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Computers to translate world's 'lost' languages after program deciphers ancient text
www.dailymail.co.uk ^ | 7/20/2010 | Niall Firth

Posted on 07/21/2010 12:27:41 PM PDT by Red Badger

Scientists have used a computer program to decipher a written language that is more than three thousand years old.

The program automatically translated the ancient written language of Ugaritic within just a few hours.

Scientists hope the breakthrough could help them decipher the few ancient languages that they have been unable to translate so far.

Ugaritic was last used around 1200 B.C. in western Syria and consists of dots on clay tablets. It was first discovered in 1920 but was not deciphered until 1932.

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology told the program that the language was related to another known language, in this case Hebrew.

The system is then able to make assumptions about the way different words are formed and whether they consist of a prefix and a suffix, for example. FIVE OF THE WORLD'S UNDECIPHERED SCRIPTS

* Etruscan - Repeated attempts to decipher this language have led little further than the numbers one to six. * The Rohonc Codex - Discovered in Hungary, it contains 10 times more symbols than any other known alphabet * Rongorongo - Discovered on Easter Island, scientists are not even sure if it is language * Linear A - An ancient Minoan script from Crete from around 1900-1800 BC * Vinca symbols - Believed to be the earliest 'proto-language' known to man, these symbols were found in Hungary in 1875. They date from around 4000 BC

(Excerpt) Read more at dailymail.co.uk ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; Israel
KEYWORDS: crete; cuneiform; elamite; elamites; epigraphyandlanguage; etruscan; ggg; godsgravesglyphs; harappan; harappans; hungary; indusvalleyscript; lineara; linearb; logosyllabic; mayankvahia; minoan; nishayadav; protoelamite; rajeshrao; rohonccode; rongorongo; ugaritic; vinca
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To: WKUHilltopper

Yeah, well my cleverly coded algorithm came up with:

You may already be a winner in the Scroll Writer's Clearinghouse 100,000 dracma Sweepstakes!

41 posted on 07/21/2010 7:36:28 PM PDT by uglybiker (BACON!!)
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To: Beowulf9; Henchster

Etruscan is actually kinda readable in a limited sense—the majority of inscriptions are formulaic funerary dedications, and we’re able to understand those fairly well. Through ancient glosses and educated guesswork we’ve pieced together 200 or so words and a few tentative bits of grammar. The longer texts are the real sticking point.

This program might not crack Etruscan though. It sounds like it relies on comparative linguistic techniques and needs a better-known related language to work. We don’t have that for Etruscan.

Incidentally, Claudius’s wife Urgulanilla was Etruscan. And the last known mention of the language being used was when Rome fell in the mid-400s and Etruscan priests were called on to offer sacrifices. It was probably just a liturgical language at that point though.

We do have one scroll that was used to wrap a mummy. It’s the longest extant Etruscan text:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liber_Linteus


42 posted on 07/21/2010 8:17:34 PM PDT by Claud
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To: uglybiker

LOL...good one


43 posted on 07/21/2010 8:22:29 PM PDT by WKUHilltopper (Fix bayonets!)
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To: SunkenCiv

44 posted on 07/22/2010 9:39:38 AM PDT by colorado tanker
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To: Claud

Thank you for that excellent info.


45 posted on 07/22/2010 9:52:02 AM PDT by Henchster (Free Republic - the BEST site on the web!)
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To: Claud
Barić displayed the mummy at his home in Vienna, standing it upright in the corner of his sitting room

Oh my!

(The writings look like a teletype, the letter are so uniform.)

46 posted on 07/22/2010 11:17:45 AM PDT by BenLurkin (Will must be the harder, courage the bolder, spirit must be the more, as our might lessens.)
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The Rohonc Codex:
47 posted on 05/28/2012 6:22:23 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (FReepathon 2Q time -- https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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Rohonc Codex
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohonczi_Codex#History
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rohonczi_Codex#Systematic_attempts


48 posted on 05/28/2012 6:22:58 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (FReepathon 2Q time -- https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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Uncracked Ancient Codes
(Lost Languages reviewed)
by William C. West
[snip] As longtime literary editor of the Times Higher Education Supplement in London, Andrew Robinson is well able to interpret the arcana of scientific discoveries for the general public. In Lost Languages, he explains the principles of three famous decipherments and applies the insights gained to an understanding of several undeciphered scripts -- Linear A, the Etruscan alphabet, the Phaistos disc, and the Meroitic, Proto-Elamite, rongorongo, Zapotec, Isthmian and Indus scripts. [/snip]
Lost Languages: The Enigma Of The Worlds Undeciphered Scripts Lost Languages:
The Enigma Of The World's
Undeciphered Scripts

by Andrew Robinson

49 posted on 05/28/2012 6:29:26 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (FReepathon 2Q time -- https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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 GGG managers are SunkenCiv, StayAt HomeMother & Ernest_at_the_Beach
Just updating the GGG info, not sending a general distribution.

To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list.


50 posted on 05/28/2012 6:29:31 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (FReepathon 2Q time -- https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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Syria: Scholar Composes Music from Archaeological Ugaritic Cuneiform Tablet
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/2549691/posts


51 posted on 05/28/2012 6:30:28 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (FReepathon 2Q time -- https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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Ugaritic cuneiform
http://www.omniglot.com/writing/ugaritic.htm
Ugaritic, a Semitic language closely related to Phoenician which was spoken in the city state of Ugarit in northern Syria.


52 posted on 05/28/2012 6:32:28 PM PDT by SunkenCiv (FReepathon 2Q time -- https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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