Phoenician "alphabet": A Historical Deception

[Hellin]

This thread might seem a bit Hellinocentric but I`d like to hear your comments.

Overwhelming evidence that one of the most important discoveries in the history of civilization is Greek

Republished from the Athenian newspaper Apogevmatini.

Kostas Katis, the manager of the Greek daily, Apogevmatini,, is one of the only high-ranking executives of the Athenian press that understands the exact magnitude of one of the greatest deceptions in history: a deception that usurps and distorts Greek History and Civilization. It is of utmost importance that the truth be restored not only for modern Greece, but also for the whole of humanity.

The deception that alphabetical script was discovered by the Phoenicians is a long-lived one. For the past 14 years [the Greek scholarly magazine] Davlos has published numerous articles on this problem. This prompted K. Katis to ask that we submit a relevant article for his mainstream daily so that this important issue would become known to a wider audience. Davlos’ publisher [Dimitris I. Lambrou] wrote the article that follows, and it was originally published in a prime position in the Sunday edition of Apogevmatini on 21 November 1999 (pages 42-43). This article summarizes the strong evidence against the "Phoenician Deception," and proves that the greatest discovery in the history of civilization is Greek. We believe it necessary to republish this article in [this issue of] Davlos exactly as it appeared in the daily.

A SCIENTIFIC MONSTROSITY

According to linguistic theory, an "alphabet" is defined as "the sum of symbols following a specific sequence and order used to ascribe the essential utterances of a language, under the condition that each utterance represents only one symbol and vice-versa". Consequently, in alphabetical script (as an example, in the writings of the people of Europe, America, Australian, as well as the other parts of the world) each letter represents one essential sound.

This is not true for the imperfect alphabets expressed through syllables where each symbol represents a syllable (with two or more voiced sounds). For example, in Greek Linear A and B, there is a symbol that represents the syllable ko (k + o), a symbol that represents the syllable po (p + o), etc. In Phoenician writing (which has only consonants and no vowels), this situation is even worse, as far as we can tell from the small amount of existing samples. In Phoenician, each symbol is not equivalent to one specific syllable, but to a variety of syllables, and thus the reader can use his imagination when attempting to decipher the sounds. For example, there are consonants which can be read as either ba, bou, be, bi, bo, etc. Others that can be read as gou, ga, ge, go, and so on. Consequently, Phoenician script does not constitute an alphabet, and is not even an advanced form of syllabic script nearing the perfection of the equivalent Greek syllabic writings.

It is truly amazing to think that, in the academic world of the past 150 years, the almost contradictory term of "Phoenician alphabet" has been established, which, in reality refers to a type of writing that has nothing to do with an alphabet. It is even more unbelievable to think that the scientific dogma that Greek came from Phoenician has been enforced. Not only is Phoenician not an alphabet, it is a less advanced form of writing than Greek Linear A and B. So, professor G. Babiniotis' statement that "Phoenician writing is something like a syllabic alphabet" must be rejected and replaced with the correct characterization of Phoenician as a "purely concise syllable system of writing," as stated by the former president of the Greek Society of Philologists, Pan. Georgountzos (see "The Alphabet: A Greek Discovery" by Pan. Georgountzos, Davlos, issue 142, October 1993, page 8242).

THE GREEKNESS OF THE ALPHABET

a) Archaeological Evidence

The theory that the alphabet is a Phoenician discovery has been maintained through the argument, among other things, that certain symbols of Phoenician writing are similar to the letters of the alphabet. For example, the Phoenician alef is the reverse or sideways Greek "A." This argument was a strong one until about 100 years ago, when linguists and historians still maintained that the Greeks did not know how to write before 800 B. C.! Around 1900 A.D., however, Arthur Evans excavated the Greek Minoan Crete and discovered the Greek Linear writings, whose symbols corresponded to 17 of the 24 letters of the Greek Alphabet.

Given that (A), the most ancient evidence of the Greek scripts (Linear A and Linear B) that were later discovered in Pylos, Mycenae, Menidi and Thebes -- but also in more northern areas up to the Danube river as well -- were dated to before 1500 B.C. And (B), that the Phoenicians and their writings appear in history no earlier than 1300 BC, Evans was the first person to express doubts about the theory that the Greeks received their script from the Phoenicians. He put forward the scientific suspicion that it was probably the other way round.

The doubts pertaining as to who was first -- the Phoenicians or the Greeks -- in discovering writing, became a certainty when French professor, Paul Fore, an internationally acclaimed specialist on Prehistoric Archaeology, published a report in Nestor (an American Archaeological Journal of the University of Indiana -- 16th year, 1989, page 2288). In this report, he submits and deciphers plates with Greek Linear writing found at the cyclopean wall of Pilikates, in Ithaca, dated, through the use of modern scientific methods, back to 2700 B.C., The language of these plates was Greek, and the decoding by professor Fore resulted in the following syllabic text, expressed phonetically: A]RE-DA-TI. DA-MI-U-A-.A-TE-NA-KA-NA-RE (ija)-TE. The phonetic equivalent of this is translated, always according to the professor, as: "Éäïý ôé åãþ ç ÁñåäÜôéò äßäù åéò ôçí áíáóóáí, ôçí èåÜí ÑÝáí: 100 áßãáò, 10 ðñüâáôá, 3 ÷ïßñïõò" [Here is what I, Aredatis, give to the queen- goddess Rea, 100 goats, 10 sheep, 3 pigs]. (See, "Davlos" magazine, issue 107, November 1990, page 6103). Thus, Fore proved that the Greeks were writing and speaking Greek at least 1400 years before the appearance of the Phoenicians and their script in history.

But, the archaeological excavations in Greece during the last 15 years have given us many more great surprises: The Greeks were writing using not only Linear A and B, but also a type of writing identical to that of the alphabet since at least 6000 B.C. In fact, at Dispilio, in the lake of Kastoria, in northern Greece, professor G. Houmouziadis discovered a plate with writing very similar to that of the alphabet, which was dated, using radioactive Carbon-14 and visual photothermal methodology, back to 5250 B.C. (see Davlos, issue 147). Three years later, N. Samson, a curator of the Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities Department, discovered shards of vases ("ostraka") with letters identical to the present Greek alphabet while excavating at the "Cyclop’s Cave," on the deserted island of Yioura, near the inhabited island of Alonnissos, in the Northern Sporades island complex. These vases were dated to 5,500 to 6,000 B.C. with the same methods (see "Davlos," issue 185, May 1997). The same archaeologist, while performing excavations on the island of Milos, discovered vessels of the proto-cycladic period (mid-3rd millennium B.C.) with letters identical to the Greek letters: "X," "N," "M," "K," "Î" [ksi],"Ð" [p], "Ï," & "Å." (See N. Samson's interview in Davlos, issue 204, December 1998, page 12749.)

It is apparent that these archaeological discoveries have given a "comical' character to the so-called "Phoenician Theory" on the discovery of writing. In addition, these archaeological discoveries have revolutionized chronological dating of Greek history as it is taught today, as well as the world history of civilization itself. (See also the book by Con. Koutrouvelli, "Re-establishing the Chronology of Prehistoric Times based primarily on astronomical information from Ancient Writers," Davlos Publishing, 1999.)

b) The somewhat mathematical proof

While the house-of-cards which provided "proof"' of the so-called "Phoenician alphabet" was being torn down by archaeological discoveries, another overwhelming piece of evidence surfaced. This evidence was offered to us by the 20-year long discreet and timid research of the Greek Language and Writing by a great researcher, Elias Tsatsomoiros. Unfortunately E. Tsatsomoiros passed away on December 19th 1991, after having, however, completed his revolutionary work, History of the Genesis of the Greek Language-from the hunter-gatherer to the time of Zeus-the Deciphering of the Greek Alphabet. The undersigned [writer of this article] had the honor of publishing and editing this work (Davlos Publishing, 1991), but also the honor of having worked closely with the researcher for more than a decade. We had long discussions on the numerous problems arising from the research, and we had published a series of articles in Davlos magazine. This memorable researcher proved in a remarkable way that every letter of the Greek alphabet contained a consistent code meaning, which is literally introduced either exactly or metaphorically within the general meaning of the Greek word it belongs to, as a partial meaning. Consequently, every (ancient) Greek word is basically an acronym (similar to D(imosia) E (picheirisi) H(lektrismou) [=ÄÅÇ in Greek, or as U(nited) N(ations), in English], where every letter provides a significant or less significant notional element, and then, they all together provide the logical definition of the meaning expressed by the word. The "significant difference" of each word's meaning is usually provided by the first letter.

