Archaeologists Find First Whole Sentence Written in Canaanite. On a Lice Comb | Hacker News Reader

Archaeologists Find First Whole Sentence Written in Canaanite. On a Lice Comb

haaretz.com

56 pointsAmorymeltzer18 comments

Not a scholar, but Lebanese background and the words on that comb are what we still use today:

"The first word is the root natash which serves like in Hebrew – to root out," he explains. The Canaanite word for hair is se'ar, the same as in all semitic languages"

We would use natash, or to "t'natsh" as the word to root/pull out And Shaer, is hair

So looks like like someone wrote the instruction manual on the product. Best place to be honest :)

I feel like a lot of modern products could benefit from that ancient lesson.

To me, it evokes Dr Bronner's soap...

Not nearly enough text on the comb for that.

“May this tusk root out the lice of the hair and the beard.”

^ Save a click

Having not read the article I then guess this was an instrument for the wealthy who could read? Or, would poor buy something they cannot read? Maybe if it was a common saying and then they have the meaning memorized.

It was a lice comb so probably some sort of prayer/spell/whatever for it to work better. This particular one was ivory so it was for someone wealthy who possibly could have been able to read it. Poorer people would have used wooden combs.

> probably some sort of prayer/spell/whatever for it to work better

Or its like a shampoo bottle and it's written there because the carver felt like it.

Exactly. Imagine 2,000 years from now "archaeologists" thinking "rinse, repeat as required" is some kind of ritual incantation on a shampoo bottle.

I would think that the carver would have done a neater job.

I imagine that a magician etching your comb with magic words (i.e. all written words 4K years ago) was like going for the extended warranty.

> I then guess this was an instrument for the wealthy

You guessed correctly, per the article: "It would have been like a diamond today, a crème de la crème luxury item. Others likely had lice combs too, but made of wood that would have decayed"

Reads like it might be instructions to me.

> Save a click

Well, there was more to the article than that. I was actually surprised that the Canaanite language wasn't more well documented.

Tangentially related recommendation of the video game Heaven's Vault. The main mechanic is the character learning the history of the mysterious fantasy setting through deciphering ancient writing that nobody can read anymore, including the character, from artifacts like ancient combs. You make guesses on words based on context and similarity to other words you've learned, and you can guess wrong. It has a cool nonlinear branching narrative and is worth playing.

Interesting fact I learned recently. Canaanite = Phoenician. The people- not the language.

Minor nitpick, but I would say Phoenician is to Canaanite as Byzantine is to Roman. It gives a name to the local continuity and further development of the Canaanite culture in the northwestern coastal region of Canaan, i.e. Phoenicia, at a time when Canaanite culture to the south developed related but distinct branches of its own.

Guessing that of the words translated, "tusk" is the least likely to be correct. Betting "ivory" is closer.

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