Allegedly undeciphered scripts - Easter Island - Etruscan Bronze Liver of Piacenza - Phaistos Disk

ALLEGEDLY UNDECIPHERED SCRIPTS

The only criticism that we have of Ager's website (see our previous blog posting concerning Omniglot.com) is that it is not complete in its selection of links regarding alleged decipherments of so-called undeciphered scripts - which in fact may already be deciphered for all we know, as was the case for the Maya Glyphs.

THE EXAMPLE OF THE MAYA GLYPHS

The Maya glyphs had in fact been correctly deciphered by Knorosow (see also German language link here), but this decipherment - as described by Yale's Michael D. Coe - had been blocked for nearly 40 years by mainstream scholars - apparently standard fare in the selfish peer-review world of alleged "science". We can thus presume that similar mainstream errors have been made - and continue to be made - for other scripts as well.

We would particularly note the following decipherments which are not included in Ager's lists or in the links which he recommends.

DECIPHERMENT OF THE EASTER ISLAND SCRIPTS AS ASTRONOMY

The decipherment of the Easter Island Rongo Rongo (Rongorongo)
Honolulu Tablet No. B 3622 as astronomy
is available as an online book at
An Astrological Zodiac in the Script of Easter Island by Andis Kaulins

This above decipherment has been confirmed
insofar as several other researches
which were published long AFTER this pioneer publication
show that the Rongo Rongo scripts are astronomy and that the symbols refer to stellar constellations or asterisms,
a fact which I discovered before anyone else did.

See Michael H. Dietrich in Asian and African Studies Vol. 8 [1998] 118-150).
I have examined Michael Dietrich's work and he is right in identifying the RongoRongo script as astronomy. He has written as follows:

All signs are symbols of stars and planets, quaters, winds, the moon, the guiding stars etc. The new endeavour to analyse the rongorongo signs is based on the accessible astronomical knowledge of Micronesia and Polynesia. The body of rongorongo signs consists of tropical descriptions of single stars, planets, zodiacal signs and other constellations. What has been registered are particular nights and, on the smaller tablets, general data on astronomical itineraries. The all in all 12 000 rongorongo signs convey exclusively instructions for sidereal navigation within the Pacific."

It appears to me to be solid work by M. Dietrich in every respect. An article by Andrea Hertlein about his astronomical findings was published in the German magazine Die Zeit. The article is found online in German at that link, under the title "Ein Fisch ist kein Fisch : Ein Grafiker aus Stuttgart will die raetselhafte Schrift von der Osterinsel entziffert haben". I ran the article through the Babelfish AltvaVista translator to give the following quite flawed but still useful translation (for non-German English speakers) which I am not going to take the time to correct even though I speak fluent German. German speakers should of course go to the original Die Zeit article. Here is what Andrea Hertlein writes in that article (presented below in a useful but flawed translation):

Babel Fish-Uebersetzung [Babel Fish Translation] In English: (c) DIE ZEIT 1999

In nearly all huts I saw wooden boards and staffs, which were covered with strange hieroglyphics, wrote "the French Missionar Eugene Eyraud 1864 in a letter at its superiors. The letter came far away from the Osterinsel, that small isle in the middle in the Pacific, 4000 kilometers from the South American mainland. Rongorongo called the native indications cut with shark fish teeth or Obsidiansplittern into wood. None the Osterinsulaner could explain the meaning of this Mysteriums to the church man.

Also the abendlaendischen science did not succeed since that time, the secret of the centimeter-large indications to air, although even laymen can recognize stylized birds, fish and humans at first sight. Origin and age of the wooden secret carriers could not even be clarified. Many appointed researchers and Visionaere developed skurrilste theories. They looked for the origin of the writing not only with the advanced cultures of South America, but also with Aliens and ufos. In the meantime most oceanists assumes the Rongorongo indications can be never deciphered.

But it concerns with Rongorongo at all a writing? Michael Dietrich, a commercial artist from Stuttgart, provokes with the completely new thesis that early sailors navigated on the basis the indications reliably by the seas. Astronomy and navigation in Rongorongo its lecture was called on 27 June in the people customer museum Leipzig. The Schwabe with its theses under the met elite of German Ethnologen, linguists and astronomers kindled violent discussions also there.

