Eteocretan language

Eteocretan (/ˌiːtioʊˈkriːtən, ˌɛt-/ from Ancient Greek: Ἐτεόκρητες, romanized: Eteókrētes, lit. 'true Cretans', itself composed from ἐτεός eteós 'true' and Κρής Krḗs 'Cretan') is the pre-Greek language attested in a few alphabetic inscriptions of ancient Crete.

In eastern Crete, about half a dozen inscriptions written in Greek alphabets have been found. These inscriptions date from the late 7th or early 6th century down to the 3rd century BC. The language is so far untranslated. It may be a survival of a language spoken on Crete before the arrival of the proto-Greek language and it has been suggested that it is derived from the Minoan language preserved in the Linear A inscriptions of a millennium earlier. Since that language remains undeciphered, it is not certain that Eteocretan and Minoan are related.

Ancient testimony suggests that the language is that of the Eteocretans (meaning 'true Cretans'). The term Eteocretan is sometimes applied to the Minoan language (or languages) written more than a millennium earlier in Cretan hieroglyphs (in reality, almost certainly a syllabary) and in the Linear A script. Yves Duhoux, a leading authority on Eteocretan, has stated that "it is essential to rigorously separate the study of Eteocretan from that of the 'hieroglyphic' and Linear A inscriptions".