Important 5,200 Year Old Pictoral Symbols Discovered in Elkab Desert Region of Egypt

A rock panel featuring depictions of a bull’s head on a short pole followed by two back-to-back saddlebill storks with a bald ibis bird above and between them.MINISTRY OF ANTIQUITIES

ANCIENT EGYPTIAN WRITING: NEW SYMBOLS REVEAL DEVELOPMENT OF HIEROGLYPHICS

BY JOSH LOWE ON 6/22/17 AT 7:17 AM

The elegant pictorial writing system of the ancient Egyptians—known as hieroglyphics—has fascinated generations of archeologists. Its precise origins are uncertain. One ancient Egyptian legend holds that the god Thoth handed the gift of writing to a few chosen scribes. A more prosaic modern theory suggests that they derived from rock pictures produced by prehistoric hunting societies wandering the desert.
Now, a new discovery may hold some clues as to how carved images evolved into a formal writing system. According to a Facebook post by the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities, a new rock inscription site discovered around 60 km south of Luxor in the village of El-Khawy “helps in understanding the development of a system of graphic communication that sets the stage for the appearance of true hieroglyphic writing.”
Now, a new discovery may hold some clues as to how carved images evolved into a formal writing system. According to a Facebook post by the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities, a new rock inscription site discovered around 60 km south of Luxor in the village of El-Khawy “helps in understanding the development of a system of graphic communication that sets the stage for the appearance of true hieroglyphic writing.”
The inscriptions date back around 5,200 years and each individual sign is about half a meter in height. “This is the first time that anyone has seen them on such a massive scale,” Darnell said. He said the team was “absolutely flabbergasted” by the size of the discovery.

According to Yale, they are significant not only for their unique size, but also because they show that even in its very earliest phases, the use of hieroglyphic writing was widespread and not confined to the offices of dusty bureaucrats as some had previously argued.

“This also suggests that there is a much more expansive use of the early writing system than is indicated from other surviving archeological material,” Darnell said.

The researchers found the inscriptions in the northern desert landscape of Elkab. This area, along with a city called Hierakonpolis across the river, were extremely important settlements in ancient Egypt, Darnell said.

More On the Controversy Surrounding Claim of Oldest Chinese Inscriptions Uncovered

Ooooh, it just makes me tingle all over when the experts get all bitchy with each other :)  Prior post.

From Art Daily, July 14-15, 2013

Experts row over 'earliest' Chinese inscriptions find at the Zhuangqiaofen archaeological site

BEIJING (AFP).- Fierce debate has erupted among experts in China over the discovery of 5,000-year-old inscriptions that some believe represent the earliest record of Chinese characters.

Pottery pieces and stone vessels unearthed at the Zhuangqiaofen archaeological site in the eastern province of Zhejiang push "the origin of the written language back 1,000 years", the state-run Global Times newspaper reported.

The inscriptions predate the oracles, writings on turtle shells dating back to the Shang Dynasty (C.1600-1046BC), which are commonly believed to be the origin of the written Chinese language system.

Some of the inscriptions were written together in what some experts believe resembles a short sentence.

Li Boqian, an archaeology professor from Peking University, said the symbols reveal the ancient Liangzhu civilisation -- which existed in Zhejiang and neighbouring Jiangsu in the Neolithic Age -- had already developed the basic structure of sentences from independent words, the Global Times said earlier this week.

Other specialists dismissed the significance of such a find. Xu Hong, an archaeology researcher from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, expressed scepticism on links between the inscriptions and the development of Chinese script.

"Even if those signs on the stones were characters, they were simply from a long dead east Asian country before the Middle Kingdom existed," he said on Sina Weibo, China's version of the social network Twitter.

"Many signs and character lookalikes earlier than the oracles have been found in east Asia."

Xia Jingchun, a professor of Chinese language from Beijing Technology and Business University, also wrote on Weibo: "It's long been believed by experts that there were more ancient characters than the oracles, because the oracles were too mature, and older languages are supposed to be less developed."

The inscriptions were found among artefacts unearthed between 2003 and 2006, state media said.



© 1994-2013 Agence France-Presse     

Oldest Chinese Symbols (Writing?) Discovered to Date

Fascinating story - and open about the ongoing debate as to what constitutes writing and what merely constitutes "symbols."  My question is - if a specific drawing of a symbol means something to the creator and to those who see it, isn't this writing?  After all, isn't writing merely a tool to convey meaning apart from the spoken word and gestures?

This is the photo of the ax head from the article -- would have preferred to see a line drawing of the markings:

A stone axe from near the Zhuangqiao relics site, in east China, shows a newly discovered form of primitive writing, archaeologists say. Photograph: AP

Story at The Guardian

Inscriptions found in Shanghai pre-date 'oldest Chinese language by 1,400 years'

Markings on artefacts from Zhuangqiao relics site date to 5,000 years ago and include string of words, says archaeologist

 

Associated Press in Beijing

guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 10 July 2013 14.16 EDT

 

Primitive inscriptions dating back about 5,000 years – and believed to be 1,400 years older than the most ancient written Chinese language – have been discovered in Shanghai, archaeologists report.
Chinese scholars are divided over whether the markings, found on artefacts at the Zhuangqiao relics site south of the modern city, are words or something simpler. But they believe the discovery will shed light on the origins of Chinese language and culture.

The oldest writing in the world is believed to be from Mesopotamia (now Iraq), dating back slightly more than 5,000 years. Chinese characters are believed to have been developed independently. [I wonder what the consensus will be 100 years from now?  What if there is a missing link of writing akin to the missing link in human evolution?]

The Chinese inscriptions were found on more than 200 pieces dug out from the neolithic Liangzhu relics site. The pieces are among thousands of fragments of ceramic, stone, jade, wood, ivory and bone excavated from the site between 2003 and 2006, Xu Xinmin, the lead archaeologist, said.

Chinese scholars, of archaeology and ancient writing, who met last weekend in Zhejiang province to discuss the finding, thought the inscriptions did not indicate a developed writing system. However Xu said there was evidence of words on two pieces of stone axes.

