Talk:Phoenician alphabet/Archive 2

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Archive 1 Archive 2

This page might need to be split

Following a recent study (Israel Finkelstein & Benjamin Sass, The West Semitic Alphabetic Inscriptions, Late Bronze II to Iron IIA: Archeological Context, Distribution and Chronology), very kindly suggested to me by user Qumranhöhle, it seems that this page covers a wider topic than it should. Recent archeological discoveries have shown that in fact "Phoenician" is one of the many "Canaanite script variants" or "Canaanite alphabets", spread throughout the Levant, and thus it is not an ancestor to Aramaic or Paleo-Hebrew. Note, other authors like Michael O'Connor used the term "Phoenician" as a name for this ancestor script for the lack of a better term. I will provide some citations below from the recent study of Finkelstein and Sass:

  • the development from Proto-Canaanite to ‘post Proto-Canaanite’ appears to be undifferentiated everywhere in the Levant and the Jazira; for a few decades the alphabet seems to have developed in unison, presumably under the influence of a leading royal city, before the Hebrew-style alphabet (below) was the first to split away
  • ["below" in the previous sentence leads to this] The first language-related alphabet variety, the Hebrew, emerged in the course of the first half of the ninth century or late Iron IIA1. If the Hebrew-style script is first documented archaeologically at S˙afi and Rehov, was it born there, or in Samaria after all?
  • "Ca. 880/870–840/830 .... Earliest language related alphabet-variant – Hebrew – vs. a uniform Philistian–Phoenician–Aramaic script in the southern Levant"
  • "780/770–740/730 "The Alphabet is omnipresent in the Levant. Differentiation of the Philistian, Phoenician, Aramaic and Transjordanian alphabet variants.

It is clear that Finkelstein and Sass are both talking about a singular "the alphabet" (user Qumran clarified that they mean script, in Wiki usage) and styles/variants/varieties.

I will also attach citations from "The World's Writing Systems", that strongly suggest that these scripts have a common origin and are all variants of one script, but note, here they use the (now antiquated) term Phoenician as an ancestor script rather than as a variant, this usage is no longer accurate following these archeological discoveries discussed in Finkelstein and Sass:

  • Page 89: [Describing a picture] Northern Linear (Canaanite) is still 1 script around 1200 BC, it turns into Phoenician around 1000 BC. "Hebrew (linear)" and "Phoenician" split as variants from Phoenician at around 800 BC. * Paleo-Hebrew appears around 200 BC until 150 BC.
  • Page 94: The northern linear abjad has a smaller consonantal inventory (ca. 22 sounds) than the southern linear form [context: South Arabian script] (ca. 28 sounds) and was used to represent a language like Phoenician that had undergone certain sound changes by ca. 1200. ... Since the earliest major texts are in fact Phoenician, the script of the period 1050-850 is called Phoenician. The argument has been made that various forms of the Bronze Age linear abjad survived into the Iron Age (Kaufman 1986). The contention that the use of the term Phoenician is therefore not justified does not follow (pace Kaufman 1986: 3-4); since the texts show the smaller consonantal inventory, they are linguistically closer to Phoenician (if they are not actually Phoenician) than to Aramaic (Naveh 1987).
  • ... the northern form [context: Phoenician rather than southern/South Arabian] over the ninth to fifth centuries developed various ways of notating vowels with mitres lectionis 'mothers of reading', consonantal signs used to indicate the presence of a vowel. Earliest notated were long vowels at the ends of words, followed almost immediately by word-internal long vowels; short-vowel notation came later. (West Semitic words never begin with vowels.) This process of vowel notation apparently began among the Arameans and later spread to Canaanite scribes. The shift to the use of vowel letters was not universal among the West Semitic script traditions: Phoenician was written in a purely consonantal orthography with no trace of vowel letters as late as the first century B.C.E., though its descendant language Punic had developed vowel letters centuries before.
  • Page 95: [Describing table] TABLE 5.4: Northern Linear Monumental scripts. XVI, Hasmonean coins and Abba inscription, 2nd-1st c. BCE "Paleo-Hebrew script"
  • Page 96: The Phoenician script was the base from which the other varieties (and later sub-varieties) developed. Texts are found in various Canaanite languages from the eleventh century B.C.E. on. In the central and southern Levant, the most notable script variety is linear Hebrew, used also for that language's lesser known relatives, Moabite and Philistine (the Semitic language of the Philistine area)
  • Hebrew continued to be written with the linear Hebrew abjad during the exilic period (597-539 B.c.E.), when it was gradually replaced by a form of the Aramaic script. The older ("linear") Hebrew abjad remained in intermittent use, nationalistically or religiously motivated, until 135 C.C.; during this later phase it is called Paleo-Hebrew script. This abjad is the basis of the Samaritan script, which emerged during the first century B.C.E. and is still used for religious purposes.

It is clear that despite not having access to new archeological discoveries, O'Connor used "Northern Linear Monumental scripts", as a collective term, which even included the much later Paleo-Hebrew which was used around 200 BC to 150 AD. It is also clear that he uses terms like "the northern form" even at 500 BC, and "West Semitic script traditions", which all indicates a Canaanite script family. He does indicate that Hebrew and Phoenician split from... "Phoenician", this corresponds to the statement by Finkelstein and Sass that at first "the scripts developed in unison". This is repeated by the claim that "Phoenician script was the base from which the other varieties (and later sub-varieties) developed", but note once more, this use of "Phoenician" is now inaccurate and "Canaanite script" would be a better term (also corresponding to Proto-Canaanite, their ancestor).

