Date: Mon, 21 Jul 2003 01:51:03 -0600
From: Stefan Darie 
Subject: Linear A
To: AEGEANET@KU.EDU

Dear Aegeaneters;

Here is my tentative decipherment and identification of the language of 
Linear A script.

The identification of the language spoken by the Minoans from Crete depends 
to a significant extent on two difficult aspects, the correct decipherment 
of the script and the correct identification of the words found on Linear A 
tablets. For my study on the Linear A language I have used the 
transnumeration and phonetic normalization made in 1994 by John G. Younger 
and checked against GORILA by Jean-Pierre Olivier and the results are 
spectacular. The transnumeration is based on the phonetic transcription of 
Linear B values for Linear A signs proposed by Louis Godard in 1984. The 
decipherment of the Linear A tablets brings to light a full range of 
important information on the language spoken in the second millennium BC in 
Crete as well as on the historical identity and the origin of the Minoan 
peoples. The texts of the Linear A tablets are a real open window to the 
everyday life of the highly literate Minoan society at the beginning of the 
18th century BC. It is incredible how civilized were the Minoans 3700 years 
ago.

The texts of the Linear A tablets provide both, lexical and onomastic data. 
The available lexical data consists mostly in core vocabulary words 
pertaining to the Minoan society and environment, such as family, plants, 
animals, natural and topographical feature, agriculture and household items. 
The onomastic data consist in personal-names, place-names and few ethnonyms. 
The Libation Formula has four parts: first a dedication with the name of 
that object, second, the name of a person, third, a formula, and fourth, a 
wish he/she is asking for. The Libation Formula is the equivalent of the 
Greek word amein, which is commonly accepted as meaning “so be it” (Strong's 
Concordance).

IO Za 2 (HM 3557) (GORILA V: 18-19), stone libation table

A-TA-I-*301-WA-JA • JA-DI-KI-RA • JA-SA-SA-RA[-ME • U-NA-KA-NA-]SI [•] 
I-PI-NA-MA
SI-RU-TE • TA-NA-RA-TE-U-TI-NU • I-DA-[
The vase is yours Zadi Kira (?) let keep that way and until the young Teuti 
kiss me don’t give her….

The component parts of the Libation Formula are;
1.	dedication - A-TA-I-*301-WA-JA – the vase is yours
2.	name - JA-DI-KI-RA – Zadi Kira or Adi Kira.
3.	formula - JA-SA-SA-RA[-ME • U-NA –  let keep that way
4.   wishes -]SI [•] I-PI-NA-MA SI-RU-TE • TA-NA-RA-TE-U-TI-NU • I-DA-[ -
These are fragments of the Libation Formula consisting in three words A-SA 
/SA/ RA-MA-NE
J/A-SA-SA-RA    U-NA-KA-NA-SI   I-PI-NA-MA
JA-SA-SA-RA-		I-PI-NA	I-DA
JA-SA-SA-RA-ME		I-PI-NA-MA  I-DA-MI
JA-SA-SA-RA-MA-NA 	I-PI-NA-MI-
JA-SA-RA-A-NA-NE		NA
A-SA-SA-RA-MA-NA

Sometimes the Libation Formula seems to be spelled in different ways either 
because of some dialectal pronunciation or because only some fragments of 
the sentence or words survived. A study of the vocabulary of the Libation 
Formula identifies some family degrees as father, mother, brother-in-law, 
uncle and grand-father. DA-DU “father”; MA-TA “mother”; TA-TE-I-KE-ZA-RE 
(dative), *TI-TI-KU “father” (diminutive), TA-TA-IE; *T/A-TA-I-301 
“grandfather, uncle”, KU-NA-TU (brother-in-law), TA-NA-RA (girl). The form 
TA-TE-I seems to be the dative singular indicating a dedication to his 
father, TA-TI-KU is a diminutive and TA-TA-IE means grandfather.

KN Zf 31 (HM 540) (GORILA IV: 154-155, 162), silver pin; HT 47 (HM 52) 
(GORILA I: 90-91) TA-TE-I-KE-ZA-RE = to my father Caesar
T/A-TA-I-301 = grandfather; TI-TI-KU = father  (diminutive), daddy
HT 47 (HM 52) (GORILA I: 90-91)
KU-*56-NA-TU= brother-in-law; the *56 symbol seems to be the consonant M

The logograms

The logograms include words for domestic animals as sheep, goats, oxen and 
boars, some plants as figs, wheat, olives, and some products as grains, wine 
and oil (olive oil). Some words for logograms were not completely or 
correctly identified. In the first colon are the words identified by Palmer 
and in the second colon labeled *ERD are the results of my study. The 
missing letters have been added in brackets.

