inaugeral date: 4 December 2005; last update: 17 February 2013

Comments, corrections, questions: John Younger (jyounger@ku.edu)

The Phaistos Disc is unique (= it is one of a kind with no parallels). It is a clay disc (D. 15.8-16.5, Th 1.6-2.1 cm), like a large cookie in shape and color. On both sides there is a spiral band containing impressions made by metal stamps, each quite small and each giving just the profile of what it depicts (head, bird, boat) much like a modern cookie-cutter. The disc was found on July 3, 1908, in one of the eastern brick cists (compartment 8 in building 101) in the north-east angle of the palace at Phaistos; along with the disc was a Linear A tablet (PH 1) and Kamares ware pottery (MM II).

The disc's spiral band was first outlined with a stylus from the circumference to the middle; first tracing the outermost spiral as a circle, then stopping to shift direction and completing the rest of the spiral to the center, with the central loop being shaped with the inscription there in mind. Then the signs were stamped, again from the periphery in to the center (as overlaps indicate: sign on sign [e.g., A XIV 3 over 2, XVII 4 over 3, XXIX 4 over 3; cf. A V 1 over 2 in an erasure], and sign on the upper spiral line [e.g., A XX 1, III 2, XIV 3, XX 3, XXVI 3, 4; B XII 2, XXII 4]). As each group of signs was stamped, a vertical line was drawn to the left to mark that sign-group off from the one to follow; here again, some signs that begin a sign-group overlap the vertical line separating it from the preceding sign-group (A XXI 1, XXIX 1; B XXVIII 2).

That the sign-groups are arranged in phrases may be indicated by small oblique strokes below final signs (e.g., A I, A III, etc.).

The Phaistos Disc carries 45 different signs. A bronze ax from the Arkalochori cave carries an inscription of 15 signs in three columns; four of these signs are new and the rest may duplicate signs on the Disc. And a clay sealing from the Phaistos sealing deposit archive (CMS II 5.246, below) also duplicates one of the signs on the Disc (sign 21).

The Phaistos Disc syllabary (if that is the nature of the script) should have some 75-100 signs, of which some 55-59 are now known.

Although the Disc is unique as a stamped inscription (often likened to a movable font inscription, like that produced by a printing press), there is one more clay object impressed with similar cookie-cutter stamps: a clay libation table found on the floor of vano VIII at Phaistos, below the deposit archive of sealings, again MM IIB context. which was impressed by two metal "cookie cutter" stamps, one in the form of a large S-spiral (CMS II 6.253) that impressed most of the rim, the other a bovine standing to left (CMS II 6.252) that impressed two sections of the rim and the corners. Since all signs that have a natural direction on the Disc face right (even if they were stamped upside down), the bovine to left is probably not part of the PH Disc syllabary.

And as a spiral inscription the Disc has one Linear A parallel, KN Zf 13, the gold ring from Mavrospelio Tb IX.E1 (cf. the inked inscriptions in two conical cups, KN Zc 6 and 7): Linear A miscellaneous inscriptions.

With only 3 documents and only some 55-59 different signs, the entire signary is still unknown -- if a syllabary, as seems likely, there should be some 75-100 signs.

For a list of the PH Disc signs (including those on the Arkalokhori Ax and Phaistos sealing, compared with Hieroglyphic signs), click here.

Phaistos Disc, side A

Phaistos Disc, side b

The Phaistos Disc syllabary (the names are conventional, Godart 1993/1995)

01 walking man	02 plumed head	03 tatooed head	04 bound man	05 child
06 woman	07 helmet	08 glove	09 plow	10 arrow
11 bow	12 shield	13 club	14 yoke	15 ax
16 saw	17 lid	18 boomerang	19 plane	20 triton
21 comb	22 frond	23 column	24 hut	25 boat
26 horn	27 hide	28 hoof	29 cat	30 ram
31 bird	32 pigeon	33 tuna	34 fly	35 tree
36 vine	37 papyrus	38 rosette	39 lily	40 bull hindquarters
41 double flute	42 rasp	43 filter	44 cleaver	45 wave

