Quote:
Originally Posted by Dazrin
For Linear B itself, the dropping of consonants at the end of words feels like a huge leap of translation to me. That is the step that really makes it difficult for me to imagine Kober solving this.
Also, the adaptation of the indigenous (we assume) Linear A script to suit Greek words when Greek is (apparently) so structurally different from the original seems odd. But, given the almost pre-history nature of this, I suppose it makes sense. There weren't a lot of other written languages to draw from. I would be interested in knowing how and why the ancient Greeks moved from Linear B to their own script. I don't think there have been any bridging or intermediary steps between Linear B and ancient Greek found. Certainly they didn't have a hard Linear B to Ancient Greek transition and it was a more smooth transition though. Or, did Linear B not catch on in the mainland and Ancient Greek is an independent construct? We know there was some on the mainland but not the extent or any of that history. I want to know more!
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Dazrin, I think there was quite a break of several hundreds of years before the Greeks had a written language. They developed an alphabetical written language based on that of the Phoenecians I seem to remember. So they had a sort of Dark Ages with no written language after the collapse of the Mycenaean civilisation. So
The Ilead and
The Odyssey were initially oral only.