Talk:Linear A/Archive 1

Comments

In disambiguating Mapping, I just unlinked it from this page, since it didn't seem be being used in any technical sense. Certainly the use here doesn't match any of the technical sense on that page if it's allowed for a symbol to correspond to more than one sound (as certainly happens in some alphabets). Or (from another POV), Linear A may be a language, but it's not a formal language ^_^. Anyway, if it is being used in a technical sense, then please let me know -- or better yet, add this sense to the Mapping article! -- Toby 23:57 Jan 26, 2003 (UTC)

---

The article is a bit confused, as it talks about "this decipherment" without actually suggesting any decipherment. (And of course, no decipherments are currently given any credence by mainstream scholars.) -- B.Bryant 06:50 19 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Linear?

Not being a linguist myself, I'm slightly curious as to why the languages (Linear A and Linear B) are called "Linear". I have read the Linear A and Linear B pages, but none of them explain why they are so named.

See this image of the script and you'll understand why. ;-) http://ccwf.cc.utexas.edu/~perlman/myth/images/linbtab.jpg Bogdan | Talk 18:52, 14 Oct 2004 (UTC)

I don't get it. Because they're composed of lines of symbols? Because the symbols are composed of lines? I see some circles there. Many languages are composed of lines, afaik. But I am not a linguist either. Equally keen to have a good explanation in the article :-) -- Jon Dowland 15:32, 11 August 2005 (UTC)

There are no _languages_ called either Linear A or Linear B. They are _scripts_, which in theory could be used to write any language (with adaptation if necessary). The names are short for 'Linear script A' and 'linear script B', which is what Arthur Evans, the excavator of the palace at Knossos, called them. He dubbed these scripts as 'linear' in contrast to the other Cretan script he found which he called 'hieroglyphic'. They are 'linear' in that the symbols are composed of lines, including curved & circular lines, as opposed to the more pictographic 'hieroglyphic' symbols (these are NOT, of course, the same as Egyptian hieroglyphics). Evans noticed that tablets of a later date seem to display a different linear script from earlier ones. As he did not know the language (nobody at that time thought either would be Greek), he simply labeled them 'Linear script A' and 'Linear script B'. Simple as that - the names have no linguistic meaning. (Ray Brown http://www.carolandray.plus.com/Eteocretan/Eteocretan.html)

Moved from article page

As signed discussion entries are not allowed on the article page, I moved the following addition to the talk page: 217.81.77.103 16:24, 13 Oct 2004 (UTC)

In Ugarit-Forschungen 2001, published in memoriam of Cyrus Gordon, (a journal edited in Münster in Westfalen) the article "The First Inscription in Punic--Vowel Differences in Linear A and B" demonstrates how and why Linear A notates an archaic form of Phoenician. In the journal Kadmos, Zeitschrift für Vor- und Frühgriechische Epigraphik of 2002 and 2003 one can read how, thanks to the decipherment of Linear A mentioned above, the still older script of Cretan Hieroglyphic can now also be read (in respectively the articles "The Lotus Flower in Cretan Hieroglyphic" and "The Many Faces of jabu-Re and bini-Re"). In October 2004 the book A Luwian Letter to Nestor (Publications of the Henri Frankfort Foundation 14) will appear, in which it is demonstrated that the script on the Phaistos Disc is a 14th-century-BCE form of Cretan Hieroglyphic, its implication, of course, being that also the latter script basically contains a Luwian (South-Anatolian) dialect. Below the old page with the traditional point of view. To it should be added that Michael Ventris deciphered Linear B in 1952, the same year in which Yuri Knorosov (Leningrad) deciphered the Maya script -- and Hillary climbed the Mount Everest!--, that identical signs in Linear A and B differ in this respect that those in Linear B with the Indo-European (in this case Greek) syllabic values e and o mostly contain in Linear A the Semitic values i and u respectively, that by just reading them in this way the assumed mystery of Linear A has been solved, and that at Figeac (Lot, France) for June 2006 the opening is planned of a new museum with the decipherments of ancient scripts all over the world, which will be a large extension of the former, marvelous museum Champollion which will be incorporated in it. In 2003 the famous Hellenist A. Bartonek has published his Grammatik des mykenischen Griechisch, in which he praises the Linear A approach since 1972 by the undersigned, which in the NRC Handelsblad of 12 & 13 January 2001 the Dutch Hellenist Kees Ruygh and the Dutch Assyriologist Wilfred van Soldt have rejected completely.

Jan Best, Amsterdam, The Netherlands (after reading the above articles and book, address of correspondence available via the editors of Ugarit-Forschungen and/or Kadmos)

category:Hellenic scripts

I don't think this article belongs to that category:

This category should include all forms of writing Greek,

Linear A is considered not to be a form of Greek, although roughly the same script was later used for writing Greek in Linear B. Bogdan | Talk 18:51, 14 Oct 2004 (UTC)

A Hellenic script is a script of Hellas (the the lands now called "Greece"). Whether Linear A encoded the "Greek language" or not is irrelevant. Think of it in the same terms as you would if referring a European script or to an Asian script. Such terms refer to all scripts of said region. Confusion may arise from the fact that Modern Greek is really the only surviving Greek language (a language from what's now called "Greece"), but it seems there was once more linguistic diversity there. Consequently, it seem that scripts for multiple languages call the Hellas their home. Sowlos (talk) 05:28, 12 August 2012 (UTC)

Moved from the article

(...) although this comes in direct contrast with the fact that the Minoan and the Mycenaean civilizations share the same art, technology and architecture, which leads us safely to the conclusion that they must be one and the same, simply in a different phase; and since the Mycenaean civilization (which, as stated, seems to be an evolution of the Minoan) is known as Greek, then it is most safe to presume that the Linear A is an even more ancient Greek scripture, which agrees with Paul Faure's (and others') claims of the Linear A being a very early Greek scripture that was adapted in each case to the local dialect.

pseudo-scientific nonsense :-)

An external link

Anonymous user 212.205.99.178 keeps adding a link to http://www.ancientgr.com which is a pile of uh-uh... silly things. Actually it's a funny as hell gem, http://www.ancientgr.com/Unknown_Hellenic_History/Eng/HELLENIC_LANGUAGE.htm <look at this.] :-) Bogdan | Talk 21:20, 25 Dec 2004 (UTC)

NPOV?

