This is a point in history (there are many) where I am lacking my own knowledge. I am trying to piece it together as I go.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bookpossum
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.
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I remember the book saying that Homer's works were oral and that the Greeks didn't have a written language for several hundred years after the Linear B tablets were created but I thought that was all based on knowledge and understanding from before Linear B was translated. Did knowing that Linear B is "ancient" Greek to the Ancient Greeks change any of those presumptions?
If Linear B is just a time capsule and doesn't have a waterfall effect on how Greece itself or the surrounding countries developed then it is a little less interesting to me. Still a great story and a great learning opportunity but much less meaningful to the world as we know it now if Linear B completely died out before having an opportunity to transform or be incorporated into another language that did make it and did have more influence in today's world.