Phaistos Disc

The Phaistos Disc (Phaistos Disk, Phaestos Disc, Greek: Δίσκος της Φαιστού) is a curious archaeological find, likely dating to the middle or late Minoan Bronze Age. Its purpose and meaning, and even its original geographical place of manufacture, remain disputed, making it one of the most famous mysteries of archaeology. This unique object is now on display at the archaeological museum of Herakleion in Crete, Greece.

Discovery

The Phaistos Disc was discovered in the basement of room 8 in building 101 of the Minoan palace-site of Phaistos, near Hagia Triada, on the south coast of Crete. Italian archaeologist Luigi Pernier recovered this remarkably intact "dish", about 15 cm in diameter and uniformly just over 1 cm thick, on July 3 1908.

Luigi Pernier discovered the disc during his excavation of the first Minoan palace. It was found in the main cell of an underground "temple depository". These basement cells, only accessible from above, were neatly covered with a layer of fine plaster. Their context was poor in precious artifacts but rich in black earth and ashes, mixed with burnt bovine bones. In the northern part of the main cell, in the same black layer, a few inches south-east of the disc and about twenty inches above the floor, linear A tablet PH-1 was also found. The site apparently collapsed as a result of an earthquake, possibly linked with the explosive eruption of the Santorini volcano that affected large parts of the Mediterranean region ca. 1628 BCE.

Dating

Yves Duhoux (1977) dates the disc to between 1850 BCE and 1600 BCE on the basis of L. Pernier's report, which says that the Disc was in a Middle Minoan undisturbed context. Jeppesen (1963) dates it to after 1400 on the basis of a wrong translation of Pernier's report. Doubting the viability of Pernier's report, Louis Godart (1990) resigns himself to admitting that archaeologically, the disc may be dated to anywhere in Middle or Late Minoan times. J. Best (in Achterberg et al. 2004) suggests a date in the first half of the 14th century based on his dating of tablet PH 1.

Similar objects

No object directly comparable to the Phaistos Disc has been found. There is, however, a small number of comparable symbols known from other Cretan inscriptions, known summarily as Cretan hieroglyphs. First, there is the votive double axe found by Spyridon Marinatos in the Arkalohori Cave, which has "similar, but not identical" glyphs. (Kober 1948:88) The altar stone found at Malia is more distantly related. Finally, there is a seal fragment (HM 992), dated to the 18th century, bearing the "double comb" sign (21). No inscription made with the same set of stamps has been found. Other artifacts bearing spiral-shaped inscriptions are known both from Crete and the Aegaean in general, and even from Etruria. A spiralling Linear A inscription is found on the golden ring of Mavro Spelio near Knossos (KN Zf 13). The Iron Age Discus of Magliano bears a spiralling inscription in Etruscan.

A very peculiar find was made in 1992 in a basement in Vladikavkaz, North Ossetia: A fragment of an apparent copy of, or draft for the Phaistos disc, with the symbols incised with a stylus rather than imprinted. It is uncertain whether this artifact is genuinely ancient, a good faith modern copy of the Phaistos disc, or a bad faith attempt at forgery. The house in the basement of which the fragment was found was built in 1880. Allegedly, the object was recognized as a fake and returned to its private owner.

The inscription

Image:Diskos.von.Phaistos Detail.1 11-Aug-2004 asb PICT3372.JPG| Image:Diskos.von.Phaistos Detail.2 11-Aug-2004 asb PICT3373.JPG| Image:Diskos.von.Phaistos Detail.3 11-Aug-2004 asb PICT3374.JPG| Image:Diskos.von.Phaistos Detail.4 11-Aug-2004 asb PICT3375.JPG| The inscription was made by pressing pre-formed hieroglyphic "seals" into the soft clay, in a clockwise sequence spiralling towards the disc's center. It was then baked at high temperature.

