Danube-Trypillia source of Minoan scripts

2020

This paper presents a critical hi storical survey of problems in research on Cyprio1e Bronze Age writing (Cypro-Minoan = CM) and draws the foll owing conclusions: (I) the current class ification of the epigraphical data into 4 general subdivi sions of writing (archaic CM, CM I, CM 2 and CM 3) is invalid. being based on faulty palaeographical assumptions , unwarranted geographical clustering , and contaminatio of inscriptions of distinct typological classes; (2) the palaeographical connection between archaic CM and Minoan Linear A is far closer than has heretofore been acknowledged; (3) the creation of Cypro-Minoan under the strong inOuence of Cretan linear writing is understandable in terms of the historical development of Cypriote contacts with the Aegean and in terms of the relative simplicity and adaptability of Linear A in comparison with contemporary Near Eastern cuneifom1 scripts; (4) Cypro-Minoan retains a remarkable independence and integrity throughout its 500 year history,...

Marco Merlini, Neo-Eneolithic Literacy in Southeastern Europe: an Inquiry into the Danube, Biblioteca Brukenthal XXXIII, Ministery of Culture of Romania and Brukenthal National Museum, Editura Altip, Alba Iulia, 2009

Writing Around the Mediterranean, 2022

The full volume, which is open access, is attached here. This paper argues that the definition of an "inscription" used in Aegean scripts studies is incompatible with the varied and distinctive Cypro-Minoan text types.

Marco Merlini, Neo-Eneolithic Literacy in Southeastern Europe: an Inquiry into the Danube, Biblioteca Brukenthal XXXIII, Ministery of Culture of Romania and Brukenthal National Museum, Editura Altip, Alba Iulia, 2009

The Decipherment of Minoan Linear A, Vol. II: Corpus of transliterated Linear A texts, Part I: Arkhanes - Kea, 2022

The decision to publish a completely revised and extended edition under the new title THE DECIPHERMENT OF MINOAN LINEAR A, VOLUME I: HURRIANS AND HURRIAN IN MINOAN CRETE: PARTS I–VI, also offered an opportunity to publish a revised and extended new edition of VOLUME II: CORPUS OF TRANSLITERATED LINEAR A TEXTS, PART I: Arkhanes - Kea (414 pages); Part II: Khania - Zakros. For Academia.edu I have provided the cover and title-pages of the book, the contents, 2 Linear A grids and the inscriptions from Arkhanes, Apodoulou and Arkalokhori. It is advisable to consult the editions with excellent photographs of the texts, such as L. Godart – J.-P. Olivier, Recueil des inscriptions en linéaire A, Vol. 1-5, Études Crétoises XXI, 1-5, Paris 1976-1985, while using this Corpus of transliterated Linear A texts. Only the photographs and ultimately the tablets and other objects on display in the musea are decisive for a sound judgement of the proposed readings.

From the data that can be gathered in the Danube inscriptions, the Proto-Indo-European civilization, which probably originally originated circa 8, 000 to 7, 500 BCE around the Black Sea, Danube River Delta, and the Balkan mountains, spread into the neighbouring territories of the Caucasus foothills thus giving rise to daughter civilizations such as those of the early Bronze Age Anatolian, Kurgan, Minoan, Mycenaean, Upper Danube, and Atlantic Europe etc. Riverboats adapted to open water navigation played a large part in early diffusion before horse taming with the innovations of chariots and ridding improved longdistance movement. Thus, from this contact with the Danube River Old Europeans, at around 5, 000 to 4, 000 BCE, they moved into Northwestern Europe, Central Asia, and down to the coastal and insular eastern Mediterranean areas of the Greek peninsula. In light of this, there are strong indications that the invention of alphabetical writing was diffused at a much earlier time than first suspected from the Pontic area on through the Eastern Mediterranean coasts and further down south through the early copper trade of the Mycenaean Sea Peoples. Henceforth, following this premise, it should be possible to decode the Danube graphemes using the most ancient Indo-European writing systems known to archaeology. At least, that is my proposal. The Indo-European chariot and horse, Hittite hunting scene, the author's drawing. Old Europe and the Danubian Civilization "The Tuatha Dé Danônn were in the northern isles of the world, learning lore and magic and druidism and wizardry and cunning until they surpassed the sages of the arts of heathendom." (The Second Battle of Moytura, author unknown, translated by Whitley Stokes) All of the many early Indo-European creation myths converge in the claim that the primordial mortal humans and immortal gods descended from a mother-goddess called Dana, Danu, or Dôn. According to the Rig Veda, the children of Danu were a technologically advanced race called the Danava. This fact has been brilliantly demonstrated by David Frawley in his book, The Rig Veda And The History Of India. The Danavas were described as children of Danu and Kasyapa and sometimes reckoned as forty in number. The Maha-Bharata refers to a number of Danava tribes at the origin of the Indo-Aryan peoples. According to the Vedas, these were the Danava, the Manava, and the Sudanava. The Greeks and the Celts saw themselves as descended from the goddess Danu thereby calling themselves the children of Danu, or Danawoi in Greek, and Danunas or Danauoi in Old Celtic, henceforth, the Old Irish Danônn or Danann. In Sanskrit, Kasyapa was the eponym of the Caspian Sea and its region. This is exactly where the old Indo-European Aryan culture was said to begin. Again, the Vedic texts distinguish two categories of these mythical ancestors: the Danava proper and the Su-Danava or "Good Danavas." The Denyen, from Danuan, also spelled Denen, or Danuna, celebrated on the Medinet Habu stone and on a collection of papyri, were one of many the Sea Peoples invaders mentioned in the Egyptian records. According to the Lebor Gabála Érenn, (The Book of the Taking of Ireland), these Dananns were said: "to reside in the islands of the North and that with them came the primordial Druids of the Tuatha Dè Danan." After a careful linguistic and historiographical analysis, Joseph Monard was led to conclude that the Danaoi and Danawoi of the Greeks, and Denyen of the Egyptians, were the one and the same. As he noted, the Denen after having raided Egypt, were forced back to the sea onto Cyprus and there became known by the continental Semites as the Dnan, also called Tribe of Dan in the Bible. As the Danuna, they contribute to the fall of the Hittite empire. As Danaoi, they mingle with the Achaeans and lead them to the battle of Troy. It seems that they were with others such as the Lusacians of mixed Proto-Illyrian and Proto-Celtic origin who at that time were hardly distinguishable in culture and appearance. It also seems that they were detrimental in the Indo-Europeanization process of their Hyperborean Proto-Finish neighbors of the North Baltic who eventually became the Germanic and Prussian peoples. Thus, this People of the Sea was labeled "Atlantikoi" by Plato as they resettled beyond the Strait of Gibraltar in the Tartessos of southern Spain and further north along the Atlantic. Indeed, the geographers of Antiquity did mention

2013

Cypro-Minoan is perhaps one of the least known and least understood of the various scripts derived from the Aegean tradition of writing, among which Linear A and Linear B are the best-known representatives. Part of the reason for this is that the Cypro-Minoan writing system(s) present a very diverse corpus of material spread over a very small number of objects, and no complete published corpus exists. The book under review by Silvia Ferrara is the first of two projected volumes on Cypro-Minoan: this first volume conducts a new contextual, epigraphic, and palaeographical analysis of the inscriptions, while the second will present for the first time a complete corpus, scheduled to be published by Oxford University Press in 2013.1

1992

Inscriptions from Troy II–V are very similar to Linear A and might represent pre-Cretan phase of the Linear A development