LINEAR A

Linear A was a writing system used by the Minoans of Crete over 3,400 years ago, before the Bronze Age collapse. More than a century after its rediscovery, it has yet to be deciphered. There’s a sadness in seeing their messages without being able to read them, and a hope that someday we might. Between the two is a strange kind of nostalgia, for a world none of us ever knew. It’s the feeling of something beautiful sitting right in front of us, just out of reach.

Yet the Minoans left us enough to start piecing their story together. Much of what we know about their civilization comes through their art, like frescoes on palace walls and paintings on the side of a vase, and through myths that later Greeks carried forward in song and dance.

LINEAR A, like its namesake, is a contribution to human storytelling, and one whose true meaning may also be lost to time. Perhaps someday in the distant future, our descendants will find it on a flash drive or an old computer. They may never know exactly what we meant by it. But they’ll know that we were here, that we hoped for something better, and that we danced.