In the modern days of Artificial Intelligence (AI) apps such as OpenAI Chat GPT https://openai.com/blog/chatgpt/, it is difficult to envision the extreme challenges ancient people faced when trying to communicate simple words, sentences, ideas, and concepts in commonly understood languages.
The history of translators and interpreters is probably thousands of years older than the first records we have of humans attempting to communicate with each other. It is a fascinating journey that we can only trace back in time to roughly 32,000 years ago.
Interestingly, there may well be thousands of years of various forms of communication, older than 32,000 years, that will never be known or understood because there are no known written records left to preserve these earlier attempts at communication.
Currently, the oldest known cave paintings in the world are located in the Chauvet Cave in southern France. These paintings are estimated to be between 30,000 and 32,000 years old. The paintings in the Chauvet Cave depict animals, such as horses, lions, and rhinoceroses, and they are thought to have been created by the Aurignacian people, who were among the first modern humans to settle in Europe. https://www.worldhistory.org/Chauvet_Cave/
The Chauvet Cave paintings are important because they provide valuable insights into the beliefs and practices of the Aurignacian people https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/biochemistry-genetics-and-molecular-biology/aurignacian, and they are considered to be among the finest examples of Paleolithic art in the world. That said, the intended purpose of these paintings may not have been art for the sake of art.
Aside from being works of art, these depictions also represent a form of recorded history through the use of symbolism. This symbolism may have been used to help teach generations about hunting practices, gardening/ gathering and the specific roles members of a community are expected to take on for the benefit of sustaining the larger community. It is thought the spoken language the Aurignacian people used to communicate was part of the larger group of languages known as Indo-European. These languages are believed to have originated in the Near East and spread throughout Europe and Asia over the course of many thousands of years. https://www.worldhistory.org/Indo-European_Languages/
The job of the interpreters of these times would have been to facilitate communication between the tribes, clans and communities that were using differing dialects of the Indo-European languages to communicate.
Roughly 20,000 years after the date of the Chauvet Cave paintings, we have evidence that the people who built Göbekli Tepe, a site in modern-day Turkey, located about 15 kilometers northeast of the city of Sanliurfa, created symbols and pictures on stone pillars. These symbols and pictures appear to have been used to represent ideas, objects, or sounds, and they may have served a similar purpose to a written language. https://artsandculture.google.com/story/g%C3%B6bekli-tepe/OALyoXJ7tDcpLA
The site consists of a series of ancient, circular stone structures that were built by hunter-gatherers during the Pre-Pottery Neolithic period, around 11,000 years ago. Göbekli Tepe is significant because it is the oldest known human-made place of worship and is believed to have been used for religious or spiritual purposes.
The Sumerians, who lived in what is now modern-day Iraq, are thought to have emerged around 4000 BCE. https://www.discovermagazine.com/planet-earth/who-were-the-ancient-sumerians-and-what-are-they-known-for. They are credited with many important technological and cultural innovations, such as the development of the wheel, the plow, and the first known system of writing, known as cuneiform. The Sumerians also developed complex systems of government, religion, and trade, and they are considered to be the first civilization in world history. Other early civilizations include the ancient Egyptians and the Indus Valley Civilization.
Some of the earliest known translations were made by the ancient Egyptians, who used hieroglyphics to record their history and beliefs. The ancient Greeks and Romans also made translations of important texts, such as the Bible and classical literature. During the Middle Ages, the Catholic Church played a significant role in the translation of religious texts, and the invention of the printing press in the 15th century made it easier to produce and distribute translated works.
In the millennia and centuries that followed, the field of translation and interpretation has continued to evolve, and today, these skills play a vital role in facilitating communication and understanding between people of different languages and cultures around the word.
Even in today’s technologically advanced times, just because a person knows what they intend to communicate, the meaning is not always communicated clearly – even when using a common language. While it is not something most people think about on a daily basis, it is interesting to contemplate that translators and interpreters have been valued members of society for at least 32,000 years.