Number systems have progressed from the use of fingers and tally marks, perhaps more than 40,000 years ago, to the use of sets of glyphs able to represent any conceivable number efficiently. The earliest known unambiguous notations for numbers emerged in Mesopotamia about 5000 or 6000 years ago.
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Accounting token in the context of Proto-cuneiform
The proto-cuneiform script was a system of proto-writing that emerged in Mesopotamia ca. 3350-3200 BC (during the Uruk period), eventually developing into the early cuneiform script used in the region's Early Dynastic I period.
It arose from the token-based system that had already been in use across the region in preceding millennia. Other precursors of this system include clay bullae containing tokens, and numerical tablets using only numeral signs. Those devices were used in the institutions of Mesopotamia and western Iran during the 4th millennium BC, in order to record administrative operations. The proto-cuneiform subsequently appeared in southern Mesopotamia, during the 34th century BC. This system is documented by around 5,000 clay tablets coming from various sites, dating from ca. 3350 BC to 3000 BC.
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