I just checked out the site again after several months being AFK, and am sad to report that I have lost faith in the Tea Party. After Sarah Palin told us to join the republican party, her credibility was gone. Days later when she said the Tea Parties should seek to reform the party from within, it was already too late. My general disillusionment with American conservatism aside, I’d just like to point out the lies of a specific liberal jerk named Bill M. Meradeia. This guy is who Rush Limbaugh means when he refers to the liberal jerks. His personal website is http://fawksnews.wordpress.com/ at the Post-Liberal Post. Check it out if you feel like getting angry and want to complain to someone about the socialist plot we all know is coming. In the field of classics, I’ve been looking into the Glozel Stones in France as evidence of Later survival of Phoenician forms and the runesstones found throughout North America. Wikipedia has a pretty good article on them, and I don’t really feel like summarizing it so check them out. I think it’s fairly good evidence of Pre-Colombian Viking Contact with ‘Vinland’, or Maine and Massachusetts.
Casting I-Ching for Obama
I know it’s just pagan mysticism, but I was wondering if a Haruspex could predict how long Obama would be in office. I almost want a big show trial and impeachment just to distract from the wars in the Middle East. Anyway, I used the ineffable wisdom of the I-Ching to look into Barack Obama’s future. It directed me to the Po Hexagram, and the commentaries of said pattern.
23rd Hexagram
The Book confirmed my worst fears. Barack Obama wasn’t going anywhere; ”Its strong subjected king, notwithstanding the actions against him, survives and acquires Fresh Vigor. The people again cherish their sovereign, and the plotters have wrought to their own demise.” Guess that means a second term.
The End of the Industrial Era.
I found a comment on my site today, one so disturbing I deleted it immediately. It was written by a liberal ideologue by the name of Bill Meradeia. He has a personal diatribe blog over at the Post-Liberal Post, which is basically dedicated to destroying America. The person wrote that I was enslaved by an archaic and esoteric ideology, and implored me to support Obama. They said I hated progress and technology, that my words came from hate and fear. They could not be more wrong. I neither hate technology nor fear the future. In our hearts we all may be sinners, but I do not fear the fate of man. That page was written in the book of time long ago. The only difference between me and my critics is that I can see where we will eventually arrive. If I am a slave to my ideology, they are slaves to the machines that determine the status of their lives. Take the cell phone. A wonderful thing, making instantaneous communication a cheap reality. This device has become a connection to the internet, a source of limitless information, games and music. Address books. Email contact lists. Our entirety. It has become a matter of personal choice; you are what you use. But what happens when we lose this instrument, this small chunk of cheap plastic? Is it not true that we lose a part of ourselves, through the care and attention we have lavished on our external souls? How can they criticize me without knowing my true intention? I believe in the inevitable. What comes to pass from each new moment is not a matter of choice, luck, or chaotic chance. You see, I do not merely question the path that America is on. I cry out against a likely destination the rest are blind to. Fight them here @ http://open.salon.com/blog/billmeradeia
And Cuneiform
I’m fully aware that Luwian was a minor language in the Hittite Empire. Also, I know that every theory of mine ignores Sumerian, Hattic, Akkadian, Assyrian, and Indian Cuneiform styles. I believe the Indo-European cultures developed (and left a physical record) for one reason. They were extremely hierarchical, and formed a stratified society that siphoned the resources from many to benefit a few. Efficient taxation allowed for a complex society, as well as a written scribal language and a large army. Unfortunately, complex societies are also the weakest. A single drought, famine, war, or peasant riot could collapse an Indo-European culture. You see, any organism of significant size risks a cascading failure from a single systemic failure. In other words, when 99% of the population lead the majority, society can collapse from any incident that questions the basis of social equity. The extreme efficiency of Indo-European society led to a quick expansion into massive kingdoms, but entropic weaknesses would usually cause total destruction about every 500 years. Then, in a different location in the empire, another Aryan group would eventually gain dominance. This is why archeologists have such problems defining the Indo-European language line. It spread over enormous areas, but usually remained a small language spoken by a small ruling class. Cuneiform was an administrative writing style, resulting from quick strokes of a reed stylus in wet clay. It was a bureaucratic system, developed for Semitic languages in the Middle East and only later adopted by the Hittite States as an efficient way to keep records. Luwian was the language of trade and royal treaties, and more accurately relates the ruling class to the kingdoms that surround it.
