about one hundred tokens at various archaeological sites suggests
that a given token typically signied a small quantity of a given commodity; probably signifying a one-to-one correspondence between
a given token and one unit of the commodity signied. Hence,
one jar of oil could be represented by one ovoid, six jars of oil
by six ovoids, and so on. There were apparently only a few tokens

that stood for a collection of items. For example, the lentoid disk
probably signied a ock of perhaps ten animals. This meant that
the token sign-system did not allow the user to express numbers
abstractly. In other words, there was no token for the concepts of
one, two and three (the concept of cardinality) independently of the
commodity counted.
In the early fourth millennium bc two mechanisms were also
devised for aggregating a group of tokens. Tokens were either tied
together with a piece of string or were enclosed in hollow containers of clay. We shall focus on the latter form of aggregation, which
Schmandt-Besserat refers to as clay envelopes (Fig. 6). Initially, it

Fig. 5. Token types.

P. Beynon-Davies / International Journal of Information Management 29 (2009) 314

Fig. 6. Clay envelope.

appears that these clay envelopes were used as a means of imprinting the seals or signatures of the parties engaging in the economic
transaction being recorded. Such signatures were hence probably
used to signify ownership, obligation or authority. After a period of
time, the impressions of the tokens contained in the envelope were
also impressed in its outer layer. After the envelope was completed
it was baked, making the record persistent or difcult to alter.
6. Accounting in Ancient Sumer
Schmandt-Bessarat (1992) hence argues that tokens were a conceptual leap for human-kind, constituting a new means of encoding
data. The essential purpose of tokens was to keep records of things:
an accounting. The shape and markings of the token signied the
thing about which the record was made. Hence, a conical type
of token probably stood for a small measure of grain, while a
spherical token stood for a larger measure of grain. In contrast, a
cylindrical token probably stood for a domesticated animal, a tetrahedron token for a unit of labour and an ovoid token for a jar of
oil.
Some have argued that clay tokens are not actually the earliest evidence of human symbolism. Marshack (2003), for instance,
suggests that symbolism such as scratches on antler horn from the
Upper Palaeolithic (35,00010,000 bc) period may constitute some
of the earliest use of a tally, related perhaps to calendar events such
as the gestation period of a horse or the phases of the moon.
However, clay tokens appear to be a distinct innovation in a
number of ways over the use of tallies.
First, they were entirely man-made artefacts compared to earlier symbolism which involved modifying natural objects. This
meant that distinct token types could be associated with a discrete
and unequivocal meaning that was easily communicated between
human actors. A tally in contrast is meaningless without communication of the context in which it is created. This enabled tokens
to provide a far more exible form of signication on a number of
counts.
Second, the forms of the token-system were relatively easy to
create and duplicate. Clay was a commonly available material which
required no special skills or tools to work. In most cases creation
of a token involved merely rolling a small lump of clay between
the palms of the hands and pinching it between the ngertips in
various ways.
Third, the tokens as a whole constituted a sign-system. This
allowed the classication of things. The token-system was also
open-ended in that the signication of new types of commodities

