Linear B texts

[Asko Parpola]

If the Mycenaeans had written their administrative documents on  
perishable material instead of clay, and all those thousands of texts  
of this type would have been lost (like all texts written on  
perishable material in Ashoka's empire have been lost, and evidently  
the Harappan administrative documents -- for it is difficult to  
imagine those large cities being managed without any accounting),  
would the remaining other types of Linear B texts be better evidence  
for Mycenaean literacy than what survives from the Indus Civilization?

With best regards, "Ashok"


Quoting "Steve Farmer" <saf at SAFARMER.COM>:

> Asko tells us instead that the "type of texts I expect to be lost is  
> exemplified by the Mycenaean Linear B tablets, i.e. economic  
> accounts, not literature, which was probably handed down orally...."
>
> This doesn't make speculation about lost Indus archives more  
> credible, due to the massive scale of the excavations conducted  
> since the 1920s. Compare here -- we haven't written about this  
> anywhere -- with finds of Linear B, of which we have many thousands  
> of long texts. The first Minoan site ever excavated, at Knossos,  
> quickly turned up no less than 4300 Linear B texts (plus of course  
> seals, etc.). Nearly *all* of these texts are far longer than what  
> is by far the longest "Indus text" on a single surface, consisting  
> of 17 high-frequency but non-repeating signs on a square about 1  
> inch square.
>
> After the find of 4300 long Linear B texts at Knossos, another 1000  
> or so showed up at Pylos. Then 300 or so from Thebes. And now we  
> have perhaps another 300 so far from other sites. Others turn up  
> every year. These are not obscure finds.
>
> Archaeological science rarely proves anything outright, but  
> eventually hypotheses based on speculation concerning *possible*  
> finds introduced to "save" a thesis, but that never materialize are  
> eventually quietly abandoned -- especially when that speculation  
> conflicts with what is commonly known from cross-cultural  
> archaeological studies from many other parts of the world. (India  
> may be "different", as Indologists often say, but not *that*  
> different.)
>
> The Indus left thousands of short symbol strings behind on many  
> types of materials, not just "seals" -- pots, potsherds, metal  
> plates, weapons, molded terracotta tablets, incised shells, cones  
> and rods, etc. -- the same kinds of materials on which other  
> civilizations (including those that routinely wrote on perishable  
> materials) left thousands of *long* texts behind. This is especially  
> true of potsherds, which were among the most prevalent writing  
> materials in the ancient world, since they were far cheaper than  
> rather expensive perishable materials (including cloth). You have to  
> have an explanation for that, and of course for all the missing  
> texts, and without one the traditional "Indus script" thesis quite  
> frankly isn't credible.
>
>
> Best wishes,
> S. Farmer
>
>