From the article:

[...]This is merely the continuation of failed attempts by Cyrus Gordon in finding connections between
Minoan and West Semitic languages. His methodology, usually involving parsing texts at whim in
order to compare the shards of Semitic words he imagined he saw, drew widespread criticism.[...]

[...]This is assuredly false[...] 

Although the arguments may be valid, this needs to be rephrased to remove the strong wording. -- unsigned comment by 210.180.187.254, Dec 19

I've made some edits, but if you have other concerns, feel free to address those as well. --Arcadian 14:00, 19 December 2005 (UTC)

How about the last half of the paragraph under Indo-Iranian theory of decipherment?

However, the La Marle interpretation of Linear A has been rejectedby
John Younger of Kansas University showing that La Marle has invented
erroneous and arbitrary new transcriptions based on resemblances with many
different script systems at will (as Phoenician, Hieroglyphic Egyptian,
Hieroglyphic Hittite, Ethiopian, Cypro-Minoan, etc.), ignoring established
evidence and internal analysis, while for some words he proposes religious
meanings inventing names of gods and rites.

--75.179.163.41 (talk) 01:48, 15 May 2013 (UTC)

There is a difference between just rejecting theories on the one hand, and quoting scolars who reject a theory on the other. Anyhow, if you're genuinely interested in discussing the treatement of la Marle's theories, I recommend you to look at slightly less antiquated sections on this talk page, to begin with, like Talk:Linear A#La Marleand Talk:Linear A#Indo-Iranian POV.

Actually, both le Marle's critics and the anonymous proponent of his ideas seem to agree that he compares the Linear A signs token by token with a large number of different writing systems - picking one similarity here and another there. If this is true, it is rather evident why professional scolars should have dismissed his theories rather summarily, isn't it? JoergenB (talk) 03:25, 21 May 2013 (UTC)

A new page for minoan language necessary?

As far as I watched this page, it has grown larger and larger as more decipherment notes were added. Perhaps it would be wiser to start a new page on minoan language speculations, if the page continues to grow, filled with materials not sticktly linked to the Linear A writing system alone.

Inconsistency

One line says "Suspecting to mean" while the other "deciphered so far, with certainty" when refering to KU-RO. Which one is true ?

KU-RO is perhaps the best-understood Linear A word. The meaning can be inferred from our knowledge of Linear A numerals. Lists often consist of names+number pairs, the names being mostly unintelligable; at the end, one would find the arithmetic sum of all numbers plus the word KU-RO. This makes it pretty clear that the KU-RO word must mean "sum, grand total". However, we do not know cleary whether the pronunciation is correct; the mapping of Linear B sound values (almost undisputed) to similar Linear A characters is a reasonable assumption, but cannot be proved correct.

Take Greek uppercase characters as an example. If you read Greek text with Latin sound equivalents, you would be right in some cases, not far off in many others, but sometimes completely wrong.

Attribution

Since translationa are hypothetical, the attribution in sections "semple", "glossary" and "short glossary" is a must. `'mikka (t) 18:51, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Deity Attitributions Tenuous

I have a BA in Classics from Reed College, 1996. So, I realize that I'm no PhD and that I got my BA 10 years ago. But... I don't understand where the author of this article gets the notions of deity attributions of words. Some of the deities that the author suggests that certain words might "mean" don't even sound the same, Astaroth Yam, for example. Apart from the little sense we can make out of Linear A (which is what we're trying to do, here, so we can't use it as evidence -- that would be circulare logic) and some art, at least as of 1996, we know NOTHING about Minoan Religion. We don't know whether they were Polytheistic (which is likely, considering that most peoples around them were), anamistic, monotheistic or even if they had a religion (as unlikely as that seems). So, it also troubles me that the author says that certain "words" gleaned from Linear A might be deity names from foreign cultures. It particularly troubles me when people make claims like, "this word might be the name of the Minoan great goddess". We don't even know whether or not the Minoans HAD a concept of the great goddess.

I think one thing to separate here is what we actually know from what some have speculated. With all due respect, I also think that a lot of Great Goddess Theory people WANT there to have been matriarchs who worshipped the "Great Goddess" in prehistorical times SO badly that they'll do and say anything to hold on (such as jumping from a series of letters, which MIGHT be a certain string of phonemes, to the conclusion that it's some ancient name of their sacred "Great Goddess"). This theory was big several decades ago, but full of major problems (such as ommission of evidence). SEE:

http://wiki.riteme.site/wiki/The_Myth_of_Matriarchal_Prehistory

I don't mean to offend, but I firmly believe in good scholarship and hope that people will try to remain logical and scholarly about this subject, rather than starting with something that people WANT to be true and trying to prove that it was. I'd therefore hope that we stick to what's actually known.

- Ivan Richmond

Sorry if you have misunderstood the terms I utilized, when editing the page. The meaning, in which I used the 'great goddess', was a synonym for 'head of pantheon'. I never meant to express any matriarchal or matrilinear claims. There were and are many societies around the world, that have a politheistic belief with a pantheon lead by a female deity. It does not mean they are either matriarchal or matrilinear. A perfect example is the Celtic/early Irish pantheon: being led by a goddess does not conflict with a patrilinear tradition. Besides, it would be hard to imagine a community on Crete, that was in close connection with both the middle eastern and mainland greek cultures, to be so drastically different and not influenced by outsiders' tradition...

As for the (highly tentative) minoan divine names, I merely mentioned the names identified by Peter W. Haider on the so-called 'London Medical Papyrus. It contains several magic formulae used to 'cure' certain diseases. Several of these are of foreign origin, some from 'Keftiu', as the author of the scroll states. One of these sentences - luckily enough - is partially Egyptian (containing various determinatives following the 'Keftian' words). It is transliterated (using the standard Egyptian transliteration), as follows:

WEBEQI det: illness SAT det: bread/offering SABUJAJADSHA det: to_go HUMEKATU det: man RAZIJA great_god AMAJA god.

