Arabic – why right to left?

Have you wondered why is the Arabic language written from right to left? We found one explanation that seemed plausible and  thought of putting it up here.

It is said that the convention of “permanent” writing started from languages around Middle East like Arabic, Hebrew, etc, which was long before the widespread use of paper. During those times, people write and make impressions on leaves, animal skin, cloth and other such materials. As these materials can’t seem to guarantee long life, stones seemed to be a material of choice during that era for long lasting documentation. To make such impressions on stones, a right-handed person would logically hold the chisel with his left hand and hammer with his right hand. With this arrangement, it is only natural for someone to start writing from far right and keep gradually proceeding towards the left. The other way around is way too inconvenient and risky, as you might end up hurting your left hand fingers if you still want to write left-to-right.

The writing system for Greek and Latin was developed when other soft materials like leather and paper became available. As writing from right-to-left on paper could smudge the written text, it became left-to-right.

It’s an interesting view isn’t it?