Linear A Sign AB056

No secure standalone sound or translation is known. AB056 is a catalogue label, and Linear A remains undeciphered.

Linear A was used on Crete during the Minoan civilization. The earliest secure evidence dates to the Middle Minoan IIA period; records become consistent in the Middle Minoan IIB period. Inscriptions include palace records of goods, quantities and transactions, as well as cultic and dedicatory objects.

At Agia Triada, an archaeological site on Crete, scholars study strings such as AB 81-56-55 and KU-*56-NU as sequences of signs. These notations preserve sign order; they are not translations of 𐘰 by itself. The neighboring signs and the inscribed object help frame an interpretation.

Why does AB056 sometimes get a sound?

That sound is proposed for Linear B, not a settled reading here. In later Linear B, the related sign 𐁖 is catalogued as B056 and called *56 in scholarly notation. Scholars have proposed that it represented a sound absent from Greek or a lip-made consonant preceded by a nasal sound. Those are hypotheses about Linear B, not a recovered pronunciation of 𐘰.

Linear B descended from Linear A. Cretan Hieroglyphic, a separate script used on Crete during an overlapping period, also shares some visual forms with Linear A. Similarity alone does not establish that a particular sign is AB056’s ancestor.