The last terms are written in full egyptian as netsher pa wer (great god) and netsher (god).

Now, if Keftiu has anything to do with Crete, we can theoretize, that these names are actually Cretan divine names. The problem is, that the mentioned text refers to the divinities as of male gender. But if we compare the names with those of the Greek mythology, it becomes crystal-clear, that the names (if Aegean in origin) must have been mistaken: for the names not only resemble of Rheia and Maia, but even their role could be possibly matched with a superior and a lesser deity. Interesting is, that we have two occurrances of the latter stem in Linear A (both seem to be names): A-MA and A-MA-JA. These were already thought to be divine names, according to Haider. (The other example cited by him: RA2-TI was not convincing as the reading is doubtful; I must agree with whoever has removed it from this site.)

PA-DE

...divine name of an unknown god, appearing on Linear B tablets as well. A comparison to the Egyptian Ptah? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.67.46.58 (talk) 11:48, 10 October 2006

Hey, what about DE PA? As in Dis Pater, Djupiter? -lysdexia 13:31, 24 December 2006 (UTC)

Transcriptions

It should be made clear that the quasi-phonetic "readings" of Linear A text in the article are only made possible by assuming that Linear A signs have similar values as the Linear B signs of the same or similar shape. This assumption appaarently has some value as a tentative working hypothesis, but it has not been proven to be 100% reliable, and should not expected to be 100% reliable. AnonMoos 14:42, 20 February 2007 (UTC)

Diagram requested

I have added Template:Reqdiagram to one of the sections to indicate that the article sorely lacks a graphical representation of the script. __meco 07:49, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Why hasn't it been deciphered?

Is there any concrete reason that Linear A remains undeciphered, while Linear B is fully translated? Perhaps there are fewer remaining examples of it, making deep anylasis difficult- or are there some structual peculiarities that makes it hard to crack? -Toptomcat 15:35, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Because the language of Linear B was found to be an archaic version of Greek, a language which is well known and still spoken. The problem there was a) to determine that it was indeed Greek and b) to determine a mapping between the script and the language. The account in Simon Singh's "Code Book" is well worth reading as a very accessible account of the process followed by Ventress in deciphering Linear B. The language of Linear A is as yet unknown and may have no modern equivalent; I have no doubt the cryptographers can tell us a lot about the structure and grammar of the language, but without some clue as to the meaning of words, it is difficult to go further. --APRCooper (talk) 13:39, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Time Period Cited in Aegean Nomenclature

The "Time Period" given for Linear A is "Possibly from MM IB to LM IIIA". While this is meaningful to well-read students of Aegean history, the typical Wikipedia user might appreciate the terminology used by we "hoi-polloi", or at least a conversion guide. An good conversion guide of Aegean time to BC/AD can be found at: http://projectsx.dartmouth.edu/history/bronze_age/chrono.html —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 198.241.217.15 (talk) 17:48, August 23, 2007 (UTC)

The thing is that we do the dating according to pottery found at the same level, and the pottery dating is not secure. However, if we do use relative chronology, we should in all instances link LM IIIA etc. --Nema Fakei (talk) 19:42, 14 January 2008 (UTC)

Three scripts?

• "Linear A is one of two linear scripts used in ancient Crete before Greek Mycenaean Linear B. [...] These three scripts were discovered [...]"

The lead section only mentions Linear A and Linear B, what is the third script? --ἀνυπόδητος (talk) 13:47, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

The hieroglyphicsDave (talk) 09:58, 26 April 2009 (UTC)

hieroglyphs are not "linear". --dab (𒁳) 13:39, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

La Marle

The La Marle stuff was added last year by an anon[1]. I am not sure this is within WP:DUE. --dab (𒁳) 13:42, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

The works of La Marle have been rejected by Younger (University of Kansas) [[2]]. La Marle's basis seems to be simply faulty as he uses the well known wrong method of affording new readings from resemblances with others (various) writings systems (Proto-Cananite, Luwian, Phoenician). Prof. Younger also shows other shortcomings. It looks like yet another meaningless "theory". --Dumu Eduba (talk) 15:41, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

"not accepted"

In section "Theories of decipherment", I suppose that positing identical valued of simiilar-looking Linear A and B signs is "not accepted currently by linguists" simply because there are no linguistic grounds for any claims about the sign values as knowledge stands (am I wrong?), so I've rewritten.

If there were a systemic small difference between many Linear A characters and their Linear B counterparts it wouldn't "strongly suggest[] a phonetic difference" to me at all, but just some kind of graphic evolution of no consequence. Who argues this? What kind of difference is actually uner discussion here? 4pq1injbok (talk) 19:51, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

The "not accepted" formulations were added by an anonymous editor, in the same edit that propagated la Marle's theories; see Talk:Linear A#La Marle supra. JoergenB (talk) 03:12, 21 May 2013 (UTC)

Suggestion

When the Japanese borrowed Chinese characters, they preserved the meanings associated w/ each character, and merely substituted their own, local, Japanese words & sounds. Thus, to large degree, Chinese & Japanese people can both read each other's pictographic writings. What if Linear A & B are the same way — to wit, the conquering Mycenaeans adopted the Linear A script, preserving the meanings, but substituting their own Indo-European Greek words ??? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.143.68.244 (talk) 09:36, 14 October 2009 (UTC) [Above transferred to titled new section from previous position at head of page. 87.81.230.195 (talk) 11:50, 19 October 2009 (UTC)]

More probably, Linear B borrowed phonetic values from Linear A. That's the usual working hypothesis. After all, Linear A and B were syllabic scripts, unlike (Old) Chinese and Japanese kanji, which are logographic.--Virda (talk) 23:35, 27 June 2016 (UTC)

Indo-Iranian POV

This article now seems to be biased toward the Indo-Iranian hypothesis (IMO, given the actual linguistic data however sparse, and the fact that Krete is so far away, this is bullshit). For example, major criticisms of the other theories are presented while none exist in the article for IndIr. The IndIr section uses words like "coherent", and "takes into account", which are usually in my experience used as weasel words. Additionally, the reference to the Indo-Iranian glossary is just thrown in there at the end where it doesn't belong as if the debate was over; it should have been put in the theories section under Indo-Iranian.