One of the pieces has six word-like shapes strung together and resembles a short sentence.

"They are different from the symbols we have seen in the past on artefacts," Xu said. "The shapes, and the fact that they are in a sentence-like pattern, indicate they are expressions of some meaning."
The six characters are arranged in a line, and three resemble the modern Chinese character for human beings. Each shape has two to five strokes.

"If five to six of them are strung together like a sentence, they are no longer symbols but words," said Cao Jinyan, a scholar of ancient writing at Zhejiang University. He said the markings should be regarded as hieroglyphics.

He said there were also stand-alone shapes with more strokes. "If you look at the composition, you will see they are more than symbols."

But Liu Zhao, an archaeologist at Fudan University, Shanghai, suggested there was not sufficient material for a conclusion. "I don't think they should be considered writing by the strictest definition. We do not have enough material to pin down the stage of those markings in the history of ancient writings."

For now the Chinese scholars are calling the markings primitive writing, a vague term that suggests they are somewhere between symbols and words. The oldest known Chinese writing has been found on animal bones (known as oracle bones) dating to 3,600 years ago, at the time of the Shang dynasty.

3,300 Year Old Cuneiform Text Found in Malta Temple

See if you're satisfied with the explanation for how the cuneiform inscription got to the Temple.  I'm not - and perhaps we'll never know...  One other point:  the article keeps referring to Mesopotamia being to the west of Malta.  If that was the case, it would be located beyond the "Pillars of Hercules" out in the Atlantic Ocean!  Mesopotamia is to the east of Malta. 

From Popular Archaeology
Rare Cuneiform Script Found on Island of Malta
December 22, 2011

A small-sized find in an ancient Megalithic temple stirs the imagination.

Excavations among what many scholars consider to be the world's oldest monumental buildings on the island of Malta continue to unveil surprises and raise new questions about the significance of these megalithic structures and the people who built them. Not least is the latest find - a small but rare, crescent-moon shaped agate stone featuring a 13th-century B.C.E. cuneiform inscription, the likes of which would normally be found much farther west in Mesopotamia.

Led by palaeontology professor Alberto Cazzella of the University of Rome “La Sapienza”, the archaeological team found the inscribed stone in the sancturary site of Tas-Silg, a megalithic temple built during the late Neolithic period, and which has been used for various religious and ceremonial purposes by the ancients from the third millennium BC to the Byzantine era. The inscription was translated as a dedication to the Mesopotamian moon god Sin, the father of Ninurta who, for centuries, was the main deity worshiped far to the west in the city of Nippur in Mesopotamia. Nippur was considered a holy city and a pilgrimage site with a scribal school that generated literary texts.

The location of the find makes it the farthest west the ancient script has ever been discovered, raising questions about how it ended up in the remote location. Some scholars theorize that the inscribed stone was likely looted from the temple of Nippur during military conflict and then transported westward through an exchange of hands by Cypriot or Mycenaean merchants, thought to have had trading relations with the central Mediterranean at the time.

Moreover, because cuneiform-inscribed agate would have been considered highly valued during the late Bronze Age, its presence within the Tas-Silg sanctuary, according to some scholars, suggests that the sanctuary had a much wider significance than for those who lived on Malta at this time. The sanctuary is already known to have been an important place of worship in the Mediterranean during the Phoenician and Roman eras.

Cover Photo, Top Left: The cuneiform-inscribed agate stone. Credit: Cultura Italia

Minoan Hieroglyphic Script Found in Western Crete

I had to do some reading on the topic as I wasn't sure if Minoan hieroglyphic script was the same as Linear A (undeciphered).  According to Wikipedia:

The earliest writing found on Crete is Cretan hieroglyphic system. It is not known whether this language is Minoan, and scholars often debate its origin. These hieroglyphs are often associated with the Egyptians but also appear related to several other writings from the Mesopotamian region.^[37] The hieroglyphs came into use from MMI and were in parallel use with the emerging Linear A from the 18th century BC (MM II) and disappeared during the 17th century BCE (MM III).

Given the relative few numbers of samples of the script and that no parallel translations have been found (such as, for instance, the Rosetta Stone, which enabled Egyptian hieroglyphics to be deciphered), it seems doubtful that either Minoan hieroglyphic script or Linear A will ever be deciphered.

Story from Greekreporter.com
Earliest Sample of Minoan Hieroglyphics Found in Western Crete

Posted on 17 November 2011 by Stella Tsolakidou

No photo credit given in the news article.

A four-sided red jasper sealstone is among the finds unearthed during this season’s excavation of the Minoan peak sanctuary at Vrysinas, located south of the city of Rethymnon. The whole area was officially announced and included in the archaeological sites list by the Central Archaeological Council of Greece.

The sealstone, which is carved on all four surfaces with characters of the Minoan Hieroglyphic script, constitutes the sole evidence to date for the presence of this earliest Minoan style of writing in Western Crete.

The excavation, which began in 2004, is conducted by the Ephorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities under the supervision of the archaeologist Helena Papadopoulou in collaboration with Prof. Iris Tzachili from the Department of History and Archaeology of the University of Crete.
A preliminary study of the artefacts recovered thus far - including some 800 clay votive statuettes and a significant number of ceramic vessels - indicates that the peak sanctuary was in use throughout the First Palace period (1900-1700 BC) and continued until at least the beginning of the New Palace phase, after which time it was relocated to a lower part of the plateau.

The Vrysinas sanctuary is believed to have been the most sacred peak in Western Crete. The site’s undeniable ritual context puts it on a par with other important Minoan peak sanctuaries like those at Iouktas, Petsofas and Traostalos Kofinas in central and eastern Crete.

What are the stones inscribed in "ancient Hebrew" in the New World?

From yourdatytonnews.com
Ancient stones a mystery for archeologists, scientists
Posted: Monday, June 27, 2011 9:44 am
Author unknown

Years ago, I got to know an archeologist that worked with archeological digs in East Texas in the area now covered by Lake Sam Rayburn.

He and I discussed various subjects regarding archeology, not only regarding Texas, but some of the surrounding states and Egypt and the Holy Land.

