# The Byblos syllabary > The Byblos syllabary is an undeciphered script known from about fourteen inscriptions found by Maurice Dunand in the temple quarter of Byblos, Lebanon… Source: https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary Publisher: Mysteries Department Licence: CC BY 4.0 (credit Mysteries Department and link the page) Updated: 2026-10-31T15:31:30+00:00 --- **MYS** 0DEDM2A11RSG·Mystery · script # The Byblos syllabary **0** [Follow][Ask a question](https://mysteriesdept.com/questions/key-questions?mystery=byblos-syllabary) The Byblos syllabary ![Photograph: a pseudo-hieroglyphic inscription from Byblos on display in the National Museum of Beirut](https://mysteriesdept.com/media/folio/byblos-syllabary-lead) Onceinawhile · CC BY-SA 4.0 Where Byblos (Jbeil), Lebanon; temple quarter⁠[[1]] When Disputed: c. 1900-1600 BC (Dunand), c. 2400 BC (Mendenhall) or c. 900-830 BC (Sass)⁠[[6]] Corpus Ten main inscriptions with 1,046 signs, plus four stone fragments and a few palimpsests; about 14 items⁠[[3]] Standard edition Dunand, Byblia Grammata (1945), pp. 71-138⁠[[1]] Sign inventory 114 (Dunand), about 90 (Garbini), no fewer than 100 (Vita and Zamora)⁠[[3]] Direction Right to left as a rule; one spatula face left to right; one stele in vertical columns⁠[[4]] Language Unknown⁠[[3]] Holder Directorate General of Antiquities, Lebanon (National Museum of Beirut)⁠[[18]] Unicode Not encoded; tentative unproposed block at U+1EB20⁠[[15]] Status Unexplained Questions 0 of 7 answered Places [All 2](https://mysteriesdept.com/places?mystery=byblos-syllabary) [**Byblos** The ancient port city on the Lebanese coast, 37 km north of Beirut, excavated by Maurice Dunand from 1924 to 1975. All the pseudo-hieroglyphic inscriptions were found in its temple quarter between 1928 and 1932, with four more stone fragments published in 1978.](https://mysteriesdept.com/records/PLC0DEDHMPQSAM4/byblos-jbeil)[**National Museum of Beirut** Lebanon's national archaeological museum on the Mathaf crossroads in Beirut, opened 1942. The Byblos excavation finds, including the bronze tablets and spatulas in the pseudo-hieroglyphic script, belong to its collection; the museum was closed and its objects encased in concrete during the civil war of 1975 to 1990 and reopened after restoration in 1999.](https://mysteriesdept.com/records/PLC0DEDHN53SJ8V/national-museum-of-beirut) Concepts [All](https://mysteriesdept.com/concepts) [Decipherment](https://mysteriesdept.com/concepts/CPT0DECW01ZWFP5/decipherment)[Frequency analysis](https://mysteriesdept.com/concepts/CPT0DECVZZJW77N/frequency-analysis)[Logographic script](https://mysteriesdept.com/concepts/CPT0DECW02H879M/logographic-script)[Syllabary](https://mysteriesdept.com/concepts/CPT0DECW02C55EK/syllabary) Catalog key**MYS** 0DEDM2A11RSG [Byblos](https://mysteriesdept.com/records/PLC0DEDHMPQSAM4/byblos-jbeil), on the coast of Lebanon north of Beirut, was a Bronze Age port with close ties to Egypt and, later, the Phoenician city where the oldest long alphabetic inscriptions were found. Between 1928 and 1932 [Maurice Dunand](https://mysteriesdept.com/records/FIG0DEDHXYX3GYS/maurice-dunand)'s excavations in its temple area turned up a small group of inscribed objects in a script nobody could read: two bronze tablets inscribed on both faces, four small bronze spatulas, and fragments of stone stelae⁠[[1]]. Because the signs looked like simplified Egyptian hieroglyphs, Dunand called the script pseudo-hieroglyphic. He published the ten texts in 1945 in Byblia Grammata with photographs, drawings and a list of 114 signs, and added four short stone fragments in 1978⁠[[1]]⁠[[2]]. The corpus is tiny. The ten main inscriptions hold 1,046 signs between them, and the two bronze tablets, c with about 225 signs and d with about 457, carry most of the material⁠[[3]]. An inventory of around 100 signs is too large for an alphabet and too small for a logographic system, so almost everyone agrees the script is mainly syllabic, with each sign standing for a consonant plus a vowel⁠[[4]]⁠[[3]]. The texts run right to left as a rule, one spatula face runs left to right, and one stele is written in vertical columns⁠[[4]]. Beyond this, little is secure. The language is unknown. The date is argued over: Dunand placed the texts in the nineteenth to eighteenth centuries BC from their find context, [Mendenhall](https://mysteriesdept.com/records/FIG0DEDHYH9EGZF/george-e-mendenhall) pushed them back to about 2400 BC, and Benjamin Sass has argued from their likeness to ninth-century Byblian alphabetic inscriptions that they belong around 900 to 830 BC⁠[[4]]⁠[[5]]⁠[[6]]. [Decipherment](https://mysteriesdept.com/concepts/CPT0DECW01ZWFP5/decipherment) has been claimed several times. [Édouard Dhorme](https://mysteriesdept.com/records/FIG0DEDHY3R2CBJ/edouard-dhorme) read the texts as Phoenician in 1946 by starting from a supposed date formula; George Mendenhall read them in 1985 as an archaic West Semitic language older than the split between Canaanite and Arabic; [Jan Best](https://mysteriesdept.com/records/FIG0DEDJ7FPN0K6/jan-best) read the two tablets in 2008 as a Semitic temple dedication with Akkadian and Hurrian words, using sign comparisons with Cretan scripts⁠[[7]]⁠[[5]]⁠[[8]]. Each produced translations that other scholars found arbitrary, and none passed an independent check. Brian [Colless](https://mysteriesdept.com/records/FIG0DEDHYN4HATX/brian-e-colless) has defended and extended Mendenhall's values since 1992 and argues that the Phoenician alphabet grew out of this [syllabary](https://mysteriesdept.com/concepts/CPT0DECW02C55EK/syllabary), a view that is not shared by most specialists⁠[[9]]⁠[[10]]⁠[[3]]. A 2024 assessment by the Bern decipherment group GEAS tested the Best and Woudhuizen values against a seal that labels Akhenaten's daughters in Byblos signs and found that the proposal fails and cannot be falsified