Obviously, there is not enough space in this article to present the code meaning of the letters of the Greek alphabet as a whole, as they are analyzed in this revolutionary volume of research in the field of human speech. As an example, I will choose only one of the 24 letters of our alphabet, "Ypsilon" = "Y" or, small case, "u" (pronounced, long-e "eepsilon," the 20th letter of the Greek alphabet, and familiar to us as "Y" in the so-called "Latin" alphabet-- which is nothing more than a variation of the Greek "Chalcidean" alphabet). Ypsilon, therefore, as its shape indicates, has the code meaning of "a cavity" ïr, if reversed, of a "convexity." This meaning is introduced into the words containing this letter, and sometimes, by extension into the meaning of liquids (which, through their natural flow end up filling the "cavity"). I will quickly mention some of the names of vessels and liquids (such as the amphiconical ê-Õ-ðåëëï which is dated back to 2700 B.C. and is displayed at the Heraklion Museum). One may add to the words mentioned there, many others, such as kot-Y-li, go-Y-ttos, tr-Y-blion, p-Y-xis, amphore-Y-s, b-Y-tion, l-Y-chnos, procho-Y-s, ske-Y-os, etc, all having the meaning of a curved object. Also, some other words such as k-Y-hsis (rounding of the stomach of an eng-Y-os [pregnant] woman); k-Y-ma (curving on the surface of the ocean); cr-Y-pti (curving of the ground); the preposition [h-Y-po] Y-po (meaning under a certain level); h-Y-per (preposition meaning above a certain level); Y-psos =height; and all of the hundreds of words that have h-Y-po or h-Y-per as a prefix, as well as thousands of others. This discovery, which unfortunately has been officially ignored, is a continuation of the forgotten Platonic approach to the problem of language (see Plato’s Cratylus ).

This theory:

Completely rejects the theorem that the Greek language came from another language (the so-called "Indo-European"), since it is proven to be the only non-conventional language of the world. In other words, the only language where a relationship between the "word" (as a form) and the "meaning of the word" is established.
Consequently, it is proven that Greek is the first and only created language of the human species which provided the basis for all "conventional" languages, as are all the other languages of the world (where there is no causative relationship between the form and the meaning). These other languages are a corrupt form of Greek.
This theory proves, without a doubt, that the alphabet was created by the Greeks so that the 24 or 27 code letters would aid in attributing the meanings of the Greek words (and only of these).
Comparatively, this theory shows that the symbols of the Phoenician writings and their nouns, e.g., "alef" =ox, "beth" = hut, "gimel = camel, etc., not only do not contain coded meaning, but are also associated or refer to [the] primitive animal conditions [one would expect in a culturally backward society].
THE HERODOTUS EXTRACT

All the Greek writers who mention the alphabet (they called it "grammata") consider it a very ancient Greek invention (by Prometheus, Palamedes, Linus, etc). The theory of the Phoenician alphabet was always, and is still, based on an exception to this general rule. This exception is an excerpt from Herodotus, that he himself presents as his 'personal opinion' ("ùò åìïé äïêååé" = "as it seems to me"). This opinion was formed based on the sayings of others, as he himself mentions in the previous paragraphs ("áíáðõíèáíïìåíïò" = taking information from others). Let us have a look at the Herodotus’ excerpt (History, E 58):

[58. As far as the Phoenicians, they, who arrived with Cadmus, including the Gefiraioi, had lived in many other places and introduced also arts (new and unknown) to the Greeks; in fact, and also (some) writing, which had not been known to the Greeks before that, as I think, first this writing which was used by all the Phoenicians. With the passing of time, however, the Phoenicians changed this type of writing along with their language.]

The most important thing about this excerpt is that in the critical phrase "… ama tin foni metevallon kai ton rhithmon ton grammaton," it is disclosed that the Phoenicians-Gefiraioi that went to Viotia with Cadmus brought some form of writing with them. But, as the Phoenicians "changed their language" (they learned Greek, in other words), they also changed their writing (they started writing, therefore, with the existing ancient Greek writing that already existed in Viotia). Although this statement was made by Herodotus, the translators, subsequently, provided the translation [meaning] that the local Greek Viotes and not the Phoenician emigrants changed their language and writing and adopted the Phoenician!

This generally incoherent reference to the alphabet, as it has been saved, has been obviously altered and meddled with, who knows by whom and when. Let us look at the suspicious continuation of the text, as it has arrived to us:

Around them (the Phoenicians) lived at that place during that year (year of Cadmus) Ionian Greeks, who received through contact or through teachings by the Phoenicians their writings, changing their own writing which they used little. When using this writing and since this writing had been introduced to Greece by Phoenicians, they called it Phoenician, as was just.

According to E. Tsatsomoiros (Davlos, issue 118), this reference, in other words that the Ionian Greeks living around the Phoenicians received the Phoenician writing and, using a few of its letters, since they had altered them and since it was just, they called it Phoenician-to pay tribute to the people who brought it to Greece, is a striking contradiction. Consequently, one can assume that this is a forged paragraph, hypothetically explanatory, which aims to reduce the previous statement "…as they changed their language, they changed their writing," to an unimportant statement. This is how the "Phoenician Theory" was substantiated and is maintained as an obvious forgery.

IN ADDITION

The "Phoenician Theory" was established in Europe during a time, when, as the renowned British classical scholar, S. G. Rembroke (The Legacy of Greece, Oxford University Press, 1984) wrote, "The Phoenicians were given an intermediary role "that is not based on any historical information". A role, in other words, of the transporter of wisdom and civilization from the "chosen" people of Israel to the "uncivilized" nations, and specifically the Greeks. This, of course, could be forgiven, since this was established around the end of the Medieval Ages, when religious fanaticism and backwardness had reached such a point that the daughter of Agamemnon, Iphigenia, is presented as the daughter of Iephtha; Deukalion is presented as Noah; Appis is a consul of Joseph; Apollo, Priam, Tiresias, and Orpheus are corrupted personae of Moses; the story of the Argonauts is the crossing of the Israelites from Egypt to Palestine, and other similar distortions. The above are noted by Rembroke.

And we conclude: At the time, Hellenism was in comatose spiritual condition regarding national and historical awareness, and therefore totally unable to defend its history and civilization, and for this reason could not react and did not react. Today, it is with our tolerance that our language is deemed "Indo-European," and our writing "Phoenician," our Athena and our Socrates are presented as "Blacks," and our civilization as "African." What spiritual situation are we in now? [i.e.,What’s our excuse this time?]

Notes:

On page 13745 of this article, is a picture of a piece of shard [pottery] dated to 6,000 B.C., found on the islet of Youra of the North Sporades island complex with Greek alphabetical writings. One can see the letters "A," "Y," & "D" [alpha, eepsilon, and delta ], almost identical to the Greek letters of the classical alphabets. This finding proves that the Greek alphabet is older than the Greek Linear writings. This finding also completely and definitely disproves the false theory that the Greeks got their alphabet from the Phoenicians, who made their historical appearance around 1300 B.C., in other words about 4,500 to 5,000 years after the creation of this plaque at Youra.

On page 13747 are shown letter-symbols from the Proto-cycladic vessels of Milos (mid-third millennium B.C.). One can distinguish the [letter] "X" [chi] to the left and the [letter] "N" to the right. These letters are written just as the letters of the Greek alphabet are written today. Other vessels were also found with "M," "K," "Î" [ksi], "Ð" [p], "O," and "E."

http://www.grecoreport.com/phoenician.htm

[Giles]

I didn't read it all, but it seemed nonsense to me. There is no evidence that the Phoenician (and other Semitic) alphabetic symbols included or indicated multiple sounds; that they included no vowels, which are variable anyway, doesn't lend any more credence to what I take is the point. A "bet" seems to have meant "b", nothing more, and very clearly developed into a "beta", in fact that evolution can be traced in early Greek inscriptions. This article is a case of a little knowledte with an axe to grind going a long way down the wrong path.

Giles

[Martin Read]

It seems rather a give-away that the Canaanite language of the Semites of the Levant has the following meanings:

Aleph - cow - Alpha

Beth - house - Beta

Gimel - Camel - Gamma.

Moreover, the alpha is a modified ox head pictogram, but alpha does not mean cow or ox in Greek. Beta was originally a pictogram representing a flat-rooved house, but beta does not mean house in Greek. The opposite is found in Semitic languages. One would have to go against simple logic to argue that the borrowing was Greek to Punic ,rather than Punic to Greek.

[Hellin]

Martin Read

Your post does make some sence but the site I found this posting in must have in mind that from what we know today Hellinic writting is much older than the rest.

Lets take Punic, the first Punic written records go back to about 1500 BC.
The earliest known inscriptions in Phoenician come from Byblos and date back to ca. 1000 BC.
And the vocalization of Canaanite, as far as it is known to us, e.g. from glosses in the Tell-el-Amarna tablets (i5th century. B.C.)i and much later from the Punic passages in the Poenulus of Plautus.

Now if you compare the ages given to the fact that Sleeman and Evans proved that Hellinic language was in use at the Aegean at least from 2,500 B.C.(see Linear A` and B`)
And latest researches (inscriptions at Ithaca's Pilakata and Dispilio of Kastoria) raise its age to the sixth millenium (5,250 BC).