Dietrich Credo reads: "a fish is not a fish, a bird is no bird, and humans are not humans. The graphic indications in Rongorongo are never what they represent." For Dietrich the mysterioesen figures are symbols for stars, planets and constellations of stars, which as signposts/guides on high lake served the Polynesian navigator.

The Rongorongo research is a difficult field. Only 25 boards with altogether 12,000 hieroglyphics remained preserved. The most important finds are in the museums of Santiago de Chile, Rome, to admire London and pc. Petersburg. From Rapa Nui - in such a way call the native their island - the Relikte of the oceanic Urvaeter completely disappeared.

United are itself the scientists that Rongorongo consists of approximately 120 basis characters, which can be joined 1500 combinations. Beginning at the lower end of the board, the plotting system is read from left to the right. Since however each second line stands on the head, the board must in each case at the line end 180 degrees.

Michael Dietrich came the coincidence to the assistance, when he directed his telescope at a cold January night of the yearly 1992 toward the constellation of the Orion, more exactly said on the belt stars - three Gestirne, which are arranged in same distance on a line in each case. Dietrich considered, how he would represent the belt stars graphically. Finally it outlined three among themselves arranged circles connected, with a line. Suddenly it became clear it that he saw one of the most frequent indications in Rongorongo at this night at the southern starlit sky.

But the indications simple images of constellations of stars and planets are not natural. After Dietrich's view they reflect the myths, which climb in Ozeanien around the Gestirne. The heavenly bodies apply in the Pacific area as visible feature of the Athua - the vergoettlichten ancestors, who live on after their death in the sky.

Refuge Cain, specialist for Polynesian languages at the free University of Berlin, carried patiently support for Dietrich out. It supported it in the case of the translation of the graphic names of stars, constellations of stars and planets from the oceanic literature into German. The babylonisch seeming language tangle in Ozeanien made this task more difficult uncommonly. But it finally created Dietrich to regain all indications in the Tradierungen of the Pacific area. The "bird with long neck" emerged as name for the thing, which we call large bear or car, and "long shark" stands for the Milky Way. "Rongorongo was already on the first day of the discovery decipherable, because the knowledge was already present", stated Dietrich boldly.

In the choreography of the indications - the figuerlichen symbols are frontal or on the head standing represented in the left or right profile, - the commercial artist believes to recognize the star courses, after those Polynesian sailors on their nocturnal travels navigated. James Cook was impressed already of the maritime achievements of the Polynesier. Dietrich assumes the star knowledge of the Maori, a Polynesian people in Rongorongo, in 14. Century from the Cook islands to New Zealand immigrated. Thus it contradicts the theory that Rongorongo is to have developed on the Osterinsel. It assumes the plotting system, whose minute it sets before less than 200 years, from which Maori of New Zealand to Rapa Nui was brought - at a time, when the tradition of the verbal excessive quantity functioned only in fragments and the knowledge of the old Sternkundigen threatened to go down.

The acknowledgment of the theory can come only of sides of the astronomers. "if we a daily all this in a planetarium after-pursue can, then we know completely accurately the course from Hawaii to the society islands or from New Zealand to Rapa Nui." In addition it needs above all a planetarium - and that is expensive. A sponsor among the sky researchers however already was: Friedrich Witte, technical manager Stuttgart planetariums, with whose assistance already individual results could be supported astronomically.

With his ketzerischen thesis Dietrich in circles that encounters Osterinselfor, which clasp themselves to the text theory, refusal. For the American Steven Roger Fischer, Vizepraesident of the Osterinsel society, is bare the Stuttgart commercial artists a "artist and no scientist". Reason of enough for it to set itself with the new research beginning only at all apart. Whether Fischer's own theory is sufficient for this requirement is doubted, however exactly the same by many experts. In its investigations it recognized a triadisches system. A threeness, which he explained with the fact that approximately each third indication carries an appendage in form of a Phallussymbols. He saw the noted creation singing of the Insulaner in the timber panels. He translated the triad from bird (with Penis), fish and sun with: "all birds begatteten fish. From this the sun came out." Whether these brainstorms are from higher soundness? Dietrich deseams anyhow the interpretations of the American contractor with same Vehemenz of the table: "nothing different one than a Sammelsurium of Polynesian plate conceptions from western view."

