Linear B tablet Kn 535 R x 41 tosa tarasia = so much copper:This tablet presents certain difficulties in decipherment. The most notable of these is that we cannot be certain whether or not Neirimia or Sarimia (depending on whether the damaged first syllabogram of this word is NI or SA) is actually a presumed name. There is no other way I can imagine translating it, given that this word (either way) appears in no Linear B Lexicon, which cannot come as any surprise. Moreover, this is a feminine name (either way). That being the case, I am not quite sure that a woman would be in possession of so much copper in Mycenaean times. However, we must always bear in mind that their society was matriarchal; hence, there is no reason why a woman should not have had possession of plenty of copper. On another vial note, tarasia can never be translated as “talent”, that huge denomination of money in Classical Athens, firstly because there was no coinage (no money) in Mycenaean Greece, and secondly because it is apparent that the term talent as a huge sum of money only much later emerged (probably ca. 700-600 BCE) from its archaic Mycenaean sense of “a unit of copper”.
Linear B tablet Kn 535 R x 41 tosa tarasia = so much copper
Sappho, spelled (in the dialect spoken by the poet) Psappho, (born c. 610, Lesbos, Greece — died c. 570 BCE). A lyric poet greatly admired in all ages for the beauty of her writing style.
Her language contains elements from Aeolic vernacular and poetic tradition, with traces of epic vocabulary familiar to readers of Homer. She has the ability to judge critically her own ecstasies and grief, and her emotions lose nothing of their force by being recollected in tranquillity.
Designed with WordPress
One response to “Linear B tablet Kn 535 R x 41 tosa tarasia = so much copper”
This tablet is a sticky one Richard. Of course there was no coin money as such in those times so I guess they must have used the barter system. I must research this further for my own interest as well.