Currently this page is still based on older assumptions (that did not have access to those new archeological discoveries) that Phoenician was the oldest and original script and the ancestor of all others. According to various Wiki pages, "Phoenician" is the ancestor of Aramaic and Paleo-Hebrew, but this usage of "Phoenician" is incorrect. I believe this should be corrected and this page might need to be split between a page called "Canaanite scripts" (named like Brahmic scripts) and a page called "Phoenician alphabet" (just like now, as alphabet is used by Wiki as a term for national variants). I'd like to hear your thoughts on this. Glennznl (talk) 09:59, 24 July 2020 (UTC)

EDIT: Diringer in "Alphabet a key to the history of mankind" wrote about a "Canaanite branch of alphabets" all the way in 1948.

  • Page 236: "The Canaanite main branch of alphabets may be subdivided into two following branches: (1) Early Hebrew with it's three secondary branches, the Moabite, the Edomite and the Ammonite, and its two offshoots, the Samaritan and the script of the Jewish coins; and (2) Phoenician, which can be distinguished into (a) Early Phoenician, (b) Phoenician proper and (c) "colonial" Phoenician, out of which the Punic and Neo-Punic varieties ... developed"
  • Page 240: [interesting for later, he actually lists some examples that make the Hebrew variety stand out]
  • Page 255: "The Aramaic scripts are a main branch of the North Semitic alphabet, the Canaanite branch being the other main branch."

The first excerpt nicely gives another case of the term "Canaanite" being used to describe this family, and the description mostly follows material seen before, once again confirming Hebrew does not descend from Phoenician and they both stem from the Canaanite branch of alphabets. What stands out is the lack of Aramaic, further detailed on page 255, where he writes it is a main branch of the North Semitic alphabet. This differs to the family tree by O'Connor where Aramaic descends from an early Phoenician (in Finkelstein and Sass this early Phoenician is still Canaanite, of which Hebrew was the first to split off while the other varieties were still undifferentiated), which split into Phoenician proper and Aramaic. To repeat, Finkelstein and Sass has "780/770–740/730 The Alphabet is omnipresent in the Levant. Differentiation of the Philistian, Phoenician, Aramaic and Transjordanian alphabet variants." I wonder if this change occured because of radiocarbon dating and new archeological discoveries. Later material should be more determinative, in any case. Glennznl (talk) 23:44, 26 July 2020 (UTC)

Finkelstein & Sass are mentioning "Hebrew letter shapes", "Hebrew trait", "Hebrew inscriptions". If not missed anything, the only describing feature they give for this is: "Hebrew-style ductus derived from the cursive".
from vHMML School page - a script's ductus is said to be a way of describing what the scribe did as he was forming the letters. For ex you can make letter O with in a single stroke or with a few separate strokes. The term "cursive" in paleography may be used to any script that appear hastily written.
It still needs to be figured out what the h is this thing "Paleo-Hebrew Alphabet". Is it a homoglyphical pseudo alphabet, or a brainchild of Wikipedia, or what?--Mustvalge (talk) 12:08, 25 July 2020 (UTC)
@Mustvalge: Clearly Hebrew is described as a style/variety of "the alphabet" that is found "omnipresent in the Levant", as shown in the examples above. Wikipedia should reflect this, but first we need to sort out Phoenician by dividing it into a page for the Phoenician variety and for the "Canaanite alphabet" that is the base of all varieties (previously called Phoenician as well). Glennznl (talk) 14:21, 25 July 2020 (UTC)
There is something that could be a "base of all varieties" - Proto-Sinaitic script. --Mustvalge (talk) 17:14, 25 July 2020 (UTC)
Seems like the process of splitting has already started in the Philistine language page - someone is trying to create there a page for "Neo-Philistine script". I'm not sure if it wouldn't be another Wikipedia's brainchild. --Mustvalge (talk) 18:19, 25 July 2020 (UTC)
@Mustvalge: Proto-Sinaitic/Proto-Canaanite is an even earlier stage than this "Canaanite alphabet" of which Hebrew and Phoenician split according to the sources, so a new page is needed, either by writing a new one or splitting this Phoenician page. Interestingly, on Philistine language it is said that Cross too used the term "West Semitic alphabet", more evidence that this Phoenician page needs to be changed. Glennznl (talk) 18:50, 25 July 2020 (UTC)
do Finkelstein and Sass show what are the distinctive features of these scripts? Would be good to be cautious to not to develope some story about nothing, just because there is such a term somewhere. With reference to Finkelstein and Sass there is some critisism from Rollston for examp - meaning that other sources should be also taken into account. --Mustvalge (talk) 20:20, 25 July 2020 (UTC)
@Kwamikagami: What do you think about this situation when looking at the citations I laid out? Glennznl (talk) 14:21, 25 July 2020 (UTC)

My impression is that it might be useful to parallel Latin script vs Latin alphabet, Italian alphabet etc. For the script itself (the writing system), we have this article, which we could move to Canaanite script. Then we would have Phoenician alphabet, Philistine alphabet, etc. for the adaptation of that script to specific languages. That terminology differs from some sources that speak of "the Alphabet" for the script, but sources are inconsistent as to the distinction between 'alphabet' and 'script', and on WP we generally use 'script' for the writing system and 'alphabet' for instances of that writing system. (There was a long debate/discussion deciding this some years ago.) This way, the titles of the articles would dab between different writing systems vs different adaptations/orthographies, would would be useful for orientating the reader. "The Alphabet" with a capital 'A' refers to the innovation of a purely alphabetic script, not to the difference between a writing system and its adaptations.