In the faith controversy Dietrich receives agreement from Ozeaniern. "in the Pacific area my results that it concerns star navigation, are not anything surprising. Humans never believed there that the in a common manner pornografischen deciphering stand in Rongorongo." Rosa Haoha, a Osterinsulanern living of six in Germany, struck itself immediately on Dietrich's side. Nothing would be their dear than the success of a Rongorongo researcher, who comes the secret of their ancestors on the "himmlischen" trace on the schliche. (c) DIE ZEIT 1999

Let me say here for the record regarding the above comments of Steven Roger Fischer regarding Dietrich, that what Fischer has written about this and other undeciphered scripts is far off the mark and incorrect. Fischer's own alleged decipherments of the Easter Island scripts and of the Phaistos Disk are valiant attempts but are simply wrong, not even close to the truth.

Naether-Verlag has more about Dietrich's work.

Sergei V. Rjabchikov also sees the Easter Island script as astronomy. I have just discovered his writings online and will have to check out his work, but it looks good, as there seems to be confluence with my work and with Dietrich's work.

DECIPHERMENT OF an ETRUSCAN BRONZE LIVER as ASTRONOMY

The decipherment of the Etruscan Bronze Liver of Piacenza shows it to be an astronomical planisphere and calendar. The entire book is available online as The Etruscan Bronze Liver of Piacenza: An Ancient Starfinder and Calendar by Andis Kaulins. There are still some small corrections to be made to my decipherment, since I have made some new discoveries in the many years since I first published this monograph, but in the main, the decipherment is correct. The Etruscan Bronze Liver of Piacenza is an ancient planisphere, starfinder and calendar operating by rising and setting stars.

DECIPHERMENT OF THE PHAISTOS DISK AS MATHEMATICS

The decipherment of the Phaistos Disk (also written as Phaistos Disc) shows it to be an ancient hieroglyphic (pictographic and syllabic) Greek text consisting of an ancient pre-Euclidean lemma about mathematics. The entire decipherment is available as an online book at The Phaistos Disc: Hierogyphic Greek with Euclidean Dimensions - The "Lost Proof" of Parallel Lines by Andis Kaulins.
I have reviewed this decipherment and it is correct - all other decipherments of the Phaistos Disc, previous or later than mine, are simply wrong, both in method as well as in their decipherment substance.

Omniglot.com - Omniglot - a guide to written language

OMNIGLOT.COM

Omniglot - a guide to written language is a superb beautifully done website by Simon Ager on script and writing systems.

Its main menu entries are:
What is writing?
Alphabetic writing systems
Syllabic writing systems
Logographic writing systems
Undeciphered writing systems
which links to a discussion of alleged decipherments of the Phaistos Disk, including LexiLine, which is our site
Alternative writing systems
A-Z index

Origins of Writing

One view of the origins of writing is found at LexiLine, where it is written as follows:

THE GENERAL STAGES OF WRITING DEVELOPMENT

The scholar Ignace Gelb4 distinguished FOUR stages in the evolutionary history of human writing systems.

The first stage was picture writing, in which the picture expressed an idea or concept directly, for example, a picture of a river, lake, pool or well to give the concept of any "water".

The second stage was word-based writing systems, in which the picture expressed a complete word, for example, "water" as a definite word may have been defined by the picture of a river.

The third stage was sound-based syllabic writing systems, in which pictures or symbols expressed one syllable of a word, e.g. "water" as composed of the syllables wa and ter, which was then written with two symbols, one standing e.g. for WA and the other for TER.

The fourth stage was the development of the modern alphabet, which we use today, in which "w-a-t-e-r" is written with five "letters" or "symbols" which are meant to represent certain phonetic sounds. At what stage of writing were the ancient Pharaohs and their priestly scribes?

A discussion of the various views about the origins of writing is found here.

A fun if somewhat limited site with wonderful graphics entitled "Origins of Writing" is found at Utah State University.
This site only explores some features of script.

Ancient Scripts is also an interesting site about writing origins.