{"id":3921698,"date":"2025-09-01T19:03:13","date_gmt":"2025-09-02T00:03:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mikedyess.info\/para\/mystery-ancient-stone-slab-engraved-with-strange-symbols-no-one-can-read-baffles-experts\/"},"modified":"2025-09-01T19:03:13","modified_gmt":"2025-09-02T00:03:13","slug":"mystery-ancient-stone-slab-engraved-with-strange-symbols-no-one-can-read-baffles-experts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/mikedyess.info\/para\/mystery-ancient-stone-slab-engraved-with-strange-symbols-no-one-can-read-baffles-experts\/","title":{"rendered":"Mystery ancient Stone Slab\u2014engraved with strange symbols no one can read, baffles experts"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A mysterious stone slab, covered with ancient symbols no one has been able to decipher has baffled experts ever since it was discovered. It remains unclear why the symbols were engraved and what message the ancient stone slab\u2014which dates back thousands of years\u2014is meant to convey.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"montoro
The ancient stone slab stands at 1.5 meters high. Image Credit: Leonardo Garc\u00eda Sanju\u00e1n and Marta D\u00edaz-Guardamino \/ Antiquity 2017<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Referred to as the \u201cStela of Montoro\u201d the enigmatic ancient slab was unearthed in a farmers field in southern Spain.<\/p>\n

Experts believe how the curious symbols engraved on its surface could be the earliest monumental script in the Iberian Peninsula. However, no one has been able to make sense of the symbols, leaving experts baffled. The stela contains elements reminiscent of other symbols that have been found half way across the world in the American Continent<\/a><\/strong> where countless strange shapes, circles, and lines were etched by ancient civilizations across the continent thousands of years ago.<\/p>\n

\"2\"
Moonset On The Past. One of the most beautiful setting moons. by Wayne Snuggs. Ancient petroglyphs from the Jornada Mogollon People.\u00a0\u00a0Image Credit:\u00a0Wayne Snuggs<\/a><\/strong><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Even more interesting is the fact that the\u00a0 \u201cStela of Montoro\u201d reassembles in many aspects the so-called Cochno stone<\/a><\/strong> located in Scotland, a massive ancient slab which dates back at least 5,000 years.<\/p>\n

\"cochno
Detail of cup and ring markings on the Cochno Stone. Credit: Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Scotland.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Scientists believe that the ancient stela dates back to around the 3rd century BC, and contains different elements of Spanish, Greek, Iberian, Canaanite and South Arabian languages, making it an extremely worthy piece.<\/p>\n

The stela itself isn\u2019t small. It has a height of 1.5 meters and a width of 85 centimeters.<\/p>\n

According to Cambridge Antiquity<\/a>,<\/strong> the curious symbols were most likely engraved sometime between the\u00a09th and 3rd century BC.<\/p>\n

Experts wrote in the study how the \u201cwriting includes elements of a North Eastern Palaeo-Hispanic script, Graeco-Iberian script, Proto-Sinaitic and Proto-Canaanite inscriptions, epigraphic South Arabian and Phoenician scripts.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"montoro
The inscriptions on the surface of the stone slab could represent graphemes from scripts from as far away as present-day Syria. Image Credit: Leonardo Garc\u00eda Sanju\u00e1n and Marta D\u00edaz-Guardamino \/ Antiquity 2017<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The curious artifact was found by a farmer in the south of Spain in 2002. However, the item was dumped to the side of the field where it remained until 2004 when two rangers noticed the curious engravings and decided to take it to the Montoro Archaeological Museum where it remained for eight years.<\/p>\n

The stela was thoroughly analyzed in 2012 when Dr. Garcia Sanjuan from the University of Seville found out that the symbols adorning the surface of the stela originate from different languages.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s rare to find something like this \u2013 the inscriptions on this stela cannot be read. There isn\u2019t a single script that makes sense of them. They seem to be an assorted collection of graphemes taken from different scripts and put together on this stone,\u201d Dr. Sanju\u00e1n told IBTimes UK.<\/p>\n

Experts have been left baffled by the ancient slab and have no idea why the engravings were made in the first place, and what message the slab carries.<\/p>\n

There are two theories according to Dr. Sanju\u00e1n.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat we have here perhaps would be local people \u2013 who were very probably illiterate people \u2013 replicating on a stone the signs that they have seen of or been told about, which they probably did not understand.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis would reflect very early contact between local people and people from outside Iberia \u2013 most likely Phoenicians coming from the eastern Mediterranean.\u201d<\/p>\n

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(H\/T IBTimes UK<\/a><\/strong>)<\/p>\n

Source: Antiquity<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Go to Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\n

A mysterious stone slab, covered with ancient symbols no one has been able to decipher has baffled experts ever since it was discovered. It remains unclear why the symbols were engraved and what message the ancient stone slab\u2014which dates back thousands of years\u2014is meant to convey.<\/p>\n

The ancient stone slab stands at 1.5 meters […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3921698","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ancient-code","odd"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/mikedyess.info\/para\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3921698","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/mikedyess.info\/para\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/mikedyess.info\/para\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/mikedyess.info\/para\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/mikedyess.info\/para\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3921698"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/mikedyess.info\/para\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3921698\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/mikedyess.info\/para\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3921698"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/mikedyess.info\/para\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3921698"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/mikedyess.info\/para\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3921698"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}