There may be some difficulty with the Aramaic and Hebrew variants of the Canaanite script, since 'Aramaic alphabet' and 'Hebrew alphabet' are used for later time periods, but I'm sure we can come up with some suitable dabs. ('Aramaic Canaanite alphabet'? 'Hebrew Canaanite alphabet'? Though the Hebrews were ethnically distinct, they spoke the Canaanite language and wrote with the Canaanite script, so I don't think that should be an issue.) — kwami (talk) 19:58, 25 July 2020 (UTC)

@Mustvalge: Can you read at all? The comment on "Neo-Philistine script" is referenced and presents the view of a scholar, quite an important one. Don't you understand even this basic difference? How about you go, read and learn BEFORE you present your "findings" here and argue without any knowledge?
@Kwamikagami: User warshy has said enough about the "convention". It is not a policy, it was never voted for, the discussion was among a few users and the result defies common use. It should safely be IGNORED. How wrong this whole approach is can easily be seen from your artificial suggestions 'Aramaic Canaanite alphabet' or 'Hebrew Canaanite alphabet'. Inventing terms is a violation of basic Wikipedia principles. If you wish, write an article, send it to a peer-reviewed journal in the field and make yourself a laughing-stock with your suggestions. I look forward to that story.
"the Hebrews were ethnically distinct" - another uninformed error. "they spoke the Canaanite language and wrote with the Canaanite script". There is neither THE Canaanite language nor THE Canaanite script. Why do you write about things you don't understand at all? --Qumranhöhle (talk) 21:59, 25 July 2020 (UTC)
@Kwamikagami: I think the "Aramaic alphabet" page should keep the name but include more early history of the script, the "Paleo-Hebrew alphabet" page should stay how it is except making it more clear that it is one of the many varieties of the Canaanite/West Semitic alphabet/script/writing system.
@Qumranhöhle: This convention has been applied to every page and we should keep consistency and not start to go against the grain with this 1 page. Improving the terminology is a different debate. Your passive aggresive behaviour towards a cooperative user like Kwami is also unwarranted.
The Hebrews are widely known to be a different ethnic group than the Phoenicians, unless you know better as always. Of course Kwami knows the scripts and languages were part of a continuum, you don't have to act pedantic. Glennznl (talk) 23:58, 25 July 2020 (UTC)
I do. If you still use "Hebrews" as an ethnic term, you are some decades behind.
"not start to go against the grain with this 1 page" - this 1 page? How come you discuss a bunch of other pages that should be renamed? --Qumranhöhle (talk) 13:30, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
Yes, Qumranhöhle, if the best argument you can come up with is to engage in personal attacks, then I think you can be safely ignored. Do you have evidence, contrary to the sources above, that there were multiple Canaanite writing systems, rather than local variants of a single writing system analogous to Fraktur or Insular minuscule for Latin script? And although this is not the place for your rants about our naming conventions, how do you suggest we rename English alphabet, since from your POV it's not an alphabet?
Glennznl, if what we already have is adequate for the other articles, then we'd just have the 2-way split that you first suggested. I do think our coverage would be clearer if we were careful to distinguish written Phoenician from the broader use of the writing system. — kwami (talk) 00:14, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
Of course I did not say that there were "multiple Canaanite writing systems" with regard to the alphabet (in light of the cuneiform alphabet in use in Ugarit [and beyond?] and the long and short versions of the alphabet it might not be wrong to speak of at least several Canaanite writing systems, but that is another point) and I do not at all disagree with the article by Finkelstein and Sass which I introduced here, in case you have forgotten it. That misunderstanding of yours is grounded in your misleading use of the terminology. Thanks for making that point clear, even if involuntarily! --Qumranhöhle (talk) 13:30, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
@Qumranhöhle: No, that is exactly the point. We're talking at cross purposes. What you call a "writing system" we have for years called an "alphabet". Does a tree makes a sound -- don't reify semantics. Whether that's how we *should* name our articles is another discussion. If you can suggest a set of terms, such that we can clearly distinguish the writing system (e.g. Latin/Roman or Perso-Arabic) from its adaptation to a specific language (e.g. German or Urdu) from a specific hand/style (e.g. Fraktur or Nastaliq), and all of that from "the alphabet" for this family of segmental writing systems (e.g. as used by Finkelstein & Sass and others), then I'm all ears, and if satisfactory I would support a WP-wide adoption of your system. The problem we've always had is that all the available terms seem to be ambiguous and are used in contradictory ways by different sources, such as "the alphabet" vs "the English alphabet", where "alphabet" means two very different things. — kwami (talk) 17:58, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
From the "naming conventions: "The term 'script' is used with four meanings: 1. A general segmental writing system, as opposed to its local instantiations... " vs. your statement "What you call a "writing system" we have for years called an "alphabet"." - ???
"The problem we've always had is that all the available terms seem to be ambiguous and are used in contradictory ways by different sources." Yes, that may well be, yet it is not Wikipedia's task to coin a new usage, especially when it leads to contradiction with the sources. --Qumranhöhle (talk) 18:35, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
Of course that's not our task, which is why we don't do that. What we do do is select among existing usages to try to have some consistency. No matter which usage we adopt, it's going to be at odds with RS's, because RS's contradict each other. There's nothing we can do about that, but we can at least try to be internally consistent, just as individual sources try to be. It does our readers no favors for the word 'alphabet' to have a different definition in the Phoenician X article than it does in the Hebrew X article, and different again in the Greek X article. Imagine if we were to say, backed by numerous RS's, that Greek is the "first alphabet", that Phoenician and Hebrew weren't alphabets because they didn't (initially) have letters for vowels, then say, again backed by numerous RS's, that Phoenician and Hebrew are alphabets. The response is going to be, "WTF? Which is it?" If we're going to say that Paleo-Hebrew is an alphabet, then we can't say that Greek is the first alphabet, despite what the sources say. We certainly can't have a 'Hebrew alphabet' article and then claim that it's not an alphabet. So, of all the conventions out there, which should WP follow? You can't just say 'whatever the sources use' because there's no such thing. If you can come up with a set of conventions that better reflects the academic lit, I'd love to see it. I'm not happy with the current situation, it's just the least-bad we've come up with. — kwami (talk) 23:30, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
From the "naming conventions: "The term 'script' is used with four meanings: 1. A general segmental writing system, as opposed to its local instantiations... " vs. your statement "What you call a "writing system" we have for years called an "alphabet"." - Can you riddle me this? For me this is an outright contradiction between the conventions and your statement.
If scholarly references contradict each other (and the do, of course), then our articles should reflect that. First of all several articles deal with that problem insofar as they explain different usages. Second, this is actually a service to the reader insofar as it also explain the complexities of the situation and does not offer false clarity. (To take up your example: It would be easy to state that some researchers prefer to call alphabet only those systems with vowel letters whereas as consonantal writing systems are called "abjad" etc. by some. However, we follow the still common usage here.). "which is why we don't do that" - good at least we agree here, yet then it is completely unclear to me why you suggested invented terms like "Hebrew Canaanite alphabet"? How does that fit your assertion "we don't do that"? --Qumranhöhle (talk) 07:09, 27 July 2020 (UTC)
@Kwamikagami: I was thinking to move this page to "Canaanite script" or "Canaanite alphabets" (I am still undecided about what would be preferable, perhaps the first, since the latter sounds more like only the variants are being discussed?) and continue development and additions over there, but then copying and returning to Phoenician alphabet only material directly related to Phoenician. Although I am not sure if that is a correct way of working according to Wiki rules. This change will also have consequences for perhaps half of the writing systems on Wiki, that list "Phoenician" as an ancestor rather than the more accurate "Canaanite". All of the Canaanite alphabets will need refering to this new page and updated family tree, and Ancient South Arabian script will also need a correction. Glennznl (talk) 09:35, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
'Script' is definitely the way to go. 'Alphabets' is used where there are multiple alphabets for a language, e.g. Mongolian with its Cyrillic and Uighur alphabets, or Chechen with its Cyrillic and Latin alphabets.
If the bulk of the history of this article is about the script, then the proper way to handle it would be to move it to 'Canaanite script' and then copy-paste-edit the Phoenician alphabet bit back into that name. The other way would be to copy-paste-edit the script bits over to the new name. The complication arises when people try following the history of the article, e.g. who added some unreferenced claim. It's best if the page history resides at the same name as the bulk of the topic that the history was involved in creating.
We can create a bot to deal with the info boxes. If it's just a change in one of the fields, without needing copy-editing, it's simplicity itself. If the lists need to be jostled around -- lengthened or shortened -- then it's still pretty straightforward, as long as you can come up with a general set of rules for the change that applies to all articles, or can manually correct the exceptions. — kwami (talk) 09:49, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
@Kwamikagami: Script it is then. We could explain how it wasn't a single standardized script but a continuum throughout the Levant in the first line of the article, to make that clear. The biggest change would be everything descending from Aramaic alphabet, which is nearly every script ever used in Asia that doesn't descend from Chinese. The tree would have to go from Canaanite > Aramaic > X, rather than Phoenician. The leftovers like Paleo-Hebrew and South Arabian can be done by hand. Glennznl (talk) 10:33, 26 July 2020 (UTC)

we'll also want to check the current target of Canaanite script to verify there's no complication there, and redirect any synonyms that may currently direct there. — kwami (talk) 10:41, 26 July 2020 (UTC)

