Fred Woudhuizen
Frederik Christiaan Woudhuizen (Zutphen, 13 February 1959 – Heiloo, 28 September 2021) was an independent scholar who studied ancient Indo-European languages, hieroglyphic Luvian/Luwian, and Mediterranean protohistory. He was the former editor of "Talanta, Proceedings of the Dutch Archaeological and Historical Society". Life. Fred Woudhuizen graduated from high school in 1977. He finished his history studies in 1985 with an exam in Ancient History and specializing in Prehistory and Early History of the Mediterranean region. His education included Provincial Roman Archeology and the study of Classical languages, including Latin and Greek, as well as Luwian languages, Italian dialects  and Mycenaeology. In 2006 he obtained his doctorate from Erasmus University Rotterdam with a Dissertation on "The Ethnicity of the Sea Peoples". From 1986 to 1989 and 1992 to 1995 Woudhuizen was editor of the Dutch journal "Talanta, Proceedings of the Dutch Archaeological and Historical Society" and from 1990 to 1992 director of the “Henri Frankfort Foundation”. Work. Woudhuizen examined in particular the writing systems of the Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age of the Mediterranean, including Luwian hieroglyphs, Cretan hieroglyphs, Linear A, Cypro-Minoan and the Byblos Script. He has also dealt extensively with the Luwian language and  with "Trümmersprachen" (Lycian, Lydian, Sidetic, Carian) and investigated Etruscan and Southwest Iberian. Woudhuizen applied a methodical principle to his work, which Stefan Hiller describes as a “paleographic-comparative procedure”. A similar approach had been used by Michael Ventris in the deciphering of Linear B. Similar or comparable character forms in related writing systems are used and their known phonetic values are transferred to the script to be deciphered. Woudhuizen described the most difficult part of his deciphering work as “hunting for sound values”. If the character sequence of the writing to be deciphered can be translated into a sequence of  phonetic values, the writing becomes legible. In order to make them understandable, word parallels in other languages must be used. Due to the close relationship of the language branches within the Indo-European language family, the meaning of some terms is obvious. Until 2008, Woudhuizen worked for two decades jointly with Jan Best, at that time a lecturer in Ancient History and Prehistory at the University of Amsterdam. Best had deciphered the libation formula in Linear A in 1981: “I have given and my hand has made as an expiatory offering, oh Asherah.” According to his studies, this sentence showed  that it is a Semitic language, which was written in a linearized script derived essentially from the Cretan hieroglyphs. Woudhuizen continued this work on his own from 2009, mainly transferring the phonetic values from the later Linear B to the signs of Linear A. He then identified the words using a Semitic dictionary – and was thus able to read Linear A. According to Woudhuizen, the language of the Linear A tablets is identical to the Semitic dialect that was spoken in Byblos at the same time. The deciphering of Linear A triggered a domino effect, because the transfer of phonetic  values between similar characters in different writing systems also made other scripts that were previously considered undeciphered readable, including the Byblos Script and Cypro-Minoan. According to Woudhuizen, the situation on Crete, with regard to languages and scripts, was complicated, as in addition to Semitic, Luwian and Pelasgian were also spoken and written on the island. The Luwian language turned out to be particularly helpful in deciphering Cretan hieroglyphs, the longest text of which, according to Woudhuizen, is the famous Phaistos Disc. Woudhuizen's works show that characters, scripts and languages of the 2nd millennium BC were largely derived from  one another across the entire Mediterranean region. With regard to the transcription of Luwian hieroglyphs, Woudhuizen insisted that the sound values of the Luwian language, which are known for around 90 percent of the words, ought to be used. The standard method for transcription, as established in 1973, however, uses Latin terms. The well-known Luwian word “parna” (for house) is therefore transcribed with the Latin term “DOMUS”. Woudhuizen argued that the translation into Latin hinders access to the Luwian language, thus making it unnecessarily difficult to understand. He also assumed a position against the so-called “new reading” advocated  by J. David Hawkins and suggested replacing this with an “adapted old reading”. Woudhuizen’s arguments have been confirmed by the subsequent studies in a number of instances: