A Companion to Linear B - The University of Texas at Austin

SUMMARY
CHAPTER 12
SCRIBES, SCRIBAL HANDS AND
PALAEOGRAPHY *
THOMAS G. PALAIMA
University of Texas at Austin
§12.1. Mycenaean scribes and their work: how and why the study of handwriting
became a key tool of research in Mycenaean studies ......................... 34
§12.1.1. Palaeographical studies before the decipherment ....................... 35
§12.1.1.1. Sir Arthur Evans ............................................................. 38
§12.1.1.2. Alice E. Kober and Emmett L. Bennett, Jr. ................... 44
§12.1.1.3. The roots of Mycenaean palaeography ........................... 46
§12.1.1.4. The major tasks of Mycenaean palaeography ................ 49
§12.1.1.5. Bennett’s results .............................................................. 55
§12.1.2. Palaeographical studies after the decipherment: Emmett L. Bennett,
Jr. and others ........................................................................ 56
§12.1.2.1. Emmett L. Bennett, Jr. and the scribes of Pylos and other
sites .................................................................................. 56
§12.1.2.1.1. The problem of the series PY Aa, Ab and Ad .. 57
§12.1.2.1.2. The language situation in Mycenaean Pylos ...... 60
§12.1.2.1.3. The link between hands and find-spots .............. 60
§12.1.2.1.4. The way in which the scribes monitored the
Pylian economy .................................................. 63
§12.1.2.1.5. The internal chronology of the tablets: the example
of tablet PY Tn 316 and the PY Ta tablets ....... 64
§12.1.2.1.6. Emmett L. Bennett, Jr. and the palaeography of
Knossos, Pylos and Mycenae ............................. 72
§12.1.2.2. Jean-Pierre Olivier .......................................................... 76
§12.1.2.3. Thomas G. Palaima ......................................................... 77
§12.1.2.4. Finger- and palm-prints on the tablets ............................ 83
* The editors received the first version of this chapter in March, 2007. The author wishes to thank
Yves Duhoux, Dygo Tosa, Andrew Zawislanski and Kevin Pluta for their advice and assistance,
and both editors for their patience and encouragement. He dedicates this chapter to Emmett
L. Bennett, Jr., his mentor and friend, and the truest gentleman he has met in his own now long
life. Photographs of Linear B tablets from Pylos are taken from the archives of the Program in
Aegean Scripts and Prehistory at the University of Texas at Austin, courtesy of the Department of
Classics, University of Cincinnati. Kevin Pluta helped a lot with the annotation of illustrations.