@Kwamikagami: Canaanite script is directed to an earlier stage of the script, Proto-Sinaitic/Proto-Canaanite, so there are no complications in that regard. I will look for synonyms. Glennznl (talk) 10:54, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
note that by convention the date for the beginning of Phoenician script is 1050 BC, older ones are classified as Proto-Sinaitic script--Mustvalge (talk) 14:23, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
basically it looks like because there were heavy upcry for redirecting this "Paleo-Hebrew alphabet", some Users just can't accept it, and now we are renaming/splitting "Phoenician alphabet" article, because this is easier to do instead--Mustvalge (talk) 15:53, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
Although it is really tiring, one must note your mistakes again: "some Users just can't accept it, and now we are renaming/splitting "Phoenician alphabet" article, because this is easier to do instead". 1) A redirect is certainly simpler, 2) the idea of splitting was Glennznl's idea who originally argued with you for the redirect, not the other way round. 3) "older ones are classified as Proto-Sinaitic script". - No, as Glennznl already said to you, Proto-Sinaitic proper refers only to those inscriptions found in the Sinai Peninsula, the others are called Proto-Canaanite and for the most part they postdate the Proto-Sinaitic (another misnomer) inscriptions. As usual, it is more complex than you assume. --Qumranhöhle (talk) 18:47, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
@Kwamikagami: Follow up, it seems like Canaanite script, Canaanite alphabet and Northwest Semitic abjad refer to the same thing, on Wikipedia atleast. I couldn't find any others. Glennznl (talk) 20:12, 26 July 2020 (UTC)


Break after alerting WikiProject Linguistics

I just had a cursory look at this discussion. I am not an expert in the field, nor do I have the time to delve into it, although I must admit I find it all most interesting. The only thing that worries me is that the proposed split is based on one, recent study, and proposes to overthrow a classification and its related terminology that have been in use for a long time in academic sources, and probably still are. It might me preliminary to come to far-reaching conclusions, and take far-reaching steps in relation to this article, based on one, recent study. I have alerted the WikiProject Linguistics to this discussion, and I hope editors will add their valuable comments below in continuation of the section above. Debresser (talk) 12:06, 26 July 2020 (UTC)

Thank you, agreed. Although I find the study by Finkelstein and Sass quite convincing I would hesitate to change terminology without comment on a large scale and take it for granted, especially as they carefully point out that their conclusion is preliminary and every new find can change the picture. --Qumranhöhle (talk) 13:20, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
@Debresser: It's clear that O'Connor was talking about the same ancestral "Canaanite script" (which he called Phoenician, the ancestor of... Phoenician and Hebrew) back in 1996. I am pretty sure that other older literature would paint the same picture. Some extra confirmation doesn't ever hurt though. Glennznl (talk) 13:41, 26 July 2020 (UTC)
@Debresser: I edited my OP to include a source talking about the "Canaanite branch of alphabets" (Hebrew and Phoenician) all the way in 1948, so this name is anything but new. Glennznl (talk) 23:44, 26 July 2020 (UTC)

If "Phoenician" is the dominant identifier in the lit, yet we wish to distinguish the script as a whole from its adaptations to any particular language, then the obvious solution would be to follow the pattern of Latin script / Latin alphabet, Arabic script / Arabic alphabet, Burmese script / Burmese alphabet, etc. and split this article into Phoenician script / Phoenician alphabet. We'd then want a hat note on the latter, saying something like, "this is 'the alphabet' as used for writing Phoenician. For the writing system as a whole, see Phoenician script."

Qumranhöhle, again, if you can come up with a set of terms to better distinguish 'alphabet' = segmental writing / 'the Semitic alphabet' (as in Finkelstein & Sass and others) from 'alphabet' = consonant-vowel writing (as in 'the Greeks invented the alphabet') from 'alphabet' = a particular set of letters/rules (as in the Latin and Cyrillic alphabets are both used for Croatian) from 'alphabet' = the adaptation of such a set to a particular language (as in the English alphabet) from 'alphabet' = the superficial appearance/style of writing (as in the Fraktur or Insular Miniscule alphabets), then I'd certainly consider a WP-wide switch to your suggestion. I don't really care what the terms are. I just don't think that inconsistent usage and having our articles contradict each other, so that the terms have no dependable meaning, is a useful approach. — kwami (talk) 17:48, 26 July 2020 (UTC)

Since this is another thread and you stated your question already above where you can also find my reply, I won't furhter comment here to avoid forking. --Qumranhöhle (talk) 19:34, 26 July 2020 (UTC)

History of the terminology

It would help this discussion greatly if we could clarify in the article the history of the terminology. We know the following so far:

  • Herodotus introduced the term "phoinikeia grammata" (Phoenician script) in ancient times, which is the reason that in common parlance Phoenician is considered the "mother script"
  • Birnbaum introduced the term "Paleo-Hebrew" in 1954, to describe inscriptions of this type found in "Hebrew" locations.
  • Cross wrote an influential article in 1954 entitled: "The Evolution of the Proto-Canaanite Alphabet"[1] He talked about "Alan Gardiner's epoch-making paper published in 1917, propounding the theory that the Proto-Canaanite alphabet was acrophonically devised under the inspiration of Egyptian writing."
  • Gardiner, however, did not use the term "Proto-Canaanite" in his paper, but rather wrote "About the tenth century B.C. there appears upon Syrian soil an alphabet of twenty-two linear signs, which is with sufficient accuracy for our purpose described as the Phoenician alphabet".[2]

