If you could know the meaning of only one Linear A word, which would it be? Scholars have one, and you are ready to see how it was found. It uses nothing but the numbers of Linear A Numbers and Fractions and the conventional readings of Signs Shared with Linear B.
Key idea
The word read ku-ro stands before a number that equals the sum of the list above it, so it is widely accepted to mean "total". The word read ki-ro also recurs in lists before numbers; its meaning is uncertain.
The argument
- Many Hagia Triada tablets are lists: a word, a number; a word, a number; and so on.
- At the bottom, a line begins with the same two signs, read by convention ku-ro, followed by a number.
- Add up the numbers above. Again and again, the sum equals the number after ku-ro.
- So ku-ro introduces the sum: it means "total", or something very close.
Other words are less clear. po-to-ku-ro seems to sum several totals and is often taken as a "grand total", less securely. ki-ro also stands before numbers in lists; some suggest it marks an amount owed or missing, but there is no agreement.
Why it works
Why is this meaning trusted when nothing else in Linear A is? Because it does not depend on knowing the language. Arithmetic is the same in every language. A word that always stands before the sum of a list does the job of "total" whatever it sounds like. It is a meaning found by function, the same way you could tell what "Gesamt" does on a German receipt without knowing German.
Common mistake
Thinking that knowing ku-ro means we can read Linear A. We know what the word does from the arithmetic, not what language it belongs to. Check: ku-ro does not even prove the sounds; "ku-ro" is its conventional reading, and its meaning would be the same if the signs were said quite differently.
Worked example: Check a total
A list reads 12, 7, 9, then ku-ro 28. Does the total work?
- 12 + 7 = 19.
- 19 + 9 = 28.
Answer: Yes: 28 is the sum.
Worked example: What can be said?
Which is supported: (a) ku-ro means "total"; (b) ku-ro shows the Minoan language was related to Greek?
- (a) comes from the arithmetic of many lists.
- (b) does not follow: a word for "total" says nothing about which language family it belongs to.
Answer: (a) only.