ROMSO Cyprus Knowledge Base

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An undeciphered language is a language whose grammar and/or vocabulary remains incomprehensible at the current level of knowledge. As a rule, the term “undeciphered language” refers to dead languages, since there is a possibility of contact with native speakers and a constant growth of knowledge about grammar and vocabulary.

There are several categories of undeciphered languages. These categories may overlap in part.

Lack of sources of this language
There are references to a number of languages in historical sources, and the existence of the nation seems reliable, but written sources of the language have not been preserved, and one can only guess about its affiliation. Examples:
Liburnian is the language of the population of ancient Liburnia (in the territory of modern Croatia) - presumably Indo-European.
The Pelasgian language - back in the XIX century. the very fact of the existence of this language and people was questioned, and the only monument of the language - the Lemnos Stela - was not identified with the Pelasgians.
Sicana is the language of the inhabitants of ancient Sicily, the Sicans, before the conquest by the Sicules (some place names are known).

Undeciphered writing

Some undeciphered languages cannot be identified because their writing has not been deciphered. Modern methods of formal analysis of texts allow at least to determine the nature of writing (syllabic, hieroglyphic, alphabetic, etc.), as well as, in some cases, to assume the genetic affiliation of the language (by the peculiarities of syntax and morphology). Thus, the texts of Biblical, Sinai, Proto-Canaanite writing are probably written in Semitic languages, and the texts of the writing of the Indus Valley are written in Dravidian language. This method is in most cases not applicable to ideographic writings.

Inability to identify vocabulary and/or grammar
In some cases, although the script is fully or partially deciphered, the language cannot be attributed to a known language family and/or is difficult to formalize. These languages are considered as unclassified languages. In extremely rare cases, it is possible to reliably establish the relationship of one undeciphered language with another undeciphered language through formal analysis of texts and reconstruction of grammar.

Meroitic - texts are written in the alphabet based on Egyptian hieroglyphs and fully read, but the language cannot be identified with known languages either lexically or grammatically.
Minoan - represented by a large number of inscriptions in Cretan script (partially deciphered), short text in Egyptian hieroglyphics and several inscriptions in the Greek alphabet; probably in the same language written Phaistos disk (not deciphered). The inscriptions are so short (each an average of 20-30 characters) that only a few elements of Minoan grammar have been reconstructed.
Tyrrhenian languages (reconstructed family of the following lexically and grammatically close languages: Etruscan, Retsky, Eteocypriot, Pelasgian).