merely required the addition of a new type of token to the tokensystem (a new shape or an existing shape with new or distinctive
markings) (Rudgley, 1999).
Fourth, since tokens of different kinds and in different quantities
could be stored together, it has been proposed that they were used
as one of the earliest forms of accounting record (Mattesich, 2000).
Such records precluded the need for any individual to memorise
accounts. They could be referred to and understood at any future
time by someone who knew what the token represented.
Fifth, it has been proposed that tokens were independent of phonetics. Hence, the Sumerian token system could be regarded as one
of the few examples of semasiographic writing. Although most
existing systems for writing natural languages are based on a correspondence between the written sign and some element of the
spoken word, a system of signs does not have to replicate speech to
communicate narrative. Therefore, people speaking different languages or dialects found it easy to adopt this system based on
physical artefacts. The evidence of extremely wide distribution of
such tokens throughout the Near East in Neolithic times seems to
support this inference.
Sixth, because of the one-to-one correspondence between the
token and the commodity represented, it was relatively easy to
apply operations such as addition or subtraction within the system.
However, when the numbers of things to be counted was large, such
operations could be time-consuming and tedious.
Mattesich (1989) describes the clay envelope with its enclosed
tokens as equivalent to modern notions of a personal account
representing that portion of total assets (or equity) invested in
a particular debtor. . .Consequently the sum-total of the various
tokens in a particular envelope. . .stood for that part of the creditors wealth lent to a debtor. The token system therefore contains
elements for representing both the physical output of goods from
one place and input into another place. It also appears to have been
used to represent social relations of ownership and debt.
Tokens were apparently not re-used once made. They were disposed of once the transaction they represented was concluded.
Evidence from archaeological investigation suggests that the use
of tokens for keeping accounts followed an annual cycle of activity
associated with agriculture. Tokens appear to have been discarded
after the harvest and threshing, when the crops would be stored.
This suggests that economic transactions were made in the course
of the year to be completed at the time of the harvest. If this was
so, the usual length of keeping accounts in archives was less than a
year.
7. Association with religion, social hierarchy and the
development of writing
Rowland (2003) summarises a number of suppositions from
the historiography of communication, particularly as embodied in
the work of Innis (1950). The rst supposition is that all communication technologies (or what we would refer to as information
and communication technologies) are extensions of basic, innate
human communication capabilities. The second supposition is that
different communication technologies impact upon the cognitive
structures of human beings over time, inuencing changes in social
organization. The work of Schmandt-Bessarat (1996) supports such
reasoning. In her research she proposes an inherent association
between the use of tokens for record-keeping purposes and the
rise of social hierarchy, centralised religious places of worship and
the development of writing in Ancient Sumeria. Tokens and clay
tablets functioned as an extension of the human brain to collect,
manipulate, store and retrieve data. In turn, processing an increasing volume of data with more complex tokens brought people to
think with greater abstraction (Schmandt-Bessarat, 1992).

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Rudgley (1999) argues that despite widespread evidence of

tokens in the Near East, there is no evidence of the use of tokens for
long-distance transactions associated with trade. Instead, tokens
seem associated with the rise of social hierarchy during the
Neolithic period and local transactions within dened communities. The argument runs as follows. In order to administer the
accumulation of foodstuffs generated by the innovation of agriculture local elites arose. A member of the elite, such as the village
headman, would be required to collect and then re-distribute the
economic surplus of the community. Tokens were the means by
which the ow of goods could be accounted for and the means by
which decisions relating to distribution could be made. As the size
of the communities of the Near East grew in size and as the activities performed by these communities became associated with a
distinct division of labour, there was a need to expand upon the
use of plain tokens. New goods produced in urban centres such as
Uruk and Susa had to be accounted for with the invention of new
complex tokens.
Schmandt-Besserat therefore proposes that the two major
changes in the token system were not associated merely with the
rise of agriculture and of cities. Instead, the invention of accounting may be related to the rise of an elite class within these early
human societies and the formation of a state bureaucracy. The two
stages of the token system, plain and complex, correspond. . .to two
phases in the evolution of social structures. Plain tokens with a rank
society, whereas complex tokens signal state formation in Southern
Mesopotamia (Schmandt-Bessarat, 1992).
This hypothesis, she maintains, is supported by three sets of
evidence.
First, the creation of the token system coincided with a new
settlement pattern characterized by larger communities. In other
words, the rst token assemblage coincides with the advent of a
hierarchical or rank society characterized by a new type of leadership overseeing community resources.
The fact that the rst stage of the token system (plain tokens)
coincided with agriculture and the second (complex tokens) with
urban formation, seems of great signicance. It clearly indicates
that the evolution of accounting coincided with major socioeconomic development. Schmandt-Bessarat states that the origin
of accounting must be credited to ranked societies and the state. . .
it was not the mere fact of hoarding grain, tending ocks, or
producing manufactured goods that brought about and developed accounting. . . it was the development of social structures
(Schmandt-Bessarat, 1992).
The appearance of the rst token assemblages in the period
80007500 bc suggests that the system of counting and recordkeeping of goods became necessary when survival depended on
domestication of grains and accumulation of the products of harvests. In other words, the token system fullled new needs for
accounting brought about by the invention of agriculture and the
development of xed communities.
The multiplication of token types and sub-types in the fourth
millennium bc also seems to correspond with the rise of the city and
the new forms of human activity reliant on a clear division of labour.
This is because the creation of workshops, and the more diversied urban economy that followed, required more sophisticated
accounting techniques.
Second, the tokens recovered in the tombs of prestigious individuals suggest that, from the Neolithic to the Bronze Age (60003500
bc), the use of counters served as an instrument of power for an elite
controlling goods.
In rare, but signicant instances, tokens have been recovered in a
funerary setting. These ndings suggest that the people who handled tokens and practiced accounting were of high status within
the society of the time. Among the thousands of graves dating