on its own terms⁠[[11]]. What is new since 2019 is method rather than result. [Michael Mäder](https://mysteriesdept.com/records/FIG0DEDJ9NQW40S/michael-mader) transcribed the whole corpus with one Unicode private-use character per sign variant and ran sequence analysis to find repeated morphemes and probable word boundaries without assuming sound values, reviving the structural approach [Harvey Sobelman](https://mysteriesdept.com/records/FIG0DEDJAPE62Q6/harvey-sobelman) had proposed in 1961⁠[[12]]⁠[[13]]. The same group has proposed the first sound values anchored in external evidence, me and pa, from the Akhenaten seal⁠[[14]]. The script sits on the Unicode roadmap as a tentative, unproposed block and the only edition remains Dunand's 1945 volume⁠[[15]]⁠[[1]]. Of the 7 questions on this site, 0 are answered. ### Key questionsset by the editors [**Can any sound values be fixed from external evidence, such as the Akhenaten-daughters seal or the Egyptian parent signs?** ](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/questions/QST0DEDQQKMXR41/can-any-sound-values-be-fixed-from-external-evidence-such-as)No answer ahead yet [**How many distinct signs does the script have, and how is it structured?** ](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/questions/QST0DEDQQ8C80YA/how-many-distinct-signs-does-the-script-have-and-how-is-it)No answer ahead yet [**What language do the Byblos pseudo-hieroglyphic inscriptions record?** ](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/questions/QST0DEDQPQYVGBW/what-language-do-the-byblos-pseudo-hieroglyphic-inscriptions)No answer ahead yet [**When were the Byblos inscriptions written?** ](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/questions/QST0DEDQQ0JG3EE/when-were-the-byblos-inscriptions-written)No answer ahead yet [**Where did the Byblos signs come from, and is the script related to the Proto-Sinaitic and Phoenician alphabets?** ](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/questions/QST0DEDQQBGYEW6/where-did-the-byblos-signs-come-from-and-is-the-script)No answer ahead yet [All 7 questions ](https://mysteriesdept.com/questions/key-questions?mystery=byblos-syllabary) ### Research sessions1 so far · last 31 Oct `S-001`[The Byblos syllabary seeded: corpus, readings and open data](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/sessions/SES0DEDWWFFGTGW/session-1-the-byblos-syllabary-seeded-corpus-readings-and) 31 Oct **18** evidence**7** questions raised**11** answers proposedNo question changed standing [All 1 sessions ](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/sessions) ## The object The corpus is a handful of small objects from one site. Dunand's ten inscriptions of 1945 are lettered a to j. Two are bronze tablets inscribed on both faces: tablet c, about 16 by 11 cm with about 225 signs, and tablet d, about 21 by 12 cm with about 457 signs, together carrying two thirds of all known text⁠[[3]]. Four are bronze spatulas, flat triangular blades about 5 by 9 cm with a stem handle, inscribed on one or both faces with 17 to 84 signs each; Dunand took them for labels attached to votive gifts⁠[[1]]. Four are fragments of stone stelae, of which fragment a, with about 120 signs in a monumental style with ruled lines, is the largest, and fragment g is written in vertical columns⁠[[3]]. In 1978 Dunand added four short stone fragments, k to n, with 10 to 45 signs each; four lines on fragment l have been read by James [Hoch](https://mysteriesdept.com/records/FIG0DEDJ8S5DPTD/james-e-hoch) as an Egyptian hieratic date formula, the one externally readable passage in the corpus⁠[[2]]⁠[[16]]. A few Byblos signs also appear under later Phoenician inscriptions, on the Azarba'al spatula and other objects reused as palimpsests, and isolated signs occur on weapons and pottery; Colless and Garbini have assigned further objects from Megiddo, Egypt and elsewhere to the same script, assignments that Vita and Zamora call very dubious⁠[[3]]⁠[[17]]. The signs on the bronzes were punched with chisels rather than scratched. The find contexts were recorded by Dunand but none is stratigraphically secure, which is why the date is open⁠[[6]]. The objects belong to the Lebanese antiquities service and are kept in Beirut; some travelled to Leiden for the 2024 exhibition Byblos: A Legacy Unearthed⁠[[18]]. The only full edition is Dunand's, with photographs and his drawings; later analysts have mostly worked from the drawings, a dependence the GEAS assessors single out as a weakness⁠[[1]]⁠[[11]]. ### Timeline **Timeline** Squeezed where little happened. Each mark is a published claim, by how it stands:AcceptedMost likelyStill possibleDisputedRuled out ## What is known The size of the inventory is the strongest structural fact. Dunand counted 114 signs; Garbini reduced that to about 90 by treating damaged forms and variants as one; Vita and Zamora put the true figure at no fewer than 100, and the GEAS transcription works with about 100 graphemes⁠[[4]]⁠[[3]]⁠[[11]]. The two tablets alone use 74 distinct signs and the other texts add 30⁠[[4]]. A set of that size cannot be an alphabet and is unlikely to be purely logographic, so the script is taken to be a syllabary, probably of open consonant-vowel syllables, with some [logograms](https://mysteriesdept.com/concepts/CPT0DECW02H879M/logographic-script); Garbini noted that a Semitic consonant set times three vowels would give 66 to 168 signs, which brackets the inventory⁠[[3]]. A statistical estimate of the phonetisation degree, about 69 percent, implies that roughly a third of the signs should be logograms⁠[[11]]. Direction is settled: right to left, with one spatula face running left to right and one stele in vertical columns⁠[[4]]. Short vertical strokes on several spatulas and stone fragments appear to divide words, though not consistently⁠[[1]]. Sobelman in 1961 and Mäder from 2019 have shown that recurring