PHOENICIAN INSCRIPTION DECIPHERED

29

Stone are found to be bi-lingual versions of the same historical record, is of great practical importance for establishing the certainty of the decipherment; for a bi-lingual version always affords the surest clue to an "unknown" script. It was a bi-lingual (or rather a tri-lingual) inscription which provided the key to the Egytian hieroglyphs in the famous Rosetta Stone. And the fact that the Ogam version of the Newton Stone inscriptions—the alphabetic value of the Ogam script being well known-agrees for the most part

FIJF
FortNinyn
μπολουστο
UXFCEUSI
Finnul

XOXOYDUER

:

FIG. 6.-Aryan Phoenician Inscription on Newton Stone. (For transliteration into Roman letters and translation see p. 32.) Note Swastika Cross in 4th line. The 2nd letter (2) should have its middle limb slightly sloped to left, see photo in Frontispiece.

literally, so far as it goes, with my independent reading of the "unknown" script is conclusive proof-positive for the certainty of my decipherment of the "unknown" script as Aryan Phoenician.

Here I give my transcription of the main or Aryan Phoenician inscription (see Fig. 6.).

It will be seen by comparing this script with its modern letter-values given in my transliteration into Roman (on

p. 32) that most of the corresponding Greek and Roman alphabetic letters, and their modern cursive writing, are obviously derived from this semi-cursive Phoenician writing or from its parent.

My reading of the Ogam version, in Fig. 7, also will be seen to differ from that of Mr. Brash,' the most careful attempt of all previous ones, chiefly in regard to those letters, the signs for which, formed by a conventional number of straight strokes, were, on account of the limited space available on the stone, crowded together and not clearly separated from the other groups of conventional numbers

FIG. 7.-Ogam Version of Newton Stone Inscription as now deciphered

and read.

A. As engraved on the stone. B. Arrangement of the letter-strokes as now read with their values in Roman letters. The 9th letter is read as A.

of similar strokes, the separate grouping of which formed a different letter or letters in this cumbrous sacred alphabetic script of the Irish Scots and Britons. It was the absence of any clue to this separation between many of the letter groupstrokes, which led Mr. Brash to confess, after completing

1 Mr. Brash's final reading of this Ogam inscription was (op. cit. 362) :— AIDDARCUNFEANFORRENNNEAI (♂R) (S) IOSSAR

On the origin and solar meaning of this cumbrous "branched" form of alphabet, see later.

OGAM INSCRIPTION DECIPHERED

31

his tentative transcription of the text into Roman characters, that the result was so unsatisfactory that he could make no sense of it, and so abstained from attempting any translation whatsoever. With the clue, however, now put into my hands by the Phoenician version, the doubtful letters in this Ogam version were soon resolved into substantially literal agreement with the Phoenician version.

The full reading of this Ogam inscription requires the introduction of the vowels; for the Ogam script, like the Aryan Phoenician, Semitic Phoenician and Hebrew, and the Aryan Pali and Sanskrit alphabets, does not express the short vowel a which is inherent as an affix in every consonant of the old Aryan alphabetic scripts.1

I now place here side by side my transcript-readings and translations of the two versions of the inscription for comparison. And it will be seen that both read substantially the same. The slight differences in spelling of some of the names are due mainly to the poverty of the Ogam alphabet, which lacks some of the letters of the Phoenician (e.g. it has no K or Z, but uses or S instead); while the omission in the Ogam version of three of the titles which occur in the Phoenician was obviously owing to want of space; for the bulky Ogam script, even when thus curtailed, overruns the face of the monument for a considerable distance. The Phoenician script, it will be seen, like the Aryan Pali and Sanskrit, does not express the short affixed a inherent in the consonants, and, like them also, it writes the short i and the medial by attached strokes or "ligatures." In my transliteration here, therefore, I have given the short inherent a in small type, and the consonants and expressed vowels in capitals, whilst the ligatured consonants (here only r) and ligatured vowels (namely i and o) are also printed in small type, not capitals.

It will also be noted that the end portion of the Ogam inscription, which is bent round over the face of the stone, is read from its right border (i.e. in the reverse direction to the rest) with its lower strokes towards the right border of the stone, so that when the curved stem line is straightened out the lower strokes occupy the same lower position as in the rest of the inscription.

THE BI-LINGUAL INSCRIPTIONS ON THE NEWTON STONE, COMPARED IN TEXT AND TRANSLATION.

the Khilani (or Hitt- ite pal- the Khilani (or Hitt-ite palace

ace dweller)

dweller)

"This

Thus this bi-lingual inscription records that : Sun-Cross (Swastika) was raised to Bil (or Bel, the God of Sun-Fire) by the Kassi (or Cassi-bel [-an]) of Kast of the Siluyr (sub-clan) of the "Khilani " (or Hittite-palacedwellers), the Phoenician (named) Ikar of Cilicia, the Prut (or Prāt, that is ' Barat' or ' Brihat' or Brit-on)."

The second s in "Qass" is somewhat doubtful, as the 4th stroke in the series of 4 strokes under the stem-line which conventionally form the letter s in Ogam script is doubtfully represented. If only 3 strokes are present they spell "B(i)l," which would give Qas-b(i)1" or Qas-b(e)l"; but Qass" is probably the proper reading, and in series with the Kazzi of the Aryan Phoenician.

"

"

The third letter here is read Ã, which latter sometimes has a form resembling this, though different from the letter read à in second line, which is similar to the A in the later Phoenician inscriptions.

The second detached letter read W from its head strokes may possibly be A, and thus give the form "Prät" instead of "Prwt."

DATE OF NEWTON STONE INSCRIPTIONS ABOUT 400 B.C.

Disclosing special features of Aryan Phænician Script, also Ogam as sacred Sun-cult Script of the Hittites, Early Britons and Scots.

THE date of these two inscriptions on the Newton Stone is fixed with relative certainty at about 400 B.C. by palæographic evidence, from the archaic form of some of the letters in the Phoenician script.

The hitherto "unknown" alphabetic script, in the face of the monument, I have called Aryan Phoenician, as it is written in the Aryan direction, like the English and Gothic and European languages generally, from the left towards the right, and not in the reversed or Semitic direction. This distinguishes it sharply from the later Semitic retrograde form of writing the later form of Phoenician letters which has hitherto been universally and exclusively termed "Phoenician." For I had found, as already mentioned, that the Phoenicians were really Sumerians, Hittites and Aryans; and that the Sumerian script, always written in Aryan fashion towards the right, was the parent of all the alphabets of the civilized world.

The cursive shape of the letters in this Aryan Phoenician script suggests that the Phoenician dedicator of this inscription had written it himself on the stone with pen and ink in his ordinary business style of writing for the mason to engrave -as the practical necessity for the Phoenician merchantprinces to keep their accounts in order" must early have resulted in a somewhat more cursive style of writing than the "lithic" or lapidary style engraved on their monuments and artistic objects, a difference corresponding to that between modern business writing and print.