Futhermore, nothing is said of the Tyrhennian (sp?) hypothesis regarding Minoan, which is not only my current opinion but is tentatively backed up as well: the overall family can be shown to have a (probably masculine) genitive in something like *-es or *-s (evidence from Lemnian -s, Etruscan -as and Linear A -OS-E) and 3sg *an (Etruscan an, Linear A-NA). One of many possible plural forms is *-ar (compare una, unar "libations" with Etruscan clan, clenar "sons" and tul, tular "stone, boundaries"). Futhermore, Linear U-NA-RU-KA-NA-SI (unar kanasi) "bear libations (?)" and Etruscan unXva cenase "bearing libations" are strikingly similar, especially given the fact that the Linear A inscriptions are written on libation tables.

Quite a well constructed house of cards can be found here: http://paleoglot.blogspot.com/2009/09/thought-on-real-name-for-land-of.html. It's obviously rabidly speculative, but an interesting read nonetheless.

Also read: http://www.mlahanas.de/Greeks/LX/LemnianLanguage.html

In summary: Tyrrhenian hypothesis needs to be included; remove Indo-Iranian POV.

I agree that Indo-Iranian is presented like if it is a quite possible and accepted scenario (with exception to one criticism). Fkitselis (talk) 14:03, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

Hello, maybe you should see my old comment on the same subject, especially the points: La Marle's "theory" has been rejected by experts; and La Marle's book is a self-published book; hence rather as good as a web page!!!!.

And, of course, Fachetti's articles and book dealing with the Tyrrhenian possibility are a really serious work and a serious hypothesis. Even if, as far as I know, he still consideres it to be only a possibility, not a sure idea. BUt yes, Indo-Iranian pseudo-hypothesis should be deleted. Dumu Eduba (talk) 17:29, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

I am afraid that theory grew ridiculously big. It even made it into this documentary-joke: http://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/episodes/sinking-atlantis/90/ . Now mind that the symbols the guy talks about have nothing to do with Indo-Iranian speakers. Anyway, I am open to most of the hypothesis as long as they do not fall in the level of the aforementioned view.Fkitselis (talk) 17:48, 24 August 2011 (UTC)

The first comment is bullshit, just because Crete is far. So according to this origin of indoaryan languages outside India is equally bullshit. Who the hell is John Younger? Not an authority. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 59.184.37.251 (talk) 18:08, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

On the section Theories of decipherment

Deferring for a moment the fact that this section (on pure not proven theories) should not be so prominent in the article, there are some dubious questions in it.

First of them: the section should be more on theories put forward or at least taken into account by experts on Linear A (maybe Luwian, Tyrrenian, and Semitic, but this selection should be studied). Theories announced by no-experts, specially those who have not been mentioned by any expert or even have been rejected, probably are not worth talking about (or at best very marginally). I do not consider either reliable theories published by people that use to use to discover completely revolutionary theories on every ancient language they deal with, but with no impact among experts.

On the other side, La Marle "theories" have been rejected by Younger (not only criticized), and thge publishing house of the book by Campbell-Dunn is Authorhouse for authors who pay to publish their books. So it is a self-published book.

Be more careful, please. --Dumu Eduba (talk) 10:26, 23 December 2009 (UTC)

Nigerian

Removed unsourced fringe material stating that linear A represent a Nigerian language. Source given was not reliable or peer reviewed (self-published, vanity press).Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 20:49, 12 January 2010 (UTC)

images

I've removed these from Arthur Evans as being too tangental. Could they be of use here?

The table of p. 87 from Scripta Minoa showing the relation between the Phoenician letters and the Cretan hieroglpyphs and Linear script. This table is about the Phoenician letters of which the names have no known meaning in any semitiic language.

The table of p. 89 from Scripta Minoa showing the relation between the Phoenician letters and the Cretan hieroglpyphs and Linear script. This table is about the Phoenician letters of which the names have meaning in some semitiic language. Hi

BrainyBabe (talk) 13:21, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

As the studies of Evans on Linear script are obsolete, I am afraid they are useless here.--Dumu Eduba (talk) 09:39, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Fair enough. BrainyBabe (talk) 13:51, 9 February 2010 (UTC)

Nevertheless, it would be nice IMO to have *some* pictures of the script besides the ones that are on the article page now--those seem to show only one or two characters (and those hard to read). Aren't there any copyright-free pictures somewhere of this script? Mcswell (talk) 04:27, 1 February 2011 (UTC)

I know this is an old comment thread, but I think explaining the historiography could be helpful. CessnaMan1989 (talk) 21:35, 13 December 2020 (UTC)

Request for help

Hello, everybody.

I've started the article about Aegean numerals. Because most of you are expert in this subject, i request you if you can cooperate expanding it.

Thanks in advance.

Crazymadlover. —Preceding undated comment added 13:25, 26 March 2010 (UTC).

Article out of date - translation by Tsikritsis

Article does not reflect recent developments in possible translation breakthroughs by Greek mathematician Minas Tsikritis. This is perhaps due to the Greek / English language barrier, but the fact of new groundbreaking developments remain, therefore leaving the page as currently written incomplete. Aletheon (talk) 13:46, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

I have heard about a new book of Tsikritis but have no idea yet about its context. From what I have read so far he proposes that Linear A texts attest several languages and that one of them is Greek. When he publish it we will need to wait for academic reviews before making absolute statements like "Linear A was deciphered". It would be amazing to hear Linear A is finally deciphered, but you have to understand that the page has to follow some standards. Fkitselis (talk) 15:04, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

From what I've found he's already published numerous articles in journals about his work, but they are all in Greek. Hopefully someone with more Greek language skills can help in posting the results of his efforts. I've seen other wiki pages that benefit greatly from scholarship that's been done in other languages, and I believe the Linear A page could also similarly benefit. Aletheon (talk) 15:15, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

