Disir
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- Sep 30, 2011
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One of the toughest codes to break is an ancient writing system. Understanding Egyptian hieroglyphics took the lucky 1799 find of the Rosetta Stone, which translated a Demotic decree (the language of everyday ancient Egyptians) into Greek and hieroglyphics. Even so, French scholar Jean-Francois Champollion labored more than two painstaking decades to make sense of the strange Egyptian symbols.
Today, only a handful of millennia-old scripts remain unreadable. Thanks to a team of European scholars led by French archaeologist Francois Desset, one of the last holdouts might finally be deciphered: Linear Elamite, an obscure system used in what is now Iran.
If the findings are correct—and the claim is hotly debated by the researchers’ peers—then they could shed welcome light on a little-known society that flourished between ancient Mesopotamia and the Indus River Valley at the dawn of civilization. Recently published in the journal Zeitschrift für Assyriologie und vorderasiatische Archäologie, the analysis could also rewrite the evolution of writing itself.
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www.smithsonianmag.com
This is kind of cool. I think it will be interesting what they learn going forward.
Today, only a handful of millennia-old scripts remain unreadable. Thanks to a team of European scholars led by French archaeologist Francois Desset, one of the last holdouts might finally be deciphered: Linear Elamite, an obscure system used in what is now Iran.
If the findings are correct—and the claim is hotly debated by the researchers’ peers—then they could shed welcome light on a little-known society that flourished between ancient Mesopotamia and the Indus River Valley at the dawn of civilization. Recently published in the journal Zeitschrift für Assyriologie und vorderasiatische Archäologie, the analysis could also rewrite the evolution of writing itself.
Have Scholars Finally Deciphered a Mysterious Ancient Script?
Linear Elamite, a writing system used in what is now Iran, may reveal the secrets of a little-known kingdom bordering Sumer
www.smithsonianmag.com
This is kind of cool. I think it will be interesting what they learn going forward.