Signs

There are a total of 241 tokens on the disc, comprising 45 unique signs. Many of these 45 signs represent easily identifiable every-day things. In addition to these, there is a small diagonal line that occurs underneath the final sign in a group a total of 18 times. The disc shows traces of corrections made by the scribe in several places. The 45 symbols were numbered by Arthur Evans from 01 to 45, and this numbering has become the conventional reference used by most researchers. Some symbols have been compared with Linear A characters by Nahm, Timm, and others. Others scholars (J. Best, S. Davis) have pointed to similar resemblances with the Anatolian hieroglyphs, or with Egyptian hieroglyphs (A. Cuny). In the table below, the character "names" as given by Louis Godart (1995) are given in quotation marks; where other description or elaboration applies, they are given in parentheses.

The Phaistos Disc signs have been provisionally assigned Unicode Range 101D0–101FF, to include the 45 signs themselves as well as the combining oblique stroke described below. (Prior to the provisional acceptance of the characters for encoding, the ConScript Unicode Registry has assigned a block of the Unicode Private Use Area to be used for the script. Two fonts include support for this area; Code2000 and Everson Mono Phaistos.)

№	Sign	Proposed character name	Description	Incidence	Remarks
01	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN PEDESTRIAN	marching figure of a man	11
02	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN PLUMED HEAD	head of man with crested helmet	19	the most frequent symbol, always word-initial
03	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN TATTOOED HEAD	a bald head in profile, with "tattoo" or jewellery on the cheek	2
04	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN CAPTIVE	a standing human figure with bound arms	1
05	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN CHILD		1
06	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN WOMAN		4
07	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN HELMET	woman's breast, a bell-shaped symbol	18
08	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN GAUNTLET	fist with cestus	5
09	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN TIARA		2
10	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN ARROW		4	on side A only
11	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN BOW		1
12	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN SHIELD		17	12 times in the group 02-12; compared with Linear B qe 𐀤 and Luwian TURPI
13	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN CLUB		6
14	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN MANACLES	the flat tops of the two prominences in this figure as well as the slots in the base are characteristic features of manacles, the slots being for the attachment of thongs	2
15	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN MATTOCK		1
16	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN SAW	knife	2
17	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN LID	instrument for cutting leather	1
18	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN BOOMERANG	carpenter's angle	12	compared with Linear A/B 37, Linear B ti 𐀴
19	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN CARPENTRY PLANE	Y shape	3	on side A only; compared to Linear B sa 𐀭
20	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN DOLIUM	handled vase	2
21	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN COMB		2
22	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN SLING	double pipe	5	on side B only
23	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN COLUMN	square headed mallet	11	compared to Linear A/B 05 or Linear A/B 06, Linear B to 𐀵 or na 𐀙
24	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN BEEHIVE	pagoda-like building	6	compared to Linear B wa 𐀷
25	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN SHIP		7
26	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN HORN	of ox	6
27	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN HIDE	of animal, probably an ox	15
28	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN BULLS LEG	ox's foot	2
29	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN CAT	head of animal of the feline genus	11
30	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN RAM	head of horned sheep	1
31	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN EAGLE	flying bird	5	on side A only
32	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN DOVE	seated dove	3
33	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN TUNNY	fish (the horse mackerel or common tunny, Thunnus thynnus)	6
34	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN BEE	insect, possibly a bee	3
35	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN PLANE TREE	plant or tree sign; the Oriental plane (Platanus orientalis)	11	compared to Linear B te 𐀳
36	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN VINE	olive branch	4	on side B only; compared to Linear B ni 𐀛 (fig tree)
37	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN PAPYRUS	plant with a fan-shaped flower	4
38	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN ROSETTE	maguerite or star-anemone; eight-petaled flower	4
39	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN LILY	saffron flower, Ψ shape	4
40	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN OX BACK		6
41	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN FLUTE		2
42	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN GRATER		1
43	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN STRAINER	triangle with internal granulation	1	compared to Linear B ta₂
44	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN SMALL AXE		1
45	PHAISTOS DISC SIGN WAVY BAND	water	6	compared to Linear B ra₂

The frequency distribution of the Phaistos Disc signs is:

19-18-17-15-12-11-11-11-11-7-6-6-6-6-6-6-5-5-5-4-4-4-4-4-4-3-3-3-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1-1

The nine hapaxes are 04 (A5), 05 (B3), 11 (A13), 15 (B8), 17 (A24), 30 (B27), 42 (B9), 43 (B4), 44 (A7). Of the eight twice-occurring symbols, four (03, 21, 28, 41) occur on side A only, three (09, 16, 20) on side B only, and only one (14) on both sides.

