Linear A Sign A358

As of 2026, no secure reading is known. 𐚒 is the Linear A sign cataloged as A358, a modern catalog label rather than a recovered Minoan name. Linear A uses signs for syllables and for whole words; each sign’s role depends on context, so this one cannot be read securely in isolation.

The earliest evidence for Linear A dates to Middle Minoan IIA, and the script appears more consistently in the later Middle Minoan IIB phase. These are successive periods in Minoan history; they date the script, not A358’s first appearance. As of 2026, a cataloged occurrence of A358 is on an inscription from Phaistos, a Minoan site on Crete, labeled PH 16a. Linear A was used for administrative records and ritual objects: clay tablets, small clay disks, sealings attached to goods, pots, stone offering tables, and jewelry.

Does Linear B tell us what A358 means?

No; the scripts’ link does not fix this sign’s value. Cretan Hieroglyphic, an older script used on Crete, overlapped with Linear A in early Crete. Scholars connect part of Linear A’s sign shapes with that older script. Linear B later reused or adapted much of Linear A’s sign system for a different language; scholars debate how signs changed in that transition.

A similar-looking Linear B sign can suggest an approximate reading for some Linear A signs, but shape alone does not prove shared value. No secure value for A358 follows from the broader script relationship, so its catalog label is the reliable identification.