A newly published study has brought surprising clarity to one of Anatolia’s most iconic sacred landscapes. An untranslated Late Iron Age inscription discovered nearly four decades ago near the famous İvriz rock relief has finally been deciphered—revealing not only the ancient name of the İvriz spring but also unexpected details about the 8th-century BCE ruler who commissioned it: Warpalawa, King of Tuwana.Progress in the decipherment of Luvian is exciting. But it is not particularly relevant to biblical studies. This Luvian lapidary inscription does have lots of new information, but what caught my eye is that it is bilingual. There's a Phoenician summary of the Luvian text.[...]
Another remarkable detail: İVRİZ 2 carries two inscriptions. The Luwian hieroglyphs occupy the front, back, and right side, while a much-damaged Phoenician text appears on the left and lower sections. This bilingualism highlights İvriz as a cultural crossroads where Luwian, Aramaic-Phoenician, and Assyrian spheres intermingled.I was hoping that the damaged Phoenician text, which has already been deciphered and published, contributed to the decipherment of the Luvian inscription. But the underlying article here doesn't show much interest in it. Nevertheless, every scrap of ancient epigraphic Norwest Semitic is good to have.The Phoenician sections appear to mirror or summarize the Luwian text—possibly for a linguistically diverse audience of merchants, travelers, or regional elites.
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