GGG ping.
Posted on 07/30/2008 6:58:45 PM PDT by Fred Nerks
Science magazine this week details the discovery of a stone block in Veracruz, Mexico, that contains a previously unknown system of writing; believed by archeologists to be the earliest in the Americas.
The slab - named the Cascajal block - dates to the early first millennium BCE and has features that indicate it comes from the Olmec civilization of Mesoamerica. One of the archaeologists behind the discovery, Brown University's Stephen D. Houston, said that the block and its ancient script "link the Olmec civilization to literacy, document an unsuspected writing system, and reveal a new complexity to this civilization."
"It's a tantalizing discovery. I think it could be the beginning of a new era of focus on Olmec civilization," explained Houston. "It's telling us that these records probably exist and that many remain to be found. If we can decode their content, these earliest voices of Mesoamerican civilization will speak to us today."
Construction workers discovered the Cascajal block in a pile of debris in the community of Lomas de Tacamichapa in the late 1990s. Surrounding the piece were ceramic shards, clay figurine fragments, and broken artifacts of ground stone, which have helped the team date the block and its text to the San Lorenzo phase, ending about 900 BCE; approximately 400 years before writing was thought to have first appeared in the Western hemisphere.
The block weighs about 26 pounds and measures 36 cm x 21 cm x 13 cm. The text itself consists of 62 signs, some of which are repeated up to four times. There is no doubt that the piece is a written work, say the archaeologists. "As products of a writing system, the sequences would, by definition, reflect patterns of language, with the probable presence of syntax and language-dependent word order," they explain.
Interestingly, the surface containing the text appears to be concave and the team believes the block has been carved repeatedly and erased - an unprecedented discovery according to Houston, who added that several paired sequences of signs could even indicate poetic couplets.
Source: Brown University Pics courtesy Science
Paging Daniel Jackson....
Probably CP/M or Fortran.
GGG ping.
...whoops...do you think this a fake?
Like Stonehenge, this may be a joke perpetrated on future generations by ancients with a big sense on humor and a fist full of peyote.
A dialect of Hebrew.
this stone tablet will outlast all hard drives and DVDs in existence.
“The link to the Olmec culture is convincing, says Mary Pohl of Florida State University, US, who was not involved in this study. Pohl had previously excavated an inscribed roller stamp of the Olmec culture, which was firmly dated to 650 BC (see Early Americans used first writing to promise loyalty).
Recently, another roller stamp has been dated to 1150 BC, pushing back the origin of the Olmec symbols. “Things are really beginning to come together; this is really an exciting time,” Pohl told New Scientist.
(further info.)
Not at all. I was just failing at being funny!
It’s too bad that archeology is not nearly as exciting and romantic as movies and TV make it seem.
Does this lend support to the idea that European sailed to the New World
in the BCs?
Looks like a shopping list:
1 Buy some bug spray
7 Some ears of corn
8 Badmitten shuttlecocks
10 a vase
12 IceCream!!!
13 asparagas
14 Carrots
16 pineapple
etc.
There I have solved it.
The first civilization to discover erasers. (yawn)
Looks like either a recipe or an inventory; not really “literary,” as in conveying a series of facts or thoughts.
What dolts. That’s clearly the first Shaper Image catalog displaying the world’s best nose hair trimmers!
In 1968, as a young 14 year old kid on a field-trip to Stone Mountain (outside Atlanta), I chiseled my initials and date in the mountain. It’s still there, and will be when most things are long gone.
yes, looks like a list or inventory.
LOL! And future generations of FReepers will be trying to work out what it means.
The message reads:
“We are having a helluva kegger, but we need more beer and pizza...”
You are probably right. It is amazing to go up on the mountain and look at all the stuff that was left many years ago by Civil War soldiers, and others.
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