[Biblical-languages] Consonantal iota

Peter Kirk peter.r.kirk at ntlworld.com
Thu Aug 14 08:23:09 EDT 2003


On 14/08/2003 05:57, biblang at ntresources.com wrote:

> So the short answer appears to be, Yes, it appears in Linear B 
> texts--the oldest known form of Greek (13-15th C. BC). Offhand, I'm 
> not sure who the leading Linear B scholars are (I'd guess they are a 
> scarce breed!) to inquire further.
>
Thank you, Rodney. Well, Linear B is already specified in Unicode, see 
http://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U10000.pdf.

> Carl's rationale for a distinct character in the "Phoenician-Greek 
> script" (i.e., the normal Greek-style characters) seems logical to me 
> since Linear B characters/glyphs have no relationship organically to 
> Greek written in the Phoenician script (which originated in the 8th C. 
> BC). That is, they have an independent origin, probably derived from 
> the Cretan Linear A script. Since the older, Linear B character is 
> constantly referred to in later discussions (e.g. Smyth) using a 
> Phoenician-Greek glyph, it would seem appropriate to have such a 
> character encoded.
>
> But that's a "Unicode-layman's" view. I don't know how such matters 
> are viewed in terms of Unicode policy.
>
So we are talking about conventions for transliterating Linear B into 
normal Greek script. I don't think Unicode would normally concern itself 
with such conventions. The exception might be if there was an already 
well-established convention which could not be represented with existing 
Unicode characters or combinations, but I don't think that is the case 
here. There may be another body which standardises such transliterations.

-- 
Peter Kirk
peter at qaya.org (personal)
peterkirk at qaya.org (work)
http://www.qaya.org/




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