Re: The Phaistos Disk, side A, according to Fischer

From: Jacques Guy (jguy_at_alphalink.com.au)
Date: 07/10/04 

Date: Sat, 10 Jul 2004 09:41:10 -0700

Qakare wrote:

> If the script is invented by a Greek, why the same signs are used for
> /t/, /d/ and /th/ or for /b/, /p/ and /ph/ or for /g/, /k/ and /kh/?
> That differences between /t/ and /th/ does not exist in Linear B was a
> reason to argue that it was not invented to write Greek!

This made me think of "sutoraiki" and the like: the Japanese
kana were not invented to write English either. Which led
me to another (useless) thought: what language was Linear B
invented to represent? A useless question because we will
likely never know. Another thought was: when the Greeks took
the Phoenician alphabet to write Greek, they made a much
better job of it. How come? Why is Linear B to Greek as
"itto waazu a daaku ando sutoromi naitto..." is to English?

 
> > : KRO-KO- (the difficulty being in the rendering of the final -S, with
> > 3 possible solutions : a)- not writing it b) writing it, using a
> > special sign c)- writing it like in the Cypriot Script by -SE ).
> > ONLY a more developped syllabic script will REDUCE the number of Signs
> > with "Complex Values" and REPLACE KRO by KO-RO- , as this is the case
> > with the Cypriot Script. Linear B, being half-the-way, has kept a few
> > of those signs with "complex values".

In fact, I would argue the very opposite: that Linear B "complex"
signs (e.g. pte) were invented when the scribes realized that
the existing syllabary was insufficient, and therefore attempted
to remedy the lack of signes for syllables with initial consonant
clusters.
 
> If the script is not so high developed, why then signs for /r/ and /s/
> are used?

That's in Phaistos-Diskian, isn't it? Because they are kludge, of
course,
just like tmae and klae and kro and...

> > Remember Cl. Shannon's work : "the Disk MAY be deciphered IF the
> > "starting hypotheses" are THE GOOD ONES" !... And the "viramā
> > hypothesis" is a WRONG one, because even Hempl himself could not reach
> > a COMPLETE decipherment !...

Similarly, the hundreds of Mayanists who now claim to have
cracked Mayan writing have laboured from the WRONG hypothesis,
because even they could not reach a COMPLETE decipherment !
(only 85% of the texts are understood, according to Michael
Coe). Hittite is not COMPLETELY deciphered either, therefore...
therefore? you fill it in. All right I'll do it for you:
scholars' starting hypotheses were not THE GOOD ONES !
Wipe the slate clean and start again. Let's say... that
Hittite is Semitic for instance, eh?

> > And I always found STRANGE that scholars like B. Schwartz,
> > who wished to rely the Phaistos Disk's script to Linear B, have never
> > been disillusioned by the fact that the Sign QE = the "shield", pretty
> > rare in Greek, was so frequent in the Disk text!...

Elementary. QE is part of the word EQE ("hear ye") astutely
identified by noted epigrapher Stephen Roger Fischer, who,
apparently, has just been knighted his momentous discovery, see:

"http://www.google.com.au/search?q=%22sir+stephen+fischer%22&ie=ISO-8859-1&hl=en&meta=lr%3Dlang_en"

*sob* serves me right for trying to decipher the Disk as Latin,
and positing "the shield" = TEM. Yes, as in ITEM. It made sense,
didn't it? "item... item.... item...". But alas, no knighthood
for me (and I always so wanted to be woken up to the tune of
"Sir Jacques, Sir Jacques, dormez-vous? Sonnez les mātines,
dign, ding, don")

PS. "eqe" = "hear ye" indeed. Interesting dialect of Greek,
eh?

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