The origins of Hunnish Runic Writing (13) The birth of letter scripts

The birth of letter scripts

 

Vowel characters (and therefore complete letter script) could not have developed in the first Semitic scripts, because Semitic scripts did not need vowel characters due to linguistic reasons. Semitic alphabets reported by different authors illustrate just an opposite process; the number of characters in earlier sets was reduced and existing vowel characters were left out.

The model for Semitic scripts seems to have been a character set of 30-32 linear letters including vowel characters, which was in use in the to the South of the Caucasus around 2000 BC.

This ancient source could have been a part of a writing set of 60-70 syllabic characters which had started to grow out of syllabification (or had used it always as a secondary method) into letter script. Hurrian syllable script shows traces of this process, as do the unsystematic syllable signs of Gubla (Protobyblos; Varga/1993/159-161) and Old-Persian cuneiform script. Precisely this practice (letter script with mixed characters) characterises Székely runic script, which contains letters, syllable signs and hieroglyphs.

The character order and sound set of the presumed ancient alphabet show a lot of similarity to Ugaritic cuneiform script which was used in 14th c. BC to record Hurrian and Semitic texts. Ugarit was founded around 4th millennium BC and became inhabited by Semitic people approximately 2000 BC, but Hurrians kept on living there as well. In its golden age the city was a part of the Hittite Empire. Ugaritic script consists of 30 characters. 27 of them also occurred in later Semitic scripts and were pronounced with the help of a vowel. However, in Semitic scripts the use of characters for the sounds "a", "i", "u" is very rare, so originally Ugaritic script appears to have been created for a widespread Hurrian language of the Hittite Empire and not for a Semitic one.[1]

The character order of the Ugaritic cuneiform alphabet is similar to that of the Latin and Székely alphabet, which shows a genetic relationship. That is, Székely script is in close connection with the Hurrian (?) predecessor of Semitic scripts, and we have no data to support the view that Semitic and Turkish scripts had an intermediate part in this connection.

Gelb (1952/133) thinks that the character forms of Ugaritic cuneiform script started to exist as the results of an independent, individual creation. Like Assyrian and Sumerian cuneiform scripts, it seems to have developed from widespread linear traditional forms. However, in our point of view, it is not character form that is important, as it largely depends on writing material. We are rather interested in the origins of complete letter script and a character order similar to Székely.

Returning to the phenomenon of the decreasing number of characters, note that around 1500 BC the Proto-Sinaitic script had 32 characters, while Southern-Aramean scripts just before the 12th c. BC had 29. The character number of Protopalestinian reduced from 27 to 22 around 1250 BC Aramean script used from the 7th c. had only 19 characters.

Such a reduction in the number of characters would be unprecedented in the case of continuously used writing systems.

Naturally Semitic scripts cannot be regarded as one continuously used writing system, but rather as a series of character transmissions between different Semitic peoples. Transmissions always give the possibility to develop, to leave out old or create new characters.

Therefore, the idea of Semitic scripts cannot be of Egyptian origin, for the Semitic-like Egyptian consonant set contains only 24 characters. Besides, later Semitic languages and scripts did not provide a reason for increasing this number first to 32, and then decrease it again to 19. This fluctuation in the number of characters suggests, that Semitic peoples borrowed a non-Semitic letter script and left the unnecessary vowel characters out.

The above data are not parallel with, but contrary to the general development of writing. Data about the development of Semitic script do not reflect the birth of an alphabet but rather its regression. It was a process of decline for a Hurrian (?) letter script which used vowel characters and letter script well before the first Semitic character set.

If we extrapolate from these character numbers and consider the number of Székely characters (32 or more according to different authors and alphabets), the birth of the Székely alphabet can be placed before 1500 BC.

Székely word characters and the syllabic script presented clearly by Thelegdi can be traced back to much earlier times.

Gelb calls the early (Sumerian, Egyptian, and Chinese) scripts word and syllabic systems, and as far as features and characters are concerned, Székely script is their equivalent. Similarly to Egyptian, the predecessor of Székely script also possessed a character set of approximately 32 letters, including vowel characters.