So somewhere between 1917 and 1954 the term "Proto-Canaanite" was coined. There must have been some discussion at the time as to why to use that name rather than "Proto-Phoenician". This book says the name came from Cross: Marc-Alain Ouaknin (1999). The Mysteries of the Alphabet: The Origins of Writing. Abbeville Press. ISBN 978-0-7892-0523-0. F.M. Cross used Albright's work as a starting point in his attempt to definitively link proto-Phoenician writing ( thirteenth century B.C.E.), which he called proto-Canaanite, back to proto-Sinaitic and forward to paleo-Phoenician Onceinawhile (talk) 10:04, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

@Onceinawhile: Thank you for this post. This should be paid extra attention to: "with sufficient accuracy for our purpose described as the Phoenician alphabet."
We should now be very careful with the term "Phoenician", as it can mean anything from "Canaanite script", "Early Phoenician", "Phoenician proper" to "Colonial Phoenician", as shown in the literature above. As the study of Finkelstein and Sass says, Phoenician and Aramaic were variants of a yet undifferentiated Canaanite script, only Hebrew split off at this point, so the "Phoenician" in Syria must be "Canaanite script" that did not develop into Aramaic just yet.
Correct me if I'm wrong but Proto-Canaanite is Proto-Sinaitic as found in Canaan (the Levant pretty much), so it is an even earlier stage than the "Canaanite script" this discussion is talking about. Glennznl (talk) 12:35, 27 July 2020 (UTC)
Hi Glennznl, from what I can tell, the terminology "Proto-Canaanite" began in the wake of the discovery of the Ugaritic texts (originally known as Ras Shamra texts). This 1936 article on Ras Shamra is the first mention of "proto-Canaanite" I can find.[3] An article from the CDLI explains:
"because of the overwhelming graphical and phonetic similarities between the Ugaritic alphabetic cuneiform script and the later Phoenician linear alphabetic writing system, it has been argued that there must have been an earlier Proto-Canaanite alphabetic writing system in use in this region that acted as a predecessor to both the Ugaritic and the Phoenician alphabets. This argument is based on the conclusion that twenty-one out of the twenty-two Phoenician signs are graphically similar or identical to the Ugaritic alphabetic signs. Therefore both the Sumero-Akkadian cuneiform writing system and the Proto-Canaanite script influenced the Ugaritic script."[4]
Onceinawhile (talk) 12:45, 27 July 2020 (UTC)
@Onceinawhile: Correct, this is Proto-Canaanite. After this stage, Ugaritic split off from Proto-Canaanite, the latter kept evolving before splitting into Southern Linear (South Arabian) and Northern Linear (Canaanite). Glennznl (talk) 12:55, 27 July 2020 (UTC)
As Ugaritic is a cuneiform alphabet (!) you can't say it split off from Proto-Canaanite, even though there are graphic similarities. --Qumranhöhle (talk) 13:06, 27 July 2020 (UTC)
@Qumranhöhle: The family tree I used as a source by O'Connor calls the ancestor of Ugaritic (Proto-)Canaanite. If you meant that there is not enough solid evidence to say Ugaritic descended from it, I have no opinion on that, I just replied to user Onceinawhile with a reply based on sourced material. Glennznl (talk) 13:14, 27 July 2020 (UTC)
That is an acceptable argument and you are right, O'Connor presents a family tree with "Northern Linear (Canaanite)" three times, the first one leading also to "Wedge (Ugaritic)". Tricky. In the sense that the system of 27 signs for single sounds is used and those are the same sounds, that tree is absolutely correct, indeed, and my remark was imprecise. It just shouldn't be forgotten that there is a fundamental distinction between linear and cuneiform writing, thus concerning the letter shapes (script) that part of the family tree would be misleading (whereas it is still correct for the rest). The timeline in O'Connor should be adjusted slightly, but that is a minor point. Okay. --Qumranhöhle (talk) 17:34, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

Relevant to our discussion: Proto-Sinaitic_script#Synonym_for_Paleo-Phoenician_or_Paleo-Hebrew_script, here it is explained how our "Canaanite script" has yet another name, this time "Proto-Canaanite", which has been given a second meaning as the ancestor of Hebrew and Phoenician aside from "Proto-Sinaitic as in Canaan". Obviously this ambiguous usage is unsatisfactory. From the description on the section I linked to it is very obvious that we are talking about the same script. Glennznl (talk) 20:08, 27 July 2020 (UTC)

