The Obituary
Ugaritic was the language of Ugarit, a wealthy harbour city on the Syrian coast, recorded on clay tablets in a remarkable alphabetic cuneiform of about thirty signs. Its archives, unearthed from 1929, preserve myths, letters, and rituals that shed light on Canaanite religion and the background of the Hebrew Bible. The language and its city met an abrupt end around 1190 to 1185 BCE, when Ugarit was destroyed amid the Late Bronze Age collapse and the raids of the Sea Peoples, and was never reoccupied.
Worth remembering
- Its 30-sign cuneiform alphabet is one of the earliest alphabets known, distinct from the syllabic cuneiform around it.
- Ugaritic myths of Baal and El illuminate the religious world behind the Hebrew Bible.
Sources
- Ugaritic was a Northwest Semitic language of the city of Ugarit, written in an early alphabetic cuneiform script. Wikipedia
- Ugarit was destroyed around 1190–1185 BCE during the Late Bronze Age collapse, ending the language. Encyclopaedia Britannica
A graveyard tradition: leave a stone to show you came, and remembered.