"What do you take me for?" fumed the citizen of UrAn important city state in ancient Mesopotamia, located in modern Iraq. . He was chiselling out one of the oldest known letters, a furious complaint to a BabylonianAn ancient Akkadian-speaking state located in southern Mesopotamia. It was south of present-day Baghdad, Iraq. copper merchant. A one-star review on a clay tablet in cuneiformA writing system used to write several languages in the ancient Middle East. 3,775 years ago.

But today, the art of letter writing may be dying. In the UK, the Royal Mail has hiked stamp prices after the number of letters dropped from 20 billion in 2004 to eight billion this year. In Australia, only 3% of letters are non-business related - prompting calls to end daily deliveries.

The Persian Queen Atossa reportedly posted the first handwritten message around 500 BC. Her scribbled note began a rich tradition of correspondence: from Saint Paul's epistlesLetters. In the New Testament, some books are epistles from apostles. in the Bible to the love letters of Virginia Woolf.

But in the digital age of texts, tweets and TikTok, handwritten notes are now an endangered form of communication. In the US, 37% say they have not sent a personal letter in the last five years.¹ Meanwhile, almost five billion people are using social media worldwide.

Does this matter? Writing is always evolving - from clay tablets to papyrus, paper, the printing press, typewriters and the internet. Is there something special about an old-fashioned letter that makes it a tradition worth saving?

The author Edwina Preston thinks so. She says a letter is "a powerful time capsule" that gives us a unique glimpse into the "interior worlds" of others. In a recent essay, she offers some reasons why we should write more letters:

Rough drafts. Emails are too easily edited, revised and perfected. A letter holds the mark of a person, their peculiar handwriting and spelling mistakes. Love letters on worn and well-thumbed paper are treasured possessions and historical artefactsItems made by humans, especially ones of historical interest..

Slow down. Writing, posting and waiting for a reply is a "commitment of time". It shows just how much we care about the other person. But it is also a chance to stop rushing around, be patient and mindful of the world around us.

Slice of life. A letter is a mix of everything. In the first known letter by a Christian, a man named Arrianus asks his brother Paulus for a recipe for fish sauce. Like diaries, letters tell historians how people lived.

Shared ideas. They also show us how to live. The ancient Roman SenecaA Roman philosopher.  set down his philosophy of stoicismA philosophy that originated in the ancient world and still has many adherents today. Stoics seek to control their emotions and preserve their happiness in the face of adversity. in 124 letters to his young friend Lucilius. Meaningful correspondence will be read and re-read for thousands of years.

Letters can contain raw personal experiences, like the two billion passed to and from the British trenches in World War One.² Or they can change the course of history, like US president Lincoln's 1864 public letter declaring: "If slavery is not wrong, nothing is wrong."

And some may outlast humanity itself and never be answered. The Voyager 1 spacecraft is the farthest human-made object from Earth. Onboard is a "golden record" containing humanity's letter to intelligent alien life in deep space. Greetings in 55 languages include the English message: "Hello from the children of planet Earth."

Yes: Next time you want to tell someone how you feel or what you have seen or done, grab a pen and write it down. Your personal letter will be a special present that a friend or loved one will keep forever.

No: How you communicate does not matter. Not everyone expresses themselves best through written words and today's technology means we can connect with anyone anytime in so many different ways.

Or... Maybe letter writing is dead. But we can still read the letters of relatives, and famous and ordinary people from history. Their wisdom and experience may change how we communicate with each other.