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Tuesday, October 15, 2013

19. Ugaritic cuneiform


Origin

Ugaritic cuneiform was named after Ugarit, the city state where it was used in what is now Syria. It was probably created sometime during the 14th century BC.

Notable features

  • Ugaritic cuneiform outwardly resembles other cuneiform scripts and has a sound system based on consonant alphabets such as Phoenician/Canaanite.
  • Ugaritic was generally written from left to right in horizontal rows, though there are examples of it written in the opposite direction.
  • Words were divided with a slash, no other punctuation was used.

Used to write:

Ugaritic, a Semitic language closely related to Phoenician which was spoken in the city state of Ugarit in northern Syria. Ugarit flourished from the 14th century BC until 1180/70 BC, when it was destroyed.
The city was rediscovered in 1928 by a peasant whose plow uncovered an ancient tomb near Ras Shamrah in northern Syria. A group of French archaeologists led by Claude F.A. Schaeffer started excavating the city in 1929.
Ugaritic cuneiform

Links

Information about the Ugaritic alphabet and language
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ugaritic_alphabet
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ugaritic_language
Information about the city of Ugarit
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ugarit
Ugaritic fonts
http://davidmyriad.tripod.com/myriads.font.page.html
http://www.fontspace.com/category/ugarit
http://www.historian.net/files.htm
http://reinhold.kainhofer.com/rk_fonts/index.html
ALPHABETUM - a Unicode font specifically designed for ancient scripts, including classical & medieval Latin, ancient Greek, Etruscan, Oscan, Umbrian, Faliscan, Messapic, Picene, Iberian, Celtiberian, Gothic, Runic, Old & Middle English, Hebrew, Sanskrit, Old Nordic, Ogham, Kharosthi, Glagolitic, Old Cyrillic, Phoenician, Avestan, Ugaritic, Linear B, Anatolian scripts, Coptic, Cypriot, Brahmi, Old Persian cuneiform: http://guindo.pntic.mec.es/~jmag0042/alphabet.html

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