A302 = probably olive oil (Palmer 1995) 	     	*A302/[OL= oleu or oliu] 
(ERD)
A303 = possibly grain (Palmer 1995) 			*A303/? =grini or grani (ERD)
21/OVIS = probably sheep (Palmer 1995) 		*21/OI = sheep (ERD)
22/CAP = probably goats (Palmer 1995) 		*22/CAP[RE] = goats (ERD)
23/BOS = probably cattle (Palmer 1995) 		*23/BO[U])I = oxen (ERD)
30/NI = figs (Palmer 1995) 				*30/[SMOKI] NI = figs (ERD)
85/SUS = probably pigs (Palmer 1995) 		*85/PORC [US] =  pig (ERD)
120/GRA = barley (Palmer 1995) 			*120/GRA[U] = wheat (ERD)
122/OLIV = olives (Palmer 1995) 			*122/OLIU=oil (ERD)
131/VIN = wine (Palmer 1995) 			*131/VIN = wine (ERD)

A detailed study of the logograms identified by Palmer indicates that the 
common words for animals
and plants are identified pretty close to their original form, but sometimes 
the words are not complet. The Minoan word for goats is “capre” in the 
language of the Linear A tablets. The logogram 23 could be for oxen (bou or 
boi) or cattles (bovine, vite) in which the first two letters are the same. 
More difficult to identify was the word for figs SMOKINI for which Palmer 
takes the last two letters. For pigs the word was believed related with the 
Latin sus and English swine which is not the case, but rather should be 
PORC(us). The next words are for cereals GRANE, vine VIN and olives. The 
corresponding syllable for the logogram 120 was correctly identified as GRA 
believed to be for “barley”, but the syllable was from the word for “wheat” 
called GRAU. A 302 symbol was identified as olive oil, but Palmer did not 
identify the word OLIU “oil” or that for olives. In exchange he correctly 
identifies the rations as VINa+OLE = 44E, GRA+NI+OLE?+*304 or VINa+OLE ‰ 
GRA, without to understand the meaning. The word OLE in Minoan language 
means large pots, pithos used as a unit for measurement.
VINa+OLE = 44E = pithos of  wine
GRA+NI+OLE?+*304 = 45 J L2 – pithos of wheat and figs  or:
VINa+OLE ‰ GRA+ = pithos of wine and wheat

The vocabulary of the present deciphered Linear A tablets consists in over a 
hundred core vocabulary words pertaining to the Minoan society and 
environment, such as family, parts of the body, household items, plants, 
animals, natural and topographical feature, agriculture, cattle and sheep 
breeding. While the Libation Formula contains words related to the Minoan 
family and society the logograms and inventory items contain words for 
domestic animals, plants and palatial products. This original approach to 
language identification is based on five different methods; first, to 
identify the common words, second to compare the Linear A words with words 
in other Indo-European languages and identify cognates, third to identify 
the Indo-European family and the language with the highest rate of cognates, 
fourth to find grammatical and other parallells with other languages and 
establish the morphology and the syntax, and fifth to identify the 
linguistic geographical homeland and the ethnic origin of its speakers. The 
main task of this comparative historical reconstruction is to identify 
cognates, words similar in both, form and meaning, from several languages, 
similarities which indicate the common roots of the words and languages. 
Languages that have the highest rate of cognates are the most closely 
related and the most recent to diverge from a common origin language, called 
a proto-language. Historical relationships among languages are also 
indicated by the phonological similarities of  their cognates. A linguistic 
analysis and a comparative philological study of the Cretan vocabulary 
provided by the Linear A tablets indicate, without any doubt, in which 
Indo-European family the Linear A language has cognates and the group of 
languages which has the highest rate of cognates to which the Minoan must be 
assigned. There were identified a number of  cognates in some of the oldest 
known IE languages as Hittite, Luwian, Old Persian, Sanskrit and Old Italic.
DA-DU “father” has roots in *IE atta and has cognates in Hittite attas, 
Luwian, tati, Old Persian atta, Oscan aeda, Sanskrit taatas.

*21/OI = sheep (ERD); *PIE owis, Luwian hawi, Sanskrit avis, Latin ovis, 
Greek aren, probata, *22/CAP(RE) = goats (ERD) Latin capra, Italian capra, 
Spanish cabra,  Sardinian craba, Greek tragos
*23/BO(U)I = oxen (ERD), *PIE gwous, gw, Sanskrit co, Latin bos, Greek bous, 
boeios
*85/PORC (US) = pig (ERD) *PIE su, porko, Sanskrit su, Latin sus, porcus, 
Greek krateutai, Sardinian porcu, Engadine porch, puerch
*30/(SMOKI) NI = figs (ERD) Latin ficus, Greek sukinos
*120/GRA(U) = wheat (ERD) Latin triticum, Greek kenchrias, French graine
*122/ULEIU = oil (ERD) Latin oleum, Greek stagmatopôlês
*131/VIN = wine (ERD) Hittite wiana, Latin vinum, Umbrian vinu, Volscian 
vinu, Greek vinos
A grammatical analysis of the available nouns, pronouns and verbs indicates 
that the language of Linear A tablets has a highly inflectional grammatical 
system, which classifies the language as an Indo-European language. The 
family words and the pronouns show some declension forms as the nominative, 
dative and genitive cases and the verbs indicate forms of conjugation. The 
language of the Linear A tablets appears to be a highly inflected 
Indo-European tongue closely connected in vocabulary and grammar with the 
Old Italic group of languages. Based on the lexical data and the available 
ethnonyms recorded on the Linear A tablets we can identify the name of the 
language and the ethnic identity of the ancient inhabitants of Minoan Crete.

Regards,

R. E. Darie