Mycenaean Words and Their Descendants

With the spelling rules of Missing Consonants and Diphthongs and Glides you can see through a Linear B spelling to the Greek word behind it. Many of those words are still recognizable in later Greek, some even in English.

Key idea

Mycenaean is Greek: many of its words live on in later Greek. ti-ri-po is tripous (tripod), di-pa is depas (cup), e-ra-wo is elaion (olive oil), wa-na-ka is anax (lord). Some words changed sound over the centuries: the w of wanax and woinos was lost.

Mycenaean words and their later Greek forms.
Signs	Spelled	Later Greek	Meaning
𐀴𐀪𐀡	ti-ri-po	τρίπους tripous	tripod
𐀇𐀞	di-pa	δέπας depas	cup, goblet
𐀁𐀨𐀺	e-ra-wo	ἔλαιον elaion	olive oil
𐀷𐀙𐀏	wa-na-ka	ἄναξ anax	king, lord
𐀏𐀒	ka-ko	χαλκός khalkos	bronze
𐀓𐀬𐀰	ku-ru-so	χρυσός khrusos	gold
𐀺𐀜	wo-no	οἶνος oinos	wine
𐀞𐀳	pa-te	πατήρ pater	father
𐀳𐀃	te-o	θεός theos	god
𐀈𐀨	do-ra	δῶρα dora	gifts

wa-na-ka: Mycenaean wanax, later anax, "lord". Tap a sign; the breakdown shows the rules at work.

Words that changed

Greek kept changing after the palaces fell. The w sound disappeared from most dialects, so wanax became anax and woinos became oinos. The kʷ and gʷ sounds written with q turned into p, b or t: gʷasileus (qa-si-re-u) became basileus. Homer's poems, written down centuries later, still show traces of the lost w in their rhythm, which scholars had suspected before the tablets were read.

Sound changes between Mycenaean and later Greek.
Mycenaean	Later Greek	What changed
wanax	anax	w lost
woinos	oinos	w lost
elaiwon	elaion	w lost
gʷasileus	basileus	gʷ became b
hikkʷos	hippos	kʷ became p

Why it works

Why are these words such strong evidence that the decipherment is right? Because they arrive with their sound changes exactly where Greek scholars had predicted. Linguists had reconstructed a w in "wine" and "lord", and a kʷ in "horse", from comparisons with other languages, long before 1952. The tablets, read with Ventris's values, showed those very sounds.

Common mistake

Thinking Mycenaean is a different language from Greek. It is Greek, about 500 years older than Homer's poems were written down, the way Chaucer's English is older English. Some words changed sound (wanax became anax). Check: strip the spelling rules away and look for a Greek word; if it is there, with an older sound or two, you are reading Mycenaean Greek.

Worked example: Find the descendant

What is the later Greek word for 𐀓𐀬𐀰?

ku-ru is khr with an empty vowel; so is -sos with the final s dropped.
So the word is khrusos, later χρυσός, gold.

Answer: khrusos, gold (English "chrysanthemum", "gold flower", comes from it)

Worked example: Spot the change

Mycenaean wo-no is woinos, wine. What is the later Greek form?

The w was lost.

Answer: oinos (οἶνος)

Mycenaean Words and Their Descendants

Words that changed

Practice

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Sources and further reading