Arguments are presented in support of a center-outwards direction of reading. Analysis of word length supports the presence of four separate messages on the disc; a new interpretation is given for three previously indeterminate symbols.. A Hittite origin for the disc is supported by (1) the similarity between the number of differing symbols on the disc and the number of syllables in Hittite and Luwian; (2) resemblances of the symbols themselves to Hittite hieroglyphs and artifacts and (3) correspondence of objects depicted by the symbols and themes from the History of Hatusili I. It is possible that the disc may be a record of gifts made to a temple, possibly that of Arinna.

The Phaistos Disc, about 6 inches in diameter, is made of clay with stamped impressions in a spiral pattern on both sides. It was found during excavations in 1908 of a basement room in the Minoan palace at Phaistos. It may be the first example of printing in human history, or a hoax. The palace had collapsed as a result of the Santorini Volcano explosion in 1628 BCE, thus giving a presumable latest date for the disc. However, the palace was reconstructed and the site was occupied for some centuries afterwards, and it is remotely possible that the disc was deliberately buried in a lower stratum. Published interpretations of the disc include a prayer of the [Filipino] sea people, a calendar, and a board game. To date, none of the decipherment attempts have met with acceptance.

We shall refer, as is customary, to the "obverse" as the side in which the central "symbol" is the Flower; the "reverse" has the Knobbed Helmet as its center. The obverse contains 113 impressions and the reverse has 117. A brief inspection of the disc reveals that both obverse and reverse are divided into two parts

(1) a spiral sequence of what we will call "words," composed of 2 - 6 symbols impressed into clay and set apart from each other by vertical lines. The spiral emanates from the center and terminates with a word that has been elongated to the edge of the disc. The Obverse Spiral (OS) contains 19 “words while the Reverse Spiral (RS) contains 18 words.

(2) a rim circle, broken at the elongated termination of the spiral. Both the Obverse Rim (OR) and the Reverse Rim (RR) contain 12 "words," all of 3 or 4 symbols, except for one word of 5 symbols on RR.

It is possible that the disc is meant to be read as a continuing spiral; however (see “Length of Words” below), the inner spirals resemble each other in number of words and variation of word length, as do the two rims, but the sequence of world lengths of the rims are very different from that of the spirals.

Although most interpreters of the Phaistos Disc have accepted that the direction of travel of the spiral is from outwards in, we hypothesize that it is from the center outwards. The arguments for this are:

(1) Practicality: It is far easier to start at a center and terminate anywhere on the rim, rather than starting from the rim and spacing the symbols so that they end at the center.

(2) The Head, Helmet Head and Striding Man symbols are all oriented so that they face in the center-out direction. In Egyptian hieroglyphics (and as would naturally occur to most writers) the heads face in the direction in which the inscription is read.

Because individual dies were made for each of the 45 symbols on the disc, one would presume that there were (at least intended to be) several copies and/or other discs produced with the same dies but having texts that differed from one another. The portability of the disc, and the method of impression point to an intended distribution over a wide area.

Some interpreters, noting the degree and placement of repetitions of symbols, are convinced that the text is that of a ritual prayer, and this may indeed be possible. However, if that were so, one would expect frequent references to a god or gods. The Woman/Goddess symbol occurs only four times, and there is but one occurrence of Standing Man.

(1) The Phaistos Disc may be a calendar, with the day names for a month of 30 days of the obverse and 31 on the reverse. Such a calendar might alternate months of 30 and 31 days (this gives an excess which would need correction, just as our calendar does.) However, certain groups of symbols are repeated exactly - this is extremely unlikely if it is a list of day names.

(2) The disc is a treaty. Each party to the treaty would need to possess a copy. Further, the disc was found in a palace, not in a temple, supporting a secular rather than religious interpretation.

(3) The disc gives a history of repeated events or achievements - the interpretation which this author finds most probable, for reasons given below in the section on Hittite provenance.

(1) There is more variability in word lengths in the spiral sequences than in the rim sequences; the OR contains onlywords of length 3 and 4; all but two of the RR words contain 4 symbols. OS has four words of 2 symbols, eight of 3 symbols, one of 4 symbols and four of 6 symbols. RS has one word of 2 symbols, six each of 4 and 3 symbols; and five of 5 symbols,

(2) Groups of 3:The sequence 3,2,6 occurs four times in OS. The probability of this happening if the symbols were randomly distributed is approximately 1/25,000.

(3) Triples: The sequence 444 occurs three times in RR and once in OR; the sequence 333 occurs once in OS, twice in OR. This suggests that words are grouped in triples, except for RS which seems to divide into groups of two. If we compare groups in OR (444-333-443-444) with those of RR (444-454-443-444)a strong correspondence is noted, perhaps implying a formulaic phrase of ending.