So actually it does make some sence (to me at least)

[Martin Read]

There are a few problems with a "Greek first" interpretation. Firstly Linear B, and presumably A, was a syllabary, the later Greek alphabet wasn't. Also the symbols of the Greek alphabet bear no obvious relation to the earlier Linear B forms. There is a good deal of evidence that literacy didn't long survive the fall of the Mycenaean city states (except perhaps in Cyprus) so that there appears to have been a period of illiteracy lasting some centuries. Finally, if the alphabet was a Greek development why on earth would the Greeks adopt Semitic names for most of the letters?

[Hellin]

""Finally, if the alphabet was a Greek development why on earth would the Greeks adopt Semitic names for most of the letters?""

We can`t be sure that the Greeks adopted the Semitic names.

Greek letters as we know from the inscriptions at Tell El Yahoodieh are of a much later date (Ramses III lived in the 12th century BC as commonly taught),unlike the 800 B.C theory of Greek writing.

The letter B was not used in the Etruscan alphabet, because this idiom only had no voiced plosives. Nevertheless, the Etruscans knew the letter that was derived by early Etruscans from Greek (Beta).

[Giles]

Originally posted by Hellin
Now if you compare the ages given to the fact that Sleeman and Evans proved that Hellinic language was in use at the Aegean at least from 2,500 B.C.(see Linear A` and B`)
And latest researches (inscriptions at Ithaca's Pilakata and Dispilio of Kastoria) raise its age to the sixth millenium (5,250 BC).

So actually it does make some sence (to me at least)

Well, I would question those dates, as a start. Schlieman had nothing to do with Linear A and B. Evans dated them to about 1500 BCE, not 2500 BCE. Archaeology at those sites that you mention have not found GREEK inscriptions that early...they have found evidence of human habitation c. 5000-3500 BCE of neo-lithic peoples who lived there before the invasion of Greek tribes c. 3500-3000 BCE. So they aren't evidence of early Greek that predates Semitic language.

As for the Phoenicians, they adopted a proto-Canaanite alphabet sometime 18-1700 BCE and then as their colonies spread, they spread the alphabet too.

There also seems to be a bit of confusion between "spoken"" language and "written" language here. That is, no one denies that Evans found a form of early Greek, but he didn't find it written in an alphabet, hence the furor over decipherment. If it were written in the alphabet we all know and love, there would be no furor and no decipherment.

Giles

[Giles]

Originally posted by Hellin
""Finally, if the alphabet was a Greek development why on earth would the Greeks adopt Semitic names for most of the letters?""

We can`t be sure that the Greeks adopted the Semitic names.

Greek letters as we know from the inscriptions at Tell El Yahoodieh are of a much later date (Ramses III lived in the 12th century BC as commonly taught),unlike the 800 B.C theory of Greek writing.

The letter B was not used in the Etruscan alphabet, because this idiom only had no voiced plosives. Nevertheless, the Etruscans knew the letter that was derived by early Etruscans from Greek (Beta).

I fail to see how these are connected.
For one thing, if the Greeks adopted their alphabet from the Phoenicians who in turn were subject to Egypt at various points in their history AND the Proto-Canaanite alphabet was developed from Egyptian hieroglyphic signs, then the presence of early letter forms should be expected, and lo and behold that is what we find. This isn't evidence of Greek alphabet in the Nile delta in 1200s BCE, its evidence of the development of the alphabet long before the Greeks ever got a hold of it.

BTW, by the time we encounter the Etruscans there have already been Greek city states in southern Italy where they transported the alphabet and the Latins later adopted it. So the Etruscans' knowledge of "B" doesn't support your argument either, it just shows they borrowed it from Greek city states further south in Italy in the 8th century BCE.

Giles

[Hellin]

Giles

Why sould I even accept what you post when you haven`t heard of
Hittite records from Bogazkoy. Study of the writings of Heinrich Schlieman, Sir Arthur Evans, and Professor Carl Blegen.

Please do some homework and then post another answer....

[Giles]

Originally posted by Hellin
Giles

Why sould I even accept what you post when you haven`t heard of
Hittite records from Bogazkoy. Study of the writings of Heinrich Schlieman, Sir Arthur Evans, and Professor Carl Blegen.

Please do some homework and then post another answer....

Because its true? Why should we believe anything you say when a) you take huge leaps in logic, for example where did you ever get the idea that I don't know anything about Hittite? Especially since neither of our posts to this point have really spoken of it? Seems to me to be a rather large leap in logic to go from nothing to a firm conclusion, but that's probably just me. B) if one wants to be snotty, why should we believe anything you say when you are unable to spell Schlieman's name correctly? See the fourth post in this thread. This hardly inspires one to think that you've delved into the matter at hand with the kind of depth you seem to want to suggest. c) when you make categorical statements that are without any support of evidence or reasoned argument (Quote: We can`t be sure that the Greeks adopted the Semitic names) and then follow it up with 2 non-sequiturs? Is there a reason to believe anything you say?

On the other hand, if you offered any sort of substantive rebuttal to what either Martin or myself have said, it might make an interesting conversation. So I'll wait and see what you come up with.

BTW, if you've read the people you say you've read, you should be able to get your dates right. And btw, it is by reading Schlieman, Evans, and Blegen as well as Chadwick, Chadwick and Ventris, Baumbach, Olivier, Bennett, Palmer, Taylour, Melena, Knudtzon, Horzny to name a few and not one of them makes the claim that Greek is the original language or that the ancient Greeks developed the alphabet all by their lonesome without influence from the East.

While I disagree with the tone, I do mostly agree with the concluding paragraph of the article you cite. Greek culture isn't African, Socrates wasn't Black etc. But Greek as a language is Indo-European and the alphabet was adopted from points further East. That doesn't make Greek "writing" Phoenician anymore than modern English is Phoenician since we use essentially the same alphabet. That's simply silly. But hey, I know nothing about Hittites, I'm told, so why bother pointing out the obvious?

Giles

[Hellin]

First I`ll apologize for being "snotty" as you called it. Nothing intentional it just seems to come out naturally.

Evans didn`t give the age of the language (which he did believe to be at least used from 2500) but the plates he found.The plates found at Pilikates, in Ithaca, dated, through the use of modern scientific methods raise the use of writing to 2700 B.C.,and the plate in Dispilio of Kastoria are dated to be at least from 5200 B.C
You say you fail to see how these are connected.It really is simple the inscriptions at Tell El Yahoodieh show Greek writen not in linears A`or B` but in the "adopted" form of alphabet you speak of in 1200 B.C,and the Etruscans knoledge of the letter "beta" shows that the Greek alphabet was in use and letters had those names even before the first millenium.

How is it possible to have mastered architecture, medicine, mathematics, literature, theater and astrology among others with no use of writing ? And then after "borowing" the alphabet from the Phoenicians create a language of 800.000 words and over 20.000 names that have influenced every language and its words still are used today.

[Giles]

Originally posted by Hellin
First I`ll apologize for being "snotty" as you called it. Nothing intentional it just seems to come out naturally.

Evans didn`t give the age of the language (which he did believe to be at least used from 2500) but the plates he found.The plates found at Pilikates, in Ithaca, dated, through the use of modern scientific methods raise the use of writing to 2700 B.C.,and the plate in Dispilio of Kastoria are dated to be at least from 5200 B.C
You say you fail to see how these are connected.It really is simple the inscriptions at Tell El Yahoodieh show Greek writen not in linears A`or B` but in the "adopted" form of alphabet you speak of in 1200 B.C,and the Etruscans knoledge of the letter "beta" shows that the Greek alphabet was in use and letters had those names even before the first millenium.

YEs and No. Evans gave the age of the first level of the palace of Knossos at 1700 or so, positing that a previous palace had been destroyed by fire and that something had stood there since about 2500. It is a huge leap to jump from there to saying that the Linear B tablets according to Evans were from 2500 BCE. BTW, recent work on the Linear B tablets has firmed teh date more to almost exclusively place ALL of the Linear B tablets into the 13th century BCE, a short lived phenomenon.
The other examples you mention are fine, except none of those examples is of the Greek alphabet, but of other kinds of writing such as Linear B or other similar syllabery. That isn't the same thing. And the Dispillo bit is highly questionable indeed...assuming that it does represent writing, your authors also therefore it assumes an alphabet, and that it is the same alphabet as the Greek one is. But from the photos I've seen, I can't see letters there, as a friend of mind said, it looks like worm damage.

As for Tell El Yahoodieh, I haven't seen an alphabet or words based on an alphabet there. I've seen coins and tiles with symbols on them, but there is no indication that I know of that gives one any evidence to conclude that they represent alphabetic sounds or an alphabetic system. This assumes of course that they are what your author and Davlos presents them as...from the photos I've seen, I've not been convinced of any of the supposed "Greek" identifications of the marks.

