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Concept
Eteocretan language
Summary
Eteocretan (ˌiːtioʊˈkriːtən,_ˌɛt- from Eteókrētes, lit. "true Cretans", itself composed from ἐτεός eteós "true" and Κρής Krḗs "Cretan") is the pre-Greek language attested in a few alphabetic inscriptions of ancient Crete.
In eastern Crete, about half a dozen inscriptions have been found, which, though written in Greek alphabets, are clearly not Greek. These inscriptions date from the late 7th or early 6th century down to the 3rd century BC. The language, which so far cannot be translated, is probably a survival of a language spoken on Crete before the arrival of the proto-Greek language and is probably derived from the Minoan language preserved in the Linear A inscriptions of a millennium earlier. Since that language remains undeciphered, it is not certain that Eteocretan and Minoan are related, although this is very likely.
Ancient testimony suggests that the language is that of the Eteocretans 'true Cretans'. The term Eteocretan is sometimes applied to the Minoan language (or languages) written more than a millennium earlier in so-called Cretan 'hieroglyphics' (almost certainly a syllabary) and in the Linear A script. Yves Duhoux, a leading authority on Eteocretan, has stated that "it is essential to rigorously separate the study of Eteocretan from that of the 'hieroglyphic' and Linear A inscriptions".
Odysseus, after returning home and pretending to be a grandson of Minos, tells his wife Penelope about his alleged homeland of Crete:
In the first century AD the geographer Strabo noted the following about the settlement of the different 'tribes' of Crete:
Indeed, more than half the known Eteocretan texts are from Praisos (Strabo's Πρᾶσος); the others were found at Dreros (modern Driros).
There are five inscriptions which are clearly Eteocretan, two of them bilingual with Greek. Three more fragments may be Eteocretan. The Eteocretan corpus is documented and discussed in Duhoux's L'Étéocrétois: les textes—la langue.
Official source
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