One of the subjects that caught my attention was one about several tablets being found in some of the Mayan temples of the Yucatan. He said that archeologists and other scientists studying these old tablets noted what appeared to be ancient Hebrew.

Now in some areas I am a skeptic, but in others I am curious and like to research. This area is one of those.

In the past I did not have the means or time to go to some university library for research on this subject. But with Internet, many research sources are now at my fingertips.

As I have researched this idea of Ancient Hebrew or Israelite explorers or other countries to the Western Hemisphere long before Columbus, I have read about various artifacts that have been discovered over the years of research of Mayan temples and ruins as well as in other areas of the Americas.

There is no definitive information at present to support this theory but I look at it this way: if they had the means to explore various parts of Europe and Asia by boat, then they certainly had the means to cross the seas to the Americas.

Image: Wikipedia commons.

One such item of interest is a large stone that was found in a dry creek bed in New Mexico. This stone discovered by early explorers contains the entire Ten Commandments written in Ancient Hebrew script. Today, this large stone still lies where it was originally found in the early 1800's on the side of Hidden Mountain near Los Lunas, New Mexico, about thirty-five miles south of Albuquerque.

Scholars who have studied the stone say it pre-dates the arrival of Columbus to America.

How did this large stone with the Ten Commandments written in Ancient Hebrew come to be in North America? No one has an answer.

Another item that shows strong evidence of the possibility of Hebrews in America is noted in a custom celebrated by the Yuchi Indians in Oklahoma.

The Yuchis originally migrated from the Bahamas to Florida and Georgia and then later to the Oklahoma territory.

Every year in the fall, on the fifteenth day of the sacred month of harvest, the Yuchis make a pilgrimage and for eight days live in what are described as booths with open roofs. They celebrate a festival during this time.

The ancient Israelites had a custom very similar and also celebrated in the harvest season on the 15th day of the sacred month of harvest.

The unanswered question is “How can two totally separated peoples observe the identical question?

Another question that haunts scientists and Bible historians is: “Did Jesus in His early years visit the American continents?

After all, there was a period from about age 12 to age 30, years unaccounted for in the scriptures. So there is a possibility that Jesus did visit other continents during those years.

Several of the ancient tribes of the Americas have stories that tell of a white-skinned bearded man that came from heaven to earth.

The Aztecs and Toltecs worshiped a god named Quetzalcoatl who not only was a white bearded man, but also wore white. The legend tells that his mother was a virgin. Legend says he taught the Native Americans about agriculture and medicine and gave them a calendar.

The Mayans worshiped a god named Kukulcan and legend says he too was white-skinned and bearded and came from heaven to earth. This particular god also had the power to heal the sick as well as bring the dead back to life.

Similar legends are to be found with the Incas.

*****************************************

Is the author a Mormon? Isn't that what they teach - that some of the "lost tribes of Israel" ended up in North America and that Christ visited their descendants at some point?

What I want to know is - why is this big old stone inscribed in "ancient Hebrew" with the 10 commandments on it still sitting out in the middle of nowhere?  If it has, indeed, been examined by "scholars" and deemed "authentic", why isn't this stone sitting in a museum?  Something is not right here. 

You can find a photo of the "Decalogue Stone" at the web site of Steven M. Collins with further information.
Wikipedia also has information on the stone.  It answered one of my questions - the inscription is inscribed on an 80 ton boulder!  That's why it hasn't been moved to a museum or lab for further study.  Conveniently, unknown persons have, over the years, also "cleaned" the inscription, thereby most likely destroying most or even all of the patina that might otherwise have been used to date the inscription. 

Is it a fraud?  I don't know.  Most people today don't write using perfect grammar and punctuation, and most likely people 2000 years ago didn't either.  People well versed in ancient Hebrew idioms of the day need to look at this stone, and despite repeated "cleanings" over the years, some attempt should be made to date the inscriptions using modern methods.  Alas, that takes money to fund the studies, and no doubt a project like this, if it is on any university's or institute's "wish list" at all, is way down at the bottom! 

Diggers Unearth 3000 Year Old Tablet, Jerusalem's Oldest Written Document

Reported at Bloomberg.com
By Jonathan Ferziger - Jun 21, 2011 8:00 AM CT

A clay tablet covered with
cuneiform script, discovered
in a Jerusalem excavation.
Archaeologists say it is a
3,000-year-old copy of a
letter that Canaanite king
Abdi-Heba wrote to the
king of Egypt.
Photographer: Meidad
Suchowolski/
Israel Antiquities Authority

Israeli archaeologists have discovered part of a 3,000-year-old clay tablet covered with cuneiform script that they say is the oldest written document ever found in Jerusalem.

The thumb-sized fragment, which is described as an archived copy of an Accadian-language letter that Canaanite King Abdi- Heba wrote to the king of Egypt, was placed on display today at the Davidson Center in Jerusalem’s Old City. It was found in excavations of a site from the First Temple period led by Hebrew University archaeologist Eilat Mazar.

The discovery closes a small blank “patch on the map of knowledge of Jerusalem,” Ronny Reich, a senior Israel Antiquities Authority archeologist, said in a speech after Jerusalem Mayor Nir Barkat opened a visitors center at the site.

Mazar’s work at the Ophel Wall site has been focused on finding evidence of palace activity from the Jewish Temple during the reign of King Solomon, centuries after the Canaanite ruler. The excavation lies in the shadow of the Temple Mount, which Muslims refer to as the Haram Sharif or Noble Sanctuary.

Years of digging have unearthed a four-room gatehouse that Mazar said appears to have been destroyed with the Babylonian conquest of Jerusalem in 586 BC. In the building’s floor she found twelve large clay jars, one of which has a Hebrew inscription indicating they were used to store wine or oil.

The excavation was funded by Daniel Mintz, managing director of Olympus Capital Holdings Asia, a New York-based private equity fund, and his wife, Meredith Berkman.

Moon and Venus Carving Found in Sudan

It's a little vague, but from what I could gather, it's another "pre-writing" "Moon and Venus" rock carving - this one found in Sudan that dates to "more than" 5000 years ago.  I added the map of the Egypt/Sudan region to provide a general idea of the geography.  The Nile River is, of course, the life-line through arid Egypt (the climate turned from savannah to desert about 7,000 years ago, or about 5,000 BCE, or even earlier).