Regarding the Etruscans, how do you figure this? The dates usually given for Etruscan is 800-250 BCE, and that they utilized the Greek alphabet, and about 800 is when Greek colonies appear in Sicily and shortly after in southern Italy. We might be able to push the Etruscans back to 1000, though there is no evidence from as early as 1000 that they were wrriting. So I do wonder at your rewriting history here.
,

How is it possible to have mastered architecture, medicine, mathematics, literature, theater and astrology among others with no use of writing ? And then after "borowing" the alphabet from the Phoenicians create a language of 800.000 words and over 20.000 names that have influenced every language and its words still are used today.

Well, it seems to me that the greatest achievements of ancient Greek civilization in the fields you mention here happened after 800, not before. The other great time of the flourishing of a Greek civilzation also had a system of writing (though not an alphabet) known as Linear B. QED. Second, languages exist seperately of their writing systems. Writing systems merely represent the language on a more permanent surface, so after the Greeks adopted and adapted the Phoenician alphabet they didn't "create a language", the alphabet was used to set down on papyrus and other surfaces an already existing language. And it is this fundamental misunderstanding that is at the heart of the article you cite.

After our last exchange I took the trouble to respond to your cited article. Because of length I've chopped it up into small segments. I expect not to convert a true believer in the autochtonic Greek language that is the basis for all others, but I hope you're not a true believer yet. If so, lets stop wasting both of our time.

All the best

Giles

[Giles]

I thought it might be interesting in light of recent posts to respond in detail to this article. So here goes:

>>
A SCIENTIFIC MONSTROSITY

According to linguistic theory, an "alphabet" is defined as "the sum of symbols following a specific sequence and order used to ascribe the essential utterances of a language, under the condition that each utterance represents only one symbol and vice-versa". Consequently, in alphabetical script (as an example, in the writings of the people of Europe, America, Australian, as well as the other parts of the world) each letter represents one essential sound.<<

a) which linguistic theory? not that I disagree with the definition as given, but there are a number of linguists who would. So which linguistic theory are we operatng under?

>>This is not true for the imperfect alphabets expressed through syllables where each symbol represents a syllable (with two or more voiced sounds).<<

Which is why these aren't alphabets, but syllaberies.

>> For example, in Greek Linear A and B, there is a symbol that represents the syllable ko (k + o), a symbol that represents the syllable po (p + o), etc. In Phoenician writing (which has only consonants and no vowels), this situation is even worse, as far as we can tell from the small amount of existing samples. In Phoenician, each symbol is not equivalent to one specific syllable, but to a variety of syllables, and thus the reader can use his imagination when attempting to decipher the sounds. For example, there are consonants which can be read as either ba, bou, be, bi, bo, etc. Others that can be read as gou, ga, ge, go, and so on. Consequently, Phoenician script does not constitute an alphabet, and is not even an advanced form of syllabic script nearing the perfection of the equivalent Greek syllabic writings. <<

This is a gross misunderstanding of Phoenician and other Semitic alphabets. Each symbol stands for a consonantal sound. Vowels are deduced from context, but are not signified in the consonantal symbol. Thus, it is an alphabet, not a syllabery, and isn't as slippery as the writer makes it sound. But already when such fallacies and falsehoods are introduced into the discussion, how can one truly expect the remainder to be better?

>>It is truly amazing to think that, in the academic world of the past 150 years, the almost contradictory term of "Phoenician alphabet" has been established, which, in reality refers to a type of writing that has nothing to do with an alphabet. It is even more unbelievable to think that the scientific dogma that Greek came from Phoenician has been enforced<<

The first sentence is already a gross misunderstanding and was addressed above, the second sentence is misleading in that no one claims that Greek as a language came from Phoenician, only that the forms of the symbols that graphically represent sounds were adopted by the Greek from teh Phoenicians or other North Semitic people using a similar alphabet.

. >>Not only is Phoenician not an alphabet, it is a less advanced form of writing than Greek Linear A and B. So, professor G. Babiniotis' statement that "Phoenician writing is something like a syllabic alphabet" must be rejected and replaced with the correct characterization of Phoenician as a "purely concise syllable system of writing," as stated by the former president of the Greek Society of Philologists, Pan. Georgountzos (see "The Alphabet: A Greek Discovery" by Pan. Georgountzos, Davlos, issue 142, October 1993, page 8242). <<

First, how does one determine that an undeciphered text is more or less advanced than another known text? Seems to me to be putting the cart before the horse. As for Linear B, so what? I?m not sure I agree, but let?s say this is correct. Does it prove that the Greeks didn?t adopt the alphabet from the Phoenicians? No, it actually could in fact show the opposite, the Greeks adopted it and improved on it. While the good professor?s comment is interesting regarding a ?concise syllable system?, deciphered Phoenician isn?t based on syllables, but on sounds, very like Hebrew.

[Giles]

>>THE GREEKNESS OF THE ALPHABET

a) Archaeological Evidence

The theory that the alphabet is a Phoenician discovery has been maintained through the argument, among other things, that certain symbols of Phoenician writing are similar to the letters of the alphabet. For example, the Phoenician alef is the reverse or sideways Greek "A." This argument was a strong one until about 100 years ago, when linguists and historians still maintained that the Greeks did not know how to write before 800 B. C.! Around 1900 A.D., however, Arthur Evans excavated the Greek Minoan Crete and discovered the Greek Linear writings, whose symbols corresponded to 17 of the 24 letters of the Greek Alphabet.<<

Well here?s a principle problem. The issue is not whether or even when the Greeks learned to write or not, its explaining the gap between 1200 and 800 or so when there is no evidence for writing of any kind and when it does reappear is strikingly different than Linear B. Just as one short step here, if Linear B was so close to the alphabet now, why did it take fifty years, almost sixty, for anyone to figure that out? Why did it need deciphering if it in fact were the alphabet of Greek? Further, the similarities between the letters of the Phoenicians are well established, it isn?t simply a ?few?, it is the majority. Further, Linear B is a syllabery, not an alphabet, and those signs that seem to correspond to later Greek letters represent different sounds than they do later, although in many cases the correspondence between a Linear B symbol and a Greek alphabet one are questionable at best while on the other hand the correspondence of Linear B symbols to Linear A symbols is large and unquestioned.

>>Given that (A), the most ancient evidence of the Greek scripts (Linear A and Linear B) that were later discovered in Pylos, Mycenae, Menidi and Thebes -- but also in more northern areas up to the Danube river as well -- were dated to before 1500 B.C. And (B), that the Phoenicians and their writings appear in history no earlier than 1300 BC, Evans was the first person to express doubts about the theory that the Greeks received their script from the Phoenicians. He put forward the scientific suspicion that it was probably the other way round.<<

Well, first Linear A has not been deciphered yet, so it is unknown whether or not it is a ?Greek? script. If we believe Evans whom the article?s author does seem to like to cite, Linear A AND Linear B are BOTH Minoan, Evans to the end of his days rejected the notion that Linear B represented Greek, one of the reasons it took so long to decipher it.
So we?re down to Linear B and my second point. Here, we must note that more recent dating of Linear B materials has placed them all pretty exclusively to the 13th century BCE only, making the height of Mycenaen influence very short lived by comparison to the Minoan. But even more so, Linear B is NOT the Greek alphabet. Linear B, again, is a syllabery containing over 60 symbols plus other graphs that signify specific nouns and verbs and diphthongs. So the fact that Linear B, which represents the Greek language, precedes the Phoenicians has absolutely NO bearing on the later adoption and adaptation of the Semitic alphabet to the Greek language.circa 800-700 BCE. These are completely unrelated.

>>The doubts pertaining as to who was first -- the Phoenicians or the Greeks -- in discovering writing,<<

Worth stating again: the issue and question is not who first discovered writing. That honor goes to other peoples in other parts of the world anyway. The issue is when and how did the Greeks first begin to use an alphabet to write their language, and that seems to be about 800 BCE and seems to have been based on the alphabet used by Northwest Semitic peoples like the Phoenicians, who were moving into Ionia, Cyprus, Crete, Sicily, No. Africa, and so coming into contact with Greek city states at the time that the Greeks started using an alphabet that is so clearly similar to one the Phoenicians already were using. Thus, the article is fighting the wrong battle altogether.

>> became a certainty when French professor, Paul Fore, an internationally acclaimed specialist on Prehistoric Archaeology, published a report in Nestor (an American Archaeological Journal of the University of Indiana -- 16th year, 1989, page 2288). In this report, he submits and deciphers plates with Greek Linear writing found at the cyclopean wall of Pilikates, in Ithaca, dated, through the use of modern scientific methods, back to 2700 B.C., The language of these plates was Greek, <snippage> Thus, Fore proved that the Greeks were writing and speaking Greek at least 1400 years before the appearance of the Phoenicians and their script in history.<<

A) No one disagrees that the Greeks were around speaking Greek in this period. B) Fore showed that they were using a writing system at this period, but once again as above, the system was NOT an alphabet, Fore does not make that claim. So once again, this has nothing to do with whether or not the Greeks adopted the Phoenician alphabet, has no bearing on that question whatsoever.

