God said kill you first son

[Redoubtable]

Originally posted by GodLied
Communication is the basis of language. Petroglyphs communicate events, conditions, and other notions.

Some petroglyphs had better artists than others.

If you truly considered petroglyphs a language, you'd have written "writers" or "authors," not "artists".
Just as you unintentionally implied, petrogyphs are a form of art. Verily, they communicate, but their messages are completely subjective and often nebulous.
There are no arbitrarily established rules to art, and, thus, it "communicates" whatever the viewer wishes to interpret. I don't see how anything so ponderously ambiguous could be a language.
It contains no axioms or specifications, no standards whatsoever. It's a bunch of drawings.

Originally posted by Voltaire
Petroglyphs are symbols.

They are only symbolic if you want them to be.
I mean, I can draw on a cave wall every whit as well as my primitive forefathers, but if I choose to do so, my scribblings don't have to be portentous or communicative at all. They could just be what they are: DRAWINGS!

There is no Petroglyphic Rosetta Stone by which one could translate these cave drawings as archaeologists and anthropologists do hieroglyphics. They are open for interpretation, be it studious or not. There is no order to it whatsoever.

 

[okinrus]

I don't even think God himself could out of GodLied shrewdness.

 

[GodLied]

Originally posted by Redoubtable
If you truly considered petroglyphs a language, you'd have written "writers" or "authors," not "artists".
Just as you unintentionally implied, petrogyphs are a form of art. ....

In China, those who write the characters of their language well, are good artists. In America writing is known as penmanship. Some people have better penmanship than others.

Petroglyphs are composed of symbols. Those symbols communicate ideas. For example: the modern handicap parking insignia is a nonverbal communication medium that is symbolic. Ancient Christians used petroglyphic fish as a symbol of their faith. That petroglyph marks the entrances of at least one subterranean christian site.

In Hawaii the image of two poles with feathered tops is a sign of Kapu. Kapu means "Do not enter." or "Forbidden." Any petroglyph including such a symbol is understood. Any other petroglyphs can be interpretted with common sense and knowledge of Hawaiian culture.

Just using the Kapu symbol in conjunction with stick drawings of men, women and children; laws forbidding same sex interaction, molestation, and incest can be represented. At the entrance of a cave, path or zone, Kapu petroglyphs allow people to know what not to do without having to be told a complete sentence with different nouns. Kapu associated with a particular act, location, food, or whatnot is sufficient in and of itself.

Think as you wish. Dream as you want. Petroglyphs are part of the official definition of language and your notions of language do not alter the official definition of language. Your refusal to comprehend the definition for language lends me to no longer see any possibility of educating your self-guided mind. Although you self-guided mind leads to superior sensation of self, it prevents yourself from rational thought. I know no cure for your condition.

GodLied.

 

[Redoubtable]

Originally posted by GodLied
In America writing is known as penmanship.

Good penmanship does not equate to artistic skill; art and writing are different areas.

Petroglyphs are composed of symbols. Those symbols communicate ideas.

Petroglyphs predating the Epic of Gilgamesh are like paintings, not handicap signs or "Kapu". Their messages, if such were intended, are wholely subjective, not definite and inarguable as in hieroglyphics. As I stated, there is no petroglyphic Rosetta Stone.

Think as you wish. Dream as you want. Petroglyphs are part of the official definition of language and your notions of language do not alter the official definition of language.

I fear I'm not the one dreaming. The definition easily backs me, not you.

lan·guage Pronunciation Key (lnggwj)
n.
1. Communication of thoughts and feelings through a system of arbitrary signals, such as voice sounds, gestures, or written symbols.

As you should have already realized by now, a language, OFFICIALLY, must contain a system. There is no system in prehistoric inscriptions, which happen to be the only petroglyphs which predate the Epic Gilgamesh. Without a system, they are nothing but antediluvian scratchings, ancient art.

 

[GodLied]

Originally posted by Redoubtable
Good penmanship does not equate to artistic skill; art and writing are different areas.

Petroglyphs predating the Epic of Gilgamesh are like paintings, not handicap signs or "Kapu". Their messages, if such were intended, are wholely subjective, not definite and inarguable as in hieroglyphics.

...As you should have already realized by now, a language, OFFICIALLY, must contain a system. There is no system in prehistoric cave-drawings, which happen to be the only petroglyphs which predate the Epic Gilgamesh. Without a system, they are nothing but antediluvian scratchings, ancient art.

On penmanship, some are sloppy and some are fancy. Fancy penmanship is a work of art.

To say the petroglyphs in ancient Irish observatories are subjective rather than definitive, is to say the the observatories were not observatories at all. Instead it is just chance that light enters the obervatory from particular windows during particular seasonal changes to mark seasons, and the sun shines through particular windows at sunrise on the symbol for the sun just by chance. Sure they accidentally built obervatories and vandalized the walls.

To fail to agree that petroglyphs in an observatory do not have a system is to say that the astronomers randomly vandalized their walls without relating their art to their field of study.

I strongly suggest you learn more about ancient observatory petroglyphs before claiming petroglyphs lack a system of objects which constitute nouns and verbs.

GodLied.

 

[Redoubtable]

In another thread, Godlied, you made a striking example of Neolithic and/or Mesolithic pictographs used in celestial observatories in Ireland. I believe the dates you used were circa 5,000 to 3,000 B.C.E.. You also indicated that researchers could translate these characters. I will admit that this implies the existence of written stories predating the Epic. However, none of these theoretical pieces are known to us.

[edit] wow . . . I didn't see the above post . . . [/edit]

 

[Redoubtable]

Originally posted by GodLied
To say the petroglyphs in ancient Irish observatories are subjective rather than definitive, is to say the the observatories were not observatories at all.