First symbols in certain words are slashed. The symbols receiving the slash are: Helmet(3 slashes), Fist (3 slashes), Dotted Triangle (1 slash), Horn (3 slashes), Five-Leaved Plant(1 slash), Square (1 slash), Standing Man and Striding Man (1 each). The slashes never occur on adjacent words. The slashed words fall into two groups on each face, one of two slashed words towards the beginning of the rim sequence and the other of four slashed words on the spiral sequence. There are at least two possibilities for interpretation of the slash: (1) modification of a syllable, for example closure with an R, and (2) determinative, i.e., marking a symbol which is to be read as a logogram, or marking a symbol as subject or object of a "sentence.". Also, the slashes might demarcate such "sentences."

If the slashes are determinative as to syllable or logogram, and if, in the underlying language, position determines case, such as a fixed "Subject Object Verb" (SOV) sentence order, then only some subjects and no objects are so marked by slashes; this is extremely unlikely. If, on the other hand, word endings and not position determine case, then the slash might be a case indicator.

On the other hand, when R occurs in Hittite it is generally a modification of the first syllable of a word. The slashed symbols are always the initial symbol of a word, but not all words begin with slashed syllables nor are all occurrences of a symbol slashed. It is interesting to compare the locations of the slashes on the obverse and reverse of the disc; both OS and RS have the same number of slashes, including slashes on the beginning symbols of the 5th, 10th and 13th word, while there are two slashes symbols on both OR and OR. The 10th word is slashed on both OR and RR.

Obverse Spiral (5 slashes): 5-Leaved Plant (word 5), Striding Man (word 9), Horn (words 10, 13, and 16)

The following 19 symbols are unambiguous in their depictions: Striding Man, Standing Man, Crested Head, Prisoner, Bare Head, Woman/Goddess, Pelt, Flying Bird, Bird, Ram Head, Fish, Ox Leg, Horn, Bone, Yoke, Axe, Knife, 5-leaved plant, and Flower. It should be noted, however, that no matter how precise in depiction, the symbols may still be read as syllables. Questions regarding the other symbols, which have been named only for ease in referencing them, include:

(1) Shield - may be a pendant (jewelry or status marker) or lotus root. The lotus root has eight holes surrounding the center hole, but 6 of these tend to be more prominent than the others. The shield designation is preferred here because of the association with Crested Head.

(5) It is suggestive that Square and two others depict angles - and the angles are respectively 90. 60. and 45 degrees. These would be the most useful angles for building because right triangles with 60 and 45 degree angles have known ratios for their lengths of sides. However, a look Table 2 shows that the distribution of 90 and 45 degree signs (if such they are) are similar, but both different from that of the one here designated as a 60 degree angle, which might indicate that this sign is not related to the other two.

(6) Dotted Triangle and Dotted Shape are indeterminate, and named for ease of reference only. It has been suggested that Dotted Triangle represents a female pubic triangle.

(8) River is so named because it follows a common hieroglyphic depiction of flowing water.

(9) It is possible that Helmet depicts a hut, a mountain or female breast. However it bears a striking resemblance to a type of Minoan helmet which was constructed of boar tusk (Figure 2); the Horned Helmet is similar to the helmet of the Hittite god Teshup (Figure 1):

Note the cobra on the front of Teshup’s helmet, which might correspond to the marking in the middle of Horned Helmet. In all fairness, this symbol might depict “house on fire” or even “volcano.”

(11) It has been suggested (quite plausibly) that Plow actually depicts a boat, or even a harp.

Doubling may indicate plurals or repeated syllables. The following signs occur twice in succession:

The population of the two faces of the disc differ. (cf. Appendix, Table 1) Shield/Helmet appears nine times on the obverse, only once on the reverse. On the reverse, the most frequent symbol is Knobbed Helmet (13 occurrences), while this symbol appears only three times on the obverse, all occurrences on OR.

The Phaistos Disc contains 45 different symbols, a rather larger number than that of the average alphabet (20-30 characters), especially considering that the disc probably doesn’t contain all the symbols used to express its underlying language. The number of syllables is small for a syllabary (60 - 200), but we cannot rule out this possibility, since the short text of the disc probably represents only a small sample of the syllables of its language. The sample is further reduced by repetitions of both words and symbols.

It is also possible that at least some of the symbols are to be read as logograms, although pictographic languages require a far larger number of characters than either alphabets or syllabaries. Only a very small percentage of the available logograms would therefore be represented on the disc. Attempts to read the symbols purely as logograms have not been convincing to date. It is tempting to assign specific logographic meanings to the pictures of heads and building plans (did these refer to specific peoples or places?) but this is debatable. Maya writing, for example, contains many well-individuated heads which are in fact read as syllables.

