World’s oldest undeciphered writing soon decoded

Oxford University academics are on the brink of decoding the world’s oldest undeciphered writing system. A breakthrough will cast light on a lost bronze age middle eastern society where slaves lived on rations close to starvation levels, the BBC reported. An image-making device is being used by researchers to decipher a writing system called proto-Elamite which was used between 3200BC and 2900BC in what is now in the southwest of Iran. The Reflectance Transformation Imaging System is a device that was shipped to the Louvre Museum in Paris, where the most important tablets are kept. It captured details on the surface of the clay tablets which were put inside the machine. Dr Jacob Dahl, director of the Ancient World Research Cluster, said “I think we are finally on the point of making a breakthrough.”

Read the full story on BBCNews.