Chapter 5 part I “A Matrix of semiotic rules and markers for inspecting the sign system of the Danube civilization” from the book Neo-Eneolithic Literacy in Southeastern Europe PDF

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Section III - METHODOLOGICAL TOOLKIT TO SET UP AN INVENTORY OF THE DANUBE SCRIPT SIGNS 169 5 A MATRIX OF SEMIOTIC RULES AND MARKERS FOR INSPECTING THE SIGN SYSTEM OF THE DANUBE CIVILIZATION Writing technology did not emerge and function in isolation, but within a cultural milieu based on a complex c...

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Chapter 5 part I “A Matrix of semiotic rules and markers for inspecting the sign system of the Danube civilizati... Marco Merlini Marco Merlini, Neo-Eneolithic Literacy in Southeastern Europe: an Inquiry into the Danube, Biblioteca Brukenthal XXXIII, Ministery of Culture of Romania and Brukenthal National Museum, Editura Altip, Alba Iulia

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Section III - METHODOLOGICAL TOOLKIT TO SET UP AN INVENTORY OF THE DANUBE SCRIPT SIGNS

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5 A MATRIX OF SEMIOTIC RULES AND MARKERS FOR INSPECTING THE SIGN SYSTEM OF THE DANUBE CIVILIZATION Writing technology did not emerge and function in isolation, but within a cultural milieu based on a complex communication system that consists of gestural code, spoken language, symbols of identification (e.g. divinity marks, heraldic marks, logos of companies), numerical systems (e.g., calendrical notation, measures and weights), and sign systems devoted to specific uses, such as the system of traffic signals or musical notation. The networking of the channels belonging to the communication system is the common means to construct and convey culture. The distinctive profile of the channels and their interactively operate individualize communication systems and cultures throughout human history. The changeover from a culture without writing technology to one with writing technology is an intricate transitional process. Having the Danube script pre-dated the other ancient scripts by up to two millennia and having been “frozen” at an early developing stage by the collapse of the Danube civilization, it is a laboratory case of this socially dramatic and semiotically unlinear landing to literacy. When inspecting the internal structuring of the communication conveyed by the Neolithic and Copper Age communities from Southeastern Europe evidence of a sophisticated system becomes noticeable. The Danube Communication System was comprised by ritualistic markings; decorations; symbols; divinity insigna; calendrical and chronographic annotations; land maps; sky atlases, constellations and motions of celestial bodies (sun, moon, and planets); ownership/manufacturer identifiers (?) on the bottom of the vessels; personal and family identification marks; lineage recognition or community affiliation marks; and markings representing bio-energetic points of the human body. Within the Danube Communication System, indications of a system of writing are apparent, too. From the survey on the inventories of the signs employed by Southeastern Europe in Neolithic and Copper Age time-frame made in chapter 4, it is evident that all the authors missed the main point: the necessity to fashion a semiotic distinction among the possibly different communicative function of the different marks as well as the same mark: script, religious symbolism, ritualistic marking, geometric decoration... Signs of writing and extra-writing marks apart, the Neolithic and Copper Age rich polysemous system for communication included also anthropomorphic figurines, language, mythology, rituals, folklore, etc. The integration of typological and semiotic studies in the common problematic of the enculturation and other symbolic prehistoric communication means will be an opportunity to approach the deep symbolic and the advanced social development of the communities of the Danube civilization (Nikolova 2005). It crosses the key issue of the behavioral, contextual, and self-reflexive status of social astuteness in Prehistory (Nikolova, Merlini 2007). Although the Danube script was very archaic and had a very weak association with phonetics, it should not be confused with other communication channels used by the Danube civilization. The Danube System of Communication was composed of several elements and writing was only one of them. It is a very exciting means of communication for us. However, the Neolithic and Copper Age populations of the Danube area, having been developed it only at the primary stage, possibly considered it not the most important communicative device for organizing and conveying knowledge. A script can be identified in terms of operational technology even without and before being deciphered. The history of research on writing aligns several prominent cases of scripts whose nature of writing system was not disputed before the crack of their codes (Haarmann 2008: 14; viz. Pope 1975 and Robinson 2002 for the analysis of successful decipherments). It is the instance of ancient Aegean scripts such as the Linear B prior to its decipherment and the Linear A, even if the decipherment is not yet complete. The Mayan script gathered a general agreement on its status as a writing system even before Michael Coe’s decipherment and establishment of the writing principle as logographic with a syllabic component (Coe 1992). The ancient Indus script is generally acknowledged as a form of writing, although its decipherment has not yet achieved success, despite initial progress (Parpola 1994), and the reserves maintained by some scholars about the nature of its signs (Maisels 1999: 343; Farmer 2003a; ibidem 2003b; ibidem 2004). The problem is that the distinction between the Danube script and the other Neolithic and Copper Age communication means is not so evident. Being the script in a very archaic phase, the sign outlines as well the organization of the reading space are not always clearly distinguishable from marks and spatial arrangement of the other communication channels. In particular, some signs of the script can coexist on the same artifact, share the same geometrical roots (sometimes employing alike outlines), and can have similar space exploitation with ritual marks, decorations, symbols, divinity identifiers, chronographic representations, and 170

