In the late 19th century, archaeologists on Crete discovered small clay tablets inscribed with lines of mysterious symbols. For decades, no one could decode them. Linear B, as it was known, was a script used more than 3000 years ago by the ancient Minoan civilisation. Like Egyptian hieroglyphs, it comprised symbols rather than an alphabet. Decoding it was a fiendish task, as the linguists who attempted it had no translations in known languages to compare with the symbols. They also had to figure out what language was being represented in the first place.
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