The oblique stroke

There are a number of signs marked with an oblique stroke, the strokes are not imprinted but carved by hand and are attached to the first or last sign of a "word", depending on the direction of reading chosen. Their meaning is a matter of discussion. One hypothesis, supported by Evans, Duhoux, Ohlenroth and others, is that they were used to subdivide the text into paragraphs, but alternative meanings have been offered by other scholars.

Directionality

Evans argued that the disc had been written, and should be read, from the center out; because it would have been easiest to place the inscription first and then size the disc to fit the text. There is general agreement that he was wrong, and Evans himself changed his mind: the inscription was made, and should be read, from the outside in toward the centre. The centres of the spirals are not in the centre of the disc, and some of the symbols near the centre are crowded as though the maker was cramped for space. One pair of symbols are set top-to-bottom, so it is hard to tell what order they should be in. Except in the cramped section, when there are overstrikes, the inner symbol overlies the outer symbol. Jean Faucounau has proposed a reconstruction of the scribe's movements, which would also require an inward direction; Yves Duhoux says that any outward reading may be discarded. Despite this consensus, there are still a few such attempted decipherments (e.g. Massey 2003).

In addition to the question of the directionality of the text on the disc itself, different viewpoints are held as to how the Phaistos Disc characters should be displayed when transcribed into text. The disc itself probably has right-to-left directionality (like Arabic), if reading proceeds from the outside to the centre; this means that the reading direction is into the faces of the people and animals, as it is in Egyptian and Anatolian. Phaistos Disc characters are shown with left-to-right directionality in this article; which is also the typical practice for edited Egyptian and Anatolian hieroglyphic text.

Inscription text

There are 61 "words", 31 on side A and 30 on side B (numbered A1 to A31 and B1 to B30, outside to inside), here read outside-to-inside (putting the "plumed head" signs word-initially and the strokes word-finally). The shortest words are two symbols in length, the longest seven symbols. The strokes are here transcribed as diagonal strokes (/). The transcription begins at the vertical line of five dots, circling the rim of the disc once, clockwise (13 words on A, 12 words on B) before spiralling towards the center (18 more words on each side). There is one word-final effaced sign at A8, which Godart notes as resembling sign 3 or 20; or less probably 8 or 44. Evans considered side A as the front side, but technical arguments have since been forwarded favouring side B as the front side.

The signs in the transcription below appear in left-to-right orientation, and the reader may read into the faces of the human and animal figures (as one reads Egyptian and Anatolian hieroglyphs):

In numerical transcription:

Side A:

02-12-13-01-18/ 24-40-12 29-45-07/ 29-29-34 02-12-04-40-33 27-45-07-12 27-44-08 02-12-06-18-? 31-26-35 02-12-41-19-35 01-41-40-07 02-12-32-23-38/ 39-11

02-27-25-10-23-18 28-01/ 02-12-31-26/ 02-12-27-27-35-37-21 33-23 02-12-31-26/ 02-27-25-10-23-18 28-01/ 02-12-31-26/ 02-12-27-14-32-18-27 06-18-17-19 31-26-12 02-12-13-01 23-19-35/ 10-03-38 02-12-27-27-35-37-21 13-01 10-03-38

Side B:

02-12-22-40-07 27-45-07-35 02-37-23-05/ 22-25-27 33-24-20-12 16-23-18-43/ 13-01-39-33 15-07-13-01-18 22-37-42-25 07-24-40-35 02-26-36-40 27-25-38-01