Petroglyphs can be a language if written with an orderly system in mind.
However, I had thought the only petroglyphs which predated the Epic (excluding hieroglyphics) had been prehistoric cave-drawings, wherein none of the said orderliness can be found.
I did not know that systematic carvings like the Irish script had been made before the recording of the Epic.
The structures are typically ascribed to the Celts, are they not? Did not the Celts arrive in Ireland in circa 2000 B.C.E.? This is the crux from which my befuddlement springs.

 

[GodLied]

Originally posted by Redoubtable
In another thread, Godlied, you made a striking example of Neolithic and/or Mesolithic pictographs used in celestial observatories in Ireland. I believe the dates you used were circa 5,000 to 3,000 B.C.E.. You also indicated that researchers could translate these characters. I will admit that this implies the existence of written stories predating the Epic. However, none of these theoretical pieces are known to us.

[edit] wow . . . I didn't see the above post . . . [/edit]

Ireland is a dangerous, wet region. Any papers would desintegrate. Any tablets would have likely been smashed by invaders as it has happened with other invaders of other lands who chose to destroy the culture and lingo of acquired citizens. For example, Hawaiian and Hawaiiana was banned when Hawaii was being anglicized. People had to practice their culture in secrecy....

GodLied.

 

[Voltaire]

I agree with Godlied. Petroglyphs are symbols. they express an idea. you might see it only as art but when an artist paints something he/she put his/her emotions into the painting giving it a deeper meaning. art is symbolic literature and to say that petroglyphs were not a way of communcating is erroneous.

 

[GodLied]

Originally posted by Redoubtable
Petroglyphs can be a language if written with an orderly system in mind.
However, I had thought the only petroglyphs which predated the Epic (excluding hieroglyphics) had been prehistoric cave-drawings, wherein none of the said orderliness can be found.
I did not know that systematic carvings like the Irish script had been made before the recording of the Epic.
The structures are typically ascribed to the Celts, are they not? Did not the Celts arrive in Ireland in circa 2000 B.C.E.? This is the crux from which my befuddlement springs.

Your petroglyphic presumptions are false. If I previously wrote 5000 BCE, I meant 5000 BCE. Such a date predated cuneiform, the language for the story in question. I do not recall the website on those petroglyphs however one can search the web and find it. Search words might be observatory, petroglyph, Ireland, Irish, Neolithic, ...., "oldest known obeservatory," .... Web sites noting historical sites in Ireland will possibly link to sites about the worlds oldest known observatories which have petroglyphic writing on the wall to acknowledge their understanding of seasons amongst other things.

When you confirm what I wrote from a third party, do not question me on it again. All data stems from Ireland. Neither will I go and double check their dating of historical sites nor will I dispute what they claim: if it were disputable it would already have been disputed.

JMG.

 

[SnakeLord]

I dont think anyone can dispute it when you have nothing present to confirm it. So quick to label people's posts as false, so slow to confirm it. Oh well...

 

[GodLied]

Originally posted by SnakeLord
I dont think anyone can dispute it when you have nothing present to confirm it. So quick to label people's posts as false, so slow to confirm it. Oh well...

This timeline shows pimitive writing started around 8000 BC.

http://timelines.ws/0A1MILL_3300BC.HTML

That preexists the Epic of Gilgamesh as well as the observatories in Ireland which have been radio-carbon dated to somwhere between 5,200 and 7,800 years ago according to:

http://www.global-vision.org/dream/dreamch4.html

That age is older than the age from the website I originally looked at when citing the ages of those stone observatories to 5000 BCE.

The validity of those website's data is not known; however, the second website is in the correct age range. I do not want to search for a second or third site verifying the first link's information about primitive writing in the year 8000 BC.

Both searches to produce those websites were not difficult from

www.google.com

If people were writing in 8000 BC, people probably were still writing in 5000 BC.

JMG.

 

[SnakeLord]

Well that site, with incredible references such as: 'excite chatrooms', and 'mysteries of the bible on the arts and entertainment TV network', isn't exactly forthcoming with it's details. It simply says mesopotamia developed primitive writing. The oldest of recovered tablets however is gilgamesh. It is widely considered that the Sumerians and inhabitants of mesopotamia were around at that time. It goes something like this:

Early village settlements, Samarra culture, Halaf culture, Ubaid culture, Gawra culture, (about 4,000 - 8,000 B.C.E. "BCE")
Uruk culture (3,000 - 4,000 BCE), late prehistoric period (2,750 - 3,300 BCE), Early Dynastic II - II periods (2,334 - 2,750 BCE)
Akkadian Dynasty (2,154 - 2,334 BCE) including Sargon (2,279 - 2,334 BCE)
Rulers of Lagash & Uruk, Third Dynasty of Ur, First Dynasty of Isin, Larsa Dynasty (1,763 - 2,155 BCE)
First Dynasty of Babylon (1,595 - 1,894 BCE)

Undoubtedly the system of developing a writing process would have taken time, and it's pertinent to assume there would have been some textual writings before gilgamesh... (gilgamesh is a full story- i doubt that would have been the very first thing written- it would stand to reason that easier things would have been written prior to a large story). However gilgamesh still holds the title because it's the oldest that has been found from mesopotamia.

As for the second website.... Admittedly it is a sordid affair, and one that i will search further into shortly. I found claims that indian writing was oldest, egyptian writing was oldest, hell- even claims that they've found writing from atlantis that predates everything. Websites are not always that trustworthy, and it can be a very hard task to differentiate. However- seeings as ireland is next door to me, and i could use a holiday- i'll pop over there and see what i can find, (aside from guiness)

Both searches to produce those websites were not difficult from www.google.com

No, it wasn't difficult- but you made the claim, the onus to provide relevant information is on you.