Johannes Friedrich: Extinct Languages (1954/1957)

This is the story of the art of deciphering forgotten languages and scripts. In this engaging and readable book author Friedrich, one of the foremost experts in both linguistics and archaeology, first describes the languages and scripts of the Ancient Orient, then proceeds on an intellectual journey that will take the reader through Egyptian Hieroglyphics, the cuneiform writing of Mesopotamia, the interpretation of Sumerian records, the scripts of the hittites and finally the languages of Ancient Italy.

First published as Entzifferung Verschollener Schriften und Sprachen, Springer, 1954
Translated by Frank Gaynor
Publisher Philosophical Library, New York, 1957
182 pages
via Archive.org

Review (Herbert H. Paper, Language, 1955)

PDF (no OCR)