Re Linear B, it's also worth pointing out that prior to its decipherment the prevailing view was that it wasn't Greek; Ventris spent most of his time trying to

Re Linear B, it's also worth pointing out that prior to its decipherment the prevailing view was that it wasn't Greek; Ventris spent most of his time trying to align it to Etruscan, and only made the breakthrough when he tried out a few Greek words more or less on a whim. I imagine that had almost any form of computerised automation been readily available in the 50s it would have made the decipherment vastly simpler, but it would require an existing hypothesis of Greek; an AI trying to fit it to Etruscan would have been merely banging its head against an electronic wall.