The Local Scripts of Archaic Greece

This is the only modern work to survey in depth the inscriptions of Greece before 403 BC. Since its first publication in 1961, the body of material available for study has increased substantially, and the size of the Supplement in this reissue is a clear measure of that growth. The new pages are partly the work of Anne Jeffery, and partly that of her pupil Alan Johnston.The original text attempts to reconstruct, for Greek inscriptions from the eighth to the fifth centuries BC, a chronological system (divided tentatively into twenty-five year periods) similar to those already generally accepted for Greek sculpture and pottery. It includes surveys of the origin and dissemination of the alphabet among the city states, the development and content of early inscriptions, and the techniques of the craftsmen, followed by a discussion of the inscriptions of each state.Each section contains a list, with bibliography, of all significant inscriptions, while numerous photographs and facsimiles of the inscriptions provide an important instrument of control. The approach is primarily archaeological, but account is taken also of the many historical, philological, andartistic problems involved.`This is a monumental, an altogether superb, book ... It is a book worth waiting for, a major work for reading and for reference, in its field incomparable, and a contribution to the history of our civilization.' Classical World

A detailed survey of the inscriptions of Greece before 403 BC, which attempts to construct a chronological system divided into 25 year periods, similar to those used for Greek sculpture and pottery. This revised edition contains additional photographs of the most significant inscriptions.

Part 1 The origin and transmission of the Greek alphabet. Part 2 Writing in archaic Greece: direction of the script and methods of inscribing; materials used; the subjects of early Greek inscriptions; letter-forms as evidence for dating inscriptions. Part 3 The local scripts: central Greece; the Peloponnese; north-western Greece; the western colonies; the Aegean Islands; the eastern Greeks; the northern colonial area.