Photo courtesy of The Guardian
A bronze hand dug up from an ancient site in northern Spain could help know more about one of the world's most mysterious language: Basque.
The "Hand of Irulegi' is a Spanish artefact discovered by archaeologists from the Aranzadi Science Society while digging near the city of Pamplona, according to a report in The Guardian.
The area was once inhabited by an Iron Age tribe called Vascones who were largely thought to be illiterate.
But the dozens of symbols on the Hand of Irulegi, which is thought to have hung from the door of a mud-brick house more than 2000 years ago, suggest it is a language to which Brusque could trace its origin.
Basque is spoken mostly in the Basque Country, a region that sits between northern Spain and south-western France.
Considering its linguistic aspects, it is a language isolate meaning it is unrelated to any other existing languages
However archaeologists are able to read one word on the "Hand of Irulegi' that resembles a word in Basque, thus tracing its origin to the language of the ancient tribe: Vascones.
The first – and only word – to be identified so far is sorioneku, a forerunner of the modern Basque word zorioneko, meaning good luck or good omen, The Guardian reported.
Experts now believe the inscriptions on the hand to be the oldest written example of Proto-Basque and the discovery, according to them, could lead to unlearn a lot of things we know about the Vascones.
Because, the Iron Age tribe was thought to have had no written language, except for the words found in their coins, until Romans introduced Latin alphabet when they arrived in the area.
But the five words written in 40 characters on the artefact suggest otherwise, according to report, because it is identified as Vasconic –probably source of modern Basque.
According to Javier Velaza, a professor of Latin philology at the University of Barcelona the discovery had finally confirmed the existence of a written Vasconic language.