<bron175.htm>     [Bronze Age Text]

 

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          Some of the engraved bone artifacts found near Mullelrup Mose, Denmark, and attributed to Neolithic industry, are in fact of much later date.  This example recorded by P. Reinecke, is lettered in Iberian-Phoenician script and dates from between 1500 and 1200 BC.  it is a trader's receipt for the purchase of cloth by payment of one cow's value of barter goods.  The word wag, to be read from right to left in the Semitic manner, is one of the ancient Indo-European roots, meaning a heifer or cow.  it survives in Iberia today as vaca, and related forms occur in all the Romance languages (Fell 1982).

 

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