Semitic RTL (Was: Ayeri: Menan Coyalayamoena ena McGuffey)

Benct Philip Jonsson wrote at 2005-04-09 22:49:45 (+0200)
 > Carsten Becker skrev:
 >
 > > [1] This raises a question: The Proto-Semitics, were they mostly
 > > left-handed, or why are semitic languages written from right to
 > > left? It would be more natural for a left-handed person. I guess
 > > left-to-right became the standard direction in Europe because
 > > most people are right handed and writing is easier for them that
 > > way.
 >
 > I've seen the right-to-left direction claimed to be an inheritance
 > from pictographic writing.  When a right-handed person draws a
 > person or an animal they tend to draw them looking leftwards, and
 > that determined the direction of writing.
 >

But figures in Egyptian hieroglyphics face _into_ the line of reading,
so left-facing animals would mean left-to-right reading order.

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