From Live Science
Article: Mysterious Ancient Rock Carvings Found Near Nile
Owen Jarus,
LiveScience Contributor
Date: 13 May 2011 Time: 11:29 AM ET


Map of Egypt, Sudan, and surrounding areas, showing Nile River and tributaries

An archaeological team in the Bayuda Desert in northern Sudan has discovered dozens of new rock art drawings, some of which were etched more than 5,000 years ago and reveal scenes that scientists can't explain.


Image from article.

The team discovered 15 new rock art sites in an arid valley known as Wadi Abu Dom, some 18 miles (29 kilometers) from the Nile River. It’s an arid valley that flows with water only during rainy periods. Many of the drawings were carved into the rock faces — no paint was used — of small stream beds known as "khors" that flow into the valley.

Some of the sites revealed just a single drawing while others have up to 30, said lead researcher Tim Karberg, of the Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster in Germany.

An Egyptian Script Not Yet Deciphered!

Wow - I had no idea there was an undeciphered ANYTHING in ancient Egypt - perhaps the most studied culture ever!  From Past Horizons --

Deciphering Pseudo-Script in Ancient Egypt
Tuesday, March 15, 2011 | Featured, News
Dr. Ben Haring

Ostracon of limestone with
workers marks - often taken from
hieroglyphics - in columns (late New Empire)

In addition to using Hieratic script, the ancient Egyptian workers also developed their own identity marking system. The Egyptian New Kingdom (ca. 1150-1070 B.C.E.) in particular provides many examples of these marks, but although Hieratic has now been deciphered, the system of marks is still a mystery.

In an effort to understand more about these marks, Egyptologist Dr Ben Haring from the University of Leiden, has been awarded a grant to carry out a more detailed research.

Tomb workers
In his research project, Symbolizing Identity; Identity marks and their relation to writing in New Kingdom Egypt, Dr Haring focuses on the marks of the workers who were occupied in constructing the royal tombs during the New Kingdom. By analysing what is a particularly well-documented system, the ‘marks‘ can be studied in a context of rich archaeological and textual data.

Rest of article.

1,000 Year Old Tamil Inscription Found

Millennium old Tamil inscription found in Trincomalee
[TamilNet, Saturday, 23 October 2010, 00:53 GMT]

The inscribed stone.  There are additional close-up photos in the article.

A stone slab having a Tamil inscription, clearly in the alphabet of the Chola times (c. 3rd century BCE - 13th century CE), was found in Trincomalee while digging for cricket stadium construction work recently. The land where it was found is a part of the esplanade, on the right side of the Koa’neasvaram Road leading to the Siva temple inside Fort Frederick and is adjacent to the bay where the temple’s Theerththam (water cutting) ritual is held. Sometimes back, a Buddhist Vihara and another structure called Sanghamitta Buddhist Rest were constructed at this place. The inscribed slab was taken into possession by the Trincomalee police and was sent to the Department of Archaeology in Colombo.

The construction work for a modern cricket stadium in the esplanade was financed by the Provincial Governor’s Fund.

The construction work in the land has been suspended by the Department of Archaeology.

The inscribed stone slab has a large perforation at the centre reminding of anchors and sluice-gates.

Academics are concerned about the safe custody of the inscription with the Department of Archaeology.

As there are no Tamil officials or no Tamil epigraphists in the Department of Archaeology, academic circles expect estampages of the inscription to be sent to relevant scholars as early as possible by the Department of Archaeology of Sri Lanka, for speedy dissemination of knowledge about the inscription.

Hunting for the Dawn of Writing

The Oriental Institute in Chicago is hosting a new exhibit that looks at the development of writing in ancient Egypt, Sumer, China, and by the New World Maya. 

Hunting for the Dawn of Writing, When Prehistory Became History
By GERALDINE FABRIKANT
Published: October 19, 2010

Sumerian goods "tag" c. 3200 BCE
with proto-Cuneiform symbols.

CHICAGO — One of the stars of the Oriental Institute’s new show, “Visible Language: Inventions of Writing in the Ancient Middle East and Beyond,” is a clay tablet that dates from around 3200 B.C. On it, written in cuneiform, the script language of ancient Sumer in Mesopotamia, is a list of professions, described in small, repetitive impressed characters that look more like wedge-shape footprints than what we recognize as writing.

In fact “it is among the earliest examples of writings that we know of so far,” according to the institute’s director, Gil J. Stein, and it provides insights into the life of one of the world’s oldest cultures.

The new exhibition by the institute, part of the University of Chicago, is the first in the United States in 26 years to focus on comparative writing. It relies on advances in archaeologists’ knowledge to shed new light on the invention of scripted language and its subsequent evolution.

The show demonstrates that, contrary to the long-held belief that writing spread from east to west, Sumerian cuneiform and its derivatives and Egyptian hieroglyphics evolved separately from each another. And those writing systems were but two of the ancient forms of writing that evolved independently. Over a span of two millenniums, two other powerful civilizations — the Chinese and Mayans — also identified and met a need for written communication. Writing came to China as early as around 1200 B.C. and to the Maya in Mesoamerica long before A.D. 500.

“It was the first true information revolution,” Mr. Stein said. “By putting spoken language into material form, people could for the first time store and transmit it across time and space.”

The Oriental Institute spent two years assembling the show, much of which comes from its own collections. However, it did borrow important Sumerian pieces from other institutions, including the clay tablet from the Vorderasiatisches Museum in Berlin, which has never before been seen in the United States.

Rest of article.

Discovery Reveals Unknown Language and Numbering System

From Physorg.com

Unearthed 400-year-old document shows how Peruvian natives used numbers
August 24, 2010 By Faith Sutter

In the early 1600s in northern Peru, a curious Spaniard jotted down some notes on the back of a letter. Four hundred years later, archaeologists dug up and studied the paper, revealing what appear to be the first traces of a lost language.

