Paleohispanic scripts | |
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Script type | |
Time period | c. 700 or 500–100 BC |
Region | Paleohispanic languages according to inscriptions (except Aquitanian - according to anthroponyms and theonyms used in Latin inscriptions). |
Languages | Aquitanian, Celtiberian, Gallaecian, Iberian, Lusitanian, Sorothaptic, Tartessian |
Related scripts | |
Parent systems | |
Child systems |
(Southern Palaeohispanic) |
Sister systems | |
The Paleohispanic scripts are the writing systems created in the Iberian Peninsula before the Latin alphabet became the main script. They derive from the Phoenician alphabet, with the exception of the Greco-Iberian alphabet that is a direct adaptation of the Greek alphabet. Some researchers believe the Greek alphabet may also have had a role in the origin of the other Paleohispanic scripts. Most of them are unusual in that they are semi-syllabic rather than purely alphabetic.
Paleohispanic scripts are known to have been used from the 5th century BCE — possibly from the 7th century, in the opinion of some researchers — until the end of the 1st century BCE or the beginning of the 1st century CE, and were the main scripts used to write the Paleohispanic languages.