研究人员可能在以色列发现最古老的字母句子

12 November 2022
以色列研究人员发现一把古老梳子上有用迦南语写的完整句子。该发现最近发表在以色列考古杂志上。

3700岁的文字告诉人们梳他的头发，胡须以便去掉被称为虱子的小虫。该句包含17个字母: "May this tusk root out the lice of the hair and the beard."

专家称该发现給出了最古老的迦南字母信息。字母发明约在3800年前。迦南字母是后来字母系统的基础。如希伯来，希腊，拉丁和古代斯拉夫话的字母。

文字主题表明当时人们生活中有虱子的困扰。研究人员说他们曾发现过梳子上有虱子的微观证据。

该梳子2016年在以色列南部被发现。但是仅在去年底才被以色列希伯来大学的一个教授发现。

Israeli researchers have found an ancient comb that has what is likely the oldest known full sentence written in Canaanite. The discovery was described in a study published recently in the Jerusalem Journal of Archaeology.

The writing could be 3,700 years old. It tells people to comb their hair and beards to remove small insects known as lice. The sentence contains 17 letters that read: "May this tusk root out the lice of the hair and the beard."

Experts say the discovery gives information about some of the earliest use of the Canaanite alphabet, invented around 3,800 years ago. The Canaanite alphabet was the base for later alphabetic systems, such as Hebrew, Greek, Latin and Cyrillic.

The subject of the writing suggests that people had trouble with lice in everyday life at the time. Researchers said they have even found microscopic evidence of head lice on the comb.

The comb was first found in 2016 in southern Israel. But it was only late last year when a professor at Israel's Hebrew University noticed the tiny words written on it.