# Palaeography · Concept

> Dating and placing a manuscript by the forms of its letters and the habits of its scribes.

Source: https://mysteriesdept.com/concepts/CPT0DECW05E35K0/palaeography  
Publisher: Mysteries Department  
Licence: CC BY 4.0 (credit Mysteries Department and link the page)  

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[Concepts](https://mysteriesdept.com/concepts)Palaeography

Concept · manuscript studies · in 8 mysteries

# Palaeography

Dating and placing a manuscript by the forms of its letters and the habits of its scribes.

[Dead Sea Scrolls: dating, scribes and provenance](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/dead-sea-scrolls-dating)[Vinča signs](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/vinca-signs)[Proto-Sinaitic and Wadi el-Hol: the first alphabet](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-sinaitic)

Handwriting changes with time and place, so the shapes of letters, abbreviations and layout can date a document to within a generation and put it in a region, when there is enough comparable material. Used alongside radiocarbon dating for the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Voynich Manuscript; it is also what tells how many hands wrote a text.

## Where it comes up

**[Dead Sea Scrolls: dating, scribes and provenance](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/dead-sea-scrolls-dating)**

[Enoch was trained on only 24 dated manuscripts, which a reviewer argued is too few to overturn palaeography.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/dead-sea-scrolls-dating/evidence/EVD0D484R1P56HK/enoch-was-trained-on-only-24-dated-manuscripts-which-a)

**[Vinča signs](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/vinca-signs)**

[Q: Do the Dispilio tablet, the Gradešnica plaque and the Karanovo seal belong to the same sign tradition as the Vinča pottery marks?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/vinca-signs/questions/QST0DEDW3GWGE7R/do-the-dispilio-tablet-the-gradesnica-plaque-and-the)[Q: How many distinct Vinča signs are there, and how stable is the inventory across sites and phases?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/vinca-signs/questions/QST0DEDW37PF87Q/how-many-distinct-vinca-signs-are-there-and-how-stable-is)

**[Proto-Sinaitic and Wadi el-Hol: the first alphabet](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-sinaitic)**

Hamilton's palaeography allows use of the script at Serabit over several centuries, which would make a single date for the corpus wrong.

[Q: How many letters did the earliest alphabet have, and which Egyptian signs are their prototypes?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-sinaitic/questions/QST0DEDW8BKH407/how-many-letters-did-the-earliest-alphabet-have-and-which)[Q: When were the Serabit el-Khadim inscriptions written: in the Middle Kingdom, about 1850 BC, or in the New Kingdom?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-sinaitic/questions/QST0DEDW70ERVE3/when-were-the-serabit-el-khadim-inscriptions-written-in-the)[Hamilton's palaeography allows use of the script at Serabit over several centuries, which would make a single date for…](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-sinaitic/evidence/EVD0DEEAQWPJRTB/hamiltons-palaeography-allows-use-of-the-script-at-serabit)

**[Unread oracle bone characters](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/oracle-bone-undeciphered)**

[Q: How many distinct graphs does the oracle-bone script have once scribal variants are merged?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/oracle-bone-undeciphered/questions/QST0DEDQEXW42BX/how-many-distinct-graphs-does-the-oracle-bone-script-have)

**[Byblos syllabary](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary)**

[Q: When were the Byblos inscriptions written?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/questions/QST0DEDQQ0JG3EE/when-were-the-byblos-inscriptions-written)

**[Glozel: the inscribed tablets of the Fradin field](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/glozel)**

[Q: Which published alphabets do the Glozel signs resemble, and could a forger of the 1920s have drawn on them?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/glozel/questions/QST0DEDTR4X4Q7P/which-published-alphabets-do-the-glozel-signs-resemble-and)

**[Eteocretan and Eteocypriot](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/eteocretan-eteocypriot)**

[Q: Is the Psychro inscription a genuine Eteocretan text or a modern forgery?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/eteocretan-eteocypriot/questions/QST0DEDZ9AN6YAA/is-the-psychro-inscription-a-genuine-eteocretan-text-or-a)

**[Linear A](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/linear-a)**

The fraction signs, long partly obscure, were given a consistent set of values in 2021 by Corazza, Ferrara, Montecchi, Tamburini and Valério, who combined palaeography with a computational search for value assignments…

## Cite it

```
Mysteries Department. (2026). Palaeography [Concept CPT0DECW05E35K0]. https://mysteriesdept.com/r/CPT0DECW05E35K0
```

Key

**CPT** 0DECW05E35K0

Record

Concept

Field

Manuscript studies

Related

[Codicology](https://mysteriesdept.com/concepts/CPT0DECW064SH8S/codicology) · [Radiocarbon dating](https://mysteriesdept.com/concepts/CPT0DECW013KR34/radiocarbon-dating)

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Related concepts

[Codicology](https://mysteriesdept.com/concepts/CPT0DECW064SH8S/codicology)[Radiocarbon dating](https://mysteriesdept.com/concepts/CPT0DECW013KR34/radiocarbon-dating)

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