Book Title: Alphabet Key To History Of Mankind
Author(s): David Diringer
Publisher: Hutchinsons Scientific and Technical Publications
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CANAANITE BRANCH
251 south of Valencia. The text engraved on both sides of the tablet contains three hundred and forty-two letters in fourteen lines. Another long inscription is that of Castellon de la Plana with a hundred and fifty-five signs, while the third longest engraved inscription, on bronze, comes from Luzaga. An interesting group of forty inscriptions on pottery (Fig. 125. 3), discovered in the years 1933 to 1936 at San Miguel de Liria, was published in 1942 by the Diputación Provincial de Valencia. One of them (Fig. 125, 3) contains as many as a hundred and fifty-seven signs. This inscription has been attributed to the last third of the fifth century B.C. Other inscriptions may belong to the fourth or third centuries, but the majority belong to the later centuries and the most recent may be attributed to the age of the Roman Empire.
The direction of writing is generally from right to left; sometimes, however, vertically downwards.
Fig. 125, I shows the Iberian alphabet as deciphered by Professor Manuel Gómez Moreno (De Epigrafia Ibérica. El plomo de Alcoy, Madrid, 1922, and Sobre los iberos y su lengua, in "HOMENAJE A MENÉNDEZ PIDAL," Vol. III, 1923) with a few additions by Pio Beltrán Vilagrasa (Sobre un interesante vaso escrito de San Miguel de Liria, Diputación Provincial de Valencia, 1942). If this decipherment, which has not yet found general agreement, be right, the following would be the main characteristics of the Iberian script: (1) The whole system consisted of thirty letters, namely twenty-five consonants and five vowels. (2) There was no distinction between b and p,g and k, and d and t. (3) There were no signs for f. h, o; on the other hand there were special signs for double n and double r. (4) The script was partly alphabetic and partly syllabic, having five different forms for each of the letters, b-p, g-k, d-t, according to the vowel sound following it. The latter suggestion is hardly acceptable.
The origins of the Iberian scripts are still uncertain. Some scholars hold that the two scripts are varieties of the same system, others (more rightly, I think) believe that they are quite different. The Turdetan script is considered by some scholars as purely consonantal and as a simple variant of the early Libyan script. The Iberian script is regarded by some scholars as a derivative of the Phoenician or Punic alphabets, by others (Taylor, for instance) as a descendant of the early Greek alphabet. Sir Arthur Evans has suggested a connection with the Cretan scripts, while other scholars (including Wilke, Cejador y Frauca) consider the Iberian script as a prehistoric indigenous creation connected with the geometrical signs employed in prehistoric Spain (Fig. 2, 1-2).
It seems that we have to deal with a very complicated question. In my opinion, the origins of both Iberian scripts can be compared with
1 I wish to thank Dr. T. M. Batista i Roca for indicating to me the recent bibliography and for lending me certain books which I had not been able to find.