sign sequences, likely morphemes, and probable word boundaries can be extracted from the texts without knowing any sound values⁠[[13]]⁠[[12]]. The origin of the sign shapes is partly known. Dunand found about 50 signs similar to Egyptian hieroglyphic or hieratic forms and 25 apparently taken from the hieroglyphic repertoire; Hoch argued that the signs derive specifically from the Egyptian uniconsonantal signs, and a GEAS shape comparison found that eight of the twelve most frequent Byblos signs lie close to an Egyptian consonant sign⁠[[3]]⁠[[19]]⁠[[20]]. Egyptian inspiration is therefore the consensus, but a direct and exclusive derivation is not proven⁠[[3]]. Two sound values, me and pa, have been proposed from a cylinder seal that names Akhenaten's three daughters in Byblos signs beside their hieroglyphic names on the Berlin family stela; the paper is not yet published⁠[[14]]. Everything else about the sounds and the language is hypothesis. ## What has been tested The first attempts came within a year of publication. Bedřich Hrozný, the decipherer of Hittite, tried the stone stele in 1946 and Édouard Dhorme published a Phoenician reading of the whole corpus the same year, starting from a group of seven strokes on tablet c that he took for a year number in a date formula and reading the preceding signs as Phoenician b-šnt, "in the year"⁠[[21]]⁠[[7]]. Dhorme assigned values to about 75 signs, but the texts that resulted were not coherent Phoenician and the reading was not taken up⁠[[4]]. Malachi Martin re-examined the objects in 1961 and reclassified the signs into 27 palaeographic classes, correcting Dunand's readings, but never published the promised continuation⁠[[22]]⁠[[23]]. George Mendenhall's 1985 book is the most complete claim. He posited 26 consonant signs and 63 consonant-vowel signs writing a West Semitic language older than the division between Canaanite and Arabic, dated the texts to about 2400 BC, and translated eight of them, tablet c as a marriage contract⁠[[5]]⁠[[4]]. Giovanni Garbini's review found the translations cryptic and the method unconstrained, and most Semitists set the reading aside; Colless is its one sustained defender⁠[[24]]⁠[[10]]. Jan Best's reading of 2008 to 2010, built on sign comparisons with Cretan Hieroglyphic and Linear A, produced a dedication to the sun god Shuraya in a Semitic language with Akkadian and Hurrian words; Fred Woudhuizen's 2007 variant added many logograms and was rejected by Best himself⁠[[8]]⁠[[25]]. In 2024 Elisabeth Schmutz and Michael Mäder tested the Best and Woudhuizen values against the GEAS methodology, the seal bilingual and a phonetisation statistic; the values failed the names on the seal, allographs had been posited only where translations needed them, and the proposal could not be falsified⁠[[11]]. Garbini's own 2009 reading, which links the spatulas to later Phoenician spatulas and takes tablet c as a remedy, is the one proposal the assessors judged methodologically admissible, and it awaits testing⁠[[26]]⁠[[11]]. Ihor Rassokha's 2017 reading of the texts as Sanskrit through Brahmi letter values assumes a script attested a thousand years after any proposed date for Byblos and has no following⁠[[27]]. ## The readings The live positions divide along two axes, language and date. On language, the oldest position is that the script writes a Canaanite dialect close to Phoenician, as Dhorme held⁠[[7]]. Mendenhall and Colless hold instead for an archaic West Semitic language from before the Canaanite and Arabic branches separated, with Colless treating the syllabary as the parent of the proto-alphabet, so that 18 of the 22 Phoenician letters would descend from its signs⁠[[5]]⁠[[10]]. Best read a Northwest Semitic language with Akkadian and Hurrian loanwords, which would fit a Late Bronze Age cosmopolitan Byblos⁠[[8]]. Rassokha's Sanskrit stands alone⁠[[27]]. The default among epigraphers, stated by Vita and Zamora and by Daniels, is that the language is undetermined: a Semitic language is probable from the place, but nothing in the texts yet proves it, and the corpus is too small to force a reading⁠[[3]]⁠[[28]]. On date, Dunand's Middle Bronze Age placement, about 1900 to 1600 BC, remains the conventional one and is supported by the Egyptian look of the signs⁠[[4]]. Mendenhall and Hoch favour an earlier origin, in the Old Kingdom or Early Bronze Age, because the closest Egyptian parallels are old⁠[[5]]⁠[[19]]. Sass argues the opposite: the shared word dividers, framing and sign forms with ninth-century Byblian alphabetic texts, and spatulas inscribed in both scripts, place the pseudo-hieroglyphs around 900 to 830 BC, in which case some signs imitate cursive letters rather than foreshadow them⁠[[6]]. The two disputes interact. If Sass is right, the script is a short-lived prestige system of the Iron Age and Colless's genealogy of the alphabet is reversed; if Dunand or Hoch is right, the script is a Bronze Age Egyptian-inspired syllabary and a possible relative of the proto-alphabet, which itself is attested from about 1900 BC⁠[[6]]⁠[[10]]. ### Published claims **Published claims and their status** | Year | Who | Claimed | Status | Reason | |---|---|---|---|---| | 1945 | Maurice Dunand⁠[1] | The inscriptions are a local Byblian syllabary of 114 signs inspired by Egyptian writing and date to the nineteenth to eighteenth centuries BC. | Still possible | The Egyptian inspiration is the consensus, but no object has a secure find context and the dating is contested⁠[6] | | 1946 | Bedřich Hrozný⁠[21] | The stone stele can be read by comparison with other ancient scripts. | Ruled out | The attempt produced no reading that anyone else could reproduce or extend⁠[4] | | 1946 | Édouard Dhorme⁠[7] | The texts are Phoenician, read from a date formula on tablet c, with values for about 75 signs. | Ruled out | The values did not yield coherent Phoenician