Marco Merlini (Italy)
Inscriptions and messages of the Balkan-Danube script
a semiotic approach
Daniela Bulgarelli is the author of the paintings appearing on the study. Images and text are "Copyright© 2002 The Global Prehistory Consortium at EURO INNOVANET - www.prehistory.it. All rights reserved World Wide. May not be reproduced without permission".
(part1) (part2) (part3) (part4) (part 5 and Essential Bibliographic References)

2. Characteristics of the signs of which the script composed
2.a The technical analysis of Winn (1981) has shown how the individual signs of which the Balkan-Danube script was composed are easily identifiable. A few have been traced out in a clear-cut manner, follow precise standard shapes and have well defined outlines.  Others are carelessly made, have less certain silhouettes and are poorly marked, follow their model with difficulty and are superposed by lines resembling ligatures. The information which each one of these actually communicated was, however,  a specific one and had a univocal meaning. The signs of the proto-European script, when compared to other archaic writings, are characterised by a high degree of stylisation and by having a rectilinear shape, due to the need of their being incised mechanically onto terracotta by means of a pointed stone or bone.

2.b. According to Gimbutas (1991), the ancient European script consisted of about thirty core signs which were originally abstract and arbitrary or had gradually become so (V, /\, X, M, Y, N, cross, triangle, lozenge, zigzag, spiral, square...), while the rest of the script consists of derivative signs (formed by adding one, two, or three lines to the core signs, or by duplicating or inverting two or more core signs). According to Haarmann's inventory (1995) there were 10 basic signs that created new individual signs by undergoing simple or complex variations, and another 131 which remained unaltered. These root-signs express most of the basic geometric forms and they continued to be used until the classical Greek period.

2.c ) The root-signs developed into the individual signs of proto-European writing, using two organising principles. The first consists of their multiple variations, since they were modified by adding small graphic markers which almost never appear as independent signs. These markers could be parallel to each other, crossed or superimposed by one, two, or three small strokes, but there were also small crosses, dots and arches. They could also be duplicated-multiplied or inverted. The sophisticated  principle of the multiple variation for creating derivative signs characterises other writing systems, but was used for the first time in proto-European script.

Second, the root-signs could be duplicated-multiplied or inverted-contrasted, creating more complex shapes. By varying and repeating-inverting-contrasting the root-signs, the repertory of the proto-European script came to contain 231 individual signs.

Fig. 4. Some modifications of the V, by Haarmann (1995) Inventory of the Proto-European signs

2.d  The sacred function of this script meant there was a natural and close association between the outlines of the signs and the religious symbols, and this is especially true for geometric and abstract symbols.

The abstract religious symbols often appear coupled with writing signs and constitute a few of the basic forms of the latter. The language for symbolic images which "fuses, is fused and is confused" with the linear signs typical of writing reveals, according to Gimbutas, the aspects and attributes of the Great Goddess (the snake, the spiral, V and M motives) or expresses the religious ideas of "Old Europe" (the meander and the swastika).

The two levels of sacred communication (abstract symbols and writing signs) were used together on the same votive objects. They should not however be confused with each other.  First, the writing signs are more numerous than the religious symbols. Second, only the writing signs can be modified and multiplied by adding small strokes, arches or crosses; the religious iconography never changes its basic shape.
   

Fig. 5,6. Gradesnica  plaque & Gradesnica signs

2. e. It is not always easy to distinguish the writing signs from the geometrical decorations. The artistic, abstract and schematic motifs share the same geometrical root as the writing signs.

Sometimes it is also true that the distinction between writing signs and ornaments of a naturalistic origin is not an evident one. For example, this is true of the stylised drawings used on the figurines for the sake of imitating necklaces, bracelets, garments, hairstyles, and sandals.

With such a flimsy and thin borderline between these, what criteria should be followed for the sake of distinguishing a decorative design from a written text? Until the time comes when the script will actually be deciphered, how will it be possible to recognise if and which signs are writing signs?

Harald Haarmann (1995) observes that the texts are characterised by an inventory of signs which is more ample than that of the decorations. The elements of text furthermore possess an individual quality of their own, an asymmetric type of co-ordination and a precise sequential alignment. This linear sequence may integrate both naturalistic signs and abstract ones. The writing signs may be impressed in an isolated position or in groups. Finally, they are subject to the principle of multiple variation: the basic forms acquire simple or multiple variations by adding graphic signs such as strokes, dots, and arches to them. And in this way simple signs have been transformed into complex ones.

The major characteristic of the decorative motifs is an aesthetic sense of symmetry.

Fig. 7. Lady Vinca wearing a ritual garment

2. f. In most cases, the writing signs are abstract and stylised geometric shapes, arbitrary motifs,  which do not offer any clues to us today, since it is impossible to connect them to forms belonging to the real world. Only rarely are symbols and writing representational. When they are, however, the shapes are either reminiscent of a human figure or part of its anatomy, or evoke a totem or sacrificial animal, a plant, or remind us of a natural phenomenon such as the sun or a stream, delineate a tool or allude to architectural forms or structures (for example, a ship).

Among the 231 signs of the Balkan-Danube script, Harald Haarmann (1995) records at least 156 arbitrary or abstract ones, only 49 representing naturalistic forms with varying degrees of stylisation, and 26 intermediate ones. Since all the other archaic systems of writing have an elevated number of pictographs, then a considerable use of abstract and arbitrary signs appears to be a specific characteristic of the proto-European script.

The lack of signs evoking naturalistic forms also bears witness to their high degree of evolution, notwithstanding the fact that they anticipated other known systems of writing by at least two millennia. The proto-European script seems to possess a great tendency for abstract signs, perhaps the result of a "geometric revolution"  that occurred in ancient times.

2. g. Haarmann (1995) records up to 231 individual signs. Of these, 142 seem to be basic (or simple) ones, 90 to be derived (composed) of a simple or complex variation from the basic signs. By means of the processes of repetition or association with additional small graphic markers, the V gives us highest number of modifications, (26). The next highest is the X (16), the Latin cross (13),  the /\ (10), the square, half circle and comb (5 each), the triangle (4), the rectangle without a base and the double line (3 each). All the other signs of the "metaphysic alphabet" may be either simple or complex, but they do not however show any mutations and do not undergo replication or multiplication by variations processes.

2.h.  The root-signs of the script in their complete form date back to the Palaeolithic. For example, a 30,000-year-old plaque was discovered in Malta (in Siberia), which already bears circles, dots and wavy lines. Therefore, the V does not emerge from the development of a single diagonal sign, since it had already been in use, precisely because it was a V, for thousand of years. The V sign derived from the pubic triangle or from the bird silhouette of prehistoric art. Likewise, the M did not come from placing 2 /\ signs side by side, but instead appears as a zigzag line since the early Palaeolithic (Gimbutas, 1991).

(part1) (part2) (part3) (part4) (part 5)