The Phaistos Disc inscription

/	A I: 02-12-13-01-18/
,   /	A II: 24-40-12,   A III: 29-45-07/
,   ,   ,   ,   [•],   ,   ,   ,   /	A IV: 29-29-34,   A V: 02-12-04-40-33,   A VI: 27-45-07-12,   A VII: 27-44-08,   A VIII: 02-12-06-18-[•],   A IX: 31-26-35,   A X: 02-12-41-19-35,   A XI: 01-41-40-07,   A XII: 02-12-32-23-38/
,   ,   /	A XIII: 39-11,   A XIV: 02-27-25-10-23-18,   A XV: 28-01/
/	A XVI: 02-12-31-26/
,   ,   /	A XVII: 02-12-27-27-35-37-21,   A XVIII: 33-23,   A XIX: 02-12-31-26/
,   /	A XX: 02-27-25-10-23-18,   A XXI: 28-01/
/	A XXII: 02-12-31-26/
,   ,   ,   ,   /	A XXIII: 02-12-27-14-32-18-27,   A XXIV: 06-18-17-19,   A XXV: 31-26-12,   A XXVI: 02-12-13-01,   A XXVII: 23-19-35/
,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   /	A XXVIII: 10-03-38,   A XXIX: 02-12-27-27-35-37-21,   A XXX: 13-01,   A XXXI: 10-03-38   B I: 02-12-22-40-07,   B II: 27-45-07-35,   B III: 02-37-23-05/
,   ,   /	B IV: 22-25-27,   B V: 33-24-20-12,   B VI: 16-23-18-43/
,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   ,   /	B VII: 13-01-39-33,   B VIII: 15-07-13-01-18,   B IX: 22-37-42-25,   B X: 07-24-40-35,   B XI: 02-26-36-40,   B XII: 27-25-38-01,   B XIII: 29-24-24-20-35,   B XIV: 16-14-18,   B XV: 29-33-01,   B XVI: 06-35-32-39-33,   B XVII: 02-09-27-01,   B XVIII: 29-36-07-08/
,   /	B XIX: 29-08-13,   B XX: 29-45-07/
/	B XXI: 22-29-36-07-08/
,   ,   /	B XXII: 27-34-23-25,   B XXIII: 07-18-35,   B XXIV: 07-45-07/
,   /	B XXV: 07-23-18-24,   B XXVI: 22-29-36-07-08/
,   ,   ,   /	B XXVII: 09-30-39-18-07,   B XXVIII: 02-06-35-23-07. B XXIX: 29-34-23-25,   B XXX: 45-07/

The Arkalokhori Ax is a large, bronze double ax found in one of the caves on Prophetis Elias near the village of Arkalokhori in central Crete.

After pillaging in the late 19th and early 20th century, and some excavation in the late 19th century, Spyridon Marinatos responded to more pillaging in 1935 with further excavation of the site and, among other finds, discovered a gold ax and silver ax inscribed in Linear A ("I-DA-MA-TE," AR Zf 1 & 2), and a bronze ax inscribed with some signs from the Phaistos Disc syllabary (Marinatos 1935: 250-259). Marinatos assumes a context date of MM III (-LM I), but there was little to no pottery. Most scholars assume a date either contemporary with Neopalatial axes of similar type or with the Phaistos Disc (late Protopalatial).

Since most of the sign groups on the Phaistos Disc are short (mostly 3 and 4 signs long), it is tempting to regard the signs in the third column as one sign group and columns one and two containing two sign groups each, separated by a divider (cf. the dotted vertical line that starts both sides of the Disc).

Arkalokhori Ax, drawing of inscription

The Arkalokhori Ax inscription

In columns

()	Col. 1: 01-02-03 (04) 05-06	Phaistos signs: 02-19-Face | 39?-22?
()	Col. 2: 01-07 (04b) 01-03-08	Phaistos signs: 02-Curved Branch | 02-Face-39?
	Col. 3: 09-10-02	Phaistos signs: 10-Double Branch-19

In signgroups (assuming sign begins a signgroup and each column contains two signgroups)

()	Signgroup 1: 01-02-03 (04)	Phaistos signs: 02-19-Face-23?
	Signgroup 2: 05-06	Phaistos signs: 39?-22?
()	Signgroup 3: 01-07 (04b)	Phaistos signs: 02-Curved Branch-23?
	Signgroup 4: 01-03-08	Phaistos signs: 02-Face-39?
	Signgroup 5: 09-10-02	Phaistos signs: 10-Double Branch-19

The third document is an impressed sealing from Phaistos (MM II late), CMS II 5, no. 246, whose seal carried Phaistos sign 21.

Bibliography of selected archaeological works on the Phaistos Disc