The back side of an early 17th century letter shows translations for numbers from Spanish to a lost language.
Photo by Jeffrey Quilter

“It’s a little piece of paper with a big story to tell,” said Jeffrey Quilter, who has conducted investigations in Peru for more than three decades.

Quilter is deputy director for curatorial affairs at Harvard’s Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, as well as director of the archaeological project at Magdalena de Cao Viejo in the El Brujo Archaeological Complex, where the paper was excavated two years ago.

The writing is a set of translations from Spanish names of numbers (uno, dos, and tres) and Arabic numerals (4-10, 21, 30, 100, and 200) into the unknown language. Some of the translated numbers have never been seen before, while others may have been borrowed from Quechua or a related local language. Quechua is still spoken today in Peru, but in the early 17th century many other languages were spoken in the region, such as Quingnam and Pescadora.

Information about them today is limited. Even so, the archaeologists were able to deduce that speakers of the lost language used a decimal system like our own.

Quilter said that this simple list offers “a glimpse of the peoples of ancient and early colonial Peru who spoke a language lost to us until this discovery.”

“The find is significant because it offers the first glimpse of a previously unknown language and number system,” said Quilter. “It also points to the great diversity of Peru’s cultural heritage in the early colonial period. The interactions between natives and Spanish were far more complex than previously thought.”

The name of the lost language is still a mystery. The American-Peruvian research team was able to determine it was not Mochica, spoken on the north coast into the colonial period but now extinct, and pointed to Quingnam and Pescadora as possible candidates. Neither Quingnam nor Pescadora, however, have been documented beyond their names. There is even a possibility that Quingnam and Pescadora are the same language but they were identified as separate tongues in early colonial Spanish writings, so a definitive connection has not yet been established.

A Linguistic Mystery

Ooooohhh, the best kind of mystery!

10 August 2010 Last updated at 20:05 ET
Ancient language mystery deepens
By Victoria Gill
Science reporter, BBC News

A linguistic mystery has arisen surrounding symbol-inscribed stones in Scotland that predate the formation of the country itself.

The stones are believed to have been carved by members of an ancient people known as the Picts, who thrived in what is now Scotland from the 4th to the 9th Centuries.

These symbols, researchers say, are probably "words" rather than images. But their conclusions have raised criticism from some linguists.

The research team, led by Professor Rob Lee from Exeter University in the UK, examined symbols on more than 200 carved stones. They used a mathematical method to quantify patterns contained within the symbols, in an effort to find out if they conveyed meaning.

Professor Lee described the basis of this method.

"If I told you the first letter of a word in English was 'Q' and asked you to predict the next letter, you would probably say 'U' and you would probably be right," he explained. "But if I told you the first letter was 'T' you would probably take many more guesses to get it right - that's a measure of uncertainty."

Using the symbols, or characters, from the stones, Prof Lee and his colleagues measured this feature of so-called "character to character uncertainty".  They concluded that the Pictish carvings were "symbolic markings that communicated information" - that these were words rather than pictures.

The Kingdom of the Picts
Prof Lee first published these conclusions in April of this year. But a recent article by French linguist Arnaud Fournet opened up the mystery once again. Mr Fournet said that, by examining Pictish carvings as if they were "linear symbols", and by applying the rules of written language to them, the scientists could have produced biased results.

He told BBC News: "It looks like their method is transforming two-dimensional glyphs into a one-dimensional string of symbols.

"The carvings must have some kind of purpose - some kind of meanings, but... it's very difficult to determine if their conclusion is contained in the raw data or if it's an artefact of their method."

Mr Fournet also suggested that the researchers' methods should be tested and verified for other ancient symbols.

"The line between writing and drawing is not as clear cut as categorised in the paper," Mr Fournet wrote in his article. "On the whole the conclusion remains pending."

But Prof Lee says that his most recent analysis of the symbols, which has yet to be published, has reinforced his original conclusions. He also stressed he did not claim that the carvings were a full and detailed record of the Pictish language.

"The symbols themselves are a very constrained vocabulary," he said. "But that doesn't mean that Pictish had such a constrained vocabulary."

He said the carvings might convey the same sort of meaning as a list, perhaps of significant names, which would explain the limited number of words used.

"It's like finding a menu for a restaurant [written in English], and that being your sole repository of the English language."

***************************************************************

The fact that so many different "knights" are depicted is fascinating.  And just what is that structure (?) at the top of the pylon, it looks like an Egyptian ankh on the left side and a scale on the right side, and they are linked by a diagonal line.  What is that?  And the form in the middle at the top - call me crazy, but it looks like a "false door" from an Egyptian tomb -- definitely some kind of door or entrance.  Absolutely intriguing.  What's going on with this pylon?

Significant Discovery: Stone Inscribed with Indus Signs in Gujarat

Story from The Indu.com

Stone inscription with Indus signs found in Gujarat
By T. S. Subramanian
The Hindu
Wednesday, May 5, 2010

SIGNIFICANT DISCOVERY: R. S. Bisht, former Joint Director-General of the Archaeological Survey of India, pointing to the Indus inscription found engraved on a sandstone at Dholavira in Gujarat.

First time Indus script found engraved on natural stone
An inscription on stone, with three big Indus signs and possibly a fourth, has been found on the Harappan site of Dholavira in Gujarat.

The discovery is significant because this is the first time that the Indus script has been found engraved on a natural stone in the Indus Valley. The Indus script has so far been found on seals made of steatite, terracotta tablets, ceramics and so on. Dholavira also enjoys the distinction of yielding a spectacularly large Indus script with 10 big signs on wood. This inscription was three-metre long.

Both the discoveries were made by a team led by R. S. Bisht, who retired as Joint Director-General of the Archaeological Survey of India in 2004. While the stone inscription was discovered in 1999, the script with 10 large signs was found in 1991.

"The inscription on stone is unique because it is the first of its kind [in the Indus civilisation area]. It is the first inscription on a stone slab. But only part of it was found," said Dr. Bisht, who led 14 field excavation seasons at Dholavira from 1989 to 2001. "It was a natural limy sandstone cut into shape and then engraved with an inscription," he said.

