Ricerc@Sapienza

The visuospatial system integrates inner and outer functional processes, organizing spatial, temporal, and social interactions between the brain, body, and environment. These processes involve sensorimotor networks like the eye–hand circuit, which is especially important to primates, given their reliance on vision and touch as primary sensory modalities and the use of the hands in social and environmental interactions. At the same time, visuospatial cognition is intimately connected with memory, self-awareness, and simulation capacity.

Pictures and words are the primordial ways of communication used by human beings: indeed, one might even conjecture which communication medium arose first. The present paper aims to analyse the deep relationship between pictures and words in ancient Mesopotamia, showing how communication is in fact the result of cooperation between the two: in particular, how pictures prevailed over and preceded words (also today we are used or we prefer to express our thoughts and emotions through pictures).