from 8000 to 3000 bc excavated in the Near East, only a dozen

are known to have yielded tokens. In these instances the counters
were restricted to the tombs of individuals of high status, some
richly furnished. The rarity of funerary tokens, their association
with luxurious burial deposits, with artefacts symbolizing power
and with special architecture, seems to indicate that the counters
did not belong to the masses, but were the privilege of an elite
(Schmandt-Bessarat, 1996).
Third, in all the major ancient Near Eastern cities such as Uruk
and Susa complex tokens occur in archaeological levels in which
seals featuring the ruler have been discovered. They also occur
in public buildings built according to an identical plan and decorated with typical mosaics and containing grain measures. In other
words, the administrative centres that yield complex tokens were
the seats of a large bureaucracy, housed in similar buildings, using
the same administrative devices (complex tokens, seals and grain
measures) and, most importantly, were headed by the same powerful ruler. The complex tokens can be considered, therefore, as being
an essential element of the bureaucracy used by the Sumerian king
to govern and control the distribution of commodities in the rst
city-states.
The appearance of tokens in the earliest rank societies, their
inclusion in rich burials, and the place of the complex tokens in
the state bureaucracy, suggest that, from the beginning, accounting
was the privilege of an elite and that the more the system became
efcient and precise, the more power it wielded for this elite.
It has thus been proposed that the rise of the complex token
system is likely to have been associated with the emergence of a
distinct temple bureaucracy. When tokens were recovered within
buildings, the structures suggest that, from early on, accounting
with tokens belonged to places of religious signicance. For example, in the sixth millennium bc site of Hajji Firuz, Iran, a number
of cones were located in a house that was apparently serving a
special non-domestic function. It showed no trace of activities of
daily life such as cooking or int chipping and the building differed
substantially from the usual domestic architecture.
Schmandt-Besserat paraphrases the eminent anthropologist
Claude Levi-Strauss as stating that writing was invented for the
exploitation of man by man. In other words, tokens were used
within early accounting systems in Mesopotamia as a means of
power. Tokens were used primarily as a means to control the
amount of goods delivered to the temple and their re-distribution.
The development of the token system therefore reects the development of authority. They were a bureaucratic tool used to control
the production of goods and their pooling for state benet. This has
much synergy with Benigers conception of the place of information and information technologies in society as tools for control.
He states that, . . .a societys ability to maintain control at all levels from inter-personal to international relations will be directly
proportional to the development of its information technologies
(Beniger, 1986).
Hobart and Schiffman (1998) offer a useful historical perspective
on the long-term nature of information and information technology. Although both writing and speech constitute communication
and therefore impart information, they limit their denition of
the rst information age to the invention of writing. In their eyes,
writing is seen as the rst information technology. Both writing
and speech constitute communication, but of the two only writing
extracts the sounds of speech from their oral ow by giving them
visual representation.
However, following Schmandt-Besserat we would argue that
writing is actually not the rst information technology. Marcia and
Robert Ascher (Ascher & Ascher, 1997), for instance, emphasise that
writing is actually not a necessary condition for civilization. Instead,
some medium for record-keeping is required. In the pre-literate

