Iberian scripts
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Iberian scripts (or Iberian alphabet) are two scripts (or two styles of the same script) found on the Iberian peninsula, the Northeast and South Iberian script.
| History of the Alphabet |
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Middle Bronze Age 19–15th c. BC
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| Meroitic 3rd c. BC |
| Complete genealogy |
Contents |
[edit] Description
The oldest date of ancient Iberian writing has been dated to the 4th century BC. After the Roman invasions in the 3rd century BC, the script and the language from which it was written in were replaced with Latin writing.
Northeastern Iberian scripts have been found on the Iberian peninsula, in southern France and on the Balearic Islands. The southern Iberian scripts have been found in Andalucia and Murcia. Both styles contain monophonematic as well as syllabic signs. The Celtiberian version of the script was used to record the Celtiberian language, for example on the Botorrita tablet.
Monophonematic signs are five vowels, transcribed a, e, i, o, u, six resonants, transcribed r, ŕ, l, m, m̄, n, and two sibilants or fricatives, transcribed s and ś. Syllabic signs combine an occlusive, t-, k-, p-, with a following vowel.
Swiggers assumes that the Iberic scripts are the result of a fusion of the Punic and Greek alphabetic traditions. The fact that the Iberian scripts are both alphabetic and syllabic is probably due to the nature of Iberian phonology. There are, as a matter of fact, "pro-Greek and pro-Semitic camps."
[edit] See also
[edit] Further reading
- Rodríguez Ramos, Jesús, Análisis de Epigrafía Íbera, Vitoria-Gasteiz 2004, ISBN 84-8373-678-0.
- Untermann, Jürgen, Monumenta Linguarum Hispanicarum. Band III: Die iberischen Inschriften aus Spanien, Wiesbaden 1990.
[edit] External links
- http://ancientscripts.com/iberian.html
- Levantine Iberian Script
- Meridional Iberian Script
- Greek Iberian Script
- Celtiberian Script
- Tartessian / South-Lusitanian Script
- "On the Story of the Decipherment of Iberian Writing" by Jesús Rodríguez Ramos
- Omniglot entry on Iberian
- Detailed map of the Pre-Roman Peoples of Iberia (around 200 BC)
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