Summary As the world grows steadily smaller through the rapid development of technologies, the need for easier communication becomes increasingly acute, and paradoxically man has apparently now come full circle - from prehistoric symbols to sophisticated verbal communication, and now back to symbols. The earliest known inscriptions date from the fourth millenium before Christ and developed from the mnemonic mark to the pictograph, the ideogram and hieroglyph, and finally to the abstract linear symbols we use as letters. The fundamentally visual language which Ezra Pound esteemed in the ideography of early peoples was based on common human experiences which could be widely understood, while the sophisticated formulae of written language and specialist knowledge codes is confined to those who know the forms. Today there are some 5.000 languages and dialects in use, and although only a hundred are of more than parochial importance, intercommunication between them ranges from difficult to impossible. It becomes increasingly apparent that we need an adjunct to speech and the written word, and require to work towards an understandable symbology. Three hundred years ago Leibnitz dreamed of a universal system of pictorial signs that could be read in all languages like 1 - 2=3. This is a subject which has occupied many minds but has probably been methodically pioneered furthest by the American Charles Bliss, who coined the term `semantography`. Semantography is a lexicon of a hundred basic signs which can be combined for any meaning needed in communication, commerce, industry and science, and could easily be reproduced by an IBM typewriting ball or computerised typesetter. In a return to the iconography of the pictogram his symbols are semi-abstract, although reminiscent of actual objects and actions. The Austrian social scientist and teacher, Otto Neurath, conceived a similar technique for translating complex figures and activities into symbolic forms which would be accurate and meaningful to a broad audience. This he called the International System of Typographic Picture Education, or ISOTYPE for short. His design images are more illustrative than those of Bliss, and seem well tuned to illustrate statistics, working activities or situations. The configurations have added potential for imparting further meanings and associations by the use of colour and 78textures. The International Organisation for Standardisation, not as sinister as it sounds, is at present conducting research and development of Neurath's system in countries around the world, in an effort to achieve a common acceptance of this pictorial grammar for general use. The late Henry Drey fuss, a designer of international repute, dedicated much of his life to semiotics, a scholarly term he coined for the science of signs indicating ideas or symbols. He enthusiastically collected and classified graphic devices, and created a Data Bank which contains over 20,000 symbols many of which he reproduced in his comprehensive publication Symbol Sourcebook. Similar compilations are being made by many organisations, the most notable being 1COGRADA, an international association of national design societies, and Glyphs Inc. which is under the direction of the anthropologist Margaret Mead and Rudolf Modley. Probably the most familiar manifestation of the early utterances of a newly created and universal visual language are the traffic guidance signs adopted by the United Nations, and now seen around the world. As design solutions they smack of committee compromise, camels rather than horses, and. often being abstract, require to be learnt to be understood. Nevertheless they are now part of our global environment. When design aesthetics are considered in conjunction with design purpose, the results can be happier. For example, the identification system created by Otl Aicher for the Munich Olympic Games was effective and conceptually elegant, in that it incorporated the modular advantages of the alphabet with the pictorial associations of the hieroglyph. In addition to cultural and institutional symbols which inform and regulate human activities there are also commercial and trading devices. As a specialised area of identification, trademarks provide an intriguing study; and their history is often a fascinating observation of social mores and personal foibles. The Sumerians, who invented writing around 3,000 BC, also invented the personal seal. Worn around the neck, the seal bore a unique engraved pictorial image, proprietary to an individual and non-transferable to another. Legal and trade transactions were inscribed on wet clay and the impressed seal provided the stamp of agreement, in much the same way as the penned signature we use today. 76Emblems and insignia used for commercial marks can be labelled according to form, purpose and function. The designer's terminology, although not altogether precise, generally defines symbols as pictorial or abstract devices, logotypes as signatures, and monograms as intertwined or connected letters. Specialised occupations also have their special terms, and publishers for example refer to their imprints as colophons, while clubs have badges and the aristocracy coats-of-arms. However the term `trademark` is generally used to describe all of those marks concerned with commerce. 77