P. Beynon-Davies / International Journal of Information Management 29 (2009) 314

societies of Ancient Sumeria and the Andean peoples of the Inca

(Beynon-Davies, 2007), information was recorded through physical
artefacts consisting of clay tokens and knotted strings. This suggests
a much broader denition for information technology. Technology
is any organized collection of artefacts created by humans to extend
their human capabilities or to compensate for their limitations.
Information technology is any such collection of artefacts used to
extend human information processing and communication capabilities or compensate for inherent cognitive and social limitations
in this area.
Having said this, the development of writing was undoubtedly a
signicant leap forward in the sophistication of information technology. It has been proposed that the impressions made on the
outside of clay envelopes were the rst step in the development
of such writing (Schmandt-Bessarat, 1996). The two-dimensional
impressions made on the outside of clay envelopes may have begun
as a way of making doubly sure that an accounting of things was
accurate. Mattesich (1989) interprets this practice as the earliest
example of double-entry accounting. Also, checks could be made
of the contents of an envelope without breaking the envelope
itself.
At a certain stage the Sumerian accountants realised that the
notation used on the outside of the envelope made both the envelope itself and the tokens contained inside redundant (Rudgley,
1999). Hence, during the period 35003100 bc the clay envelope
gave way to the clay tablet. Accounting now took place merely by
impressing symbols for the things recorded directly onto a tablet.
With the rise of such pictography around 3100 bc a further recognition occurred that quantities which previously had been expressed
by direct or concrete correspondence between the sign and the
commodity could be abstracted and represented by explicit symbols, used to represent a cardinal number such as three.
Hence, Harris (1986) portrays the decisive step from the use
of tokens to the use of written script as the movement from a
token-iterative sign-system to an emblem-slotting sign-system.
As discussed above, in a token-iterative sign-system the concept
of three sheep would be represented as sheep, sheep, sheep. In
an emblem-slotting sign-system the same concept would be represented by two signs or emblems: one representing sheep, the
other the cardinal number three.
8. Discussion
Information is a central concept for organizational and personal
life in the 21st century. For this reason many have referred to the
emergence of an information society globally (Castells, 1996). However, as the Sumerian case demonstrates, information is not the
prerogative of the modern Western world. It is possible even to
argue that, information is a characteristic of all human cultures
and time-periods, ever since the dawn of human culture itself over
50,000 years ago (Klein, 2002).
Nevertheless, the concept of information is difcult to dene
precisely because it is multi-faceted. For this reason we have chosen
to consider information in terms of the concept of a sign. Signs
mediate between the physical and the social world: they are sociotechnical phenomena. Signs are essential component elements of
human communication.
Communication is clearly essential for coordination of human
activity. In small groups, spatially located close together and for
tasks that are temporally limited, face-to-face human communication is sufcient for such coordination. When the size of the
group increases, when the agents of the communication are spatially distant and/or when there is some temporal dis-location in
the message wishing to be conveyed then some information system
is essential.

11

Human communication is therefore a necessary but not a sufcient condition for an information system. The essence of an
information system is embodied in the concept of the record and
the activity of record-keeping. The record acts as an external and
persistent memory of something. The record signies something
intended by the maker of the record that can be interpreted by the
reader of the record at some other time and possible place. Using
such artefacts, the dialogue or discourse of human agents can occur
across time and possibly space.
We have used the discipline of semiotics and its concept of a
sign as a means of providing greater clarity to the concept of information. Semiotics is devoted to the study of signs and consists of
four sub-areas. The levels of pragmatics, semantics, syntactics and
empirics represent various facets of the concept of a sign that span
between the social and the technical.
The focus of pragmatics is on the intentions of human agents
underlying communicative behaviour. In other words, intentions
link language to action. The case described in this paper indicates
that record-keeping as a formal language appears to pre-date the
invention of written language. There is evidence of this in other cultures such as the Inca where a form of record-keeping based upon
knotted strings emerged in a society without a written language
(Urton & Brezine, 2005).
Human memory is sufcient to support cooperative and simple
activities between individuals in small communities. As communities grow, activities, particularly those reliant on economic
exchange, need to take place between strangers and generally
are more complex in nature, reliant typically on some division
of labour. Records compensate for the limitations of individual
human memory and extend it into social memory. Records of
economic transactions institutionalise memory of past economic
exchanges and the obligations placed upon individuals engaged in
such exchange. It is also proposed that accurate record-keeping
is critical in establishing and sustaining trust between strangers
engaging in economic exchange. Records account not only for the
types and quantities of commodities exchanged, they are also
important for supporting social relationships such as ownership
and debt.
Semantics is concerned with the meaning of a message conveyed in a communicative act. Semantics considers the content of
communication and is the study of the meaning of signs. Semantics can be considered as the study of the link between symbols
and their referents or concepts. In contrast, syntactics is concerned
with the formalism used to represent a message. Syntactics studies
the form of communication in terms of the logic and grammar of
sign-systems. In other words, syntactics is devoted to the study of
the form rather than the content of signs.
John Dewey (Dewey, 1916) suggested that a word is three things:
a fence, a label and a vehicle. The same could be said more generally
of the concept of sign. A sign is a fence in the sense that it sets a
conceptual boundary around some thing and is used to distinguish
one thing from another. A sign is a label in that it acts as a convenient reference standing for something else. Finally, a sign is a
vehicle in the sense that used with other signs as a language it
is a means for describing and debating with the world as well as
acting upon it. Pragmatics is particularly interested in the sign as
a vehicle as a means for supporting action. Syntactics is particularly interested in the sign as a fence how conceptual boundaries
are created with symbols. Semantics is particularly interested in the
idea of the sign as label and as such is the study of what symbols
refer to.
A simple model which encapsulates some of the essence of
semantics and syntactics is one in which a sign is broken down
into three component parts which are frequently referred to collectively as the meaning triangle (Fig. 7) (Ogden & Richards, 1923).