beyond the starting formula and Semitists did not adopt them⁠[4] | | 1961 | Harvey Sobelman⁠[13] | Word boundaries and grammatical patterns can be found from sign sequences without assigning sound values. | Accepted | Daniels recommended the approach and Mäder's 2019 computational analysis reproduced it on the full corpus⁠[12] | | 1962 | Malachi Martin⁠[23] | Dunand's 114 signs reduce to 27 palaeographic classes once variants are grouped. | Still possible | The reclassification was never completed and later counts of 90 to 100 signs do not follow it⁠[3] | | 1985 | George E. Mendenhall⁠[5] | The script has 26 consonant and 63 consonant-vowel signs and writes an archaic West Semitic language of about 2400 BC. | Disputed | Garbini's review found the translations cryptic and the method unconstrained, and most Semitists set the reading aside⁠[24] | | 1990 | James E. Hoch⁠[19] | The Byblos signs derive from the Egyptian uniconsonantal signs and their remains formed the core of the Semitic alphabets. | Still possible | A 2021 shape comparison found eight of the twelve most frequent signs close to Egyptian consonant signs, but the result is preliminary and the alphabet link is disputed⁠[20] | | 1992 | Brian E. Colless⁠[9] | Mendenhall's values are broadly right, the script is a West Semitic logo-syllabary used across the Levant, and the proto-alphabet is a simplification of it. | Disputed | Vita and Zamora judge the reconstruction speculative and the extra inscriptions assigned to the script very dubious⁠[3] | | 1995 | James E. Hoch⁠[16] | Four lines of stone fragment l are an Egyptian hieratic date formula. | Most likely | The reading uses a known script and is reported without dispute, but the fragment is small and it dates only itself⁠[3] | | 2007 | Fred C. Woudhuizen⁠[25] | Best's approach, with many more logograms, yields readable texts. | Ruled out | Best rejected the revision and the 2024 GEAS test found the values fail the seal bilingual and cannot be falsified⁠[11] | | 2008 | Jan Best⁠[8] | Tablets c and d record a Semitic temple dedication to the sun god Shuraya with Akkadian and Hurrian words, read through Cretan sign parallels. | Disputed | The GEAS assessment found the values fail the names on the Akhenaten seal and allographs posited only where the translation needed them⁠[11] | | 2009 | Giovanni Garbini⁠[26] | The spatulas belong with later Phoenician spatulas and tablet c is a remedy against vomiting. | Still possible | The GEAS assessors judged the method admissible but have not yet tested the reading⁠[11] | | 2017 | Ihor Rassokha⁠[27] | The texts are Sanskrit written with Brahmi letter values. | Ruled out | Brahmi is attested from the mid first millennium BC, a thousand years after any proposed date for the Byblos texts, and no epigrapher has taken the reading up⁠[3] | | 2018 | Juan-Pablo Vita and José Ángel Zamora⁠[3] | The script is undeciphered, probably syllabic and Egyptian-inspired, and no proposal has produced solid results. | Accepted | It is the current specialist consensus and the GEAS tests of 2024 confirmed the failure of the most recent reading⁠[11] | | 2019 | Benjamin Sass⁠[6] | The inscriptions date to about 900 to 830 BC and share features with ninth-century Byblian alphabetic texts. | Still possible | The argument rests on affinities, not stratigraphy, and conflicts with the Egyptian derivation of the signs⁠[3] | | 2022 | Michael Mäder⁠[12] | Morphemes and word boundaries can be detected computationally in the Unicode-transcribed corpus. | Still possible | The method is published open access but the boundaries have not yet been checked against an independent reading⁠[12] | | 2023 | Michael Mäder⁠[14] | A cylinder seal naming Akhenaten's daughters gives the values me and pa. | Still possible | The paper is unpublished and the seal's attribution to the Byblos script rests on Garbini's 2004 publication⁠[14] | | 2024 | Elisabeth Schmutz and Michael Mäder⁠[11] | The Best and Woudhuizen decipherment is unfalsifiable and its translations are wrong. | Most likely | The tests are explicit and reproducible but the assessment is not peer-reviewed⁠[11] | ## What would settle it A bilingual would settle the sounds, and one small one may already exist: the cylinder seal naming Akhenaten's daughters, if its attribution to the Byblos script holds, would fix several syllabic values at once and test every proposed syllabary against them⁠[[14]]⁠[[11]]. Any decipherment must now read those names correctly. A second check is internal. Mäder's Unicode transcription makes [sign frequencies](https://mysteriesdept.com/concepts/CPT0DECVZZJW77N/frequency-analysis), positional statistics and recurring sequences reproducible; a proposed grammar must match the morpheme boundaries that emerge without sound values, and a proposed sign list must respect the variant distinctions in the data rather than merging them where a translation requires⁠[[12]]⁠[[11]]. The date could be settled without reading a word. The bronzes can be analysed for alloy composition and compared with dated Byblian bronzes of the Middle Bronze Age and the Iron Age; the palimpsest spatula, with Byblos signs under Phoenician letters, fixes only a lower bound⁠[[6]]. A re-examination of Dunand's excavation records, now returned from Geneva to Lebanon, might recover find contexts for individual objects⁠[[6]]. New photographs would help everyone: nearly all work since 1945 has relied on Dunand's drawings, and the GEAS assessors note that readings have been built on drawn forms that the photographs do not always support⁠[[11]]. Finally, new texts are the real need. A corpus of about 1,000 signs with no document longer than 460 signs cannot support a decipherment by internal analysis alone, and claims that the script occurs at Megiddo, in Egypt or in Italy should be tested object by object, since a confirmed find outside Byblos would both enlarge the corpus and date it⁠[[3]]⁠[[17]]. ## Questions 0 of 7 questions are answered. **Key questions** [All 7](https://mysteriesdept.com/questions/key-questions?mystery=byblos-syllabary) **0** [Can any sound values be fixed from external evidence, such as the Akhenaten-daughters seal or the Egyptian parent signs?