Could you clarify the probem a bit for me, since I am not sure I understand it. Is it about Proto-Canaanite vs. Canaanite? But above you were already - and rightly so - cautiously applying "(Proto-)Canaanite". As a lemma something like this with () would be impractical, but to indicate in a discussion, as you did, that both terms are applicable, it seems to me a good solution. Personally I think it infeliticious to use Proto-X if X is not used. That applies to Proto-Sinaitic as well - not all scholars used Proto-Sinaitic, some preferred Sinaitic, but the former has gained precendence. Or is it about Proto-Sinaitic in relation to Proto-Canaanite? The term Proto-Sinaitic was initially coined for a set of inscriptions found at the Sinai Peninsula. The (Proto-)Canaanite inscriptions basically belong to the same system, thus instead of Proto-Canaanite is Proto-Sinaitic in Canaan you could as well say Proto-Sinaitic is Proto-Canaanite at Sinai. If I am not mistaken most of the Proto-Canaanite inscriptions were dated later than the Proto-Sinaitic ones, thus there was a regional as well as a chronological difference. Whatever, it is basically the same system and a scholar like Hamilton prefers Early Alphabetic (A, B, C) as more neutral terms for those scripts. Thus, Proto-Sinaitic/Proto-Canaanite are the ancestors of Phoenician and Hebrew. Does that clarify something or did I miss your point about ambiguity? In any case we should make clear that the scholarly discussion is going on and the recent two decades have seen some changes in perception. Any article should ideally reflect that. --Qumranhöhle (talk) 07:49, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
@Qumranhöhle: Sure I can. This very wide variety of terminology with different, the same and double meanings is getting very confusing, I am not sure how the academics work with this unstandardized mess.
So to recap, earlier we discovered that the term "Phoenician" is often used in an inaccurate way, namely, it is often used to name the ancestor script of Hebrew, Phoenician and Aramaic (this ancestor is no longer Proto-Sinaitic/Proto-Canaanite at this point in time), rather than only the variety of the script as used by the actual Phoenicians. This can be seen in the citation provided by user Onceinawhile, the scholar Gardiner says about using the name "Phoenician" as the ancestor script, that it has "sufficient accuracy for our purpose", so this sounds more like a term of convenience. Finkelstein and Sass have called this Phoenician-Aramaic-Hebrew mother script "post Proto-Canaanite" or just "the alphabet", which they also said at first "developed in unison". Diringer talked about the "Canaanite branch", a descendant of Proto-Sinaitic/Proto-Canaanite, all the way back in 1948 and named Hebrew and Phoenician as the two varieties of this Canaanite branch. In the family tree of O'Connor, it is clear that his Phoenician1 and Phoenician2 should be this "Canaanite script", as he later says: "The Phoenician script was the base from which the other varieties (and later sub-varieties) developed. Texts are found in various Canaanite languages from the eleventh century B.C.E. on. In the central and southern Levant, the most notable script variety is linear Hebrew, used also for that language's lesser known relatives, Moabite and Philistine (the Semitic language of the Philistine area)". This corresponds to Finkelstein and Sass who also said Hebrew was the first to split away from the "post Proto-Canaanite"/"the alphabet" and that Phoenician/Aramaic varieties stayed undifferentiated a little while longer than Hebrew. Note: Finkelstein and Sass never use Phoenician in this inaccurate manner, only as a variety of Canaanite, just like Hebrew and Aramaic.
So now on the Wiki article for Proto-Sinaitic/Proto-Canaanite. On this page the term Proto-Canaanite is explained to have a second meaning (aside from "Proto-Sinaitic in Canaan", its main meaning), namely: "The term Proto-Canaanite is also used when referring to the ancestor of the Phoenician or Paleo-Hebrew script, respectively, before some cut-off date, typically 1050 BC, with an undefined affinity to Proto-Sinaitic". It is clear that we are talking about the same Hebrew-Phoenician ancestor script here, despite the confusing term "proto-Canaanite" this actually corresponds to Finkelstein and Sass' "post proto-Canaanite" ("the alphabet" which first developed "in unison") and Diringer's "Canaanite branch" descended from Proto-Sinaitic/Proto-Canaanite.
In my opinion, the "post proto-" of Finkelstein and Sass should cancel each other out and we should be talking about a "Canaanite script". Using "Canaanite" without any prefixes was already done by Diringer in 1948, as proven by me, so it has precedent. Using "Canaanite" is a satisfactory solution as it will be used to describe a later stage than "Proto-Canaanite", it's ancestor.
I hope that clears things up, we should be careful not to get confused by the potpouiri of names. Glennznl (talk) 09:29, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
No we're talking. This is an almost unexpected learning success. "I am not sure how the academics work with this unstandardized mess" - part of it is only apparently a mess when one lumps together different terminology from the last hundred years. Terminology changed over time with new discoveries and new theories/models, that's natural. And especially the last two decades or so have seen a reevaluation partially based on new finds, that lead to a reorientation of the models. In such a phase of research a non-standardized language is almost inevitable. However, there are (slightly) different models, thus also different terminology, but from context the respective models and terminology becomes clear. Thus, not so messy then.
