A possible function found for the Phaistos Disc

The Phaistos Disc is a disk of fired clay currently on display at the archaeological museum of Heraklion. It was found in the Minoan palace of Phaistos on the Greek island of Krete, possibly dating to the middle or late Minoan Bronze Age (2nd millennium BC). It is about 15 cm (5.9 in) in diameter and covered on both sides with a spiral of stamped symbols. Its purpose and meaning, and even its original geographical place of manufacture, remain disputed, making it one of the most famous mysteries of archaeology. The Archaeological News Network reports that we might be one step closer to figuring this mystery out.

New findings by Gareth Owens, Erasmus coordinator at the Technological Educational Institute (TEI) of Krete describe the disk as 'the first Minoan CD-ROM’ featuring a prayer to a mother. While speaking at the TEI of Western Macedonia on Monday, he said there is one complex of signs found in three parts of one side of the disk spelling I-QE-KU-RJA, with I-QE meaning 'great lady of importance' while a key word appears to be AKKA, or 'pregnant mother', according to the researcher. One side is devoted to a pregnant woman and the other to a woman giving birth.

The disc was discovered in 1908 by the Italian archaeologist Luigi Pernier in the Minoan palace-site of Phaistos, and features 241 tokens, comprising 45 unique signs, which were apparently made by pressing hieroglyphic 'seals' into a disc of soft clay, in a clockwise sequence spiralling toward the disc's centre. Many of these 45 signs represent easily identifiable every-day things, but the general meaning has remained unclear--until Gareth Owens, perhaps.