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What appears to be evidence of the oldest alphabetic writing in human history is etched onto finger-length, clay cylinders excavated from a tomb in Syria by a team of Johns Hopkins University researchers.

From talks to tricolours, tribulations and tremors - here's my alphabetic run-down of the past 12 months in Northern Ireland politics.

Here is my alphabetic rundown of the past 12 months.

As the scientists explain in an article published Wednesday in the Jerusalem Journal of Archaeology, the 17 letters on the comb form the oldest full, decipherable sentence ever found in an early alphabetic script.

“There are just not enough securely dated early alphabetic inscriptions currently known,” he said.