3 ms·

> sheds light on how the ancient Minoan and Mycenaean elite Mycenaeans are considered Greek. Minoans generally not considered Greek. Their script, Linear A,

> sheds light on how the ancient Minoan and Mycenaean elite Mycenaeans are considered Greek. Minoans generally not considered Greek. Their script, Linear A, has never been deciphered, so we don’t actually know what language they spoke, but most linguists think it wasn’t Greek, based on how poorly Linear A’s signs map onto Greek phonetics when tested as they do successfully with Mycenaean Linear B. Culturally the Minoans also look distinct from later Greek civilization. Different religious iconography (bull-leaping, goddess-centric imagery), different art style, no clear warrior-elite hierarchy the way Mycenaean and later Greek society had.

throwawayffffas 2mo ago
Linear B also maps poorly to Greek as far as I know. It's clearly an adaption of a foreign script.
- andsoitis 2mo ago
  Linear B maps onto Greek quite well once you understand that it is a syllabary, not an alphabet. The fit is imperfect in specific, well-understood ways. Once you correct for well-understood systematic gaps, though, the underlying grammar, vocabulary, and even some divine names (Poseidon, Zeus, Hera, Dionysus all show up) are recognizably continuous with classical Greek.
- applicative 2mo ago
  It is flat out Greek. I can even read some of the transliterations. I laughed like a drain when I saw that one of the leading characteristic key words of Aristotle's teaching, 'heneka' is the main connector in the oldest written Indo European text. three goats heneka one coat , i.e. 'for the sake of' in the context of a list of palace exchanges.
altmanaltman 2mo ago
The actual paper doesn't claim that, it understands they are two distinct cultures but itn covers the georgaphical Greece in the title not cultural. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0305440326001524?via%3Dihub https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S03054...
anon48293 2mo ago
Except it does partially map into Greek, they had settlements on several Greek islands, influence on the Cyclades, and talk about similar Gods. Even the cave where Zeus was allegedly born is on Crete.
- suddenlybananas 2mo ago
  They can heavily influence later Greek culture without being Greeks themselves. It's not unlike the Etruscans and Rome.
  - anon48293 2mo ago
    I stated some corrections, but did not mean to imply they are Greek. Even Cretans now consider themselves Cretan first and foremost.
qup 2mo ago
> Their script, Linear A, has never been deciphered https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48600107 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48600107
- andsoitis 2mo ago
  I read it. The claim is still early and yet to be accepted.
- gus_massa 2mo ago
  That was only a blog post about a secret draft that has not been published, nor peer reviewed. Let's classify it as "unconfirmed".
  - quuxplusone 2mo ago
    +1. Tom Di Mino hasn't posted anything on https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7471395019157835776/ https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7471395... since June, nor has Stephen Kosloff posted anything more on https://aiclambake.com/clamtakes/ https://aiclambake.com/clamtakes/ . I wouldn't expect any updates on that story. As for Linear A decipherment claims, claiming decipherment isn't the same as decipherment. For example, here's a claim from 2014 that Linear A encodes spoken Japanese: https://konosos.net/2014/12/09/the-phonetic-method-in-linear-a-decipherment/ https://konosos.net/2014/12/09/the-phonetic-method-in-linear... Does Linear A encode spoken Japanese? of course not.
JumpCrisscross 2mo ago
> Mycenaeans are considered Greek It's fair to argue they aren't. The Assyrian people still exist [1] today. Their language and culture having been passed on-unbroken–by the living to the living for thousands of years. The Myceneans–like the Hittites and others whom we know so little about we haven't even named them–are in a fundamentally distinct category. Like yes, they weren't nuked out of existence. But there is a permanent and irreparable break in the continuity of exchange that severs the timeline between then and now. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assyrians https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assyrians
- suddenlybananas 2mo ago
  Mycenaeans are not remotely like the Hittites. The Mycenaean language is what turned into Greek, while Hittite died out and was forgotten. Myceneans were remembered and celebrated until the present day with the Odyssey and the Illiad (while I realise these were composed later, and are not a remotely perfect reflection of Mycenean society, they still refer to a memory of that time, and furthermore include authentic details from that time). The language and culture of the Mycenaeans also had an unbroken linguistic and cultural chain (of course with the big upheaval of the Bronze age collapse, but Assyrians also went through many upheavals). Modern day Assyrians also speak Aramaic (or Arabic) rather than Akkadian which was the state language of the Assyrian empire (Aramaic did replace Akkadian as the lingua franca under the Neo-Assyrian empire however). Conversely, Greek is the descendant of Mycenaean Greek just as Coptic is the descendant of the Ancient Egyptian language. Mycenaeans really are not like the Hittites who were essentially completely forgotten until 19th and 20th century archeology discovered them.