>>But, the archaeological excavations in Greece during the last 15 years have given us many more great surprises: The Greeks were writing using not only Linear A and B, but also a type of writing identical to that of the alphabet since at least 6000 B.C. In fact, at Dispilio, in the lake of Kastoria, in northern Greece, professor G. Houmouziadis discovered a plate with writing very similar to that of the alphabet, which was dated, using radioactive Carbon-14 and visual photothermal methodology, back to 5250 B.C. (see Davlos, issue 147). Three years later, N. Samson, a curator of the Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities Department, discovered shards of vases ("ostraka") with letters identical to the present Greek alphabet while excavating at the "Cyclop?s Cave," on the deserted island of Yioura, near the inhabited island of Alonnissos, in the Northern Sporades island complex. These vases were dated to 5,500 to 6,000 B.C. with the same methods (see "Davlos," issue 185, May 1997). The same archaeologist, while performing excavations on the island of Milos, discovered vessels of the proto-cycladic period (mid-3rd millennium B.C.) with letters identical to the Greek letters: "X," "N," "M," "K," "Î" [ksi],"Ð" [p], "Ï," & "Å." (See N. Samson's interview in Davlos, issue 204, December 1998, page 12749.)<<

This is quite a claim. And one would expect that if true, that not only were the Greeks using the present alphabet to write, but were doing so some 2500 years before the Chinese, Sumerians, and Egyptians, the world press and world professional community would be vitally interested! This would be a far more important discovery than Evans? or Schlieman?s. But what I find when I do a bibliographic search is absolute silence both in the world press and in databases of professional journals. I even talked to a friend at Oxford and a US friend, one a Homeric specialist, the other an archaeologist and art historian of the pre-historic Greek period, and neither has heard of these discoveries. It seems the only source is ?Davlos? and that makes me very suspicious of the credibility of these claims. Have independent scholars examined these finds and verified that indeed what is written is written in an alphabet? That they indeed are as old as this article says? If so, where? Considering the mistakes already pointed out in the article, I have my doubts that the article is citing things correctly anyway.

[Giles]

Having said all that, the article writer is making an assumption here, and seems to want to include the worthies he mentions in this assumption. That assumption is that finding ?shapes? that are similar to or even identical with the shapes of the letters of the later alphabet means that the two are identical. This is a false assumption, it needs to be shown that these shapes are an alphabet and signify particular sounds, not syllables, nouns, or just look pretty. I have a nephew who at age 3 was making shapes and playing with blocks with letters on them, but he certainly didn?t know how to read in spite of his imitation of those shapes. Another example is the swatstika. That shape is known from tiles in a temple on Malta from 2500 BCE, but I don?t know of anyone who would argue that this means that the Nazis were present on bronze age Malta, the shape is certainly there, the meaning is not. And that?s the question, does the presence of these symbols, or something that looks like them, indicate that this is an alphabet? Judging from the cagey way the article?s author cites the authors in Davlos I would say that the authorities the author is citing do NOT make that equation, otherwise the author would just quote the authorities saying that they believe there is an alphabet at work in these letters and have done. Since he doesn?t so easily prove his point, I think it safe to assume that the authorities he cites do not make the assumption that the author is making. Again, let me differentiate between an alphabet and writing?and also point out that some symbols are universal and easy to make, the presence of something like an X or M for instance is not an indication of an alphabet. You, Hellin, probably have access to Davlos, have you looked up these articles with their plates?
I ask because there is a some doubt about the good professor?s find in 1994. First, before anyone else saw it, it disintegrated. Second, the photos that were taken are of poor quality. One expert of my acquaintance noted that from what he could tell of the so-called Displis scripture looked more like worm damage than the reconstructed symbols of Hormouziadis. In short, it is far from agreed that the Dispolis find constitutes writing at all much less that it is writing with an alphabet.

>>It is apparent that these archaeological discoveries have given a "comical' character to the so-called "Phoenician Theory" on the discovery of writing. <<

As seen, this is a non-sequitur. It does not follow that the presence of symbols similar to those later used in the Greek alphabet indicate that it is the Greek alphabet, nor does it indicate those peoples who were the Greeks were in the peninsula as early as 5200 BCE, in fact this early Balkan culture at Dispilio is not considered to be a Greek culture at all by the archaeologists, thus, the similarities there do not support the conclusion that the author here is drawing, if those similarities even exist.

>>In addition, these archaeological discoveries have revolutionized chronological dating of Greek history as it is taught today, as well as the world history of civilization itself. (See also the book by Con. Koutrouvelli, "Re-establishing the Chronology of Prehistoric Times based primarily on astronomical information from Ancient Writers," Davlos Publishing, 1999.)<<

I?m beginning to sense a theme?.seems the source of all truth is Davlos Publishing and its flagship magazine. If some of this ?information? were found in several refereed scholarly journals, then its time to sit up and take note. The fact that they are all in publications by a single publishing company with the stated purpose of promoting Greek language and culture makes this ?revolution? in chronological dating suspicious and probably not worth its salt.


[B}>>b) The somewhat mathematical proof

<snippage>[/b]

Ah yes, the ?ancient and all knowing code? theory reaches Greece, similar to the secret knowledge codes of Runes, Druids, ancient pre-historic religions, and of course, lest I forget, the apex of human civilization, Atlantis from which we have all devolved but the secrets of which are preserved in the magic marks on stone, wood, wax, and paper?grammata! This is pseudo-mystic mumbo jumbo, not scientific, and I note once again, published by Davlos, and no other

>>This theory Completely rejects the theorem that the Greek language came from another language (the so-called "Indo-European"), since it is proven to be the only non-conventional language of the world. In other words, the only language where a relationship between the "word" (as a form) and the "meaning of the word" is established. <<

Since by the author?s own admission above, they only worked on Greek, and not other languages, this claim is mere hyperbole (Greek words!!), and of course will be denied by those believers who say that Gaelic or Hebrew or Chinese or Mayan represent the highest achievement of human development, and of course these believers can prove that their particular take on the question is more valid that this one. In short, we?ve crossed a line between scientific and historical investigation and mysticism. I?d like to share a personal anecdote. When I worked at a public library while earning my first degree, one of the patrons engaged me in conversation and he said he was studying Hebrew, which I had also studied. Well, after several reference questions over the next few weeks he let me in one of his discoveries. In printed text of Biblical Hebrew, there is a dot applied to certain consonants when they are doubled, such as the letter beth, B. So a word with a double ?B? will have in the middle of the letter beth a dot. According to my qualified researcher, this made the letter look like it had breasts, and that indicated the female principle, and since it was Eve who caused the fall, anything with the female principle was evil. Therefore every word in the Hebrew bible with a doubled beth had female and so therefore negative connotations. He had a paper published in his small Christian denominations ?professional? theology rag. But that doesn?t make it true, its bunk (What he did with the first word of the Hebrew Bible, bere****h, in the beginning I didn?t stay around to find out). I?d suggest that this article, particularly this portion on the supposed mystic meaning of upsilon (eepsilon?) ranks up there with wishful thinking.

>>Consequently, it is proven that Greek is the first and only created language of the human species which provided the basis for all "conventional" languages, as are all the other languages of the world (where there is no causative relationship between the form and the meaning).<<

Whoa! How is that proven even if we accept his claims in the snipped bit of the article? If we accept his method and its applications and therefore his conclusions the only thing he has proven is that there is deeper meaning to each Greek letter graph than merely signifying a sound. It certainly doesn?t prove that this means that it is first or the root of all other languages. In fact, if anything it proves on an evolutionary model that Greek is the LAST language to be developed. I wonder how we can get a "concave" or convex kind of meaning into a word like hupnos (sleep), the "u" being the upsilon, or even in the name of the graph, the u psilon--the naked or bare convex? Huh...

>>Comparatively, this theory shows that the symbols of the Phoenician writings and their nouns, e.g., "alef" =ox, "beth" = hut, "gimel = camel, etc., not only do not contain coded meaning, but are also associated or refer to [the] primitive animal conditions [one would expect in a culturally backward society]. <<

Yep, and so? Well, I wouldn?t say culturally backward society, I would say an iron age or previous level of society, which by the way the Greeks were in their bronze age at the time. Unless of course you are trying to claim that the Greeks in spite of all the archaeological evidence really were industrialized and not bronze age at all.