If you know exactly on which journals he has published articles, I can be of help. Of course, we cannot claim decipherment until his gets recognition by the broader scholar community. At least we can mention his attempts and be cautious to his claims. To be honest I have belief on Tsikritis. I have one book talking about decipherment methods based on mathematics and he seems a very down to earth guy. Fkitselis (talk) 06:05, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Here are a few of the Greek language resources I've found on him-- some are newspaper articles--

Article 1 Article 2 Article 3 Article 4 Article 5 Aletheon (talk) 08:03, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

According to this very old " `new" the alleged new decipherment by M. Tsikritsis is rather old (from 1998). So it looks like we do not have to wait until seeing whether it is accepted or not. Obviously not. I guess this is a case closed. Regards. Dumu Eduba (talk) 10:25, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

I can find only two hits for "Tsikristis" and "linear a" on Google scholar, one of which may be a genuine cite, and the other a way out fringe book about Atlantis by G. Menzies. Zero hits on Google books, and a Google search turned up no academic sources in the first 300 hits. Essenstially no mention in the scholarly literature in 13 years strongly indicates that Tsikristis never published his work in a peer-reviewed journal or book. Until he does, and is cited in reliable independent sources, it is not notable enough for inclusion in WP. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 10:42, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

I agree, the theory appears very fringe and of little interest to scholars. I would be against confusing the article with fringe theories that have no academic acceptance. In this case, there is barely any recognition, there is more mention of Tsikritsis' fringe theories on ancient calculators in Crete but even these are treated with suspicion. Tsikritsis may have presented papers for his novel theories but (based on a search on JSTOR) I find no established academics seriously quoting these or evidence that these have been properly subject to peer review. --Fæ (talk) 10:50, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

From those articles the best one can do is to place him in the same line like V. Georgiev who suggested that some tablets are in Greek and some are in Luwian. Tsikritsis didn't claim decipherment in any of those but only a belief he has. We definetely need a papper/book and critics/acceptance in order to include him. Fkitselis (talk) 14:08, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Based on the number of different sources in which he has been published, Tsikritsis' theory easily meets the Wiki notability requirement. Also please note there is more than one English transliteration of his name, and the most search results are had by using Greek characters. The blurb from ANISTORITON is relevant here- "A few months ago, his book entitled Linear A. A Contribution to the Understanding of an Aegaean Script (259 p.) was published by the Vikelaia Library of Herakleion, Crete, Greece. Unfortunately, the book was published in Modern Greek by an important but small publishing house operated by Vikelaia Library. Moreover, the Greek Archaeological community has no expert on the field of Aegean scripts and cannot evaluate Tsikritsis's work. Most likely, Tsikritsis study will be forgotten in the years to come as, written in Modern Greek, it will have a very limited audience." (link) Aletheon (talk) 17:46, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

All of the sources are extremely poor quality. None can be considered a reliable source for a breakthrough of this magnitude. None of them are peer-reviewed academic articles or books, and Mr. Tsikritsis has apparently not yet published his work. If you find high-quality academic sources, fine. But a hill of nothing still amounts to nothing. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 18:05, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

I don't think that the fact it is in Greek, creates an issue. First of all, there ARE people who can evaluate his work within Greece and Cyprus. Even foreign scholars can evaluate his work in Greek like for example Gareth Owens. Scholars generally do communicate and send their work to each other. I don't think that if he has reached a solution he is standing still and waiting for someone to buy the book. I am sure he would make a send out to selected people who would evaluate his work. That is the way it goes AFAIK. Also if language was a problem, he would most probably translate it. If he knows ancient Greek and Anatolian languages then English or French would be no problem. Personally, I do believe on his view that Linear A renders more than one language, but nevertheless we do need academic acceptance to make statements about decipherment here. Mind also that Linear A and Minoan studies has been unfortunately flooded with trash. Fkitselis (talk) 18:39, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Time to restore the damaged parts?

The la Marle protagonist edit here seems to have caused more damage than the inconsistencies and POV's recognised supra. I think it is time to go through that edit, restore what could be restored, exclude those additions which are patently wrong, mark any remaining unsorced addition {{fact}}, and check out consequential damages. However, I do think we should retain information about la Marle's theories, together with its rejection. Information about both could be rather relevant for a reader, who may have encountered the la Marle hypothesis elsewhere.) JoergenB (talk) 15:36, 26 May 2013 (UTC)

Similarities with early Japanese / Chinese?

Has this been researched before? From one glance at the symbols it almost looks like a simplified version of the root of these East-Asian languages. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Makitk (talk • contribs) 15:55, 2 August 2013 (UTC)

Similar statements could be made about cuneiform and several other ideographic-syllabic scripts that existed across the ancient East. However, if it's not discussed in reliable sources, we have nothing to add. Wikipedia is not a place for original research.  —Sowlos  10:55, 5 August 2013 (UTC)

link available

Scripta Minoa by Sir Arthur Evans is on Internet Archive. 71.163.117.143 (talk) 13:07, 24 July 2014 (UTC)

"Contrary to most other scripts used for Semitic languages, Linear A presents many written vowels.[citation needed]"

At the time that Linear A was written, there were basically two big examples of written languages related to Phoenician which could have influenced Linear A. The first was Egyptian, which (while not Semitic) is in the larger Afro-Asiatic family that contains the Semitic languages and which doesn't really use vowels. The second was Akkadian, which is Semitic and which does use vowels (thanks to its adoption from Sumerian). Although it's a few centuries later, Akkadian was eventually used for diplomatic correspondence throughout the region.

Yeah yeah original research yeah yeah, but a) it doesn't hold up and b) there's no source anyway. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.212.189.162 (talk) 16:10, 28 July 2014 (UTC)

Markov Models

Some years ago, I attended a lecture where the speaker presented some work on language translation, building Hidden Markov Models to align parallel texts, and inducing phrase-by-phrase translations. At the climax of the talk, she announced that she had put in all the Linear-A she could get her hands on, and came up with a translation ... it was a Semitic language, and the translated text was almost "typical" for ancient languages: something about cows and wheat and taxes, or something like that. However, googling this, I find nothing. Anyone else heard of this? Would know a reference? 67.198.37.16 (talk) 23:41, 1 December 2015 (UTC)

Linguistic influence of Linear A language on Linear B Greek?

