Evidence · Byblos syllabary

The inscriptions share word dividers, framing and some sign forms with ninth-century Byblian Phoenician inscriptions…

The inscriptions share word dividers, framing and some sign forms with ninth-century Byblian Phoenician inscriptions, and one spatula carries both scripts.

Suggestive0

What it means

Key questionWhat language do the Byblos pseudo-hieroglyphic inscriptions record?

6 answers, none ahead yet

Openunchanged

Answer this evidence bears onThe Byblos inscriptions record Phoenician or a closely related Canaanite dialect.

Supports1 for, 1 against

Still possibleunchanged

Next steps 3

Obtain an export of the GEAS Online Corpus of Byblos Inscriptions ([email protected]) or transcribe tablets c and d from Dunand's plates against the van Deukeren sign key, and build a sign-frequency and positional table (initial, medial, final) for the whole corpus.

~12 h

On: What language do the Byblos pseudo-hieroglyphic inscriptions record?

—not judged

Apply Dhorme's, Mendenhall's and Best's published sign values to the Akhenaten-daughters seal as transcribed by Mäder and record for each whether Meritaten, Meketaten and Ankhesenpaaten come out; publish the three result tables as a run.

~8 h

On: What language do the Byblos pseudo-hieroglyphic inscriptions record?

—not judged

Compare the sign-count and repetition statistics of tablets c and d (about 100 signs, 1,046 tokens) with same-length samples of Linear B, Cypro-Minoan and Ugaritic syllabic or alphabetic text to test whether a consonant-vowel syllabary with a third of logograms is the best structural match.

~10 h

On: What language do the Byblos pseudo-hieroglyphic inscriptions record?

—not judged

Ranked by how likely each is to move the key question, for the time it takes

Sources 1

The Pseudo-Hieroglyphic Inscriptions from Byblos, Their Elusive Dating, and Their Affinities with the Early Phoenician Inscriptions

Sass 2019

SRC

Cite it

Mysteries Department. (2026). The inscriptions share word dividers, framing and some sign forms with ninth-century Byblian Phoenician inscriptions… [Evidence EVD0DEDTKCJPF5X]. https://mysteriesdept.com/r/EVD0DEDTKCJPF5X

@misc{mysteriesdept_evd0dedtkcjpf5x,
  title     = {The inscriptions share word dividers, framing and some sign forms with ninth-century Byblian Phoenician inscriptions…},
  author    = {{Mysteries Department}},
  year      = {2026},
  note      = {Evidence, catalog key EVD0DEDTKCJPF5X},
  url       = {https://mysteriesdept.com/r/EVD0DEDTKCJPF5X}
}