Grave Creek Stone - Inscription

Inscription

The 23 alphabetical / pseudo-alphabetical symbols inscribed on the Grave Creek Stone have been the object of much controversy. Henry Rowe Schoolcraft was the first to study this aspect of the stone. He strove to determine whether or not the symbols were alphabetical by consulting experts on the subject. His correspondence with "noted antiquarians" led him to the conclusion that inscription contains "four characters corresponding to the Ancient Greek; four Etruscan; five Runic; six ancient Gallic; seven old Erse; ten Phoenician; fourteen old British; sixteen Celtiberic, with some resemblance to the Hebrew". However, he was "inclined to regard the whole inscription as Celtiberic".

M.C. Reid performed an experiment in the late 1870s in which he asked four people: a teacher and law student, a schoolgirl, a pharmacist, and a college professor, to create for him "twenty or more arbitrary characters not resembling any figures or alphabetical characters known to them". Since the Grave Creek Stone was inscribed using only straight lines (which is quite common, since straight lines are much easier to inscribe than those with curve), Reid instructed the four participants to only use “straight lines or combinations of straight lines". To further simulate the actual inscribing of the stone, the individuals were not allowed to improve upon their first attempt (since one cannot erase all or part of a symbol once it is inscribed). Just like the inscription on the Grave Creek Stone, these symbols were found to resemble characters found in alphabets of the old world. Reid was "compelled to conclude that there is nothing in the form of the characters of the Grave Creek Stone which require us to decide that they are old, that they are alphabetical, or if alphabetical that they are derived from any known alphabet".