Concerning Phoenician: I recommend the clear article by G. Hamilton in "An Eye for Form", eds. Hackett and Aufrecht, which I already mentioned. There (p. 42) he refers to Cross's "Early Linear Phoenician" (as Cross himself wrote "The term ... was arbitrarily devised by the writer as a designation for the alphabet which emerged in the course of the eleventh century...) and explains the reasoning: Because (at that time) "almost all of the long inscriptions assigned to the beginning of this single-directional stage of alphabetic writing [scil. Hamiltons Early alhabetic C] came from Byblos". He goes on to describe Rollston's slightly different use of simply Phoenician (instead of Cross's earlier Early Linear Phoenician) and modification of the underlying argument - i.e. because this kind of writing "has been best attested in Phoenicia, and some apparently Phoenician forms of the ltters are found in inscriptions written from right to left in Palestine", therefore - according to Rollston - Phoenician is the "mother script" from which many others descend. However, Hamilton himself sees nothing distinctive Phoenician in that period (and insofar agrees with Finkelstein & Sass despite other differences). In other words: Alphabetic writing was spread far beyond Phoenicia proper in the late Bronze age. Model A see nonetheless Phoenicia as the (prestigious) centre of development and thus justifies the use of "Phoenician" for the early phase (ca. 1050-900 BCE?), although the development is still widely uniform and no clear split into the later "national" scripts appeared, whereas model B does not accept the idea of one prestigious centre with the peripheriy simply following and rather sees multiple nodes, and therefore restricts the usage of "Phoenician" (proper) to the period when distinctly "national" scripts had arisen. Despite the differences there are many agreements between the models and the interpretation of the facts. In fact, the differences may sound quite marginal to non-specialists. --Qumranhöhle (talk) 12:01, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
@Qumranhöhle: Thanks for the further explanation on the term "Phoenician" and clarifying the two different models. So now I suppose the question is, should Wikipedia reflect model A or model B? I would say model B? Model A seems to rely more on theories/guess work/assumptions (because some letters were found in Palestine, Phoenician must be the prestigious origin and mother script) and older archeological material available at the time, even though it is said the development was still widely uniform. Model B seems to be a more common view and seems to rely more on the facts as they are without making assumptions. I think more users should look at this. Glennznl (talk) 13:53, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
Honestly, I don't dare to decide the matter. All of them are respected scholars and experts in their field. Personally I am bit more inclined to Model B, but of course new finds can easily change the picture. Interestingly Hamilton and Finkelstein & Sass agree on that point while sharply disagreeing on others. This may indicate something. Whatever the decision in the end, the alternative view and arguments can/should be presented as well. In any case the Proto-Canaanite article needs expansion. Not least all those inscriptions deserve an article by themselves. Finally, it is certainly a good idea to involve more users. --Qumranhöhle (talk) 18:01, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
@Qumranhöhle: Perhaps we should both create a new page for the "Canaanite script", and modify this Phoenician page to both cover the "Phoenician variant" and "Model A". A section on this page reading "Some scholars argue that Phoenicia was a prestigious center and thus the Phoenician script was the mother script of all other Canaanite varieties", would work well to respect both models as no definitive academic answer is available yet. What is clear is that "Model B" is not reflected on Wikipedia at all, at the moment. Glennznl (talk) 18:11, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
I would be happy to provide you with bibliographic information and would enjoy very much if you are willing to read it and create a page based on it (or rework the Proto-Canaanite page). At the moment I neither have time nor energy to do a good job writing that page. It is surely missing, as are so many other topics from that field. Anyway, I will already be relieved if the introduction of new errors could be prevented. (You know, heart attacks in my age may have somewhat more serious consequences.) --Qumranhöhle (talk) 18:18, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
@Qumranhöhle: Sure, thanks. I would love to get my hands on more reliable quality sources and have enough free time to undertake such a thing. I will however wait with working on anything until the other users also agree on a solution, as many different options are available such as splitting, creating a new page, modifying this page or the Proto-Sinaitic page. P.S. Don't put anything related to Indian languages or scripts on your watchlist, the daily unsourced "Sanskrit" and "Tamil" additions/vandalism might be the end of you. Glennznl (talk) 19:01, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
Thanks, I can imagine parts of the conflicting lines there and am happy that this is not my cup of tea. --Qumranhöhle (talk) 20:33, 28 July 2020 (UTC)
Not an academic source but nonetheless interesting, Encyclopedia Britannica calls this Phoenician-Hebrew-Aramaic ancestor script "North Semitic alphabet" https://www.britannica.com/topic/North-Semitic-alphabet. Glennznl (talk) 20:05, 30 July 2020 (UTC)

