Development of the Linear A Script in Minoan Crete
- Date
- c. 1800 BCE
- Category
- Science, technology & invention
- Region
- Crete (Greece)
- Era
- Ancient Civilizations
- Significance
The Minoans developed Linear A, a syllabic writing system used across Crete and on several Aegean islands roughly between 1850 and 1450 BCE, primarily on clay tablets, sealings and a range of votive and everyday objects.
Linear A served Minoan palace administration, recording commodities, personnel and transactions in the redistributive palace economy, and it grew out of an earlier Cretan 'hieroglyphic' tradition. Although many of its signs were later adapted to write Linear B (Mycenaean Greek), the language behind Linear A — conventionally called 'Minoan' — remains undeciphered, because it does not correspond to any known language and surviving texts are short. Linear A is significant as one of the earliest attested writing systems native to Europe and as the administrative backbone of Minoan civilisation, and its undeciphered status remains one of the major open problems of Aegean prehistory.
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Empires active in c. 1800 BCE
- Old Babylonian Empire1894 BCE – 1595 BCE
- Bactria-Margiana Archaeological Complex (Oxus Civilization)2250 BCE – 1700 BCE
- Elamite Kingdom2700 BCE – 539 BCE
- Xia Dynasty2070 BCE – 1600 BCE
Related science, technology & invention events
- Proto-Sinaitic inscriptions: the first alphabetic writingc. 1850 BCE
- Old Babylonian mathematics: base-60 and Plimpton 322c. 1800–1600 BCE
- The Taung Child and the naming of Australopithecus africanus1924–1925 CE (fossil c. 2.8 million years old)
- Edwin Smith Surgical Papyrus, earliest known treatise on traumac. 1600 BCE
- Rhind Mathematical Papyrus copied by the scribe Ahmesc. 1650 BCE
- Sintashta culture and the first spoke-wheeled war chariotsc. 2100–2000 BCE
Further reading
The wider story
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