Greek-derived alphabets used to write the Carian language of Anatolia
Carian
Inscription in Carian of the name 𐊨𐊣𐊠𐊦𐊹𐊸, qlaλiś[1]
Script type
Alphabet
Time period
7th to 1st centuries BCE
Direction
Left-to-right, right-to-left script
Languages
Carian language
Related scripts
Parent systems
Egyptian hieroglyphs[2]
Proto-Sinaitic
Phoenician
Greek alphabet ? [3][4][5]
Carian
Sister systems
Lycian, Lydian, Phrygian
ISO 15924
ISO 15924
Cari(201), Carian
Unicode
Unicode alias
Carian
Unicode range
U+102A0–U+102DF
This article contains phonetic transcriptions in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA. For the distinction between [ ], / / and ⟨⟩, see IPA § Brackets and transcription delimiters.
The Carian alphabets are a number of regional scripts used to write the Carian language of western Anatolia. They consisted of some 30 alphabetic letters, with several geographic variants in Caria and a homogeneous variant attested from the Nile delta, where Carian mercenaries fought for the Egyptian pharaohs. They were written left-to-right in Caria (apart from the Carian–Lydian city of Tralleis) and right-to-left in Egypt.
Carian was deciphered primarily through Egyptian–Carian bilingual tomb inscriptions, starting with John Ray in 1981; previously only a few sound values and the alphabetic nature of the script had been demonstrated. The readings of Ray and subsequent scholars were largely confirmed with a Carian–Greek bilingual inscription discovered in Kaunos in 1996, which for the first time verified personal names, but the identification of many letters remains provisional and debated, and a few are wholly unknown.
The Carian alphabet resembles the Greek alphabet, but the exact Greek variant from which it could have originated, has not yet been identified. The main reason for this is that some of the Greek letters have different sound values in Carian.[5] Two hypotheses have been suggested to explain this. The first is that the Greek letters were randomly attributed to phonetic values; though some letters retained their Greek value. The second proposed by Adiego (2007), is "that the Carian alphabet underwent a strong process of cursivisation, dramatically changing the form of many letters. At a certain point this graphic system underwent a change to 'capital' letters, for which the Greek capital letters were used as models - but now only from a formal point of view, disregarding their phonetic values (...).".[4]
^Palaeolexicon. "The Carian word qlaλiś".
^Himelfarb, Elizabeth J. "First Alphabet Found in Egypt", Archaeology 53, Issue 1 (Jan./Feb. 2000): 21.
^Cross, Frank Moore (2018-08-14). Leaves from an Epigrapher's Notebook: Collected Papers in Hebrew and West Semitic Palaeography and Epigraphy. BRILL. p. 58. ISBN 978-90-04-36988-7.
^ abBoyes, Philip J.; Steele, Philippa M. (2020). Understanding Relations Between Scripts II: Early Alphabets. Oxbow Books. p. 115. ISBN 978-1-78925-092-3.
^ abScriptsource.org - Carian "Visually, the letters bear a close resemblance to Greek letters. Decipherment was initially attempted on the assumption that those letters which looked like Greek represented the same sounds as their closest visual Greek equivalents. However it has since been established that the phonetic values of the two scripts are very different. For example the theta θ symbol represents ‘th’ in Greek but ‘q’ in Carian. Carian was generally written from left to right, although Egyptian writers wrote primarily from right to left. It was written without spaces between words."
The Carianalphabets are a number of regional scripts used to write the Carian language of western Anatolia. They consisted of some 30 alphabetic letters...
the Phoenician Alphabet. The Lydian and Carianalphabets are generally believed to derive from the Greek alphabet, although it is not clear which variant...
might be that the Carians originally developed an alphabet consisting of consonants only (like the Phoenician and Hieroglyphic alphabets before them), and...
these alphabets resemble Greek letters but have unrelated readings, most extensively in the case of Carian. The Phrygian and Lemnian alphabets by contrast...
spoke the Carian language. It is not clear when the Carians enter into history. The definition is dependent on corresponding Caria and the Carians to the...
Carianalphabet, which had an f derived from Φ, the Lydian f has the peculiar 8 shape also found in the Neo-Etruscan alphabet and in Italic alphabets...
inscription in Greek and Carian found in 1996. They helped to decipher the Carianalphabets. After Xerxes I was beaten in the Second Persian War and the Persians...
section lists alphabets used to transcribe phonetic or phonemic sound; not to be confused with spelling alphabets like the ICAO spelling alphabet. Some of...
of about 30 inscriptions and is the type-site of one variant of the Carianalphabets. It governed a number of rural sanctuaries, of which the most notable...
orientalizing period also accompanied the invention of the Greek alphabet and the Carianalphabet, based on the earlier phonetic but unpronounceable Levantine...
the so-called "old Phrygian" inscriptions less than 300 words The Carianalphabets whose texts, mainly from Egypt, contain around 600 words. the Umbrian...
the Carian and the Paleo-Balkan languages problem. In 1966, he suggested his own interpretation of the Carianalphabet, and his own reading of Carian inscriptions;...
Greek. It was largely similar to the Lydian and the Phrygian alphabets. The Lycian alphabet contains letters for 29 sounds. Some sounds are represented...
it is one of the most important known find-sites for inscriptions in the Carian language. Extensive excavations halted in 1937 and organised archaeological...
Lycian had its own alphabet, which was closely related to the Greek alphabet but included at least one character borrowed from Carian as well as characters...
identified elsewhere in Carian, which contains the Carian ś sound spelled with . Adiego follows this with the hypothesis that both the Carian letter and sampi...
Sidetic was probably closely related to Lydian, Carian and Lycian. The Sidetic script is an alphabet of the Anatolian group. It has about 25 letters,...
amongst the witches of Thessaly, and an important sanctuary among the Carians of Asia Minor in Lagina. Her oldest known representation was found in Selinunte...
example, Herodotus, Histories, II.154.1. Inscriptions in the Carian language and alphabet have been found in many parts of Egypt. "Cyrene". Livius.org...
Ephesus and the Anatolian peoples of the region, that is the Lydians and Carians, shared in common the temple of an Anatolian goddess equated by the Greeks...
(664–610 BC) established a garrison of foreign mercenaries at Daphnae, mostly Carians and Ionian Greeks (Herodotus ii. 154). According to the Hebrew Bible, the...