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/questions/QST0DEDQQKMXR41/can-any-sound-values-be-fixed-from-external-evidence-such-as) 0 of 0 sub-questions answered·0 No evidence yet **0** [How many distinct signs does the script have, and how is it structured?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/questions/QST0DEDQQ8C80YA/how-many-distinct-signs-does-the-script-have-and-how-is-it) 0 of 0 sub-questions answered·0 No evidence yet **0** [What language do the Byblos pseudo-hieroglyphic inscriptions record?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/questions/QST0DEDQPQYVGBW/what-language-do-the-byblos-pseudo-hieroglyphic-inscriptions) 0 of 1 sub-questions answered·0 Open: 6 answers, none ahead **0** [When were the Byblos inscriptions written?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/questions/QST0DEDQQ0JG3EE/when-were-the-byblos-inscriptions-written) 0 of 0 sub-questions answered·0 Open: 3 answers, none ahead **0** [Where did the Byblos signs come from, and is the script related to the Proto-Sinaitic and Phoenician alphabets?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/questions/QST0DEDQQBGYEW6/where-did-the-byblos-signs-come-from-and-is-the-script) 0 of 1 sub-questions answered·0 Open: 2 answers, none ahead ## Evidence 17 findings [What language do the Byblos pseudo-hieroglyphic inscriptions record?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/questions/QST0DEDQPQYVGBW/what-language-do-the-byblos-pseudo-hieroglyphic-inscriptions)9 findings [The Byblos inscriptions record Phoenician or a closely related Canaanite dialect.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/answers/ANS0DEDS6V0FS2V/the-byblos-inscriptions-record-phoenician-or-a-closely)Still possible +[The inscriptions share word dividers, framing and some sign forms with ninth-century Byblian Phoenician inscriptions, and one spatula carries both scripts.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDTKCJPF5X/the-inscriptions-share-word-dividers-framing-and-some-sign)Suggestive −[Dhorme's values for about 75 signs did not yield coherent Phoenician texts beyond the starting formula, and no Semitist adopted them.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDTK1261EK/dhormes-values-for-about-75-signs-did-not-yield-coherent)Supported [An archaic West Semitic language (Mendenhall, Colless)](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/answers/ANS0DEDS7919YAY/an-archaic-west-semitic-language-mendenhall-colless)Still possible +[Colless reports that 18 of 22 Phoenician letters have a shape ancestor in the syllabary and that his own values, largely agreeing with Mendenhall's, read further inscriptions from Megiddo and elsewhere.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDTQJ3MBDC/colless-reports-that-18-of-22-phoenician-letters-have-a)Speculative −[Garbini's review found Mendenhall's translations cryptic and his method unconstrained, and the reading was set aside by most Semitists.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDTP40P1F4/garbinis-review-found-mendenhalls-translations-cryptic-and)Supported [Northwest Semitic with Akkadian and Hurrian elements (Best, Woudhuizen)](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/answers/ANS0DEDS82XZT4Q/northwest-semitic-with-akkadian-and-hurrian-elements-best)Still possible −[Tested against the Akhenaten-daughters seal and a phonetisation statistic, the Best and Woudhuizen values fail to produce the names and posit allographs only where translations require them.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDV4524AXH/tested-against-the-akhenaten-daughters-seal-and-a)Supported −[Best himself rejected Woudhuizen's revision of the reading, and Vita and Zamora judge Woudhuizen's correspondences highly speculative and his translations unacceptable.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDV4CMT8KV/best-himself-rejected-woudhuizens-revision-of-the-reading)Suggestive [The Byblos inscriptions record Sanskrit, written with signs whose values are those of the Brahmi letters they resemble.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/answers/ANS0DEDSH1KX1WA/the-byblos-inscriptions-record-sanskrit-written-with-signs)Still possible −[Every proposed date for the Byblos inscriptions, from about 2400 to about 830 BC, is centuries earlier than the first attestation of the Brahmi script, so Brahmi letter values cannot have been the model.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDV4KG6RGK/every-proposed-date-for-the-byblos-inscriptions-from-about)Established [Undetermined: the texts cannot yet be assigned to a language](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/answers/ANS0DEDSH7W3M43/undetermined-the-texts-cannot-yet-be-assigned-to-a-language)Still possible +[The current specialist overviews conclude that the script remains undeciphered and that no proposal since 1946 has produced solid results.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDV4SM9H2R/the-current-specialist-overviews-conclude-that-the-script)Supported +[Sequence analysis of the Unicode-transcribed corpus recovers morphemes and word boundaries without sound values, giving a language-neutral structure that no reading has yet been checked against.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDV51A295T/sequence-analysis-of-the-unicode-transcribed-corpus-recovers)Suggestive [When were the Byblos inscriptions written?