Lead does not reflect significance of the topic at hand

Suggested improvements:

  • definition is self-referential: "The Phoenician alphabet is an alphabet [...] an early development [...] into a linear, alphabetic script"
  • summary of the fact that many widely used alphabets in use today, including, er, this one, are derived from it. this is nowhere in the lead
  • brief explanation of "linear" not a link to a section in an article
  • that it's an "abjad" should be mentioned later and not half way through first sentence.
  • more emphasis on fact that it is a transition from hieroglyphs etc. to what we know of as an alphabet --Cornellier (talk) 15:13, 26 April 2021 (UTC)

Individual letters do not have any inherent meanings

The table of letters section has a "meaning" column. Being that this is an alphabet, not a logography (or even a syllabary), the letters don't have meanings. The only source provided for any of these is over a century old and I'm unable to verify it. According to this presentation there is no modern scholarly support for saying that these letters have any inherent meanings.Yaakovaryeh (talk) 23:39, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

Yes. I think the meaning is of the original Egyptian hieroglyph. It could be made more clear, and perhaps a more recent reference found. --Cornellier (talk) 00:10, 19 July 2021 (UTC)
But the meaning of the original Egyptian hieroglyph isn't really relevant to the Phoenician letter. The Latin letter A is also based on the Phoenician 𐤀 which is based on the hieroglyph 𓃾, but that isn't really relevant to the letter A. Some try to use these connections to play word games and find "secret" meanings in ancient texts. This seems to be what the "meaning" column is based on, but I have been unable to find any reliable sources for this.Yaakovaryeh (talk) 19:37, 19 July 2021 (UTC)
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