The race to decode a mysterious language - Susan Lupack
-
0:07 - 0:10In the early 1900s on the island of Crete,
-
0:10 - 0:14British archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans
uncovered nearly 3,000 tablets -
0:14 - 0:17inscribed with strange symbols.
-
0:17 - 0:19He thought these symbols represented
the language spoken -
0:19 - 0:22by Europe’s oldest civilization.
-
0:22 - 0:26Their meaning would elude scholars
for 50 years. -
0:26 - 0:29Evans discovered these tablets
amid the colorful frescoes -
0:29 - 0:33and maze-like hallways
of the palace of Knossos. -
0:33 - 0:35He called the civilization Minoan—
-
0:35 - 0:39after the mythical Cretan ruler,
King Minos. -
0:39 - 0:43He thought the script, dubbed Linear B,
represented the Minoan language, -
0:43 - 0:47and scholars all over the world
came up with their own theories. -
0:47 - 0:50Was it the lost language of the Etruscans?
-
0:50 - 0:53Or perhaps it represented
an early form of Basque? -
0:53 - 0:57The mystery intensified because Evans
guarded the tablets closely–– -
0:57 - 1:01only 200 of the inscriptions
were published during his lifetime–– -
1:01 - 1:03but he couldn’t decipher the script.
-
1:03 - 1:07However, he did make
two accurate observations: -
1:07 - 1:11the tablets were administrative records,
and the script was a syllabary, -
1:11 - 1:15where each symbol represented
both a consonant and a vowel, -
1:15 - 1:18mixed with characters
that each represented a whole word. -
1:18 - 1:24Evans worked on Linear B for three decades
before a scholar from Brooklyn, New York, -
1:24 - 1:27named Alice Kober
set out to solve the mystery. -
1:27 - 1:30Kober was a professor
of Classics at Brooklyn College -
1:30 - 1:33when few women held such positions.
-
1:33 - 1:37To help in her quest, she taught herself
many languages–– -
1:37 - 1:40knowledge she knew she would need
to decipher Linear B. -
1:40 - 1:44For the next two decades,
she analyzed the symbols. -
1:44 - 1:46Working from the few
available inscriptions, -
1:46 - 1:49she recorded how often
each symbol appeared. -
1:49 - 1:53Then she recorded how frequently
each symbol appeared next to another. -
1:53 - 1:57She stored her findings on scrap paper
in cigarette cartons -
1:57 - 2:00because writing supplies were scarce
during the Second World War. -
2:00 - 2:02By analyzing these frequencies,
-
2:02 - 2:05she discovered that Linear B
relied on word endings -
2:05 - 2:07to give its sentences grammar.
-
2:07 - 2:11From this she began to build a chart
of the relations between the signs, -
2:11 - 2:15coming closer than anyone before
to deciphering Linear B. -
2:15 - 2:21But she died, probably of cancer,
in 1950 at the age of 43. -
2:21 - 2:24While Kober was analyzing
the Knossos tablets, -
2:24 - 2:28an architect named Michael Ventris
was also working to crack Linear B. -
2:28 - 2:33He had become obsessed with Linear B
as a schoolboy after hearing Evans speak. -
2:33 - 2:38He even worked on deciphering
the script while serving in World War II. -
2:38 - 2:41After the war, Ventris
built on Kober’s grid -
2:41 - 2:44using a newly published cache
of Linear B inscriptions -
2:44 - 2:49excavated from a different archeological
site called Pylos, on mainland Greece. -
2:49 - 2:53His real breakthrough came
when he compared the tablets from Pylos -
2:53 - 2:55with those from Knossos
-
2:55 - 3:00and saw that certain words appeared on
tablets from one site but not the other. -
3:00 - 3:03He wondered if those words represented
the names of places -
3:03 - 3:05specific to each location.
-
3:05 - 3:09He knew that over centuries, place names
tend to remain constant, -
3:09 - 3:11and decided to compare Linear B
-
3:11 - 3:15to an ancient syllabary
from the island of Cyprus. -
3:15 - 3:19The Cypriot script was used
hundreds of years after Linear B, -
3:19 - 3:21but some of the symbols were similar—
-
3:21 - 3:23he wondered if the sounds
would be similar, too. -
3:23 - 3:27When Ventris plugged some of the sounds
of the Cypriot syllabary -
3:27 - 3:28into the Linear B inscriptions,
-
3:28 - 3:31he came up with the word Knossos,
-
3:31 - 3:34the name of the city where Evans
had discovered his tablets. -
3:34 - 3:38In a domino effect,
Ventris unraveled Linear B, -
3:38 - 3:41with each word revealing more clearly
that the language of Linear B -
3:41 - 3:44was not Minoan, but Greek.
-
3:44 - 3:49Ventris died in a car crash four years
later, at the age of 34. -
3:49 - 3:52But his discovery rewrote
a chapter of history. -
3:52 - 3:56Evans had insisted that the Minoans
conquered the mainland Greeks, -
3:56 - 3:59and that was why examples of Linear B
were found on the mainland. -
3:59 - 4:03But the discovery that Linear B
represented Greek, and not Minoan, -
4:03 - 4:05showed that the opposite had happened:
-
4:05 - 4:10mainland Greeks invaded Crete and adopted
the Minoan script for their own language. -
4:10 - 4:13But the story isn’t over yet.
-
4:13 - 4:15The actual language of the Minoans,
-
4:15 - 4:18represented by another script
called Linear A, -
4:18 - 4:20has yet to be deciphered.
-
4:20 - 4:23It remains a mystery—
at least for now.
- Title:
- The race to decode a mysterious language - Susan Lupack
- Speaker:
- Susan Lupack
- Description:
-
View full lesson: https://ed.ted.com/lessons/the-race-to-decode-a-mysterious-language-susan-lupack
In the early 1900s, archaeologist Sir Arthur Evans uncovered nearly 3,000 tablets inscribed with strange symbols. He thought the script, dubbed Linear B, represented the Minoan language, while others came up with their own theories. Was it the lost language of the Etruscans? Or an early form of Basque? Its meaning would elude scholars for 50 years. Susan Lupack explores the mysterious inscriptions.
Lesson by Susan Lupack, directed by Movult.
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TED-Ed
- Duration:
- 04:24
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lauren mcalpine edited English subtitles for The race to decode a mysterious language | ||
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Tara Ahmadinejad edited English subtitles for The race to decode a mysterious language | ||
Tara Ahmadinejad edited English subtitles for The race to decode a mysterious language |