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/questions/QST0DEDQQ0JG3EE/when-were-the-byblos-inscriptions-written)5 findings [Middle Bronze Age, c. 1900-1600 BC (Dunand)](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/answers/ANS0DEDT09DQ846/middle-bronze-age-c-1900-1600-bc-dunand)Still possible +[Dunand's excavation context and the hieratic character of the signs led him to a nineteenth to eighteenth century BC date, which Posener's nineteenth-century terminus and the handbooks follow.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDVKMSHWNN/dunands-excavation-context-and-the-hieratic-character-of-the)Suggestive −[None of the 13 to 16 inscribed objects has a secure stratigraphic context, so the Middle Bronze Age date rests on Dunand's judgment rather than on recorded stratigraphy.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDVKZNT733/none-of-the-13-to-16-inscribed-objects-has-a-secure)Suggestive [Early Bronze Age, c. 2400 BC or earlier (Mendenhall, Hoch)](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/answers/ANS0DEDT0M1GCMG/early-bronze-age-c-2400-bc-or-earlier-mendenhall-hoch)Still possible +[Hoch finds the closest Egyptian parallels for the Byblos sign forms in Old Kingdom characters of about 2700 to 2200 BC.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDVM9V3QNK/hoch-finds-the-closest-egyptian-parallels-for-the-byblos)Speculative [Iron Age, c. 900-830 BC (Sass)](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/answers/ANS0DEDT0Q4XR3A/iron-age-c-900-830-bc-sass)Still possible +[The pseudo-hieroglyphic objects share the spatula medium, word dividers, text framing and some sign forms with ninth-century Byblian alphabetic inscriptions, and one spatula carries both scripts.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDVMHTSEDW/the-pseudo-hieroglyphic-objects-share-the-spatula-medium)Suggestive −[A cylinder seal reported to name Akhenaten's daughters in Byblos signs would place a use of the script in the fourteenth century BC, five centuries before Sass's date.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDVMVP13GW/a-cylinder-seal-reported-to-name-akhenatens-daughters-in)Suggestive [Where did the Byblos signs come from, and is the script related to the Proto-Sinaitic and Phoenician alphabets?](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/questions/QST0DEDQQBGYEW6/where-did-the-byblos-signs-come-from-and-is-the-script)3 findings [Egyptian-derived syllabary, ancestor of the alphabet (Hoch, Colless)](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/answers/ANS0DEDT0YB9TS7/egyptian-derived-syllabary-ancestor-of-the-alphabet-hoch)Still possible +[Eight of the twelve most frequent Byblos sign types lie within a small graphical distance of an Egyptian uniconsonantal sign, and Dunand had already matched about 50 signs to Egyptian forms.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDVN022MA5/eight-of-the-twelve-most-frequent-byblos-sign-types-lie)Suggestive −[The intermediates between the Byblos syllabary and the linear alphabets are few and obscure, and the proto-alphabet is attested from about 1900 BC with its own acrophonic derivation from Egyptian.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDVN83FCDR/the-intermediates-between-the-byblos-syllabary-and-the)Suggestive [Local creation; resemblances to the alphabet are not ancestral](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/answers/ANS0DEDT13MFT4Z/local-creation-resemblances-to-the-alphabet-are-not)Still possible +[Vita and Zamora present the script as one of several local Syro-Palestinian writing experiments existing alongside or before the linear alphabets, with Egyptian writing as a general model whose direct transmission cannot be proven.](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/evidence/EVD0DEDVNFGQXRK/vita-and-zamora-present-the-script-as-one-of-several-local)Suggestive ## Artifacts The films, photos, papers and objects this mystery rests on, each with its own key and its distance from the original. **Artifacts** Transcription1 step from object [Bronze tablet d (Dunand inscription d)](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/artifacts/ART0DEDN81KX7EH/bronze-tablet-d-dunand-inscription-d) GEAS (M. Mäder and contributors) · not stated Document1 step from object [Bronze tablet c (Dunand inscription c)](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/artifacts/ART0DEDN8G01RJ2/bronze-tablet-c-dunand-inscription-c) Directorate General of Antiquities, Lebanon (National Museum of Beirut) Document1 step from object [The inscribed bronze spatulas (Dunand inscriptions b, e, f, i)](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/artifacts/ART0DEDN8TSTWE2/the-inscribed-bronze-spatulas-dunand-inscriptions-b-e-f-i) Directorate General of Antiquities, Lebanon (National Museum of Beirut) Photo1 step from object [The stone stele fragments (Dunand inscriptions a, g, h, j and k to n)](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/byblos-syllabary/artifacts/ART0DEDN9D0Z1AQ/the-stone-stele-fragments-dunand-inscriptions-a-g-h-j-and-k) GFreihalter (Wikimedia Commons) · CC BY-SA 4.0 ## See also [ **Proto-Sinaitic and Wadi el-Hol: the first alphabet** The first alphabet, scratched by Semitic speakers in Egypt around 1850 BC: its letters are known, its texts mostly are not. ](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-sinaitic) [ **Cretan Hieroglyphic** The first script of Minoan Crete, 1900 to 1600 BC, on seals and clay, with no word read. ](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/cretan-hieroglyphic) [ **Proto-Elamite and Linear Elamite** Two scripts of south-western Iran, 3100 to 1880 BC, one claimed deciphered in 2022. ](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/proto-elamite) [ **Eteocretan and Eteocypriot** Two Iron Age languages, from Crete and Cyprus, written in scripts we can read and languages we cannot. ](https://mysteriesdept.com/mysteries/eteocretan-eteocypriot) ## References 1. 1.