Background

The Phaistos Disc (AE 1358) (a.k.a. The Phaistos Disk or Phaestos Disk) is a clay circular disk discovered in the ruins of the Phaistos Palace, Crete, Greece, in the early 1900s by Luigi Pernier.^[1] It contains a spiraled inscription in a language undeciphered as of July 2020. Various scholars have assigned date ranges for its creation, which has been agreed upon as being in the Bronze Age, ca.1850-1377 BCE.^[2] In 2009, Wolfgang Reczko has suggested that the structural design of Side A of the disk represents content which may be dated to ca. 1377 BCE.^[3] The disk itself is almost 6.23 inches in diameter and on display in Room III at the Heraklion Archaeological Museum, Heraklion, Crete, Greece. Its inventory number is AE 1358 and the Greek Ministry of Culture and Sports' website lists the following description:

"This most famous example of Minoan pictographic script, unique in its kind, was discovered inside a small room of the Phaistos palace. It dates to the early Neopalatial period and is preserved intact. Both sides of the disc have signs impressed in a single spiraling line beginning at the edge and ending in the centre. The inscription uses forty-five different signs, which are repeated and grouped together to form words separated by vertical incisions. The signs were impressed on the unbaked clay using seals and for this reason the disc is considered as the earliest known example of typography. Until now several different interpretations of the text have been suggested, none of which is entirely convincing. Modern scholars believe it to be a religious text or hymn. It is noteworthy that several signs of this inscription appear on an axe from Arkalochori." ^[4]

While many notable scholars believe in the authenticity of the artifact, Jerome M. Eisenberg has been outspoken in arguing that the artifact itself is a forgery.^[5]

Mythological contents of The Phaistos Disk

Various scholars have provided opinions concerning the myths and deities which may be depicted in The Phaistos Disk. Arthur J. Evans has suggested that an Anatolian cult goddess named Ma could be represented in the female-looking symbols.^[6] More recent interpretations that utilize computational linguistics have also gained thrust, as evidenced by the publications of Peter Z. Revesz (cf. bibliography).