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P. Beynon-Davies / International Journal of Information Management 29 (2009) 314

Fig. 7. The meaning triangle.

The designation of a sign refers to the symbol (or collection of symbols) by which some concept is known. The extension of a sign refers
to the range of phenomena that the concept in some way covers.
The intension of a sign is the collection of properties that in some
ways characterise the phenomena in the extension, and is the idea
or concept of signicance.
In this conception, symbols are equivalent to data. A datum, a
single item of data, is a symbol or a set of symbols used to represent something. Information particularly occurs in the stands-for
or intentional (Searle, 1970) relations between the symbol (designation) and its concept (intension) and the symbol and its referent
(extension).
The Sumerian clay token is a classic example of a sign. The token
itself represents the designation of the sign the symbol. A token
signies two concepts through its existence, shape and markings
(intension): the quantity of some commodity and the type of commodity. Hence, there was meant to be a one-to-one correspondence
between the designation and extension within the sign-system.
For example, one token of a given type represented one item of
a commodity such as a measure of grain or oil.
The collection of both plain and complex tokens constituted as
a whole this sign-system. The physical makeup of the token themselves and the ways in which the features of each token allowed the
user to distinguish between one type of token and another constituted its syntax. Given the demise of the human community that
used this particular sign-system, the semantics of tokens is subject
to much interpretation. However, Schmandt-Besserat believes that
there is sufcient evidence for a number of associations such as
those illustrated in Fig. 8 for particular types of plain and complex
token.
Empirics is the study of the signals used to carry a message; the
physical characteristics of the medium of communication. Empirics traditionally considers problems solely of data communication,
particularly the study of communication channels and their characteristics. However, empirics should also logically concern the issue
of data representation and storage based around the concept of a
record.
The term universe of discourse (UoD), domain of discourse or
ontology (Kishore, Sharman, & Ramesh, 2004) is sometimes used
to describe the context within which a group of signs is used continually by a social group or groups. For work in informatics, at the
level of empirics, it is important to develop a detailed understand-

ing of the structure of these signs as a schema: an attempt to develop

an abstract description of some UoD, usually in terms of a formal
language. To build a schema we must have a data model, which
establishes a set of principles for representing and organizing the
storage of data. In general terms, the syntax of any data model can
be described in terms of a hierarchy of data items, data elements
and data structures (Tsitchizris & Lochovsky, 1982). A data item is
the lowest-level of data organization. A data element is a logical collection of data items and a data structure is a logical collection of
data elements.
The most common data model that has been employed for data
storage within organizations has been referred to as a le-based
data model. This data model uses the inter-related constructs of
elds, records and les. Fields are data items, records are data

Fig. 8. Designation, intension and extension of Sumerian tokens.