The table of positions of the individual symbols shows that Crested Helmet, Knife and Ax only occur at the ends of words; Woman/Goddess is last in the word 3 times out of 4 appearances; Cat Head ends a word 7 times out of 10. Striding Man begins 5 of the 9 words in which it appears. This might occur in a logographic text if Shield/Helmet represented a stock phrase, such as “under the protection of the Army” or because of a rigid ordering of subject, object and verb in the underlying language.

Doubling of symbols would (clumsily) serve the purpose of indicating plurals in a logographic text; a syllabic text, however, might easily include words composed of repeated syllables, like mama or tawananna. As for the slash, it might be a determinative which particularized a logogram or modified a syllable, for example by closing the vowel with an added R.

For the above reasons, it seems plausible that the symbols of the Phaistos Disc are a mixture of syllable signs and logograms.

I. Correspondence of Number of Symbols to Number of Syllables in Hittite or Luwian

Hittite has no "O" sound, and "R" is used predominantly to modify the remaining four vowels. Consonants are otherwise limited and counting initial syllables in the Hittite dictionary, one finds there are only 44. Thus the symbols of the Phaistos Disc might easily (especially if modified with a slash for r) be a syllabary of that language (though we do not believe that it is purely so, for reasons set forth in the section on Textual Materials).

It is possible (even likely) that Square Building and Curved represent actual places, rather than syllables. Similarly, Bare Head, Helmet Helmet Head (and even Horned Helmet) may represent nations or rulers. This would reduce the number of symbols available to represent syllables; but it is possible that syllabic symbols were used only for prepositions or conjunctions. This is precisely the pattern of Hittite hieroglyphs (Walker, 2004) were in fact a syllabary underlain by the Luwian language with supplementary logographs not specific to any language. When Luwian became a written language with its own hieroglyphs, 47 Luwian syllabic signs, a number which is also consistent with the number found on the disc.

The following drawings were taken from photographs (Figures 10 ff) of middle and late period Hittite hieroglyphs taken by the author in the Museum of Anatolian Archeology:

which are identical to the Whisk, Mace, T-Square, Paddle, Five-Leaved Plant, Bone and Water.

Less certain correlations also include the depiction of a fish, an antelope with a horn like Horn, and a striding duck (or eagle?) figure whose arms and legs are in the same position as that of Striding Man. These, as well as the originals of the above drawings, are visible in Figures 10-13 at the end of these notes.

The British Museum has a hieroglyphic seal from Bogazköy with both inner and outer texts (though no obvious spirals)

In the interior circle, we can easily see Mace, Triangle, and a 3-pronged figure much like one-half of Building at 3 o’clock. In the outer circle, there is a running figure at approximately seven o’clock, several triangles, and possibly a Goddess figure at 10 o’clock.

The absence from the Phaistos Disc of the familiar mountains, double half circles, winged discs, etc., which refer to Hittite gods and are so prominent in Hittite hieroglyphic inscriptions should be noted. This is a very strong argument against Hittite influence; but it is also possible (though unlikely) that the disc deals only with secular matters and doesn’t refer primarily to the gods.

The number of Hittite Hieroglyphs (7/43, approximately 16%) which exactly dupicate Phaistos Disc symbols is striking. An even higher percentage (11/43 or approximately 25%) of disc symbols correspond (with some imagination) to Luwian hieroglyphs Although Luwian hieroglyphs were not used for more than half a millenium after the burial of the Phaistos Disc in the Santorini explosion, they may easily represent survivals or simplifications of an earlier system.

One would naturally expect that two hieroglyphic systems composed of fairly elaborate and specific images would have a number of glyphs in common, especially when the two systems belonged to people with essentially the same flora and fauna and parallel trade and agricultural practices. However, there are almost no correspondences between the Phaistos Disc symbols and Egyptian hieroglyphs. The Egyptians used many images of birds, but none look like the Phaistos Disc bird; none of the Egyptian birds are flying. Thus even this low percentage of correspondence between Hittite hieroglyphs and the Phaistos symbols may be significant.

Below is an image of Hittite deities from the early Bronze Age Note the elongated head, pose of arm and wide hips of the female deity on the right. The same features are seen in Goddess/Woman. The figure on the left strongly resembles Standing Man.

