The Antiquity of the Greek Alphabet

Early Greek Alphabetic Writing

“…38 Those who reject the argumentum ex silentio have another pressing argument in their favour: if we look at other writing traditions, not related to alphabetic Greek, it is not uncommon to find long periods in which writing is not visible in the archaeological record, after which it is usual to see a continuity in the writing system that shows 33 For a visual summary of the dates proposed and their supporters see Heubeck 1979, 75 f. For more recent states of the question see Bourgignon 2010b; Bourogiannis 2018. 34 Second half : Carpenter 1933, 1938. Mid-8th century: Johnston 1983Jeffery and Johnston 1990, 21. First half : Heubeck 1979, 149;Powell 1991a, 20;Slings 1998;Sass 2005, 146.…”

A Proto - Canaanite Abecedary Dating from the Period of the Judges and its Implications for the History of the Alphabet

“…We need not rehearse all the particulars, but suffice with the mention of the main points. Modern scholars of ancient Greek script have followed Rhys Carpenter, who on the basis of similarity of the letters, argued for a borrowed Semitic script during the 8th century (Carpenter 1933;Jeffery 1961:15). Support for this date has been the absence of Greek texts earlier than this century.…”

The social context of literacy in Archaic Greece and Etruria

“…It was put to a greater range of uses and survives in a greater variety of archaeological and epigraphic forms. It seems clear, for example, that from the late 8th century onwards, soon after its introduction into Greece (Carpenter 1933;1938), writing was used in the composition of poetry, more perhaps as a mnemonic device than as a means of securing a permanent record and a wide audience (Johnston 1983). It was also used to mark property and perhaps also the contents of vessels (Johnston 1983).…”