The signs are seven cm tall and 6-10 cm wide.

The script has three large Indus signs, running from right to left, and there appears to be a fourth sign too. Dr. Bisht said: "The inscription must have run longer, but the stone was broken into pieces. The stone was used as ordinary building material for making an underground chamber in the bailey area of the citadel during stage five of the seven stages documenting the rise and fall of the Indus civilisation at Dholavira. It was placed in such a manner that it was facing us when we found it."

He was sure that there must be more stone pieces with the Indus script there. He surmised that the stone with the script must have been used as a lintel of the doorway of the underground chamber so that people could notice it. The inscription could have stood for the name of the house, its owner or an incantation. "It is a closed book," he said. (The Indus script has not been deciphered yet).

Michel Danino, independent researcher in the Harappan civilisation, called it "an unprecedented discovery because there is no stone inscription in the Indus civilisation." Stone was a rare material on the Indus plains. "This is the first time we have come across a stone
inscription, but it has not attracted the attention it deserves," Mr.
Danino said.

Dholavira in Kachch district is a major Indus site. It attracted wide attention in the 1990s for yielding what Dr. Bisht calls "a spectacularly large inscription made of 10 unusually big Indus signs" which were inlaid on a wooden board which had, however, decayed. The signs were made of thoroughly baked gypsum. It must have been sported right above the north gate of the castle, and "it must have been visible from afar with its white brilliance," Dr. Bisht said.

Highly literate society
He argued that it was a highly literate Harappan society that must have existed at Dholavira because seals, tablets, pottery, bangles and even copper tools with Indus signs were found everywhere in the citadel, the middle town, the lower town and the annexe of the site.

Besides, the same seals, beads, pottery and ornaments were found everywhere as if the entire population had wealth. "It appears to have been an egalitarian society. On the basis of material culture, you cannot draw a distinction among the city's inhabitants," he said.

Ancient Writing: Texts Show Similarities Between Ugaritic and Arabic

Maybe it's just because I'm tired - this article seems vague.  At first I thought it was perhaps implying that ancient Ugaritic stemmed from ancient Arabic languages, but then after reading it again I thought it meant the other-way around.  Still not precisely clear and too tired to read it again tonight!  Is it talking about findings from a current specific dig taking place in Syria? Perhaps you can figure it out and let me know.

From the Global Arab Network
Archaeologists: Ancient Texts Show Similarities between Arabic and Ugaritic Languages
Friday, 16 April 2010 01:33

According to archaeologists, the ancient texts found in Ugarit revealed important information on the intellectual and cultural life in Ugarit, detailing the various aspects of life in the ancient city.

The finds highlight similarities between the Ugaritic language and Arabic in terms of meanings and grammar.

Director of Lattakia Department of Archaeology Jamal Haidar said excavations in Ras Shamra uncovered documents that illustrate the attempts of an Ugaritic scribe at teaching his students the alphabet, noting that scribes were respected in the city and royal court of Ugarit and that they were highly cultured and knowledgeable.

Ancient texts show that Ugaritic scribes learned foreign languages and taught them in addition to giving special attention to their mother tongue, the Canaanite language.

Haidar pointed out that the discovered small clay tablets show that the alphabetical order of the Ugaritic language is very similar to the Arabic and Greek alphabets with only few differences.

He added that the Ugaritic language is also close to Arabic in grammar and terms, with around 1000 words that are the same in Arabic, making up more than two thirds of the Ugaritic vocabulary, noting that some Ugaritic words are not found in classical Arabic, but rather in the common dialect of Lattakia.

Director of the Ugarit site Ghassan al-Qaiem said that, according to British scientist John Healey, the people of Lattakia are the heirs of the people of Ugarit, which makes it natural for Ugaritic terms to remain in the local dialect, adding that this facilitated the study of Ugaritic texts.

The Ugaritic language, discovered by French archaeologists in 1928, is known only in the form of writings found in the lost city of Ugarit, near the modern village of Ras Shamra, Syria. It has been extremely important for scholars of the Old Testament in clarifying Biblical Hebrew texts and has revealed more of the way in which ancient Israelite culture finds parallels in the neighboring cultures.

Ugaritic was "the greatest literary discovery from antiquity since the deciphering of the Egyptian hieroglyphs and Mesopotamian cuneiform[1]". Literary texts discovered at Ugarit include the Legend of Keret, the Aqhat Epic (or Legend of Danel), the Myth of Baal-Aliyan, and the Death of Baal — the latter two are also collectively known as the Baal Cycle — all revealing a Canaanite religion.

Indus-Like Inscription?

Objective scientific analysis in this article - or political propaganda?

Article at The Hindu Online
Thursday, Apr 08, 2010

Indus-like inscription on South Indian pottery from Thailand
Iravatham Mahadevan

A fragmentary pottery inscription was found during excavations conducted by the Thai Fine Arts at Phu Khao Thong in Thailand about three years ago. (Dr. Berenice Bellina of the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, France, sent me a photograph of the object: Figure 1 [right])

The discovery of a Tamil-Brahmi pottery inscription of about the second century CE at the same site was reported earlier ( The Hindu, July 16, 2006). One can presume that the present inscription is also from the Tamil country and belongs approximately to the same period. The two characters incised on the pottery now reported are not in the Brahmi script. They appear to be graffiti symbols of the type seen on the South Indian megalithic pottery of the Iron Age-Early Historical Period (second century BCE to third century CE).

What makes the discovery exciting is that the two symbols on the pottery resemble the Indus script, and even the sequence of the pair can be found in the Indus texts, especially those from Harappa.

Rest of article.

Pictish "Artwork" Is Actually Writing

It's been there all alone, staring the common man and the experts alike, in the face...

From MSNBC
‘Rock art’ reveals language of ancient Scotland
If deciphered, writing could provide insight into early Scottish history
By Jennifer Viegas
updated 12:08 p.m. CT, Wed., March. 31, 2010

The ancestors of modern Scottish people left behind mysterious, carved stones that new research has just determined contain the written language of the Picts, an Iron Age society that existed in Scotland from 300 to 843.