29-24-24-20-35 16-14-18 29-33-01 06-35-32-39-33 02-09-27-01 29-36-07-08/ 29-08-13 29-45-07/ 22-29-36-07-08/ 27-34-23-25 07-18-35 07-45-07/ 07-23-18-24 22-29-36-07-08/ 09-30-39-18-07 02-06-35-23-07 29-34-23-25 45-07/

The "plumed head" (02) only ever occurs word-initially, in 13 instances followed by the "shield" (12, which in some instances also occurs word-finally). Six words occur twice each: The three-word sequence 02-27-25-10-23-18 28-01/ 02-12-31-26/ occurs twice (A14-16, A20-22). 02-12-31-26/ recurs for a third time (A19). Four more words occur twice each, 02-12-27-27-35-37-21 (A17, A29), 10-03-38 (A28, A31), 22-29-36-07-08/ (B21, B26) and 29-45-07/ (A3, B20).

Decipherment attempts

A great deal of speculation developed around the disc during the 20th century. The Phaistos Disc captured the imagination of amateur archeologists. Many attempts have been made to decipher the code behind the disc's signs. Historically, almost anything has been proposed, including prayers, a narrative or an adventure story, a "psalterion", a call to arms, a board game, and a geometric theorem. Some of the more fanciful interpretations of its meaning are classic examples of pseudoarchaeology.

Most linguistic interpretations assume a syllabary, based on the proportion of 45 symbols in a text of 241 tokens typical for that type of script; some assume a syllabary with interspersed logographic symbols, a property of every known syllabary of the Ancient Near East (Linear B as well as cuneiform and hieroglyphic writing). There are, however, also alphabetic and purely logographical interpretations.

While enthusiasts still believe the mystery can be solved, scholarly attempts at decipherment are thought to be unlikely to succeed unless more examples of the signs turn up somewhere, as it is generally thought that there isn't enough context available for meaningful analysis. Any decipherment without external confirmation, such as successful comparison to other inscriptions, is unlikely to be accepted as conclusive.

Origin of the script

Cretan or foreign origin?

There are a few main theories about the origin of the signs. Until recently, most scholars have argued strongly against the local origin of the artifact. Evans (1909:24f.) wrote that

"when one comes to compare the figures in detail with those of the Minoan hieroglyphic signary, very great discrepancy is observable... Out of the forty-five separate signs on the Phaistos Disk, no more than ten more or less resemble Cretan hieroglyphic forms... The human figures in their outline and costume are non-Minoan... The representation of the ship also differs from all similar designs that occur either among the hieroglyphic or the linear documents of Crete".

Ipsen (1929:15) concluded that the Disc was certainly from somewhere on the Aegean. Because of its differences from Linear A or B, Ipsen found it tempting to assume, like Evans, a non-Cretan origin for the Disc. He observes, however, that since Linear A was a common Aegean script such an assumption will not resolve the problem of multiplicity.

The Arkhalohori Axe and other finds have made Cretan origin more popular: female images with pendulous breasts have also been found at Malia and Phaistos. (Godart 1995:125). Duhoux asserts the Cretan provenance of the disc; in his review of current research, Trauth (1990:154) comes to the conclusion "Crete as source of the Disc can no longer be called into question".

Original invention or derivation?

Ipsen (1929:11) also speaks against an entirely independent origin of the scripts, arguing that its inventors did not leap from no knowledge of writing to a syllabic script with these elegant signs. He goes on to cite Hieroglyphic Luwian as a "perfect parallel" (Ipsen 1929:17) of an original script inspired under the direct influence of other scripts (its symbol values inspired by cuneiform, its shapes by Egyptian hieroglyphs)

Schwartz (1956:108) asserts a genetic relationship between the Phaistos Disc script and the Cretan linear scripts.

Among the known scripts, there are three main candidates for being related to the Disc's script, all of them partly syllabic, partly logographic: Linear A, Anatolian hieroglyphs and Egyptian hieroglyphs. More remote possibilities are comparison with the Proto-Canaanite abjad or the Byblos syllabary.

