The Kafkania pebble is a small rounded river pebble about long, with
Linear B
Linear B was a syllabic script used for writing in Mycenaean Greek, the earliest attested form of Greek. The script predates the Greek alphabet by several centuries. The oldest Mycenaean writing dates to about 1400 BC. It is descended from ...
symbols and a
double axe
''Labrys'' ( gr, , lábrus) is, according to Plutarch (''Quaestiones Graecae'' 2.302a), the Lydian word for the double-bitted axe. In Greek it was called (''pélekus''). The Ancient Greek plural of ''labrys'' is ''labryes'' ().
Etymology
P ...
symbol inscribed on it. It was found in Kafkania, some north of
Olympia
The name Olympia may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Film
* ''Olympia'' (1938 film), by Leni Riefenstahl, documenting the Berlin-hosted Olympic Games
* ''Olympia'' (1998 film), about a Mexican soap opera star who pursues a career as an athlet ...
, on 1 April 1994 in a 17th-century BC
archaeological context
This page is a glossary of archaeology, the study of the human past from material remains.
A
B
C
D
E
F
...
. If it were genuine, it would be the earliest writing on the Greek mainland, and by far the earliest document in Linear B. The Kafkania Pebble would also have had to exist two or more centuries before the earliest of the Linear B Documents. However, it is in all probability a modern
forgery
Forgery is a white-collar crime that generally refers to the false making or material alteration of a legal instrument with the specific intent to defraud anyone (other than themself). Tampering with a certain legal instrument may be forbidd ...
and a
hoax
A hoax is a widely publicized falsehood so fashioned as to invite reflexive, unthinking acceptance by the greatest number of people of the most varied social identities and of the highest possible social pretensions to gull its victims into pu ...
.
Inscription
The pebble bears a short inscription of eight syllabic signs in
Linear B
Linear B was a syllabic script used for writing in Mycenaean Greek, the earliest attested form of Greek. The script predates the Greek alphabet by several centuries. The oldest Mycenaean writing dates to about 1400 BC. It is descended from ...
, possibly reading '. The reverse side shows a
double-axe
''Labrys'' ( gr, , lábrus) is, according to Plutarch (''Quaestiones Graecae'' 2.302a), the Lydian word for the double-bitted axe. In Greek it was called (''pélekus''). The Ancient Greek plural of ''labrys'' is ''labryes'' ().
Etymology
P ...
symbol. The inscription is identified by some to be in
Mycenean Greek
Mycenaean Greek is the most ancient attested form of the Greek language, on the Greek mainland and Crete in Mycenaean Greece (16th to 12th centuries BC), before the hypothesised Dorian invasion, often cited as the ''terminus ad quem'' for the ...
, but that identification remains disputed. It has been suggested that such an isolated example of Linear B script indicates, at best, an early stage of Mycenaean writing at the time of origin.
G. Owens suggests that the inscription is Minoan in origin rather than Mycenaean. Then, a
Minoan
The Minoan civilization was a Bronze Age Aegean civilization on the island of Crete and other Aegean Islands, whose earliest beginnings were from 3500BC, with the complex urban civilization beginning around 2000BC, and then declining from 1450B ...
could have written the text for a
Mycenaean. No evidence exists that the Mycenaean Greeks wrote before the Linear B archive of Knossos.
Forgery
Several specialists in Mycenaean epigraphy have expressed serious doubts about the authenticity of the inscription; indications that it is a modern forgery include:
Thomas G. Palaima Thomas G. Palaima (born October 6, 1951) is a Mycenologist, the Robert M. Armstrong Centennial Professor and the founding director of the university's Program in Aegean Scripts and Prehistory (PASP) in the Department of Classics at the University ...
, "OL Zh 1: ''QVOVSQVE TANDEM?''" ''Minos'' 37-38 (2002-2003), p. 373-8
full text
* Inscriptions on pebbles are otherwise unknown in Mycenaean and Minoan epigraphy.
* The "rays" surrounding the axe have no parallels in Mycenaean or Minoan iconography.
* Most of the symbols are "carefully executed" but one appears to be a "random graffito".
* Its context, imbedded in a wall, is peculiar and unprecedented.
* Linear B is otherwise consistently written left-to-right, but the inscription is apparently written in
boustrophedon
Boustrophedon is a style of writing in which alternate lines of writing are reversed, with letters also written in reverse, mirror-style. This is in contrast to modern European languages, where lines always begin on the same side, usually the le ...
.
* The
writing style
In literature, writing style is the manner of expressing thought in language characteristic of an individual, period, school, or nation. As Bryan Ray notes, however, style is a broader concern, one that can describe "readers' relationships with, t ...
appears anachronistic.
* It is unlikely on historical grounds that Linear B writing then existed in the northwest Peloponnese.
* Finally, the pebble was apparently discovered on the morning of
April Fool's Day
April Fools' Day or All Fools' Day is an annual custom on 1 April consisting of practical jokes and hoaxes. Jokesters often expose their actions by shouting "April Fools!" at the recipient. Mass media can be involved in these pranks, which may ...
.
''Minos'': 2003, p. 489
''Meletemata: Studies in Aegean archaeology presented to Malcolm H. Wiener as he enters his 65th year, vol. 2'', 1999
''Polemos: Le contexte guerrier en Egée à l'âge du Bronze. Actes de la 7e Rencontre égéenne internationale, Université de Liège, 14-17 avril 1998'', 1999, p. 400
If it is indeed a forgery, the symbols spelling ''a-so-na'' may spell out the name ''Iasonas'', the first name of the son of Xeni Arapojanni and Jörg Rambach, the alleged discoverers of the pebble.
See also
* Psychro or Epioi inscription, a modern forgery involving characters resembling Linear A characters
References
Sources
*{{cite book , title=Kavkania: Die Ergebnisse der Ausgrabung von 1994 auf dem Hügel von Agrilitses , last=Arapojanni , first=Xeni , author2=Rambach, Jörg , author3=Godart, Louis , year=2002 , publisher=von Zabern , location=Mainz , isbn=3-8053-2934-2
External links
Bryn Mawr Classical Review 2005.01.20 - Panos Valavanis, Games and Sanctuaries in Ancient Greece
1994 archaeological discoveries
1994 hoaxes
Archaeological artifacts
Archaeological forgeries
Inscriptions of disputed origin
Mycenaean Greek inscriptions
Stone objects