throwawayffffas 2mo ago

Linear B also maps poorly to Greek as far as I know. It's clearly an adaption of a foreign script.

andsoitis 2mo ago
Linear B maps onto Greek quite well once you understand that it is a syllabary, not an alphabet. The fit is imperfect in specific, well-understood ways. Once you correct for well-understood systematic gaps, though, the underlying grammar, vocabulary, and even some divine names (Poseidon, Zeus, Hera, Dionysus all show up) are recognizably continuous with classical Greek.
applicative 2mo ago
It is flat out Greek. I can even read some of the transliterations. I laughed like a drain when I saw that one of the leading characteristic key words of Aristotle's teaching, 'heneka' is the main connector in the oldest written Indo European text. three goats heneka one coat , i.e. 'for the sake of' in the context of a list of palace exchanges.

altmanaltman 2mo ago

The actual paper doesn't claim that, it understands they are two distinct cultures but itn covers the georgaphical Greece in the title not cultural. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0305440326001524?via%3Dihub https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S03054...

anon48293 2mo ago

Except it does partially map into Greek, they had settlements on several Greek islands, influence on the Cyclades, and talk about similar Gods. Even the cave where Zeus was allegedly born is on Crete.

suddenlybananas 2mo ago
They can heavily influence later Greek culture without being Greeks themselves. It's not unlike the Etruscans and Rome.
- anon48293 2mo ago
  I stated some corrections, but did not mean to imply they are Greek. Even Cretans now consider themselves Cretan first and foremost.

qup 2mo ago

> Their script, Linear A, has never been deciphered https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48600107 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48600107

andsoitis 2mo ago
I read it. The claim is still early and yet to be accepted.
gus_massa 2mo ago
That was only a blog post about a secret draft that has not been published, nor peer reviewed. Let's classify it as "unconfirmed".
- quuxplusone 2mo ago
  +1. Tom Di Mino hasn't posted anything on https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7471395019157835776/ https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:7471395... since June, nor has Stephen Kosloff posted anything more on https://aiclambake.com/clamtakes/ https://aiclambake.com/clamtakes/ . I wouldn't expect any updates on that story. As for Linear A decipherment claims, claiming decipherment isn't the same as decipherment. For example, here's a claim from 2014 that Linear A encodes spoken Japanese: https://konosos.net/2014/12/09/the-phonetic-method-in-linear-a-decipherment/ https://konosos.net/2014/12/09/the-phonetic-method-in-linear... Does Linear A encode spoken Japanese? of course not.

JumpCrisscross 2mo ago

> Mycenaeans are considered Greek It's fair to argue they aren't. The Assyrian people still exist [1] today. Their language and culture having been passed on-unbroken–by the living to the living for thousands of years. The Myceneans–like the Hittites and others whom we know so little about we haven't even named them–are in a fundamentally distinct category. Like yes, they weren't nuked out of existence. But there is a permanent and irreparable break in the continuity of exchange that severs the timeline between then and now. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assyrians https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assyrians

suddenlybananas 2mo ago
Mycenaeans are not remotely like the Hittites. The Mycenaean language is what turned into Greek, while Hittite died out and was forgotten. Myceneans were remembered and celebrated until the present day with the Odyssey and the Illiad (while I realise these were composed later, and are not a remotely perfect reflection of Mycenean society, they still refer to a memory of that time, and furthermore include authentic details from that time). The language and culture of the Mycenaeans also had an unbroken linguistic and cultural chain (of course with the big upheaval of the Bronze age collapse, but Assyrians also went through many upheavals). Modern day Assyrians also speak Aramaic (or Arabic) rather than Akkadian which was the state language of the Assyrian empire (Aramaic did replace Akkadian as the lingua franca under the Neo-Assyrian empire however). Conversely, Greek is the descendant of Mycenaean Greek just as Coptic is the descendant of the Ancient Egyptian language. Mycenaeans really are not like the Hittites who were essentially completely forgotten until 19th and 20th century archeology discovered them.