Is it possible to detect anything about the linear A language from its influence on the Greek of the linear B inscriptions? Presumably there was some influence. Has any been detected? Is there any sign of non-Indo European, for instance? Wodorabe (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 22:15, 20 December 2016 (UTC)

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 14 January 2019 and 8 May 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): L.anny.C.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 02:37, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

DNA could help?

Are there bones synchronic with the Minoan ruins and Linear A? In which case, the DNA of such bones may show us where the Minoans came from, and thus indicate a language or parent language for Linear A. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 121.223.187.157 (talk) 10:21, 26 August 2015 (UTC)

The analysis of a small number of Bronze Age DNA samples from Greece and Crete was published by Lazarides et al. 'Genetic origins of the Minoans and Mycenaeans' in Nature in 2017. They concluded that "Minoans and Mycenaeans were genetically similar, having at least three-quarters of their ancestry from the first Neolithic farmers of western Anatolia and the Aegean,and most of the remainder from ancient populations related to those of the Caucasus and Iran", so nothing surprising. European Prehistorian (talk) 19:21, 30 March 2019 (UTC)

@European Prehistorian: The Minoans lack steppes DNA, so their pre Mycenaean Greek language is unlikely to be Indo-European. It is more likely another Anatolian descendant. Metta79 (talk) 12:27, 23 August 2020 (UTC)

Problem with the dates

This article lists the dates for Linear A from 2500 BCE to 1450 BCE. However, the source used (Haarmann, H. The Danube Script and Other Ancient Writing Systems:A Typology of Distinctive Features. J. of Archaeomythology 4,1:12-46) uses the term "Cretan Linear A" conflating both, the Cretan hieroglyphs and Linear A.

All other sources date Linear A from 1850 BCE or 1800 BCE. For example:

"Linear A is attested in Crete and on some Aegean islands from approximately 1850 bc to 1400 bc."

"The first linear script, Linear A, dates from about 1700 B.C. and was also partly pictorial in nature. It appears on clay tablets written between 1750 B.C. and 1400 B.C. and has been classified as a West Semitic script."

"Linear A was in use in Phaistos as early as 1850 B.C., long before the disappearance of the first script [Cretan hieroglyphs]; but the bulk of the surviving texts date from the destruction of the palaces at the end of LM Ib (around 1450 B.C.) with a smaller number assignable to MM III and none securely dated after 1400 B.C.

Even the Wikipedia article on Cretan hieroglyphs states:

"Cretan hieroglyphs are undeciphered hieroglyphs found on artefacts[sic] of early Bronze Age Crete, during the Minoan era. It predates Linear A by about a century, but the two writing systems continued to be used in parallel for most of their history."

However, the date range for the Cretan hieroglyphs is given as 2100-1700 BC. This error causes both chronologies of Linear A and Linear B on Wikipedia to be completely out of range when compared to the scholarly versions.

Also note in the Linear B article, the chronology has Cretan hieroglyphs comprising the period only from 1625 BCE(?) to 1500 BCE. No scholarly source places the Cretan hieroglyphs that late, and no scholarly source places Linear A as early as 2500 BCE. Both articles, Linear A and Linear B, are in sore need of correction. 96.50.8.92 (talk) 22:29, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

References

Yeah, and now the article even claims that Linear A was used from 2500 BCE. This seems wholly idiosyncratic and cannot be sustained. I'll change the early dates to 1800 BCE. —Pinnerup (talk) 09:44, 1 April 2019 (UTC)

Greek Archeology & Art Homework

I really hope I'm doing this right. I am a college sophomore in no way an expert on anything to do with Wikipedia or Linear A. But, upon review of the article these are the improvements that I can see can be made with the page.

At first read through, I am impressed by the detail and thoroughness of the wikipedia page. If I were first researching Greek early writing styles, and wanted to familiarize myself with Linear A, I would trust the accuracy of the information presented to me. The article is setup in an organized way that is easy to follow. It is helpful in that it starts with a brief interdiction, using language that is easy to follow, before starts with an overview before diverging into subsections. I feel that everything in the article is relevant to Linear A. The one suggestion of improvement I would make is the inclusion of random “fun-facts” throughout, such as including in the script section that “an interesting feature is that of how numbers are included in the script. The highest number that has been recorded is 3000…”. There are a few of these details that seem unnecessary to the main point.

While the article was well organized, however one point of distraction was the variety of different sub-organization tools under the “Theories of deciperment section”. Here, information was organized in summaries, by quoting chunks of text, or in bullet points. The different methods of organizing text weren't visually pleasing and was confusing to follow. My other suggestion in organization is to bring the Discovery section to before the Corpus section. To me, it makes more sense to talk about the original discovery of Linear A before then proceeding to talk about other places the language has been found. 

As far as I can tell all of the claims seemed neutral. In my read through certain subtopics received far more attention than others. The discovery of Linear A was a total of three sentances, while theories of theories of decipherment was eight paragraphs. If I were to edit this page I would add more detail to the discovery section and summarize the different theories of decipherment into a few paragraphs, rather than give each theory their own paragraph. Another section that seemed to be missing was a history on Linear A. While it is not deciphered, and we don’t know its use, it would have been helpful to place Linear A within its historical context. This information could be placed in the beginning with the general overview of Linear A. Linear A is a topic discussed alot within my class so I came in with prior knowledge. However to someone not knowing anything about Ancient Greece from c. 2500-1400 B.C.E, then they wouldn’t know where to pinpoint what society looked like when Linear A was being used.

The links to the citations I clicked on work. Overall, the citations seem to come from reputable sources including books and academic journals. There are also a multitude of sources used, so we know information collected is from a variety of viewpoints. The one imporvement the article could make are there are a few spots were a distinct fact was placed with no citation. Such as with the highest number being 3000 quote in the Script section.