The highly stylized rock engravings, found on what are known as the Pictish Stones, had once been thought to be rock art or tied to heraldry. The new study, published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society A, instead concludes that the engravings represent the long lost language of the Picts, a confederation of Celtic tribes that lived in modern-day eastern and northern Scotland.  (Image: Rob Knell and Rob Lee.  Riders and horn blowers appear next to hunting dogs on what is called the Hilton of Cadboll stone)

"We know that the Picts had a spoken language to complement the writing of the symbols, as Bede (a monk and historian who died in 735) writes that there are four languages in Britain in this time: British, Pictish, Scottish and English," lead author Rob Lee told Discovery News.

"We know that the three other languages were — and are — complex spoken languages, so there is every indication that Pictish was also a complex spoken language," added Lee, a professor in the School of Biosciences at the University of Exeter.

He and colleagues Philip Jonathan and Pauline Ziman analyzed the engravings, found on the few hundred known Pictish Stones. The researchers used a mathematical process known as Shannon entropy to study the order, direction, randomness and other characteristics of each engraving.

The resulting data was compared with that for numerous written languages, such as Egyptian hieroglyphs, Chinese texts and written Latin, Anglo-Saxon, Old Norse, Ancient Irish, Old Irish and Old Welsh. While the Pictish Stone engravings did not match any of these, they displayed characteristics of writing based on a spoken language.

Lee explained that writing comes in two basic forms: lexigraphic writing that is based on speech and semasiography, which is not based on speech.

"Lexigraphic writing contains symbols that represent parts of speech, such as words, or sounds like syllables or letters, and tends to be written in a linear or directional manner mimicking the flow of speech," he said. "In semasiography, the symbols do not represent speech -- such as the cartoon symbols used to show you how to build a flat pack piece of furniture -- and generally do not come in a linear manner."

Although Lee and his team have not yet deciphered the Pictish language, some of the symbols provide intriguing clues. One symbol looks like a dog's head, for example, while others look like horses, trumpets, mirrors, combs, stags, weapons and crosses.

The later Pictish Stones also contain images, like Celtic knots, similar to those found in the Book of Kells and other early works from nearby regions. These more decorative looking images frame what Lee and his team believe is the written Pictish language.

"It is unclear at the moment whether the imagery, such as the knots, form any part of the communication," Lee said. He believes the stones also contain semasiographic symbols, such as a picture of riders and horn blowers next to hunting dogs on what is called the Hilton of Cadboll stone. Yet another stone shows what appears to be a battle scene.

Can You Read 15th Century Gothic?

A text mystery?  I find it absolutely amazing that this text, dated to the 15th century, cannot be deciphered.  What am I missing here?  This isn't Linear A or the Phaistos Disk, for Goddess' sake!  Ohhhhh, now I get it - it's English!

Search on to decipher Gothic text
Saturday, 6 March 2010

A Gothic inscription recently discovered hidden behind a monument at Salisbury Cathedral is now thought to date from the 15th Century. [Digitally emhanced photo of the actual inscription.]

The text was found in January when experts moved the Henry Hyde monument from the south aisle wall to clean it.

Archaeologist Tim Tatton-Brown said: "The basic questions of what exactly the words are and why it was written on the cathedral wall remain unanswered. It would be wonderful for us to solve the mystery."

He added: "I originally surmised it dated from the 16th Century, bearing in mind the monument was erected soon after 1660. Our researches now suggest it was written a century earlier and therefore pre-dates the Reformation.

"Study of this by specialist academics is leaning towards the text being written in the 15th Century, a period when English was, for the very first time, being used just occasionally in preference to Latin which was then the norm."

Dr John Crook, an independent historian, said: "There are clearly several lines of a large textual inscription. There seems to be a phrase, 'and we are c…', but so far we have not been able to work out more.

"If anyone thinks they can identify any further letters from the enhanced photographs, please contact us via Salisbury Cathedral website and I can trace them in."

The conservators' work on The Hyde Monument has now been completed, the monument has been put back on the wall and the text is once again hidden from view.

***************************************************

Experts pin hopes on public to decipher 500-year-old English inscription discovered in church
By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 11:40 AM on 02nd March 2010

What is believed to be the first ever example of English written in a British church has been discovered. Problem is, no-one can read it.

The 500-year-old inscription was found on a wall in Salisbury Cathedral, Wiltshire, hidden behind a monument dedicated to an aristocrat.

The faded black lettering was discovered in January but experts have now asked for help from the public in a bid to make sense of the inscription.

Conservators came across the writing when they were preparing to clean a 350-year-old monument to Henry Hyde, a local aristocrat who was 'martyred' in the English Civil War for his support of King Charles I.
The text on the cathedral's south aisle wall had been whitewashed over with lime, which is why it is hard to read.

Tim Tatton-Brown, the cathedral’s archaeologist, said: 'The cathedral’s conservators quite unexpectedly found some beautifully written English text behind the Henry Hyde Monument on the cathedral’s south aisle wall.

'It was discovered when the monument was temporarily removed as part of the ongoing schedule of work.
'I originally surmised that the text dated from the 16th century, bearing in mind that the monument was erected soon after 1660.

'However, our researches now suggest it was written a century earlier and therefore pre-dates the Reformation.

'Study by specialist academics is leaning towards the text being written in the 15th century.

'This was period when English was, for the very first time, being used just occasionally in preference to Latin, which was then "the norm".'

Sir Henry had been buried there in 1650 after his execution. The monument was put up in 1660 and refers to him as ending life 'kissing the axe ... to suffer the envied martyrdom of Charles I'.

Mr Tatton-Brown added: 'My guess is that it is a biblical text, put there in the Elizabethan period when the nave was fitted out with high pews for people to sit in to listen to the "new" sermons preached there.

'Inscriptions of the Bible, the Word of God, would have been written on the inside walls of the building following the Reformation, having been translated into English in Cranmer’s bible.'

Although in the 15th century the clergy stuck to Latin, English was increasingly spoken by wider society, including the ruling class. The royal court used the language from 1413 onwards.