P. Beynon-Davies / International Journal of Information Management 29 (2009) 314

elements and les are the data structures within this data model.
Although this data model assumed some signicance with the rise
of the modern ofce and bureaucracy (Weber, 1946), we would
argue that the le-based, sometimes referred to as the recordsbased, data model has existed for many thousands of years in
numerous distinct human civilizations. In a sense, records by their
very nature involve the use of signs to act as a persistent signication of something. By persistence we mean that a communication
is encoded in some reied form which allows it to be transported
through time and space. Records are typically collected together in
the data structure of a le. Collecting records together in a particular
le normally implies some association (semantic intent) between
these data elements.
One can clearly argue that accountants in Ancient Sumeria used
an inherently le-based data model based around the creation and
manipulation of physical tokens. Clay tokens of various types constituted the data items in this data model. The analysis conducted
by Schmandt-Bessarat indicates that the variety (Beer, 1972) in this
sign-system is 492 (the sum of the number of sub-types in Fig. 5).
Hence, there are roughly 500 different things that could be represented as data items within this data model.
Sometimes, a collection of such data items were collected
together and enclosed in a clay envelope. This envelope was xed
in baking as a data element or record of an economic transaction. It could also be argued that the co-location of tokens and clay
envelopes within some location such as a temple precinct equated
to the creation of a data structure or le which served perhaps to
record information such as the surplus of a particular harvest stored
for later use.
Schmandt-Bessarat cogently summarises her position in the
following quote: The conceptual leap that revolutionised communication was the creation of a set of symbols with specic shapes
and endowing each shape with a discrete meaning. The tokens were
modelled in striking, geometric shapes that were easy to recognise. The forms were simple and easy to duplicate. The counters
were systematically repeated, always carrying the same meaning.
The dozens of token shapes constituted a code of dozens of interrelated concept symbols concerning goods and commodities. Later,
with the development of a repertory of markings, the code grew to
hundreds of concept symbols. The system made it possible to deal
concurrently with multiple kinds of data, thus allowing the processing and communication of a volume and complexity of information
never reached previously (Schmandt-Bessarat, 1992).
If we replace Schmandt-Bessarats use of the term concept symbol with sign in this quote we would argue that the four levels of
sign described above, relate directly to three levels of system important to informatics. Human activity systems are social systems
and hence typically interact with the semiotic level of pragmatics.
Signs are used within such activity systems to support collaborative and coordinated action. In one direction they are used to encode
intentions. In the other direction they are used as key inputs into
decisions made about action. An information system is a communication system used to support a given activity system and as such
is mainly located against the semantic and syntactic levels of signs.
The output of an information system is therefore information; information systems use agreed systems of signs to represent meaning.
An ICT system is a designed system of artefacts used to collect, store,
process and disseminate data. Since the output of an ICT system is
data, such systems are located mainly at the technical and empirics
level of signs. ICT is concerned with the physical representation of
signs for storage, transmission and manipulation.
Within the Sumer case, the activity system of concern involved
the storage and distribution of wealth produced by a settled
community. Tokens were used within an information system to
represent the accumulation of agricultural and manufactured prod-

13

ucts by a community and to account for this collective wealth for

the purposes of economic re-distribution. The tokens themselves,
along with their aggregation in clay envelopes, represented the
information technology of the day. Such tokens were used for data
representation, storage and manipulation.
9. Conclusion
This paper has described part of a programme of work with the
overall aim of understanding and describing some of the fundamental nature of informatics. It is the rst in a planned series designed
to examine this nature through utilization of a set of literatures,
many of which are unfamiliar to academics and practitioners in
information management, information systems and information
technology. We particularly intend to use a consideration of historical cases to help make strange and challenge existing conceptions
of foundation terms within informatics.
The important premise underlying this exercise is that component elements of informatics have a universal quality. In other
words, as a working hypothesis, we propose that information, information systems and even information technology are likely to have
a presence in numerous distinct human cultures in different timeperiods and across global geography. This leads us to suggest that
informatics, dened in these very broad terms, might therefore be
a phenomenon inherently associated with the cognitive and social
makeup of Homo sapiens. We further propose that this conception
of informatics provides a better intension for the term than a mere
re-branding of computer science. We believe that this conception
of informatics demands special disciplinary attention and suggest
that it may act as a rmer foundation for an area of interest which, in
some of its guises, is traditionally fragmented and has been subject
to continual cycles of disciplinary crisis (Banville & Landry, 1989;
Benbasat & Zmud, 2003).
Three component elements of informatics are considered in this
series of papers as universal human phenomena. The key issue
examined in the current paper has been to identify the essence
of what information is. Using the evidence of Sumerian clay tokens
we have made the case for considering information as embodied
in the concept of the sign. Signs are represented in various ways
as information technology. They are the source of communication
within information systems and as such enable the coordination of
activity systems. The next paper in the series will build upon this
discussion and examine the related concept of an information system, using a similar method of analysis and exposition. This will
be followed by a more detailed consideration of the universals of
information technology, as alluded to in the current paper.
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Paul Beynon-Davies is currently a professor of business informatics at Cardiff
Business School, Cardiff University. Before taking up an academic post, Professor
Beynon-Davies worked for several years in the informatics industry in the UK. He
still regularly acts as a consultant to the public and private sector particularly in the
area of ICT and its impact on organizational performance. He has published widely
in the eld having 10 books and over 60 academic papers to his name. Professor
Beynon-Davies has engaged in a number of projects related to the impact of ICT on
the economic, social and political spheres, both in the UK and Europe.