astral signs. First, signs of writing can cohabit on the same object with marks from other informative codes. Sometimes more than one channel of communication was in use at the same time on the same vase, figurine, or spindle whorl. 1 Second, when inspecting the internal structuring of the Danube Communication System evidence of a writing system becomes noticeable. Nevertheless, as noted by Gimbutas, depending on the semiotic context some marks can by either units of the inscriptions or elements of other communicational codes (Gimbutas 1991). A number of signs have the same outlines of sacred symbols because they had origin as elements of a religious-mythical system. In particular, some of them share the same silhouettes of the geometrical and abstract symbols from which they had derived. This close relationship between symbolic and writing systems could originate uncertainty into the researchers employed to catch the semiotic code and possibly to decipher the Danube script. However, it witnesses at the some time that signs of this system of writing have their origin from the sacred language of symbols. Finally, if signs of writing are not always aligned in linear sequence, sometimes decorations, symbols and calendrical marks are. Our Western-acculturated inclination to associate writing with signs that follow a linear sequential organization is wrong-footed by the acknowledgment that the Danube script can arrange signs haphazardly, whereas symbols can bee aligned in succession (divinity identifiers can be positioned along a line according to the divinities hierarchical position, bioenergetic marks can appear according to symbolic patterns able to render the progressively stimulating energy and life, etc.). A key question arises. I expose it in a polar form in order to better clarify the dilemma. Was the Danube script only a “half baked” system of writing, because several important symbols were used and identified as a basic part of it and the Neolithic cultures possibly did not make a distinction between symbolism and script? Alternatively, did the newborn communicative code, the script, simply “borrow” the outlines of its signs from the marks belonging to the other channels in order to store and transmit information in a new way? According to my analysis, the first point of view presents the Danube script as too immature, undervaluing key features such as for example the high level of abstractness in sign shape, or the inclination to arrange the signs in a linear sequence. It also postulates the contemporary multiple meaning of a mark according to the context, which is not the case of the Danube script. In fact, being written not on smooth, white, rectangular pages of paper, but on pottery or stone, it made the typology of the incised object and the position of the signs on it to participate to the construction of a message. The second point of view does not cope with the antiquity of the Danube script in comparison with other systems of writing of the ancient world2 underestimating, for example, the weak association with phonetics and a number of archaic features of internal structuring of the sign system (viz., for example, the numbering system). According to my investigation, Danube script reached a level of maturity to be considered an indicator of civilization, but this achievement cannot shadow that it had several “primitive and "rudimentary" traits. If the distinction between the Danube script and the other coexistent communicational means is not always so evident, it is necessary to build a matrix of semiotic rules and markers in order to distinguish in the field, with a reasonable degree of probability, even without knowing how to read the system of writing, inscriptions of the Danube script and marks belonging to the ornamental sphere, the symbolic language, the chronographic representations, the astronomical marks, or the divinity/owner/manufacturer identifiers. The present chapter copes with this complexity fashioning a “Matrix of semiotic rules and markers” in order to inspect the internal structuring of the sign system developed during the Neolithic and Copper Age timeframe in Southeastern Europe starting from the acknowledgment of the high communicative skills attested by the presence of a complex and sophisticated semiotic system (the Danube communication system). The Matrix of guidelines and indicators is based on an investigation concerning how groups of marks are positioned and assembled on objects. Useful are some parameters of the integrational semiotic, developed vigorously by Roy Harris (1994; 1995). This discipline identifies three sets of factors that typically 1