[Giles]

THE HERODOTUS EXTRACT

All the Greek writers who mention the alphabet (they called it "grammata") consider it a very ancient Greek invention (by Prometheus, Palamedes, Linus, etc). The theory of the Phoenician alphabet was always, and is still, based on an exception to this general rule. This exception is an excerpt from Herodotus, that he himself presents as his 'personal opinion' ("ùò åìïé äïêååé" = "as it seems to me"). This opinion was formed based on the sayings of others, as he himself mentions in the previous paragraphs ("áíáðõíèáíïìåíïò" = taking information from others). Let us have a look at the Herodotus? excerpt (History, E 58):

No it isn?t. That Herodotus tells this story helps confirm the theory, if Herodotus is historical, but it certainly isn?t the basis of the theory. The theory is based in large part on the similarities of the names of the letters and their shapes in early inscriptions as compared with Phoenician shapes of the same period. Since it is observable that the movement is from less advanced to more advanced rather than from highly advanced to less advanced, it naturally leads one to conclude that the Greeks who left no evidence of having written in an alphabet before began to do so AFTER coming into contact with the Phoenicians. That?s the short form anyway.

>>[58. As far as the Phoenicians, they, who arrived with Cadmus, including the Gefiraioi, had lived in many other places and introduced also arts (new and unknown) to the Greeks; in fact, and also (some) writing, which had not been known to the Greeks before that, as I think, first this writing which was used by all the Phoenicians. With the passing of time, however, the Phoenicians changed this type of writing along with their language.]

The most important thing about this excerpt is that in the critical phrase "? ama tin foni metevallon kai ton rhithmon ton grammaton," it is disclosed that the Phoenicians-Gefiraioi that went to Viotia with Cadmus brought some form of writing with them. But, as the Phoenicians "changed their language" (they learned Greek, in other words), they also changed their writing (they started writing, therefore, with the existing ancient Greek writing that already existed in Viotia). Although this statement was made by Herodotus, the translators, subsequently, provided the translation [meaning] that the local Greek Viotes and not the Phoenician emigrants changed their language and writing and adopted the Phoenician!<

WOW, how not to read what the text says. Where our chap?s translation above has ?With the passing of time however the Phoenicians changed this type of writing along with their language? actually reads in the text ?At the same time the sound and form of the letters were changed? For those online only, www.perseus,.tufts.edu has both the Greek text of this chapter and an English translation, and there are other translation at various places on the Net to compare our friend?s translation to and mine. Further, the Perseus site has a lookup tool so you can look up every single word. Anyway, Herodotus very plainly says 1) Cadmus and company brought ?grammata?, letters with them and introduced the Greeks to the, 2) says nothing about Cadmus and co. useingthe same system of letters that the other Phoenicians used 3) and says nothing about them changing either their language or their alphabet. Herodotus very clearly does NOT say that Cadmus and company adopted an already existing Greek alphabet: in fact in the next lines immediately after what our author quotes H says: At that period most of the Greeks in the neighborhood were Ionians; THEY WERE TAUGHT THESE LETTERS BY THE PHOENICIANS AND ADOPTED THEM, WITH A FEW ALTERATIONS, FOR THEIR OWN USE?.very clearly H sees the Phoenicians as teaching the Greeks how to write with an alphabet. Our author is guilty of circular reasoning, that is if the Phoenicians changed their language and changed their writing accordingly that means that they there was a pre-existing Greek writing system. Of course, one can only argue this by ignoring the rest of what Herodotus says. (BTW, those interested will find H?s comments in Book 5.58)

>>This generally incoherent reference to the alphabet, as it has been saved, has been obviously altered and meddled with, who knows by whom and when. Let us look at the suspicious continuation of the text, as it has arrived to us:

Around them (the Phoenicians) lived at that place during that year (year of Cadmus) Ionian Greeks, who received through contact or through teachings by the Phoenicians their writings, changing their own writing which they used little. When using this writing and since this writing had been introduced to Greece by Phoenicians, they called it Phoenician, as was just.<<

Why is it incoherent? It is pretty straightforward; the Greek is here transliterated and translated:
perioikeon de spheas ta polla tôn khôrôn touton ton khronon Hellênôn Iônes, hoi paralabontes didakhêi para tôn Phoinikôn ta grammata, metarruthmisantes spheôn oliga ekhreônto, khreômenoi de ephatisan, hôsper kai to dikaion ephere, esagagontôn Phoinikôn es tên Hellada, Phoinikêia* keklêsthai*.

Most (of) those Greeks living around them (the Phoenicians) in the region at the time were Ionian, who taking to themselves the letters taught by the Phoenicians they changed them in form a small degree. Doing thus they called, as it carries justice the Phoenicians introducing them into Greece, them Phoenicea?.

In this translation I?ve tried to be somewhat literal. I take great exception to the translation offered by our author quoted above, either his ancient Greek is wanting or his English or something because he has misunderstood some key elements in the passage. For instance the he says that the Phoenicians ?changing their own writing which they used little? is an impossible reading of the Greek. Ta grammata are letters, not writings, metaruthmisantes is a participle from the verb meaning to change the shape or form of something, spheon refers back to grammata, ?them?, and oliga likewaise refers back to grammata and expresses how their shape or form was changed: a little, not a lot. Thus, rather than the Phoenicians changing their writing, it describes the Greeks adapting the Phoenician system ?changing their form a little? to represent Greek rather than Phoenician, not unlike how Linear B derived from Linear A. What is suspicious here is not the text as it has come down to us, my critical edition has no significant variant readings or lacunae listed here, rather the author?s reading of Herodotus is suspicious, particularly since he makes it say something it doesn?t, and then attacks the text based on that misunderstanding, classic straw man fallacy not to mention just messing up the meaning of Herodotus? prose.

>> This is how the "Phoenician Theory" was substantiated and is maintained as an obvious forgery.<<

The only forgery is the criminal way in which Herodotus is being made to say what he clearly doesn?t say.

[Giles]

>>The "Phoenician Theory" was established in Europe during a time, when, as the renowned British classical scholar, S. G. Rembroke (The Legacy of Greece, Oxford University Press, 1984) wrote, "The Phoenicians were given an intermediary role "that is not based on any historical information"<<

Not at all. Look, the ?theory? works this way: After approximately 1200 BCE there is practically no evidence of writing, of large inhabited cities, of significant buildings such as palaces, or even stunning pottery and art. Between 1200 and about 800 there is very little of anything. About 800 though we begin to see growth, we hear of writing, we begin to see some Greek outreach and colonization, we see the Cycladic style of pottery and so on. There are no inscriptions here. We know that the Phoenicians at this point were also reaching further out into the Mediterranean and establishing colonies and were great traders, in fact there are a number of Phoenician words in HOMERIC Greek, so at a very early strata in the alphabetic period that have to do with colors and trade goods, it stands to reason that since the early Greek inscriptions from 800-600 show letter forms similar to the Phoenician letter form, the Phoenician words borrowed into Greek, that the Greeks adopted and then adapted the Northwest Semitic alphabet as represented by the Phoenicians. I?m not sure why that?s such a bad thing, but it isn?t to try and prove some sort of transmission from the Hebrews to the Greeks, esp. since we?re talking about the Jews at about the time of Amos, still going quite strong.

>>. A role, in other words, of the transporter of wisdom and civilization from the "chosen" people of Israel to the "uncivilized" nations, and specifically the Greeks. This, of course, could be forgiven, since this was established around the end of the Medieval Ages, when religious fanaticism and backwardness had reached such a point that the daughter of Agamemnon, Iphigenia, is presented as the daughter of Iephtha; Deukalion is presented as Noah; Appis is a consul of Joseph; Apollo, Priam, Tiresias, and Orpheus are corrupted personae of Moses; the story of the Argonauts is the crossing of the Israelites from Egypt to Palestine, and other similar distortions. The above are noted by Rembroke.<<

Well, first this is a non sequitur, the fact that Jews and then Christians sought to include Greek figures into their own biblical schema starts happening from the time of Alexander the Great, and sure it continues up to the Enlightenment, but so what? And our nineteenth and twentieth century forbears also had a particular view of history starting in Sumeria and slowly moving westward to culminate first in Britain in 19th century and then USA in middle 20th. That view has now been rejected, but just as Newton?s test of gravity still rings true in spite of the rejection of Newtonian physics, so too does the Phoenician Theory and the linguistic bases of Indo-European remain true in spite of the rejection of the cultural triumphalism and view of history of 19th century scholarship.

[/b]>>And we conclude: At the time, Hellenism was in comatose spiritual condition regarding national and historical awareness, and therefore totally unable to defend its history and civilization, and for this reason could not react and did not react. Today, it is with our tolerance that our language is deemed "Indo-European," and our writing "Phoenician," our Athena and our Socrates are presented as "Blacks," and our civilization as "African." What spiritual situation are we in now? [i.e.,What?s our excuse this time?]<<[/b]

More fallacies. The language is Indo-European, its syntax, morphology, sound changes, and word base make it so. No one says Greek ?writing? is Phoenician, it is only the alphabet that was ADOPTED and ADAPTED from the Phoenician; by way of analogy Chaucer?s Canterbury Tales isn?t Arabic because it imitates 1001 Arabian Nights. And the rest, while some have made those arguments, are by no means accepted by the scholarly community at large, so to include well-founded theories (no matter how badly misrepresented) with unaccepted theories is merely a rhetorical trick, not illuminating scholarship.