Linear A

12 = qe, Phaistos glyph 43.png 43 = ta₂, or Phaistos glyph 31.png 31 = ku''. A recent systematic comparison with Linear A is that of Torsten Timm, 2004 ^*. Based on the Linear A character distribution patterns collected by Facchetti Timm concludes that the language of the Disc inscription is the same as the language of Linear A. Timm identifies 20 of the 45 characters with Linear signs, assigning Linear B phonetic values to 16.

Anatolian hieroglyphs

01 is compared to the logogram SARU, a walking man or walking legs in Luwian. Phaistos glyph 02.png 02 is compared to word-initial a₂, a head with a crown in Luwian. The "bow" Phaistos glyph 11.png 11 is identified as the logogram sol suus, the winged sun known from Luwian royal seals. The "shield" Phaistos glyph 12.png 12 is compared to the near identical Luwian logogram TURPI "bread" and assigned the value tu. Phaistos glyph 39.png 39 they read as the "thunderbolt", logogram of Tarhunt, in Luwian a W-shaped hieroglyph.

List of decipherment claims

The decipherment claims listed are categorized into linguistic decipherments, identifying the language of the inscription, and non-linguistic decipherments. A purely logographical reading is not linguistic in the strict sense: while it may reveal the meaning of the inscription, it will not allow for the identification of the underlying language.

Linguistic

George Hempl, 1911 (interpretation as Ionic Greek, syllabic writing); A-side first; reading inwards;
Florence Stawell, 1911 (interpretation as Homeric Greek, syllabic writing); B-side first; reading inwards;
Albert Cuny, 1914 (interpretation as an ancient Egyptian document, syllabic-logographic writing);
Benjamin Schwarz, 1959 (interpretation as mycenean Greek, syllabic writing, comparison to Linear B); A-side first; reading inwards;
Jean Faucounau, 1975, (interpretation as "proto-Ionic" Greek, syllabic writing ^*); A-side first; reading inwards;
Vladimir Georgiev, 1976 (interpretation as Hittite language, syllabic writing); A-side first; reading outwards;
Steven R. Fischer, 1988 (interpretation as a Greek dialect, syllabic writing); A-side first; reading inwards;
Kjell Aartun, 1992 (interpretation as a Semitic language, syllabic writing); A-side first; reading outwards;
Derk Ohlenroth, 1996 (interpretation as a Greek dialect, alphabetic writing); A-side first; reading outwards; numerous homophonic signs;
Sergei V. Rjabchikov 1998 (interpretation as a Slavonic dialect, syllabic writing ^*^*); A-side first; reading outwards;
Adam Martin, 2000 (interpretation as a Greek-Minoan bilingual text, alphabetic writing); reading outwards, side A as Greek, side B as Minoan
Kevin & Keith Massey, 2003 (interpretation as a Greek dialect, syllabic writing ^*); A-side first; reading outwards;
Marco Corsini, 2003 (interpretation as a Greco-Creto-Egyptian document ^*); A-side first; reading outwards;
Achterberg et al., 2004 (interpreted as Luwian); A-side first; reading inwards;
Torsten Timm, 2005 (reading attempt based upon the hypothesis of a Cretan Script ^*).

Non-linguistic or logographic

Paolo Ballotta, 1974 (interpretation as logographic writing);
Leon Pomerance, 1976 (interpretation as astronomical document);
Peter Aleff, 1982 (interpretation as ancient gameboard ^* );
Ole Hagen, 1988 (interpretation as calendar)
Harald Haarmann, 1990 (interpretation as logographic writing);
Hermann Wenzel, 1998 (astronomical interpretation)
Friedhelm Will, 2000 (interpretation as number-philosophically-document of "Atlantean" origin);
Axel Hausmann, 2002 (document from Atlantis, dated to 4400 BC, logographic reading)
Rosario Vieni, 2005 (interpretation as a calendar)

