Linear B Oil Ideogram

It marks oil as a commodity in Linear B records.

Linear B was used to write Mycenaean Greek. Its surviving clay tablets include palace accounts listing people, goods, amounts, and measures. In that setting, B130 marks oil being counted, stored, or distributed; it is a logogram—a sign standing for a thing, not spelling its spoken syllables.

In modern scholarly transcriptions, OLE, OLEUM, and *130 label the sign; they are not a known ancient pronunciation. Linear B developed from the older Linear A script, and its surviving palace-record tradition belongs to the fourteenth and thirteenth centuries BCE.

Does B130 mean olive oil only?

Not necessarily; the exact variety can remain disputed.

Some Linear B tablets add syllabic signs such as A or PA beside OLE. Scholars have proposed that these distinguish oils, including almond oil or oil from wild olives, but those readings are disputed; “oil” is the safe base reading.

Records also associate oil with perfume-making, lighting, and food. B130 identifies oil in an account, not one fixed use.

Can I send 𐂕 when I mean oil?

Only with a label; alone it is hard to read as oil.

A bare 𐂕 gives little clue that you mean oil. If you use it that way, identify it in the surrounding text as the Linear B oil sign.