See 5.E.d “Identifying writing and decoration when they cohabit on the same artifact”, 5.F.c “Symbolic, written and decorative codes simultaneously on play”. 2 Early Egyptian hieroglyphs developed between c. 3350–2600 BCE, Sumerian pictography of the archaic period is between c. 3200 and 2700 BCE, the Proto-Elamite script is c. 3050–2700 BCE, the ancient Indus script is c. 2600–1800 BCE, the Cretan Linear A is c. 2200–1450 BCE, the oracle bone inscriptions of the Chinese Shang dynasty are c. 1200– 780 BCE, and Olmec is c. 1500-600 BCE. 171

contribute to the making of any sign: a) biomechanical factors, relating to the capacities of the human organism that determine the parameters within which communication can take place; b) macrosocial factors, relating to cultural practices and institutions established in particular communities; c) circumstantial factors, relating to the particular context of communication and the activities integrated (Harris 1995: 22). The Matrix of semiotic rules and markers intends: a) To investigate the internal structuring of the sign system developed in Neolithic and Copper Age timeframe in Southeastern Europe to verify the possibility that these cultures might have expressed an early form of writing, i.e. the Danube script. b) To distinguish inscriptions of the Neolithic and Copper Age system of writing composed of two or more signs, without knowing what each of them stands for, from compounds of marks associated with other communicational channels utilized by the Danube civilization. In the present prototypal phase, the matrix includes ritualistic markings, decorations, symbols, and divinity identifiers. In progress is its improvement concerning: schematic but naturalistic representations of objects, structures or natural events; calendrical and chronographic annotations; sky atlases, constellations and motions of celestial bodies (sun, moon, and planets); terrestrial maps; family identification marks; lineage recognition or community affiliation marks; and markings representing bio-energetic points of the human body. c) To establish organizing principles that the Danube script share with other ancient scripts as well as peculiar proprieties, even if it is far to be deciphered. d) To input into the databank DatDas, developed by the author, inscribed artifacts, inscriptions, and signs that have got through the filter of the matrix. Versions in progress of the matrix of markers and rules have been published (Merlini 2005b and 2005c). An extended edition of the section concerning the distinguishing guidelines between signs/inscriptions of the Danube script and decorative motifs/patterns is available (Merlini 2007a).

5.A Framework and methodological restrictions The choice to include only the inscriptions with two or more signs in the databank in order to test them with the “Matrix of semiotic rules and markers” is due to the fact that the elements of the system of writing share the same schematic geometric root with the agents of other communicational channels, such as, for example, decorations and symbols. Therefore, their shape could overlap. When a mark appears in isolation, it could be a sign of writing (with or without a linguistic label), a symbol, or an artistic motif depending on the context. Its nature is not certain and one has to cope with a range of probabilities. A one-sign decoration is quite rare. More often one comes across a sign of writing. Most likely one deals with a symbol. In the chapter concerning the features of the databank I document and emphasize that it also leaves out inscribed artifacts with more than one sign if they are marked singularly on different areas. Here one has to consider some engraved marks isolated on artifacts of the Danube civilization, which I did not include in my data base and did not submit to the “Matrix of semiotic markers and rules” although they are possibly units of the Danube system of writing occurring in the inventory of its signs. Even if the is a sign recorded in the inventory of the Danube script, when it is incised as isolated mark, such as on the bottom of a Turdaş vessel from Orăştie-Broos (Romania) (Luca, Pinter 2001, tab. 43/1), it could be either an element of the system of writing, or a symbol, or an ornament. A comb-based mark occurs on bottoms of Transylvanian vases, for example, from Turdaş and from OrăştieDealul Pemilor (Luca 2001a: 76; ibidem 1997). One interpretation of these marks on invisible part of vessels or objects is personal and non-linguistic identifiers, such as craftsman’s or owners’ marks. According to some authors, this category explains almost any occurrence of linear, abstract, and non-decorative signs on the bottom of vessels of the Danube civilization (Garašanin 1951; Tasić, Srejović, Stojanović 1990).