Brief History of Semitic/Indo-European Scripts
I’ve uploaded a few dozen images of extinct scripts and hieroglyphic systems, but their haphazard placement between political posts might have confused the casual viewers. The Indo-European language began between 6000 and 3000 BC, as a combination of the remnants of Vinca culture symbols and Indus Valley seal glyphs. The pictogram system of the Canaanites, often called proto-Semitic, was an example of this process. After the Collapse of early Bronze age Indian cultures, the Indo-Aryan tribes relocated briefly to the Anatolian highlands. This route was predetermined by ancient trade lanes, following the spread of farming West to the Mediterranean. Luwian hieroglyphs and the Phaistos disc are the first known examples of the unification of the various Indo-European strains. As the Hittite empire grew in power, Luwian was bastardized into a number of linear trade languages. Linear A, B, Cypriot, and Byblos are samples of these two-consonant syllabaries. After 1200 BC, Phoenician developed from the synthesis of many trade languages derived from Luwian. Traditionally, archeologists assumed that Greek developed directly from Phoenician. For many reasons that deserve their own series of posts, this is impossible. Just as we cannot point to the direct forerunner of Phoenician, the origin of the Greek language is also shrouded in mystery. At least one or more writing styles stood between Phoenician and Attic Greece, and several of these possible languages are only known through a few inscriptions. The possible linguistic families that precede Greek are Phrygian, Lydian, Lycian, Carian, Raetic, Lemnian, and several others. These languages (at least in writing form) are so similar even I have trouble telling them apart sometimes. Pre-Greek writing systems developed on several islands, from a combination of post-Phoenician cultures. The various Hellenic systems are called Pelasgian, Boetian, Corinthian, Delian, etc., after the Island they were found on. Classical Attic Greek probably arose as a combination of Boetian and Corinthian writing styles. However, this is not the end of the story. Some type of Raetic, Lemnian, or Phrygian bypassed Greece and spread through Romania to Mainland Italy. There it resisted the influence of Alexander the Great, remaining separate from the written Greek Language. Etruscan, Oscan, Umbrian, Marsiliana, Iberian, and eventually Ligurian in the 2nd century attest to the survival of Phoenician forms, even after the creation of Latin from Etruscan and Greek. The proof of my theory is that Etruscan and Latin maintained certain Semitic and Indo-European forms that were eliminated from Classical Greek.
The Origin of Luwian Hieroglyphs and the Indo-Europeans
The idea that Luwian script developed from Egyptian Hieroglyphs is almost entirely incorrect. Egypt was remarkably insular, and the history of the outside world mattered very little until the Hyksos and Hittites invaded after 1600 and 1400 BC. Luwian probably borrowed certain forms from Egyptian, but according to my Matlab models that map image functions, it developed mostly from two other sources. The first is from the symbols associated with Vinca culture, existing after 7000 BC between Italy, and Siberia. Vinca writing is known through a pottery shard and seal impressions. This example is a royal seal or record, found in Romania:
Tartaria Seal
Physical evidence from the Vinca culture was spread over a wide range and period of time. This seal was found in the Siberian plains of Russia:
Vinca Seal
The full range of Vinca symbols varied over time, and seals rarely used the full range of symbols at once. This is one of the few nearly complete syllabaries you can find on the internet:
Vinca Symbols
The Vinca occupied part of the area covered by the later Hittites who wrote with Luwian symbols. Archeologists have found evidence of early trade with the civilizations of the Indus Valley, especially the cities of Harappa and Mohenjo-Daro. These early Indo-Aryan cultures developed a form of writing between 3000 BC and 2400 BC, known primarily from seals and short inscriptions. Here are three samples of the known Indus Valley Pictograms:
Indus Valley Pictograms 1
Indus Valley Pictograms 2
Indus Valley Pictograms 3
The Luwian writing system, developed after 2000 BC, was most likely a combination of the remnants of early Vinca scripts and Indus Valley pictograms.