Experts in deciphering similar messages have attempt to find the meaning of the inscription but have so far failed.  Dr John Crook, who produced a digitally-enhanced image of the text, said he had found one line which read 'and we are c...' but the rest was illegible.

He added: There seems to be a phrase but so far we have not been able to work out more. 'If anyone thinks they can identify any further letters from the enhanced photographs, please contact us via the Salisbury Cathedral website.

'The basic questions of what exactly the words are and why the text was written on the cathedral wall remain unanswered. It would be wonderful for us to solve the mystery.'

Dr Crook also believes there are likely to be other inscriptions in the cathedral, which have since been lost or painted over. He said: 'It would be too much of a coincidence that the only one happened to be behind this monument.'

The inscription has now been re-covered by the Henry Hyde monument, as scholars said it would be better protected.

An interesting sidebar:

So, what would English have been like in the 15th century?

The era saw the development – and finally dominance – of an English language that we would recognise today.

Not only were peasants using it, but the ruling class, who were still largely descended from the 1066 Norman invaders, increasingly spoke it too.

Revolutionary: Caxton's printing press
Middle English, which more closely reflected its Saxon roots than today’s language, was already used in Parliament (from the 1360s) and the royal court (from King Henry V, who acceded in 1413).

Latin, however, remained the official language of the clergy, making the use of the inscription at Salisbury Cathedral all the more fascinating.
It perhaps reflects a growing confidence in users of the tongue during a time of great upheaval as men from lower levels in society came into positions of power.

The advent of William Caxton's printing press in the 1470s also led greater standardisation, with more recognisable forms of grammar and syntax.

So, as a wider public became familiar with a standard language, the era of Modern English was truly underway.

Ancient Writing: How the Alphabet Was Born from Hieroglyphs

So writes Orly Goldwasser in the March/April, 2010 issue of Biblical Archaeology Review. The entire article, with images and photographs, as well as two interesting sidebar features, are included at BAR's website, which I love to visit regularly because I never know what treasures I might find there.

Article. Traces the development of a unique form of written communication by foreign workers and settlers in Egypt - an alphabet - based exclusively on the sounds of syllables composing a single word. It's long but worth the read for anyone interested in the development of ancient writing and, in this case, an invention that we use in modified form to this very day!

Sidebar: The Wadi el-Hôl Inscription: Earlier than Serabit?
Photograph by Bruce Zuckerman and Marilyn Lundberg, WS Research. Courtesy Department of Antiquities, Egypt.  The el Hôl inscription is faintly carved into a limestone wall. The inscription could be read “(The) besieger עוחי, ‘El’s Trickle.”







Sidebar: A Cuneiform Alphabet at Ugarit

DIFFERENT SCRIPT, SAME ALPHABET. This cuneiform clay tablet found at the ancient Syrian coastal city of Ugarit is in fact impressed with wedge-shaped alphabetic signs. Was the alphabet invented twice?

Ancient Writing: 60,000 Year Old Symbols on Ostrich Shells

See "The Writing on the Cave Wall" from yesterday.  These lines and dots look rather familiar, don't they.  Except these are even older...

Image Credit: P.-J. Texier, Diepkloof project

Stone Age engraving traditions appear on ostrich eggshells
Standardized designs identified on 60,000-year-old water containers
By Bruce Bower
March 1, 2010 Web edition : 3:04 pm

Long before human communication evolved into incessant tapping on computer keys, people scratched on eggshells.

Don’t laugh—researchers say a cache of ostrich eggshells engraved with geometric designs demonstrates the existence of a symbolic communication system around 60,000 years ago among African hunter-gatherers.

The unusually large sample of 270 engraved eggshell fragments, mostly excavated over the past several years at Diepkloof Rock Shelter in South Africa, displays two standard design patterns, according to a team led by archaeologist Pierre-Jean Texier of the University of Bordeaux 1 in Talence, France. Each pattern enjoyed its own heyday between approximately 65,000 and 55,000 years ago, the investigators report in a paper to be published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Researchers already knew that the Howiesons Poort culture, which engraved the eggshells, engaged in other symbolic practices, such as engraving designs into pieces of pigment, that were considered to have been crucial advances in human behavioral evolution. But the Diepkloof finds represent the first archaeological sample large enough to demonstrate that Stone Age people created design traditions, at least in their engravings, Texier says.

Evidence of intentionally produced holes in several Diepkloof eggshells indicates that ancient people made what amounted to canteens out of them, a practice that researchers have documented among modern hunter-gatherers in southern Africa.

The engraved patterns probably identified the eggshells as the property of certain groups or communities, Texier proposes.

“The Diepkloof engravings were clearly made for visual display and recognized as such by a large audience comprising members of a community, and probably members of related communities,” comments University of Bordeaux 1 archaeologist Francesco d’Errico, who was not involved in the new study.

D’Errico participated in the recent unearthing of 13 pieces of engraved pigment at South Africa’s Blombos Cave dating to between 100,000 and 75,000 years ago. Along with perforated sea shells and other personal ornaments previously excavated in Africa and the Middle East, these discoveries show that items holding symbolic meaning were made more than 60,000 years ago by both modern humans and Neandertals.

Even more exciting, according to archaeologist Curtis Marean of Arizona State University in Tempe, is the presence of drinking spouts in the South African eggshells. Water containers opened a new world of travel across arid regions for ancient people, he notes.

“The ability to carry and store water is a breakthrough technological advance, and here we have excellent evidence for it very early,” Marean says. “Wow!”

Eggshell fragments from the oldest sediment layers at Diepkloof display a hatched-band motif. These engravings consist of two long, parallel lines intersected by varying numbers of short lines. Some specimens contain one hatched band, while others display remnants of two or three. Engravers always fashioned parallel lines first and then inserted regularly spaced intersecting lines, Texier says.

Eggshells from younger soil layers at Diepkloof contain patterns consisting of deeply engraved, parallel lines that sometimes converge or intersect. One eggshell fragment from these layers exhibits a different pattern—slightly curved horizontal lines that cross a central, vertical line.

Of the many Howiesons Poort sites in southern Africa that have yielded ostrich eggshells, only Diepkloof shows evidence of stylistic engraving traditions, Texier says.