First Movable Type is a fake? (no, not that Movable Type)

Kevin Kelly blogs about the Phaistos Disc, an archeological object some believe is the oldest historic example of moveable type — the concept, of course, not the blogging platform. Snip:


The characters on the clay disc were stamped from a set of "seals" creating a text written in a spiral, although neither the text nor the language of the text has been deciphered.

(…) On my shelf I have a small bronze replica of this object simply because it is a beautiful mandala. The fired-clay Disc which it replicates was discovered in 1908. However this week a specialist in faked ancient art claims that the original object is …well… faked ancient art. In other words that the Phaistos Disc is a hoax. In addition to this expert's technical reasons you can add two others: no other example of the writing has been found, and even the shape and format of the object is unique.

Is the "First Movable Type" a Hoax? [ The Technium ]