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Fig. 5.1 – In case of a single mark, it is impossible to discern to which kind of communicative channel it belongs. Examples from Transylvania: a) a F-like sign on the Turdaş bottom of a vessel recovered at Orăştie-Broos (Romania) (Graphic elaboration by Merlini after Luca, Pinter 2001: tab. 43/1); b) a combbased sign from a bottom of a vessel from Turdaş and belonging to the Petreşti Ia culture (Graphic elaboration by Merlini after Luca 2001a: fig. 42/3). Although the is a recurrent sign in the Danube script, there is no possibility of discerning to which communicative channel this kind of zigzag belongs when it is incised alone, such as on a middle Vinča fragment of base discovered at Gomolava (Republic of Serbia) (Starović 2004: 71) and a late Vinča fragment of base unearthed at Čučuge-Ilića Brdo (Republic of Serbia) (Starović 2004: 65).

Fig. 5.2 – When observing a single mark, it is impossible to discern to which kind of communicative code it belongs. Two examples regarding the zigzag: a) a zigzag from a middle Vinča fragment of base discovered at Gomolava (Republic of Serbia) (photo Merlini M. 2004); b) the same mark from a late Vinča fragment of base found at Čučuge-Ilića Brdo (Republic of Serbia.) (Photo Merlini 2004). Paradigmatic of the difficulty to identify the nature of the when it is incised as single mark is a jugshaped vessel from Battonya-Gödrösök (Hungary) belonging to the Tisza-Herpály-Csöszhalom complex.3 A 3

Raczky and Anders ascertained it to the end of the Middle Neolithic (2003: 170); Gimbutas to the 5200-5000 BCE (1989: 22, fig. 34). For the development of script in the Tisza-Herpály-Csöszhalom cultural complex, see § 9.C.e “The employment of ambivalent marks in the Tisza-Herpály-Csöszhalom cultural complex”. 173

symbolic “M” is prominently applied to the cylindrical neck just below the face. The comb-like mark positioned on the nape is another, more ancient, symbol on the anthropomorphic vessel. In addition, the parallel curved band depicted on the backside is indicative of a symbolic feature that is frequent in TiszaHerpály-Csöszhalom complex and derived with an essentially unchanged shape from the corresponding types of artifacts of the Tiszadob-Bükk-Szilmeg-Esztár pottery, as well as of the Szákalhát ceramics (Raczky 2000). A fourth powerful symbol is the meander pattern chiseled inside and a fifth symbol is the net incised on different areas of the body. The pithos from Battonya-Gödrösök shows a supernatural creature in a human (female) form with a brick red surface. The arms are painted in yellow and red, and the curved belt around the body in white (Gimbutas 1989: 22). It possibly played a significant role within the given social context (Tilley 1989; Renfrew 1994: 5-11; Renfrew 2001: 129-131; Thomas 1997; Hodder 1989: 190; Hodder et al. 1997: 201-212), belonging to a typology of vessels that, according to the archaeological data, mediated a long chain of religious activities. The five coded symbols, their combined sets and their matching iconic and decorative patterns must have embodied a complex meaning on a sacred level associated with the feminine, which also may have been a formal expression of group identity (Raczky, Anders 2003: 170). Therefore, they may have been agents of a symbolic communications system that operated within a ritual context and a spiritual tradition (Biehl 1997: 169-171) and that I consider a significant component of the Danube Communication System (the semiotic system of expression of the Danube civilization). Studying human representations in the Central European Linear Pottery, Höckmann drew similar observations regarding the compositional regularities and the semiotic system of the "sacred symbols" (Höckmann 2000-2001: 87-88).

Fig. 5.3 – An isolated

occurs near the base of a vessel from Battonya-Gödrösök (Hungary) belonging to the Tisza-Herpály-Csöszhalom complex. (Graphic elaboration by Merlini after Raczky, Anders 2003: 168, fig. 6/2).

Within the more general framework of the Neolithic and Copper Age cultures across Southeastern Europe, the "sacred symbols" of the “ ” and the “comb” seem to have carried the same symbolism: the transcultural and "universal" concept of the female principium (Ruttkay 1999: 9). However, it has not yet been demonstrated that they could be interpreted not only as symbols but also as ideograms, as stated by Ruttkay and other ...