Undeciphered Scripts, Phaistos Disc and Arkalochlori Axe
One of the lesser known palaces on Crete in the Middle Bronze age was located on the site of Phaistos. It was found in 1908 by the archeologist Luigi Pernier, who unlike Schliemann kept meticulous notes. The disc was unusual in that it was purposely fired, without the char and burn marks that appear on all authentic Linear A tablets. It has been called a poem, a treaty, a trade envoy record, and a fraud at different times.
Phaistos Disc 2000 BC -1400 BC
It starts on the right side in the middle, going to the outside on the left (Start/End Marked with flowers). It is unusually hard to decipher, because it could correspond to any written script, including Egyptian, Luwian, and Rongo-Rongo. Since there are over 30 discrete symbols, it is probably mostly logograms with names spelled out in a syllabary. Based on the repetition of phrases and the formal separation of symbols, I think this is a treaty of Alliance with either Egypt or the Hittite Kings. The disc was carbon dated to a range of 3000 years, the result being that half said it was older than 2000 BC and half said it was a forgery. Many people have used this as evidence of a Minoan-Hittite connection. After the discovery of another sample on an axe in Arkalochori cave, most people came to accept this as a real, unique language:
Arkalochori
A nobel prize and tenure for anyone who successfully translates this language. However, due to the lack of samples, this might prove impossible.
Hittite/Minoan 2
I wanted to explain the connection between Minoan and Hittite in further depth. The original excavator of the palace at Knossos was Arthur Evans. This man bought parts of the Island of Crete outright, and assumed that meant he could do whatever he wanted. After tearing a huge hole through the main castle, Evans happily set about recreating the center room. Since he already knew what the buildings should look like, this was an incredibly easy task. He rebuilt entire frescoes from a few shards, and painted the rest to look like the models he constructed. This is a fresco from the main palace of Knossos. I don’t want to tell you how little of it is real. Almost just the bull with a set of arms on it.
This image gives credit to the myth of Thesius, a Greek youth who was one of the Attic children chosen for sacrifice to the Minotaur of Minos on the pre-Classical island of Crete. On the other hand, Evans knew the legend and may have reconstructed the Fresco to resemble the myth. This is the difficulty in studying the Minoans. We can never be sure if we are looking at them, or the image Evans constructed. The best bet is to study the other middle bronze age palaces on Crete, like Vasiliki or anywhere not ‘studied’ by Schliemann.
The other evidence of a Hittite-Minoan connection is the “horns of consecration” symbol. It appeared in art, architecture, and was the chief altar at what archeologists think are the Minoan temples. Or it could be a game where you kick a ball through the goalpost.
This image has no precedent in M BrII mainland Greece. It could, however, be either the Hittite Gods Anu or Tarhunza. Anu was the main God, comparable to Zeus, and married to Ba’al Astarte. Christian mythology lists Ba’al as one of the major demons, but in fact she was similar to Athena. My personal opinions is that the name is derived from the Canaanite word for woman. Here is Anu:
If you see a resemblance to the Zoroastrian protection spirit or Persian art, you’re half right. Like I said, Anu is Zeus to the Hittites.
Here is Tarhunza, originally a Hittite king transformed after death into an aspect of the God of Storm and Thunder:
Both Anu and Tarhunza have curved horns in their helmets. This, and Linear A’s resemblance to Luwian logograms has led archeologists to draw a connection between the Minoans and the Hittite.
The last two images used were actually produced after 1000 BC, but the art forms in Anatolia had remained fairly steady over the previous Millennia.