The lion gate (picture by author) at Bogazköy (ca. 1300 BCE) is in the shape of Hairpin Arch:

Below is a picture taken by the author in the middle Hittite collection of the Anatolian Museum of a Hittite frieze with helmets very much like the rather dolichocephalic examples of the Phaistos Disc symbol:

The relief of Sam'al le Roi Barrekup et son scribe, Hittite ca. 1300 BCE, shows the bare-headed scribe with an implement for writing on clay, very much like Paddle, which might indeed be, since the symbols are not to scale, a stylus. If so, we might postulate that this sequence, Flower, Bare Head, Paddle, corresponds to a stock phrase, “Here begins what the scribe writes...”

The author took this photograph of Early Bronze Age Hittite spearheads with hooked tangs, like the one pictured by Knife.

The Hittite gods wore horned helmets. In Figure 2, we see the head of Teshup the weathergod, which is especially interesting in that in exhibits both horns in the same position as Horned Helmet and a frontal device (cobra) which might be indicated on the Horned Helmet symbol.

Flower only appears one more time, as the second symbol on RR. Many-petaled flowers were common in the center of circular tablets and artifacts such as bowls.

We are fortunate to have both the heartbreaking Testament and the relation of the Wars of Hatusili I, complete texts contemporary with the latest possible date of the Phaistos Disc.

(1) The text is predominantly a list of Hatusili I’s 18 campaigns against 16 neighboring cities.

(2) Lists of plunder from these cities are given. Among the items plundered are cattle and sheep and silver statues, particularly of the gods, a ship with gold lions; and gold and silver tables.

(3) Lists of offerings to the Goddess Arinna are mentioned twice, as is the construction of a temple of the Goddess.

Although it is a long stretch to assume the Phaistos Disc is a retelling of these events, one might note the close correspondence between the number of Hatusili’s campaigns (18) and the appearances (19) of the Shield/Helmet combination, which could plausibly indicate military action.

Cattle skins (Pelt), Ox Leg, the Ram’s head, Cat Head (or lion head?), Boat, Yoke and even Fist are symbols that correspond to items in the plunder lists. The Wars of Hattusili (Kuhrt, 1995) contains the following:

As noted above, Standing Man has a strong resemblance to the statue of a Hittite god shown in Figure 7, particularly the pot belly, round head and short arms.

If we accept a Hittite origin for the Phaistos Disc, then the symbol Woman/Goddess most likely refers to Arinna. The resemblance between this symbol and a statue of a Hittite goddess has been noted above. Also, on the Obverse, both appearances of Woman/Goddess are preceded by T-Square, which points directly at “Arinna”; it is possible that T-Square can be read as “to.” However, on the Reverse, Woman/Goddess is preceded by 5-Leaved Plant. Ox Leg might easily represent an offering.

Also on the Reverse, Woman/Goddess immediately precedes Crested Helmet in a rare appearance of that symbol without a preceding shield. This combination, Woman/Goddess-Crested Helmet might correspond to the stock phrase “The Goddess took [Hatusili] on her lap,” i.e., favored him. In that case, Hatusili would be represented by the Crested Helmet, while Shield would stand for military action; and Shield/Helmet would indicate military action specifically by the King.

Horned Helmet is a problematic symbol, appearing only three times on the Phaistos Disc. The opening in the front might indicate a door if this symbol were meant to represent a hut rather than a helmet; in that case, the “horns” might be flames. One might possibly conjecture that the appearance of this symbol correlates with the destruction of cities by fire. However, the strongest resemblance, as noted above, is to the helmet of the god Teshup, the weathergod, mentioned (though not as frequently as Arinna) as a beneficiary of the offerings of Hattusili.

Hatusili remarks that he “opened the gate” of Ninassa; it is possible that the Hairpin Arch symbol was intended to convey that meaning. Gates at Boguzköy have the same shape as this Arch.

Towards the end of the History, Hatusilis in fact relates that he freed all the slaves in the city of Zippasna; the Prisoner symbol may be a reference to such an occasion.

Given that Akkadian cuneiform was customary for documents during the period in question (1650-1625), one would ask why the disc was created in this rather clumsy form.

The answer might be that the disc was intended for distribution to areas where cuneiform was not interpreted. After all, the disc was found far from Anatolia. An inspection of the Table 4 (Linear A) shows several resemblances to the Phaistos Disc symbols, notably Woman/Goddess, Vine/Systrum, Cat Head, Paddle, Y, Shield, Flying Bird, and Boat . It may be that an attempt was made to incorporate these symbols so that the disc would be decipherable at its intended destination. Notable is the strong resemblance between the Linear A building and the building depicted among the Hittite Hieroglyphs in Figure 12.

An exact decipherment of the Phaistos Disc is elusive at this time, yet the resemblances between the material of the disc and the text of the Wars of Hattusili are strong enough to warrant further study.