[The corpus edition: Dunand's publication of the ten pseudo-hieroglyphic inscriptions a to j (pp. 71-138) with photographs, drawings, a sign list of 114 signs and his dating. Beirut, Ministère de l'Éducation Nationale et des Beaux-Arts. The URL is the Mnamon bibliography record; the book itself is not online.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDF2YQM7E3/byblia-grammata-documents-et-recherches-sur-le-developpement)cited 10 times here**SRC** 0DEDF2YQM7E3 1. 2.[Bulletin du Musée de Beyrouth 30: 52-58. Adds the four short stone fragments k to n and restates Dunand's dating (19th to first half of the 18th century BC).](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDFA5TC4KT/nouvelles-inscriptions-pseudo-hieroglyphiques-decouvertes-a)cited 7 times here**SRC** 0DEDFA5TC4KT 1. 3.[In S. Ferrara and M. Valério (eds), Paths into Script Formation in the Ancient Mediterranean, Studi micenei ed egeo-anatolici NS Supplemento 1, Rome: Quasar, pp. 75-102. The current scholarly overview: corpus, sign counts per text (c: 225 signs, 46+3 distinct; d: 457, 65+3; a: 123, 34+3), dating, structure and a verdict that the script remains undeciphered.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDGEMHG9CB/the-byblos-script)cited 16 times here**SRC** 0DEDGEMHG9CB 1. 4.[Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa's Mnamon entry (updated March 2022): corpus list, sign counts (74 distinct on the two tablets, 30 more elsewhere), direction, dating proposals, decipherment attempts and bibliography.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDH5FYW6VK/byblos-pseudo-hieroglyphic-mnamon-ancient-writing-systems-in)cited 9 times here**SRC** 0DEDH5FYW6VK 1. 5.[Beirut: American University of Beirut, 179 pp. (reissued Syracuse University Press 1986). The fullest decipherment claim: 26 consonant signs and 63 consonant-vowel signs writing an archaic West Semitic language dated c. 2400 BC or later; translations of eight of the nine texts then known.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDFKRMY1H4/the-syllabic-inscriptions-from-byblos)cited 4 times here**SRC** 0DEDFKRMY1H4 1. 6.[In P. Abrahami and L. Battini (eds), Cultures et sociétés syro-mésopotamiennes: Mélanges offerts à Olivier Rouault, Oxford: Archaeopress, pp. 157-180. Argues that no inscription has a secure context and that affinities with ninth-century Byblian alphabetic inscriptions point to an Iron Age date (c. 900-830 BC) rather than the Middle Bronze Age.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDGEWRK5S4/the-pseudo-hieroglyphic-inscriptions-from-byblos-their)cited 12 times here**SRC** 0DEDGEWRK5S4 1. 7.[Syria 25: 1-35. The first full decipherment claim: a Phoenician reading starting from a supposed dating formula on tablet c, with values for about 75 signs.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDFAASG0X6/dechiffrement-des-inscriptions-pseudo-hieroglyphiques-de)cited 5 times here**SRC** 0DEDFAASG0X6 1. 8.[Ugarit-Forschungen 40: 129-133 (with the companion paper "Suruya in the Byblos Script Corpus", UF 40: 135-141). Best's decipherment of tablets c and d through sign comparisons with Cretan Hieroglyphic and Linear A, read as a Northwest Semitic text with Akkadian and Hurrian elements dedicating a temple to the sun god Shuraya. URL is the author's site.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDG4KS0FJY/breaking-the-code-of-the-byblos-script)cited 3 times here**SRC** 0DEDG4KS0FJY 1. 9.[Abr-Nahrain 30. Colless's first Byblos paper, defending Mendenhall's values and arguing that most Phoenician letters descend from signs of the syllabary; followed by his text-by-text studies in Abr-Nahrain 31-33 (1993-1995). URL is the author's web summary.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDFW7YW8WM/the-byblos-syllabary-and-the-proto-alphabet)cited 2 times here**SRC** 0DEDFW7YW8WM 1. 10.[Antiguo Oriente 12: 71-104. Open-access statement of Colless's position: the proto-alphabet is a simplification of the Byblos (West Semitic) syllabary, 18 of 22 Phoenician letters have a syllabary ancestor, and Mendenhall's decipherment is defended.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDG4C61RR1/the-origin-of-the-alphabet-an-examination-of-the-goldwasser)cited 7 times here**SRC** 0DEDG4C61RR1 1. 11.[GEAS Begleitpapiere zum Entzifferungstool 2024/1 (Assessing Decipherment Attempts, Series 1), Bern; not peer-reviewed. Tests the Best/Woudhuizen values against a partial bilingual (a cylinder seal naming Akhenaten's daughters) and a phonetisation-degree statistic, and finds the proposal unfalsifiable and its translations incorrect; estimates about 100 graphemes.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDGQS0Y0KV/die-byblos-schrift-beurteilung-des-entzifferungsvorschlags)cited 6 times here**SRC** 0DEDGQS0Y0KV 1. 12.[BAF-Online: Proceedings of the Berner Altorientalisches Forum 4 (2019 conference, published 2022), CC BY 4.0. The first computational treatment: the corpus (15 inscriptions plus 28 tentatively assigned fragments) transcribed with one Unicode private-use character per sign variant and run through a sequence-analysis tool to find morphemes and word boundaries; the largest text has 461 discernible signs.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDGFCJ9NS7/detecting-word-boundaries-in-an-undeciphered-script-the)[doi](https://doi.org/10.22012/baf.2019.03)cited 7 times here**SRC** 0DEDGFCJ9NS7 1. 13.[Journal of Semitic Studies 6: 226-245. A structural (sign-sequence, n-gram) approach to word boundaries and grammar without assigning sound values; the model for the 2019-2022 GEAS work.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDFBRMSBW5/the-proto-byblian-inscriptions-a-fresh-approach)cited 4 times here**SRC** 0DEDFBRMSBW5 1. 14.[Announces proposed values me and pa from a cylinder seal (Garbini 2004) that labels Akhenaten's daughters in Byblos signs, matched against the Berlin family stela in hieroglyphs; the formal paper is listed as forthcoming in Ägypten und Levante.