>>Notes:

On page 13745 of this article, is a picture of a piece of shard [pottery] dated to 6,000 B.C., found on the islet of Youra of the North Sporades island complex with Greek alphabetical writings. One can see the letters "A," "Y," & "D" [alpha, eepsilon, and delta ], almost identical to the Greek letters of the classical alphabets. This finding proves that the Greek alphabet is older than the Greek Linear writings. This finding also completely and definitely disproves the false theory that the Greeks got their alphabet from the Phoenicians, who made their historical appearance around 1300 B.C., in other words about 4,500 to 5,000 years after the creation of this plaque at Youra.<<

Once again, it is assumed that the presence of these similar signs indicates that those signs have their alphabetic values. Once this is recognized as an unproven assumption, the rest of the ?argument? becomes fallacious.

>>On page 13747 are shown letter-symbols from the Proto-cycladic vessels of Milos (mid-third millennium B.C.). One can distinguish the [letter] "X" [chi] to the left and the [letter] "N" to the right. These letters are written just as the letters of the Greek alphabet are written today. Other vessels were also found with "M," "K," "Î" [ksi], "Ð" [p], "O," and "E."<<

Two lines that cross each other (i. e. X) is one of the most obvious in human history. This doesn?t mean that the presence of an X had a sound value of a chi anymore than an X in English does (having the sound value of ks). Similarly the other letters, and pictures aren?t all that clear to begin with. Wishful, hopeful thinking.

I realize in writing this that I will not change the mind of a true believer, but perhaps those who know no better will at least think twice before accepting anything in this article as true.


Sorry for the length folks.

[Hellin]

Something I forgot to post is, this article is the sequel to another one called "Indo-Europeans the invisible race"
This might just help you understand where the writer is coming from.
Anyway, you took every word literally, without even trying to understand the greater idea and you probably didn’t.

Why care which linguistic theory, when you do agree with the definition as given?


>>This is a gross misunderstanding of Phoenician and other Semitic alphabets. Each symbol stands for a consonantal sound.
Vowels are deduced from context, but are not signified in the consonantal symbol.<<

I really do fail to see the difference in what you both write,
"Its origins lie further back in the Hieroglyphic and
cuneiform practice of polyphony - representing several syllables beginning with a
common consonant by one sign" (Driver, 1954:139).
"A further problem is that phonological reading is only effective with language not dominated by homophones
(words sounding alike such as burry and berry).For example 69 Chinese words are pronounced /i/, the average word shares
the same pronunciation (including tone) with ten others" (Diringer, 1968:64).
In Greek, vowel letters represent only vowels; in consonantal alphabets letters representing vowels may be also representing consonants something which might not be immediately unambiguous. (John R Skoyles)

>>the gap between 1200 and 800<<

I already posted about the inscriptions at Tell El Yahoodieh its funny that even though
E. Naville, `The Mound of the Jew and the City of Onias', Plate IV
Brugsch, Emil, `On et Onion, Receuil des travaux relatif a la philo. et. hist. Egypt. et Assyr', Vol. VIII, 1885, p.5.
Griffith, F.L.L., `The Antiquities of Tell-el-Yahudiyeh', p. 41
T. H. Lewis, Tel El-Yahoudeh' in TSBA, Vol. VII, January 1881, Part 2, p. 177-192
all of them mention the inscriptions of letters A, E, I, D, O, C, T, X and acknowledge them as Hellenic, you seem to find a gap.

>>Evans to the end of his days rejected the notion that Linear B represented Greek, one of the reasons it took so long to decipher it.<<

Evans figured out that short lines in Linear B texts were word dividers. He also deciphered the counting system and a number of pictograms, which led him to believe that the script was mainly pictographic. Evans also discovered a number of parallels between the Cypriot script, which had been deciphered, and Linear B. This indicated that the language represented by Linear B was an ancient form of Greek, but he wasn't prepared to accept this, being convinced that Linear B was used to write Minoan, a language unrelated to Greek.
I assume you mean this, so the problem here is, if the Minoan, Mycenaean, Dorian, Macedonian and all other tribes were Hellenic or something else.


>>That assumption is that finding ?shapes? that are similar to or even identical with the shapes of the letters of the later alphabet means that the two are identical.<<

If these were the only inscriptions of this type found, I could see the swastika example you give as correct, but there are many more Hellenic alphabetic inscriptions from the Euboean settlement of Pithekoussai on the isle of Ischia dating to before 675 BC. Many of these however are just single letters that appear on burial Amphorae, so you see that single letter inscriptions were used. Unless you mean the Hellenes had not “adopted” the letters yet.
You keep on mentioning the fact that Linear B` was Minoan, who told you that Minoans were not Hellenes? That is one of the
major problems, from what I see you don’t accept the Minoans and probably any other tribe of that time to be Hellenic but something else, just as Evans did.
(and he was proved to be wrong)
Looks like the Indo-European theory to me

>>No one disagrees that the Greeks were around speaking Greek in this period. <<

Are you sure? I bet I could surprise you... see UNESCO`s "historians" official statements on the Hellenic civilization.

>>I even talked to a friend at Oxford and a US friend, one a Homeric specialist, the other an archaeologist and art
Historian of the pre-historic Greek period, and neither has heard of these discoveries.
It seems the only source is ?Davlos? <<
>>You, Hellin, probably have access to Davlos, have you looked up these articles with their plates?<<

You could search for N. Samson's (a curator of the Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities Department) mentioned in the article
point of view on the topic, as I’m sure he could give you all you need to know
about the vases, unless you are prepared to doubt him as well.
As for the Dispilio plate it did exist until given to a German archaeologist (unfortunately I don’t remember his name) for further studies and then he informed us of the disintegration you mention.
Similar problems can be found, see Petralona Man, prof. Braitdinger (might be spelled wrong) wouldn’t return the scull and 48 skeletons from the Marathon tomb he was given to date, only after a 25yr law suit did the scull return, but not the skeletons (they also disintegrated!!!) were as he later admitted (of the record of course) kept as a kind of pay for his trouble.
(but we just won’t learn from our mistakes)

>>I’m beginning to sense a theme?.seems the source of all truth is Davlos Publishing and its flagship magazine.
If some of this?information? were found in several refereed scholarly journals, then its time to sit up and take note.
The fact that they are all in publications by a single publishing company with the stated purpose of promoting Greek
language and culture makes this ?revolution? in chronological dating suspicious and probably not worth its salt.<<

When I originally posted this article I clearly stated that it is a bit Hellinocentric
The fact that Davlos is the only source mentioned in the article means nothing any simple google search will give you all the information you need or you could check out the 8th European Association of Archaeologists Annual Meeting (24-29 September 2002, in Thessalonica, Greece) where the Dispilio plate was talked about extensively.

>>in fact this early Balkan culture at Dispilio is not considered to be a Greek culture at all by the archaeologists<<

As I already mentioned you have some problem distinguishing what Hellenic is.
The next thing I expect to read is that findings of Sesklo ( According to the state-of-the-art dating technology employed by the University of Pennsylvania in America, Sesklo was dated to 5800 B.C., with a margin of error factor of + - 97 years. And, of course, older Neolithic artifacts, such as those from Argissa, which have been dated to 6200 B.C. by U.C.L.A., from Elateia (6290 B.C.), and from Nea Nicomedia (6240 B.C.). but according to you they probably aren’t Hellenic either.

>>Ah yes, the ?ancient and all knowing code? theory reaches Greece<<

I wonder if you even know of the code or seen it work. The fact that it isn’t commonly accepted or well known yet doesn’t prove it to be wrong, many scholars still don’t accept the deciphering of Linear B` or it being Greek.

Just so you see it and tell your friends all about it (you know the Oxford one, and the US one, the Homeric specialist, the other the archaeologist and art Historian of the pre-historic Greek period,

Alpha – initial power / Beta – the energy of sound , the creation of the visible world by sound / Gamma – earthly body, the enclosing of power in earth / Delta – power , creation , building / Epsilon – the descending power , (from Alpha ) horizontal spread of energy / Zeta – life / Eta – the revelation of power (of Alpha) , the apparent and great flow of energy towards /earth Theta – view , the world becomes visible , the sky is visible on earth/ Iota – the invisible but continuous small descent of power (from Alpha) ,the invisible and small flow of energy to earth / Kappa – everything down , earth as a planet , the human body / Lambda – for everything celestial , the Sun and the earthly waters , descent of sun rays ,that lose their free flow on earth/ Mu – apparent nature, the womb / Nu – mind , law/ X i (K+S) – the earthly bodies / Omicron – limited space , the apparent and unseen world / Pi – initial fire / Rho – flow , primary photo-energy ,the flow of energy from the heavens to earth / Sigma – the inner view - self / Tau – the fixed power / Upsilon – great concentration of power (of Alpha) , great accumulation of energy / Phi –light / Chi – the infernal land , the earthly elements / Psi - (P+S) the internal flame / Omega – the earthly environment , on the earth


Each consonant of the Hellenic language represent a specific meaning, while, the vowels enlighten and decipher the meanings.
for example: the letter (Lambda) means THE SUN, (Gamma) means the earth.
So word (LOGOS) means (the light on earth)
The verb L-EGW (LEGW) means I (EGW) ENLIGHTEN (L)
ERGALEIO=ERGO+LEIO=ERGON HLIOY or ERGON FWTINON
The CODE is EY-LOGOS or a EY-LOGIA useful to those in search of knowledge.
It can show us the hidden meanings in all sciences Theology, philosophy ex...