Frequency and Location of Symbols on the Phaistos Disc: Total Occurrences-Ocurrences at Beginning of Word -Occurrences at End of Word
Symbol	OS	OR	RS	RR	Totals
Human
1,Striding Man	4-4-0	2-0-1	2-2-0	3-1-0	11-7-1
2.Crested Head	9-0-9	5-0-5	2-0-2	3-0-3	19-0-19
3.Bare Head	2-0-0				2-0-0
4.Prisoner		1-0-0			1-0-0
5.Standing Man				1-1-0	1-1-0
6.Goddess/Woman	1-0-1	1-0-0	2-0-2		4-0-3
7.Fist		1-1-0	3-2-0		4-3-0
Totals	16-4-10	10-1-6	9-4-4	7-4-3	42-11-23
Animal
8.Pelt	8-1-0	2-0-2	2-0-1	1-1-0	13-2-3
9.Flying Bird	4-0-2	1-0-0			5-0-2
10.Bird	1-0-0	1-0-0	1-0-0		3-0-0
11.Fish	1-0-1	1-1-0	2-1-0	2-1-1	6-3-2
12.Cat Head		3-0-3	8-0-6		11-0-9
13.Ram Head			1-0-0		1-0-0
14.Ox Leg	2-0-2				2-0-2
15.Shell			1-0-0	1-0-0	2-0-0
16.Horse Head		1-0-0			1-0-0
17.Bone	2-0-0				2-0-0
18.Horn	4-3-0	1-0-0			5-3-0
Totals	22-4-6	10-1-5	15-1-7	4-2-1	51-8-18
Building/Tools
19.Paddle/Stylus	3-0-0				3-0-0
20.Whisk (or Thistle)	1-0-0				1-0-0
21.Yoke	1-0-0				1-0-0
22.Plane	1-0-0				1-0-0
23.Square (90^∘ Angle)	4-2-0	2-2-0	4-1-0	2-1-0	12-6-0
24. 45^∘ Angle	2-1-0	2-2-0			4-3-2
25. 60^∘ Angle			2-0-2	1-0-1	3-0-3
26.Building	2-2-0				2-2-0
27.Curved Building	1-0-1		3-0-0	2-0-0	6-0-1
28.Plow	2-1-0		2-2-0	3-1-0	7-4-0
29.Hairpin Arch			2-1-1		2-1-1
Totals	17-6-1	4-4-0	13-4-3	8-2-1	42-16-5
Warfare
30.Mace	4-1-2	1-0-0	4-0-0	2-0-0	11-1-2
31.Ax				1-0-1	1-0-1
32.Knife			1-0-1	1-0-1	2-0-2
33.Bow	1-1-0				1-1-0
34.Shield (or Lotus Root/Jewelry)	8-0-0	7-2-0	2-0-0	3-0-3	20-2-3
35.Helmet		3-2-0	11-5-3	4-1-1	18-8-4
36.Horned Helmet		2-0-0	2-0-0		4-0-0
Totals	13-2-2	13-4-0	20-5-4	11-1-6	57-12-12
Plants
37. 5-Leaved Plant	2-1-0	2-2-0	4-2-2	2-2-0	10-7-0
38.Flower	2-2-0	1-0-0			3-2-0
Totals	4-3-0	3-2-0	4-2-2	2-2-0	13-9-0
Musical
39.Flute	2-0-0	1-0-0	1-1-0	2-0-1	6-1-1
40.Sistrum (or Vine)			3-0-0	1-0-0	4-0-0
Totals	2-0-0	1-0-0	4-1-0	3-0-1	10-1-1
Indeterminate (these shapes named for convenience in referencing them only)
41.Legs		2-0-0	1-0-1	2-0-1	5-0-2
42.River				1-1-0	1-1-0
43.Dotted Triangle				1-1-0	1-1-0
44.Dotted Shape				1-0-0	1-0-0
45. Palm	1-0-0	2-0-0			3-0-0
Totals	1-0-0	4-0-0	1-0-1	5-2-1	11-2-2

Photographs of early period Hittite hieroglyphs taken by the author in the Museum of Anatolian Civiliation

The following glyphs are seen above:Paddle, top of first row,glyph 3, Bone, middle of first row, glyph 7, Knobbed Helmet, bottom of first row, glyph 5, Whisk, bottoms of 2nd row, glyph 2, Roots inverted, bottom of 4th row, glyph 6, Flying Bird, top of 5th row, glyph 1, Horned Helmet, top of 5th row, glyph 4, Ox Leg, bottom of 7th row, glyph 3