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDGR7ECH4T/byblos-first-sound-value-proposal-based-on-external-evidence)cited 4 times here**SRC** 0DEDGR7ECH4T 1. 15.[Shows Byblos as a tentatively allocated, unproposed script (marked ¿Byblos?) at U+1EB20-1EB2F in the 1EB row; no encoding proposal has been written.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDH5SJSKKH/roadmap-to-the-smp-supplementary-multilingual-plane-revision)cited 1 time here**SRC** 0DEDH5SJSKKH 1. 16.[Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt 32: 59-65. Reads four lines of stone fragment l (Dunand 1978) as an Egyptian hieratic dating formula, the only externally readable text in the corpus. URL is the author's CV listing the paper.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDFVTR04AS/egyptian-hieratic-writing-in-the-byblos-pseudo-hieroglyphic)cited 6 times here**SRC** 0DEDFVTR04AS 1. 17.[Abr-Nahrain (Ancient Near Eastern Studies) 35: 26-46. Lists the inscriptions Colless assigns to a West Semitic logo-syllabary (Byblos plus finds from Megiddo, Sinai, Egypt and elsewhere) and gives his sign table with proposed values. URL is the author's blog post summarising the paper.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDFWHG6P2W/the-canaanite-syllabary)cited 3 times here**SRC** 0DEDFWHG6P2W 1. 18.[In Byblos: A Legacy Unearthed (National Museum of Antiquities, Leiden, and Directorate General of Antiquities, Lebanon, eds), Leiden: Sidestone Press, pp. 181-184; open access. Exhibition-catalogue summary of the script by an Egyptologist, written for the 2024 Leiden exhibition that borrowed Byblos objects from Lebanon.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDGSJX5VJQ/the-byblos-script)[doi](https://doi.org/10.59641/z8124cl)cited 2 times here**SRC** 0DEDGSJX5VJQ 1. 19.[Journal of the Society for the Study of Egyptian Antiquities 20: 115-124 (published 1993). Argues that the Byblos signs derive from the Egyptian uniconsonantal signs and that the syllabary's remains formed the core of the Semitic linear alphabets; links the forms to Old Kingdom Egyptian. URL is the author's CV listing the paper.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDFVFAGQQQ/the-byblos-syllabary-bridging-the-gap-between-egyptian)cited 6 times here**SRC** 0DEDFVFAGQQQ 1. 20.[Preliminary result: eight of the twelve most frequent Byblos sign types have a graphical Levenshtein distance below 2 from an Egyptian uniconsonantal sign, taken as support for Hoch's derivation. Preliminary and not peer-reviewed.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDGS16TNCV/james-hoch-1990-confirmed-byblos-signs-and-the-egyptian)cited 2 times here**SRC** 0DEDGS16TNCV 1. 21.[Archiv Orientální 15: 138-157. An early decipherment attempt of the stone stele by the decipherer of Hittite; no result was accepted. The URL is the Mnamon bibliography record.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDFAH54KMG/die-hieroglyphische-stele-von-byblos-ein)cited 1 time here**SRC** 0DEDFAH54KMG 1. 22.[Orientalia NS 30(1): 46-78. Re-examination of the objects correcting Dunand's readings; followed by the two-part 1962 reclassification of the signs into 27 classes.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDFK99C4HQ/a-preliminary-report-after-re-examination-of-the-byblian)cited 2 times here**SRC** 0DEDFK99C4HQ 1. 23.[Orientalia NS 31(2): 250-271 and 31(3): 339-363. Palaeographic reclassification of Dunand's sign list into 27 classes; the main independent sign study before the 2019 Unicode transcription.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDFKH6Q95C/revision-and-reclassification-of-the-proto-byblian-signs)cited 2 times here**SRC** 0DEDFKH6Q95C 1. 24.[Rivista di Studi Fenici 16: 129-131. The critical review that most Semitists followed in setting Mendenhall's reading aside; Garbini also put the sign inventory at about 90 rather than Dunand's 114. The URL is the Mnamon overview that reports the review; the review itself is not online.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDFM1MYAZY/review-of-g-e-mendenhall-the-syllabic-inscriptions-from)cited 3 times here**SRC** 0DEDFM1MYAZY 1. 25.[Ugarit-Forschungen 39: 689-756. Woudhuizen's revision of the Best approach with many more logograms; Best himself rejected this version (UF 42, 2010), and the GEAS assessment of 2024 treats Best and Woudhuizen together. URL is the Mnamon bibliography record.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDG661MR7X/on-the-byblos-script)cited 2 times here**SRC** 0DEDG661MR7X 1. 26.[In La scrittura nel Vicino Oriente antico, Milan, pp. 37-62. Garbini's own reading, which connects the spatulas with later Phoenician spatulas and takes tablet c as a medical remedy; the one proposal the GEAS assessors judged broadly compatible with their methodology. URL is the Mnamon bibliography record.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDGECZZS19/decifrazione-e-origine-della-scrittura-pseudo-geroglifica-di)cited 2 times here**SRC** 0DEDGECZZS19 1. 27.[Word 63(3): 181-191. Reads the Byblos texts as Sanskrit by assigning Brahmi letter values; recorded here as a fringe proposal with no following among Semitists or Egyptologists.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDH4DKH1BK/indo-european-origin-of-alphabetic-systems-and-deciphering)[doi](https://doi.org/10.1080/00437956.2017.1348031)cited 2 times here**SRC** 0DEDH4DKH1BK 1. 28.[In P. T. Daniels and W. Bright (eds), The World's Writing Systems, New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 29-30. Standard handbook note treating the script as undeciphered and singling out Sobelman's structural approach as the one future work should build on. URL is the Mnamon overview page, which gives the same assessment.](https://mysteriesdept.com/sources/SRC0DEDH1KZKSQZ/pseudo-hieroglyphs-of-byblos)cited 3 times here**SRC** 0DEDH1KZKSQZ Last edited 31 Oct 2026