13-05-2020, 06:35 AM
The idea that the script was invented to represent a previously unwritten script, or a not-very-accurate romanisation of an existing script, is interesting. It is one specific example of the option that the text largely represents spoken text.
This might explain the very existence of this particular text, and the fact that there is just this example. It might also explain to some extent why it has so far been impossible to understand it, or to match it to known languages.
However, this does not allow to explain a number of features that we are seeing in the MS. These are the features that are position-dependent, not inside words, but related to the written lines and paragraphs.
The fact that certain characters appear preferentially (but not uniquely) in top lines of paragraphs is not explained by a spoken text, but points to a written source. The same is true for the unusual behaviour at line starts and line ends, which are equally not black-and-white, but preferential behaviour.
So, even if the text is a rendition of a spoken, rather than a (previously) written text, at least there must have been a significant alteration as a second step, to introduce these features.
This might explain the very existence of this particular text, and the fact that there is just this example. It might also explain to some extent why it has so far been impossible to understand it, or to match it to known languages.
However, this does not allow to explain a number of features that we are seeing in the MS. These are the features that are position-dependent, not inside words, but related to the written lines and paragraphs.
The fact that certain characters appear preferentially (but not uniquely) in top lines of paragraphs is not explained by a spoken text, but points to a written source. The same is true for the unusual behaviour at line starts and line ends, which are equally not black-and-white, but preferential behaviour.
So, even if the text is a rendition of a spoken, rather than a (previously) written text, at least there must have been a significant alteration as a second step, to introduce these features.