Letter from Michael Ventris to Emmett Bennett - April 26, 1952

47 Highpoint,
North Hill,
Highgate,
LONDON, N.6.


26 April 1952.

Page 1

Dear Bennett,
Your index arrived this morning. It is an excellent piece of work, and I am most grateful to you for it. I had not realized that this version was to include the Pylos sign-groups with the Knossos sign-groups, but this makes it doubly useful.
On glancing through it, I notice that a number of the Evans/Myres forms which seemed suspicious have been suitably amended; though I expect that there will also be a few less welcome emendations, such as ones which knock the bottom out of little theories one had built up. I had already realized that po-si - on the chariot tablets has to be divided off as a separate word, and that therefore no amount of ingenuity will connect together po-si-e-e-si and po-si –
e-re-pa as I tried to do in my last note (p 170). If the theory which regards po and pa as closely similar sounds is correct, then po-si - might I suppose be connected with the adverbial (?) po-si - of Jn04.7. ( - and po-si-da-i-jo with pa-si-te-o-i ???).
I am baffled by the last sign of a-ra-ro-mo-me-jo and a-ja-me-jo on the Chariot tablets. I had hoped that checking of the tablets would have revealed a clear choice of -jo or of
-na throughout these cases. For the tidiness of the grammatical forms, -na would be very much more welcome, but if -jo is certain we shall have to try and fit it in. I note you give
a-ro-mo-teme-na (04.22) but a-ra-ro-mo-te-me-jo (04.02 etc), but both a-ja-me-na and
a-ma-me-jo. Your criterion is, I expect, whether the sign has one or two horizontal strokes above the “crook”. Is it your opinion that there really is a deliberate distinction here, or that all Kober’s “verbal” forms in fact are only badly-written -na s ? In your list of rejected sign-groups, a mistake has I think crept in in [sic] a-ra-ro-mo-te-to-me and a-ra-pa-mo-te-to-me-na, which in Myres’ reference to 04.16 and 04-05.2 do not have the internal -te-to (and should not, if -to- is only the alternative vocalisation of the same consonant as -te-?).
a-ra-ro-mo-to-o (04-16) is rather surprising: -o can’t be genitival, I suppose, since it follows Vowel 2, and I suspect that a-ra-ro-mo-to-o may stand to a-ra-ro-mo-te-me-jo as ko-to-no-o-ko does to ko-to-na.
Myres’ idea that the chariot tablets contain just a random list of craftsmen’s names is not very imaginative, and cannot be right. I do not, either, entirely agree with his argument that the chariots of 04-19 etc are a different sort from those of 04-01 etc.
After all, there’s no yoke on them: they look far more like the same chariots in an early state of manufacture: and this ties up with the fact that a different “verb” is used with the two ideograms.
My guess is that two stages are recorded (leaving out a possible previous stage recorded by me-ta-ke-ku-me-jo of 04-28).

1) The provision of the a-na-mo-to (main framing) governed by the word (verb?) a-ja-me-jo, and qualified by a-na-ta (plural? a-na-to sing?).
2) The provision of the a-ra-ro-mo-to (equipment: mounting rail, floor, yoke, traces etc) - a word constructed like a-na-mo-to, but made verbal: a-ra-ro-mo-te-me-jo [The -to- forms seem to argue against a compound form with -te-me-na (Er01.1).]
3) Whether the “wheel” tablets record an inventory of wheels, or the fitting of them, isn’t clear, but as they aren’t all in pairs it must be a separate part of the process. Myres’ suggestion that the wheels were changed frequently ties in with this.

Parallel, apparently, in root to a-na-mo-to and a-ra-ro-mo-to- are the two entities a-ni-ja and
a-ra-ru(-wo)-ja (unless the former is connected rather with a-na-to). The latter recurs in slightly different spelling as a-ra-ru-wo-a [ ro/ru as po-ro/po-ru- (An 18.rev.1)?] on most of the “sword” tablets 1541 etc, which ties up with some idea of ‘equipping’ or ‘armoury’ etc, and make it unlikely that the “sword” formula is one of Myres’ lists of names either.

Page 2

A form which puzzled me for some time is the wi-ri-ne-ja which is shown in 04-09.1 on page “Junctions” in SM. I see you index this as wi-ri-ne-o , which removes the difficulty. mi-we-sa in K 04-15.2 is presumably a misprint similarly for mi-to-we-sa. The occurrences of i-qi-ja on 04-01 and 04-15 are puzzling, too. I had thought that there must be some connection between the -jo and the -no in the verb on 04-01, but 04-15 disproves this. It would have been nice if there have been 1 chariot following the -jo, and a larger number after -ja : but there seems to be no perceptible difference in context at all, any more than between a-ko-ra-jo and a-ko-ra-ja on 903-907. I am completely baffled by the -no of the “verbal” forms, at Knossos (04-01) and Pylos ( Eb01, Eb02 etc) unless they are intended to be more participial that the others, which might help to bridge the gap to the numerous endings in me-no which seem to be part of personal names, whether or not the endings are in any way connected. me-na does not seem to be used in these other situations.
Miss Kober evidently made a very good start at listing the ‘Category 3’ sign-groups which show an “adjectival” form in -jo/-ja. I’m beginning to think that while -ja seems regularly used as the feminine form, (eg, with -wo or -wa)., and apparently the general plural, some of the -jo forms must be masculine plural in sense, not singular (eg:- the senseless alternations of -jo and -ja mentioned above). At least they don’t alternate on the same tablets, only on separate ones of the same series.
tu-ni-ja is presumably “adjectival” from -tu-na-no- (Tunnija - Tunan ??)= two consonants of the same kind sometimes seem liable to be telescoped, as in a-ra-ro etc. The chief Knossos ‘adjectivals’ seem to be these:-

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I expect you’ve fully sorted these out already. It would be a wonderful thing if one could sit down on the hill at Knossos & know just what the names of all the surroundings towns & villages were in LM; because I’m sure some of them must occur in this series. I’m still rather intrigued by AMNISOS for a-mi-ni-so, which is the only B group with initial a- and -ni- as 3rd except a-pa-ni & this name too should occur, surely. Amnisos is generally spoken of as if it was the port of Knossos, but I gather there was a nearer harbour at the mouth of the valley? The frequent a-mi-ni-so-de=AT AMNISOS? , i.e=at a separate royal depot?? Who are the ki-ri-te-wi-ja-i who are mentioned after ko-no-so (KNOSSOS??) and who recur at Pylos? - cilitheviia - “peasants, locals, ??” (Etr cilth, “land, country”).

Yours sincerely,

Michael Ventris