Israeli archaeologists have found a comb some 3,700 years old adorned with what may be the oldest phrase ever found in Canaanite script, according to a scholarly paper published Wednesday.
The 17-letter phrase encourages the user of the instrument to comb their hair to remove lice from their hair and beard.
Experts say the discovery sheds new light on one of mankind’s oldest uses of the Canaanite alphabet. This alphabet invented around the year 1800 BC. served as the foundation for all subsequent alphabetic systems, including the Hebrew, Greek, Arabic, Latin, and Cyrillic alphabets.
The somewhat banal subject demonstrates that the humans of the time were struggling with lice. Archaeologists even reported finding microscopic traces of head lice on the comb.
The comb was found in 2016 at Tel Lachish, an archaeological site in southern Israel, but it wasn’t until the very end of last year that a professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem noticed the tiny words engraved on it. Details were released Wednesday in the Jerusalem Journal of Archaeology.
Lead researcher, Hebrew University of Jerusalem archaeologist Yosef Garfinkel, told The Associated Press that several ornate objects of the Canaanite alphabet have been found over the years, but this is the very first complete sentence.
Moreover, Mr. Garfinkel said, the fact that the phrase was found on an ivory comb in the palace and temple district of the city, and the fact that the beard is mentioned, could demonstrate that only wealthy men could read and write.
“It’s a very human text,” Mr. Garfinkel said. It shows us that people haven’t really changed, and lice haven’t really changed. »
The Canaanites spoke an ancient Semitic language ― a cousin of modern Hebrew, Arabic and Aramaic ― and occupied territory on the eastern shores of the Mediterranean. They would have developed the first written alphabet in history.
The discovery of a complete sentence could also demonstrate that the Canaanites differed from other civilizations with their use of the written word. “It shows that even in the earliest phase there were complete sentences,” Garfinkel said.
Carbon dating failed to determine the exact age of the comb, according to the article.