>>which by the way the Greeks were in their bronze age at the time<<

Wrong type of metal. Now I’m starting to believe your prejudice because it is well known that the Hellenes used iron in the 12th century BC. Iron was put into general use for weapons and tools during the Dark ages you’ve talked about.

>>Anyway, Herodotus very plainly says 1) Cadmus and company brought ?grammata?, letters with them and introduced the Greeks to the, 2) says nothing about Cadmus and co. using the same system of letters that the other Phoenicians used 3) and says nothing about them changing either their language or their alphabet.<<

Actually the translation is correct but the conclusions he made suck!!
«Ïé äå Ãåöõñáéïé, ôùí Þóáí ïé öïíÝåò ïé ÉððÜñ÷ïõ, ùò ìåí áõôïß ëÝãïõóé, åãåãüíåóáí åî Åñåôñßçò ôçí áñ÷Þí, ùò äå åãþ áíáðõíèáíüìåíïò åõñßóêù, Þóáí Öïßíéêåò ôùí óõí ÊÜäìù áðéêïìÝíùí Öïéíßêùí … Ïé äå Öïßíéêåò ïýôïé, ïé óõí ÊÜäìù áðéêüìåíïé, ôùí Þóáí ïé Ãåöõñáéïé, Üëëá ôå ðïëëÜ ïéêßóáíôåò ôáýôçí ôçí ÷þñçí åóÞãáãïí äéäáóêáëßá åò ôïõò ¸ëëçíåò êáé äç ôá ãñÜììáôá …>> (Herodotus Terpsihori 57 - 59)

In English:
The Gephyraei, to whom the two men who killed Hipparchus belonged, came, by their own account, originally from Eretria; but I have myself looked into the matter and find that they were really Phoenicians, descendants of those who came with Cadmus to what is now Boeotia where they were allotted the district of Tanagra to make their homes in. After the expulsion of the Cadmeans by the Argiva, the Gephyraei were expelled by the Boeotians and took refuge in Athens, where they were received into the community on certain stated terms, which excluded them from a few privileges not worth mentioning here.
The Phoenicians who came with Cadmus (Cadmus = the founder of Thebes) - amongst whom were the Gephyraei - introduced into Greece, after their settlement in the country, a number of accomplishments, of which the most important was writing, an art till then, I think, unknown to the Greeks. At first they used the same characters as all the other Phoenicians, but as time went on, and they changed their language, they also changed the shape of their letters. At that period most of the Greeks in the neighbourhood were Ionians; they were taught these letters by the Phoenicians and adopted them, with a few alterations, for their own use, continuing to refer to them as the Phoenician characters - as was only right, as the Phoenicians had introduced them. The Ionians also call paper 'skins' - a survival from antiquity when paper was hard to get, and they did actually use goat and sheepskins to write on.
Indeed, even today many foreign peoples use this material. In the temple of Ismenian Apollo at Thebes in Boeotia I have myself seen cauldrons with inscriptions cut on them in Cadmean characters - most of them not very different from the Ionian. There were three of these cauldrons; one was inscribed: 'Amphityron dedicated me from the spoils of the Teleboae' and would date from about the time of Laius, son of Labdacus, grandson of Polydorus and great-grandson of Cadmus……

But it isn’t the translation that matters because we know he is wrong
1) According to the ancient Greek writer Plutarch (see the book «ÊáêïÞèåéåò Herodotus»), Gephyraiei, and Cadmus (= the founder of Thebes) and his ascendants (Oedipus, Eteoclees etc) were Greeks and the legends of Herodotus are lies of rage, which he said because:
a) The people of Thebes took the Persians side and not the Greeks side in the Persian – Greek war,
b) Gephyraei (or the democratic brothers Armodius and Aristogeiton = the killers of the tyrant Ipparchus etc) were part of the democratic people in Athens and Herodotus was on the side of tyrant Ipparchus.

According to Aristotle the killers of tyrant Ipparchus were not Phoenicians (not the Gephyraei), but Greeks, the democratic brothers Armodius and Aristogeiton, and for that the Athenians made celebrations in their honor

2) According to the ancient Greek writers Euripides, Aeschylus etc on one side Cadmus (= the founder of Thebes) and his ascendants (Eteoclees, Polinicis, Oedipus etc) were Greeks, they spoke Greek etc and on the other hand from the ancient land of Phoenicia (where Master Aginor was, from where Cadmus came and established the town of Thebes, the prince Europe etc)was an island in Europe, in the western part of Greece and near Italy, in the Turrinian sea and not a land in Asia
(Euripides. Phoenissae1-10),(26-29),(210-220),(278-279),(580),(640-670) ,(1220 -1230) (Aeschylus. Seven Against Thebes. 69-80)

3) According to other ancient writers the letters of the Greek alphabet are Greek made.

Dosiades: äå åí ÊñÞôç öçóßí åõñåèÞíáé áõôÜ (ôá ãñÜììáôá)" Diodorus: "öáóßí (ïé ÊñÞôåò) ôïõò Öïßíéêáò ïõê åî áñ÷Þò åõñåßí, áëëÜ ôïõò ôýðïõò ôùí ãñáììÜôùí ìåôáèåßíáé ìüíïí".
( A. Baker, "Hellenic Anecdotes II 783,14)
«Ï ÐáëáìÞäçò Üöùíá êáé öùíïõíôá óõëëáâÜò ôåèåßò åîåõñïí áíèñþðïéóé ãñÜììáôá åéäÝíáé.» ( Diodorus Siculus. Library.3, 76, 3)


>>The language is Indo-European, its syntax, morphology, sound changes, and word base make it so.<<

Sir William Jones was dispatched to India as a judge in 1783. Being an amateur linguist, he spent his evenings teaching himself Sanskrit, a dead language which was being maintained by priests who memorized its sacred hymns. In 1786 he told a gathering of the Asiatic Society in Calcutta that many of the classical languages, such as Sanskrit, Greek, Latin, Gothic, Celtic and Persian must come from the same source.
The "perfect" relationship between the examples he gave was there for everyone to see and Bingo!, the genetic family of Indo-European languages was born, soon to be joined by a baffling assortment of laws of phonological correspondence and an Ur-mother-language which had supposedly given birth to the whole mess. The academic world built a big bandwagon and all jumped on, linguists, archaeologists, anthropologists, geographers, everybody. All are now using the classification "Indo-European" as if it were a reality. Over the past two centuries thousands of highly paid linguists have conducted their endless and fruitless research into the perceived genetic relationship. All they need now is a few more years of study to answer all the questions........
While studying the language "family" some of the smarter linguists realized there was something fishy. They decided that the truth could be established by using classical comparative methodology. To accomplish this they proposed four criteria supposed to be diagnostic:
1) phonological correspondence,
2) shared vocabularies,
3) common grammatical features,
4) identical constructive particles.
However, the early grammarians, active over the last four millennia, were well ahead of them. They had, very early on, recognized that spoken languages do change into dialects and independent languages and thus they had long ago built these same four criteria into the various languages they created, giving the impression of a genetic relationship. When the 18th century linguists jumped on the I.-E. band-wagon they had reasoned that if the observed relationship was not accidental, it had to be genetic, thereby totally underestimating the skill and determination of the ancient grammarians. Through the years there have been a few courageous linguists who had doubts about the troublesome Indo-European theory. One of them, M.E. Landsberg of Columbia University S.C., wrote:
"Indeed, courses in historical linguistics at Universities all over the world, in spite of much perplexing evidence to the contrary, mostly still persist in adhering to strict Indo-European theories".
In spite of them, no-one thought to ask if there possibly was another explanation, e.g. an invented relationship. And to this day this question is not being asked. I am sorry to be a party-pooper and derail the cushioned wagon ride, but there never were any Indo-Europeans, there was no proto-Indo-European language and the family of Indo-European languages is a long perpetuated academic fraud.

Edo Nyland tells us:
" ... none of the languages which are presently assumed
to be part of the Indo-European language "family" are genetically related
i.e. not one of them evolved slowly over time from another.
They were all invented and forced onto a reluctant public
by a determined and occasionally cruel church leadership.
If the languages are not genetically related,
the Indo-European group cannot be a family.