Looking at the talk page I saw discussion on what sections were being underrepresented (which agreed with my perspective). There was also a lot of talk trying to confirm is certain facts were 100% accurate. A lot of this had to do with Theories of Decipherment, and which theories were still being considered and which ones proven wrong. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Char flower (talk • contribs) 23:26, 17 September 2017 (UTC)

Unicode Linear A

The first question that occurred to me when I saw the section on Unicode was 'why??' I don't have an answer, and it isn't addressed in the text, but I thought I'd ask here if anyone has some idea why someone would add a long dead, undeciphered script to a modern character set standard. just for convenience among researchers?? Beergeekjoey (talk) 20:28, 17 May 2019 (UTC)

The goal of Unicode is to provide a unique number for every character including historical characters. – Þjarkur (talk) 20:40, 17 May 2019 (UTC)

t/d

In the context of whether there was a voicing distinction in the language behind Linear A, the article reads "The distinction t / d reflected in the Linear A, Linear B and Cypriot is an example of speech stops" and cites an article. I'm a linguist, and I can't figure out what is being said here. I looked the article cited up in the Wayback machine, but I could not see that it spoke to this issue at all. At any rate, it's *possible* that the text in this Wikipedia article is saying that /t/ and /d/ are stops, which is true (although whether the corresponding Linear A symbols represent these sounds is perhaps harder to determine, I assume this is relying on Linear A/ Greek). But that doesn't seem terribly relevant, unless I'm missing s.t. Mcswell (talk) 04:58, 28 June 2020 (UTC)

@Mcswell: Good observation, the passage was inserted here[3]. Since it is a close-to-gibberish statement with a reference that does not back up whatever is meant by the statement, I'll delete it. The meaningful part of it (the partially defective coding of voice contrasts) is mentioned in the page Linear B anyway. Next time you find stuff like this, just be WP:BOLD and tag or remove it. Thanks for having a closer look at this page! –Austronesier (talk) 09:59, 28 June 2020 (UTC)

I agree, the removed fragment is close to incomprehensible.--Bob not snob (talk) 10:02, 28 June 2020 (UTC)

Ugric

@Bob not snob: While we're at it, yesterday an edit-warring IP was unhappy with Headbomb's removal of the "Ugric" section, which is based on two non-RS published in predatory journals (cf page history). Such sources may be included (but even then only with caution) if they have been cited by scholars in peer-reviewed non-predatory journals (thus reliable sources), which may "heal" their default status as non-RS. I cannot see that this is the case with these two fringe papers. –Austronesier (talk) 10:13, 28 June 2020 (UTC)

Agree, removed, [4].--Bob not snob (talk) 10:53, 28 June 2020 (UTC)

The "A distinct, otherwise unknown branch of Indo-European" Section

I would like to seriously condense this section as it hinges exclusively on one scholar's unsupported, personal interpretation of the script, using Linear B values for Linear A -- a method referred to in this Wikipedia article as resulting in a text "[no] scholar can read." While I would like to remove the section entirely, as it's based on a claim of decipherment of the Linear A script (along with numerous fringe beliefs, e.g. PIE had already begun to disintegrate prior to 10,000BCE(1)(2)(3)), the theory is from a peer-reviewed source, and therefore presumably meets the criteria for inclusion on the page. The quote, however, does not; it is from a non-peer-reviewed newspaper(?) article, elementary in its description of Indo-European, and fraught with inconsistencies and/or flat-out contradictory assertions ("In the Minoan language (Linear A), there are no purely Greek words, as is the case in Mycenaean Linear B" (?!)). While the medium of a newspaper article is admittedly most conducive to elementary or introductory explanations of any material, there is a reason such sources do not quite meet WP requirements for inclusion. I would recommend at the very least removing the quote, and replacing it with something more appropriate from one of the author's peer-reviewed sources. The reason I believe that removing the entire section may still be warranted is that once all the aforementioned issues are dealt with, it leaves little of substance in the sub-section in question.

Also, both footnotes associated with the author's works: 33 and 34, are dead links, leading to pages with page not found errors. I would also suggest removing the entire Indo-Iranian section as it's also just based on bad science (which is thankfully explained), but that's a different story.

(1) Ringe, D. and Anthony, D., 2015. The Indo-European Homeland from Linguistic and Archaeological Perspectives.

(2) Gamkrelidze,T.V., & Ivanov, V., 1995. . Indo-European and the Indo-Europeans: A Reconstruction and Historical Analysis of a Proto-Language and a Proto-Culture.

(3)Renfrew, C., 1987. Archaeology and Language: The Puzzle of Indo-European Origins. (hilariously, Owens actually cites this specific article, and then seemingly proceeds to completely disregard its contents even though the time-depth contained within is probably closest to his ridiculous one)

Vindafarna (talk) 06:05, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

@Vindafarna: Agree 100%, go ahead and WP:boldly change what needs to be changed. –Austronesier (talk) 09:42, 9 October 2020 (UTC)

@Vindafarna and Austronesier: I disagree. Owens' work is legitimate and well-studied. It's quite common for authors to cite articles in on section approvingly and disagree with their other sections. CessnaMan1989 (talk) 21:40, 13 December 2020 (UTC)

Display problem!

I cannot see the Glyph column in "Proposed values of fraction glyphs". What character set should I use? Mazarin07 (talk) 07:49, 2 August 2021 (UTC)

You'll need a Unicode Linear A font installed to see those characters properly. DRMcCreedy (talk) 15:48, 2 August 2021 (UTC)

Actually, it is deciphered.

