When I was little, my parents gifted me one of those journals with a heart-shaped locket that sang every time you opened it. There were also ones with invisible ink that required you to use your magic flashlight to read them, but those were for the cool kids.
I’m sure many of us had moments where we sat in the middle of the bed with a diary and a colorful pen to write down what happened in school. Then we grow up (or grow bitter), go to college, and we think those days are behind us. Yet, we still journal when we’re writing half-thoughts down between classes, a paragraph or two about our days, or ranting about a dramatic event that got us angry or frustrated, even if it is in a way less exciting notebook.
The truth is: writing is a part of the human experience, and it has been for centuries, just not exactly in the same form. That’s where an interesting question is born: When did we start keeping diaries in the first place?
Diaries of the Ancient World
Sorry to disappoint, but we didn’t always pour our hearts onto pages. In fact, some of the earliest forms of writing were much less romantic. In ancient Mesopotamia, they used sharp reeds to write in wet clay and keep count of how many sheep or grain had been sold, calculate taxes, and record supplies.
They had to be practical and succinct because material wasn’t nearly as accessible as in later periods, when the transitions from papyrus, parchment, then paper made the process easier and more affordable. Still, who would’ve guessed that the founding fathers of what would later become creative writing were accountants? Pretty cool, huh?
Then came the adventurers: the people who would write about their journeys to new places, the different sights and landscapes they witnessed, trade and navigation, as well as religious quests. Pilgrims, for instance, provided us with one of the earliest known examples, which is The Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, a first-century Greek account of travel across the Red Sea and Indian Ocean.
Sometimes, there would even be details of a construction process, like in one of the recent discoveries, the Diary of Merer. The Diary of Merer is an Egyptian written record kept by a governmental official responsible for leading the working crew that created the Great Pyramid of Khufu, which dates to around 2570 BC.
If you ever were curious about the process of building a pyramid and want to learn from what was considered the tallest structure for more than three thousand years, you can thank the act of journaling.
Diaries as Historical Sources
Some diaries were written about military and political matters that were later utilized for further analysis of the events, combined with the personal perspectives of each writer.
Some examples are John Stevens, a Jacobite who wrote about the Williamite War (1689–1691), and Anne Frank, who vividly show how a diary’s value can surpass someone’s personal sphere and become a memoir for a grief shared by many individuals of that time period.
On a similar note, there were people who intended to write only for themselves as a personal exercise and ended up becoming famous for the legacy it left behind. An example of that is Samuel Pepys, whose diary was written between 1660 and 1671 and provided much insight into the context of the Great Plague in London.
There are also plenty of diaries closer to our modern conception of one as well. Back in medieval Europe, many people wrote regularly as part of a religious commitment. They would keep track of their prayers and confessions, as well as what they considered their daily temptations.
Nowadays, although writing doesn’t necessarily imply religiousness, it can take a similar shape of serving as a space for personal accountability and moral dwelling. This is yet another thing we inherited from older societies and traditions when it comes to our self-expression.
Personal diaries as we know them today, ones that concern themselves with individual fears, emotions, and dreams, became more common around the 18th century, with the rise of mass literacy and tools such as paper becoming more affordable to the people.
The Modern Diary
As technology evolved, so did our ways of journaling. Blogs started emerging in the early 2000s, when people would welcome others into their private thoughts that used to be reserved for the pages hidden under their pillows. Now, with social media, people build collections of videos and photographs that, just like a diary, tell a story, too.
I don’t know about you, but I’m grateful for having been born in a day and age where I can easily access my Notes app when life gets too complicated. Journaling, as we can see by its historical timeline, has enabled all of us to not only keep a record of our outer world, including discoveries, journeys, and wars, but has also been an important resource for exploring our inner world, composed of our beliefs, thoughts, and feelings.
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