Notes

Selected bibliography

General

Balistier, Thomas. The Phaistos Disc - an account of its unsolved mystery, Verlag Thomas Balistier, 2000.
Chadwick, John. The Decipherment of Linear B, Cambridge University Press, 1958.
Duhoux, Yves. Le disque de phaestos, Leuven, 1977.
Duhoux, Yves. How not to decipher the Phaistos Disc, American Journal of Archaeology, Vol. 104, n° 3 (2000), p. 597-600 (PDF 5.9 Mb).
Evans, A. J., Scripta Minoa, the written documents of Minoan Crete, with special reference to the archives of Knossos, Classic Books (1909), ISBN 0742640051.
Faure, P. "Tourne disque", l'énigme du disque de Phaistos, Notre Histoire n°213, October 2003 (PDF 0.7 Mb).
Godart, Louis. The Phaistos Disc - the enigma of an Aegean script, ITANOS Publications, 1995.
Kober, Alice: The Minoan Scripts: Facts and Theory. 1948, American Journal of Archaeology, Volume 52, pp. 82 - 103.
Timm, Torsten. Der Diskos von Phaistos – Fremdeinfluss oder kretisches Erbe?, BoD, 2005.
Trauth, Michael: The Phaistos Disc and the Devil’s Advocate. On the Aporias of an Ancient Topic of Research. 1990, Glottometrika 12, pp. 151 - 173.

Attempted decipherments

This list contains off-line accounts of various decipherments mentioned above

Aartun, Kjell, 'Der Diskos von Phaistos; Die beschriftete Bronzeaxt; Die Inschrift der Taragona-tafel' in Die minoische Schrift : Sprache und Texte vol. 1, Wiesbaden, Harrassowitz (1992) ISBN 3-447-03273-1
Achterberg, Winfried; Best, Jan; Enzler, Kees; Rietveld, Lia; Woudhuizen, Fred, The Phaistos Disc: A Luwian Letter to Nestor, Publications of the Henry Frankfort Foundation vol XIII , Dutch Archeological and Historical Society, Amsterdam 2004
Balistier, Thomas, The Phaistos Disc - an account of its unsolved mystery, Verlag Thomas Balistier, 2000 (as above); describes Aarten's and Ohlenroth's decipherments.
Faucounau, Jean, Le déchiffrement du Disque de Phaistos & Les Proto-Ioniens : histoire d'un peuple oublié, Paris 1999 & 2001.
Fischer, Steven R., Evidence for Hellenic Dialect in the Phaistos Disk, Herbert Lang (1988), ISBN 3261037032
Gordon, F. G. 1931. Through Basque to Minoan: transliterations and translations of the Minoan tablets. London: Oxford University Press.
Hausmann, Axel, Der Diskus von Phaistos. Ein Dokument aus Atlantis, BoD GmbH (2002), ISBN 3831145482.
Martin, Adam, Der Diskos von Phaistos - Ein zweisprachiges Dokument geschrieben in einer frühgriechischen Alphabetschrift, Ludwig Auer Verlag (2000), ISBN 3-9807169-1-0.
Ohlenroth, Derk, Das Abaton des lykäischen Zeus und der Hain der Elaia: Zum Diskos von Phaistos und zur frühen griechischen Schriftkultur, M. Niemeyer (1996), ISBN 3484800089.
Polygiannakis, Ο Δισκος της Φαιστού Μιλάει Ελληνικά (The Phaistos disk speaks in Greek), Georgiadis, Athens (2000).
Pomerance, Leon, The Phaistos Disk: An Interpretation of Astronomical Symbols, Paul Astroms forlag, Goteborg (1976). reviewed by D. H. Kelley in The Journal of Archeoastronomy (Vol II, number 3, Summer 1979)
JSTOR URL

External links

Article on a site about strange ancient artifacts
The symbols
French site
List of decipherment claims
Michael Everson's proposal to encode Phaistos Disc signs in Unicode and ISO/IEC 10646

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