Thus, the idea and practice of developed letter script arose in Hittite and Hurrian territories in the first half of the 2nd millennium at the latest, and Székely script must have been its first or one of its earliest realizations.

The Hurrian Mitanni Empire was broken up by Hittites around 1400 BC, and the Hittite Empire suffered the same fate around 1200 BC under the blows of the sea peoples. Their populations probably migrated north and northeast, where their relatives lived. Hittite and Hurrian tribes founded the Urartian tribal confederation on the Armenian Plateau. As early as 13th c. BC. Assyrians conducted a campaign against them. From their confederation grew the Urartian Empire of several nationalities around 10th c. BC

Urartian hieroglyphic script, which is very similar in form to Székely, could have developed under the influence of an early and local variant of Hittite hieroglyphic script in the 2nd millennium BC. Assyrian cuneiform script spread in a wide area in the 10th c. BC, but not even that could push Urartian out of use (Fig. 35). Urartian culture had a powerful effect on Scythians and, through the Medes, on the Persians. The existence of Old-Persian cuneiform script may be due to this effect. Old Persian is very close to pure letter script, and some of its characteristics can be found in Székely and Turkish writings, too.

According to Al Bíruni, in the 13th c. BC Siyanus[2] arrived in Khwarism. His descendants reigned up to the 10th c. AD; they ruled the earlier natives as well as the later inhabitants (Tolstov/1986/12).

János Harmatta says that according to the latest archaeological finds, Eastern-European nomadic peoples knew two kinds of script in the second half of the 2nd millennium BC. One was the above mentioned Urartian hieroglyphic Aramean[3], the other an Old-Aramean (more precisely Pre-Aramean-VG) letter writing (Harmatta/1996/396).

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[1] On the other hand, Hittite hieroglyph syllable writing possessed vowel characters "a", "e", "i", "u".

[2] Siyanus's name means "Szent javas" - Holy Medicine Man (cf. Obi-Ugrian sanki "great god"; its root can be found in the Magyar word szõke (blond).

[3] Very little is known about Urartian hieroglyph writing. Some of its characters presented by Barnett (1974) are linear (many are similar to Székely characters, Fig. 35.), the others are pictorial (like Székely pottery motives). If Urartian had had a runic tally variant (which is very likely) it must have been very similar to Székely writing. However, this only proves the relation between character systems and mythologies, but it is not enough to identify the source of Székely writing. Since the equivalent of character "us" is missing from Urartian, it can also be an extinct collateral line of the predecessor of Székely writing.

Fig. 23 Both character "a" in classic Cypriot syllable writing and rune "ty" in Székely developed from the abbreviated Hurrian word for father (atta) and represent the Orion constellation.

(letter "a" of classic Cypriot syllable script, superimposed on the Orion constellation; Székely "aty" rune (atya = father) superimposed on Orion; the Orion constellation is identified as Nimrod, our forefather)

 

Fig. 24 Greek and Székely vowel characters adapted from Aczél. Greek "v" and Székely "u" and "v" have evidently the same root, but the latter represent the older form, the form of the ox-hide shaped semi-finished metal ingots (like the corresponding Urartian hieroglyph in Fig. 35); the Chinese character for bronze cauldron fits in that steppe character tradition (Fig. 2)

 

Contents

Preface to the English edition	7.
Preface	9.
History of the scientific views on the origins of Székely runic script	10.
Principles of deriving the origins of Székely script	26.
The development of writing	28.
The shapes of runes and the objects they represent	29.
The mythology, names, and sound values of runes	32.
Rituals and runic script	35.
Types and number of characters	37.
Order of characters	39.
Direction of reading and characters	48.
Syllabic signs	52.
The regular use of syllable and vowel signs	55.
The birth of letter scripts	58.
Comparing of writing systems	61.
The academic historical-geographical preconception	68.
The Turkish connection	70.
What the historical sources say	71.
Székely script of the Huns	73.
The age of the development of Székely character forms	79.
The age of unification of Székely character sets	82.
Hungarian vocabulary connected to writing	87.
Ligatures that survived millennia	92.
Migrations of peoples	97.
Summary	101.
Bibliography	109.

Varga Géza

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