Hello,

After the reading of the books about minoan script written bij Peter G. van Soesbergen, I am pretty sure he deciphered a Huge part of the minoan linear a. The website about his books is http://www.minoanscript.nl

Kind regards, Jodocus — Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.167.198.196 (talk) 17:50, 2 October 2017 (UTC)

See also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PiLyN9T2stY&feature=youtu.be deciphering some Linear A texts by Peter Revesz — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:A03F:C30A:1F00:7842:F540:954E:F14B (talk) 12:24, 5 December 2020 (UTC)

Linear B is considered deciphered, even though there are some unknown characters. Linear A is considered undeciphered; some of it is, but much of it isn't. It might be a matter of the meanings of characters and words. Linear B is written in an ancient form of Greek, which is much more known about than the Minoan of Linear A. 64.124.38.140 (talk) 19:16, 9 May 2024 (UTC)

Opening Image

Does anyone know where that first image is from? I checked the cited source (which is available on IA) but it doesn't match. AtticEdit (talk) 13:12, 18 January 2022 (GMT+13)

• Check the online corpus (cannot add the link as the English Wikipedia blocks it, but you can check it in the references on the Russian version of the article). It is a golden ring from Mavro Spilio. Dmitri Lytov (talk) 21:33, 20 January 2022 (UTC)

Corpus

I tidied up and updated the article but it needs work on what the current Linear A inscriptions are (and what they are on). Seriously, I thought things were bad in the cuneiform world but given there are only a few hundred inscriptions and maybe a few thousand total glyphs in existance its amazing how underpublished and poorly published the Linear A corpus is. This is a long winded way of asking if someone more up to date on things Minoan than I am could fix this up. ThanksPloversegg (talk) 22:08, 16 March 2022 (UTC)

LIbation Formulas

I see that someone did a draft article on Libation Formulas Draft:Libation Formula which was soundly rejected by the PTB. Maybe some of it could be incorporated into this article.Ploversegg (talk) 17:58, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

It looks like the main intent of the draft was to promote a preprint article that was rejected for inclusion here in this article. But of course, quality content that can be supported with reliable sources is a welcome addition here. –Austronesier (talk) 19:31, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

Cool. Thanks for looking at it.Ploversegg (talk) 20:49, 5 May 2022 (UTC)

Method of equivalent hieroglyphs

Hi,

There is a new method for translating based on Egyptian hieratics: https://nantt44.wordpress.com/2022/08/10/chapter-xv-charmuthas-betius-minoan-theology-through-linear-a/

According to this method, PO-NI-ZA the last three symbols of the historical coin KO ZF2 would give the Immortal lord of Sky, Ba'al Shamin. We can also find the main gods and goddesses of the Minoans. These hieroglyphs could thus be the key to decipher the Linear A of the Cretans. Lepoivre Bertrand (talk) 20:19, 30 August 2022 (UTC)

This appears to just be someone's blog, not a reliable source. – Scyrme (talk) 21:15, 30 August 2022 (UTC)

Chronology

Almost everything I've read had Linear A beginning c. 1800 BC. The Minoan civilization article (and another paper I saw) says 2500 BC based on one paper. I read that paper (Haarman 2008) and it quotes no source for that claim. What it does do is move Middle Minoan IIB back to 2500 BC. Odd. So I disbelieve and plan to change the Minoan article unless someone has a better idea.Ploversegg (talk) 04:31, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

Agree. ~1800 BCE is what you find most sources, including the ones cited in this article. And even if there is a source that explicitly pushes the date of the earliest attestations of Linear A back to 2500 BCE (and not just its cultural horizon), we should mention it only here as an outlier proposal, but not in Minoan civilization. –Austronesier (talk) 21:44, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

I think, after consideration, that the author was trying to link Linear A to the Danube Script and needed to cook the dating to make that even remotely work.Ploversegg (talk) 21:50, 15 December 2022 (UTC)

The language of Linear A is a close relative of Hattic

This point should be marked in the “Other languages” section and should not be deleted. The idea that the language of Linear A is related to Hattic is much more realistic than any other hypothesis about the language of Linear A.

Alexander Akulov and Peter Schrijver have independently come to the conclusion that the language of Linear A is a quite close relative of Hattic.

Akulov, A. 2021. The deciphering of the Linear A tablet Malia 10. Cultural Anthropology and Ethnosemiotics, Vol. 7, № 3; pp.: 8 - 18

The Linear A tablet Malia 10 has inscriptions on four sides of six. Sides A and B have relatively well-preserved inscriptions containing syllabograms, logograms depicting different vessels, and numerals. Previously it was shown that Minoan and Hattic are rather close, so phrases from the tablet can be decoded through Hattic. The component tew from the phrase dupitewa from side B correlates with Hattic tepušne/tewušne "libation". The -a ending correlates with Hattic imperative -a. The component -u- in the syllable du correlates with Hattic marker of 2sgsb -u- / un-. The syllable pi correlates with Hattic marker of plural object -p-. The phrase ru from the side A correlates with Hattic verb lu "to be able". https://www.academia.edu/53367491/The_deciphering_of_the_Linear_A_tablet_Malia_10

Schrijver, P. 2019. Talking Neolithic: the case for Hatto-Minoan and its relationship to Sumerian, Proceedings of the workshop on Indo-European origins held at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig, December 2-3, 2013

The word sarja, followed by a logogram/determinative depicting human being, on the Linear A tablet Haghia Triada 102 correlates with Hattic word zariu meaning “human being”. https://www.academia.edu/38376555/Talking_Neolithic_the_case_for_Hatto_Minoan_and_its_relationship_to_Sumerian Pepe mantani (talk) 22:47, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

For background Hattic language and Minoan language. Ploversegg (talk) 23:25, 3 April 2023 (UTC)

Is this Peter Schrijver the same as Peter Schrijver? Seems a bit out of his field if so. – Scyrme (talk) 02:31, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

Yep, Peter Schrijver Pepe mantani (talk) 02:38, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

@Roger 8 Roger: It's looks like they already did "explain the source on the talk page" (above, posted before your revert). I don't know whether these sources are credible or whether mentioning them would be undue, but your edit summary seems unclear and possibly unfair. – Scyrme (talk) 01:56, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

Yes, I can see now. There wasn't any explanation on the edit tags, such as 'see talk' so I assumed it was a simple wp:BRD issue. All good now, thanks for reverting. Roger 8 Roger (talk) 03:00, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

As an aside, the 1st papers is at (wordpress) [5] and the 2nd paper is available at [6].Ploversegg (talk) 03:08, 4 April 2023 (UTC)

@Ruslik0: What on earth are you doing? Don't revert Pepe mantani's contributions without a proper explaination. –Austronesier (talk) 20:41, 4 April 2023 (UTC)