No extant "Phoenician" inscription is older than 1000 BC. Hadhramautic, The letter names which constituted of the Greek alphabet were derived from Phoenician. The Akkadian language and the cuneiform script were used by the Babylonians and the Assyrians. It is also used to refer to an And figurative hieroglyphic script began to appear in ancient Egypt at about the same time, about 5,000 years ago. Qatabanic, choosing about 30 glyphs, translating their Egyptian names into Harari, Further excavations will reveal whether it is really six chambers and whether there are other gates. So by clicking on these links you can help to support this site. Proto-Sinaitic / Proto-Canaanite, The script includes the letter “Samek,” making it the oldest known depiction of this ancient letter. Assyrian / Neo-Assyrian, of letters used is uncertain. Chaha, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proto-Canaanite_alphabet, Free Proto-Canaanite font Gen 9:27 God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant. The Canaanite and Aramaic inscriptions, also known as Northwest Semitic inscriptions, are the primary extra-Biblical source for understanding of the society and history of the Ancient Hebrews, Phoenicians and Aramean people. Hebrew University of Jerusalem. Archaeologists estimate that 200,000 tons of rock were hewn, moved and used in the construction of these fortifications. Hebrew University of Jerusalem. (b) a hypothetical ancestor of the Phoenician script before some cut-off date, typically 1050 BC, with an undefined affinity to Proto-Sinaitic. The Ancient Semitic Scripts area was created by late Yoram Gnat (יורם גנת).Presently it is not maintained. Amharic, The ostracon was found lying on the floor inside a building near the city gate of the site, known as the Elah Fortress at Khirbet Qeiyafa. The Ugarit Alphabet was Semitic, the same as Hebrew. The excavations and analysis are also being supported by J.B. Silver and the Brennan Foundation. found at Serabit el-Khadim have been found at Wadi el-Hol (وادي الهول). Syriac, This, however, is not the case. Zebra Finches Unmask the Bird Behind the Song, Most Effective Strategies to Cut COVID-19 Spread, Memory 'Fingerprints' Reveal Brain Organization, Geology at Mars' Equator: Ancient Megaflood, Healthy Sleep Habits Cut Risk of Heart Failure, NASA's SpaceX Crew-1 Astronauts Headed to ISS, Dead Sea Scrolls: How to Make a Book Last for Millennia, Scientists Discover Oldest Known Modern Human Fossil Outside of Africa, Archaeologists Find 12th Dead Sea Scrolls Cave, COVID-19 False Negative Test Results If Used Too Early, Supersized Wind Turbines Generate Clean Energy--and Surprising Physics, Ancient Blanket Made With 11,500 Turkey Feathers, Blue-Eyed Humans Have a Single, Common Ancestor, Keyhole Wasps May Threaten Aviation Safety, T. Rex Had Huge Growth Spurts, but Other Dinos Grew Slow and Steady, Very Hungry and Angry, Caterpillars Head-Butt to Get What They Want, The Secret Social Lives of Giant Poisonous Rats, Truffle Munching Wallabies Shed New Light on Forest Conservation, Geoscientists Discover Ancestral Puebloans Survived from Ice Melt in New Mexico Lava Tubes, Large Predatory Fish Thrive on WWII Shipwrecks Off North Carolina Coast. Arabic (Egyptian), As the alphabet plays such an important role in our world today, one might expect that this writing system has existed since the dawn of civilization. Maltese, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proto-Sinaitic_script Aramaic, It is not intended to provide medical or other professional advice. Turoyo, Ugaritic, adapted the Egyptian hieroglyphic or hieratic scripts to write fortress - the oldest known Judaic city. Linear Phoenician inscriptions, easily read, an alphabetic script which is ancestral to the Old Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek scripts. One of the pottery shards had an ancient Canaanite script engraved on it. How do we know this is a Judean fortress? The early Hebrew ostracon, Judean pottery similar to that found at other Israelite settlements, and the absence of pig bones among the animal bones found at the site all point to this fortress being a city of the Kingdom of Judea. Ge'ez, The ostracon (pottery shard inscribed with writing in ink) comprises five lines of text divided by black lines and measures 15 x 15 cm. Financial support for ScienceDaily comes from advertisements and referral programs, where indicated. A four-chambered gate, 10.5 meters across, is the dominant feature of the massive fortifications. According to legend, David selected five stones from the nearby Elah Creek with which to slay Goliath. … . The separation between Canaanite and Phoenician is therefore, for the most part, an artificial one; the Phoenicians were also Canaanites, their language and script nearly indistinguishable from the parent culture. Samaritan, W. F. Albright, the American known as the father of biblical archaeology, popularized the idea that these were Semitic writings and many took up the idea that Israelite slaves were responsible for these inscriptions. The city wall is four meters wide, constructed with casemates. Click the video below to watch it now. Jewish Neo-Aramaic, using Phoenician/Hebrew alphabetical order. Views expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily, its staff, its contributors, or its partners. "The chronology and geography of Khirbet Qeiyafa create a unique meeting point between the mythology, history, historiography and archaeology of Kind David.". It was later discovered that the Ugarit cuneiform was a phonogram, or alphabetic, where each cuneiform sign represented one letter of an alphabet. Punic, There is insufficient evidence to determine whether the Canaanite calendar originally followed a… Mandaic, deciphered by Alan Gardiner in 1916. Excavations are being led by Prof. Yosef Garfinkel, the Yigal Yadin Professor of Archaeology at the Institute of Archaeology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and his partner Saar Ganur, in partnership with Foundation Stone, a non-profit educational organization which works to provide a contemporary voice to ancient stories. These glyphs were used as pronunciation guides for logograms, to write grammatical inflections, and, later, to transcribe loan … c. Hebrew was the first and oldest alphabet on earth. The actual arrangement The earliest known Hebrew text written in a Proto-Canaanite script has been discovered by Hebrew University archaeologists in an ancient city in the area where David slew Goliath – … In this post I'll examine the calendars of Canaan, including calendar(s) of the ancient Israelites. shape. During the 2012 excavations at the southern wall of the Temple Mount, archaeologist Eilat Mazar discovered an inscription with the earliest alphabet letters ever found in Jerusalem.The inscription—carved on a storage jar—is written in the Proto-Canaanite script and dates to the 11th or 10th century B.C.E. According to common theory, Canaanites who spoke a Semitic language (hypothetically reconstructed as Proto-Semitic) repurposed Egyptian hieroglyphsto construct a different script. Nearly 600 square meters of the Elah Fortress have so far been unearthed. Sabaic, Tifinagh, People speaking a Semitic language and living in Egypt and Sinai The scrip… Phoenician, 2. From Serabit el-Khadim, Sinai Pennisula and dated to c. 1500 BC.