section_path: History/Tablet
section_name: Tablet
paragraph_text: Tablet
  
  Some of the earliest written records were made on tablets. Clay tablets (flattened pieces of clay impressed with a stylus) were used in the Ancient Near East throughout the Bronze Age and well into the Iron Age, especially for writing in cuneiform. Wax tablets (pieces of wood covered in a layer of wax) were used in classical antiquity and throughout the Middle Ages.
  
  The custom of binding several wax tablets together (Roman pugillares) is a possible precursor of modern bound books. The etymology of the word codex (block of wood) suggests that it may have developed from wooden wax tablets.