PaleoHebrew

Paleo-Hebrew is the name given by epigraphers to the ancient variant of the Hebrew script used by the Israelites and neighboring communities during the late Bronze Age and Iron Age. It is a form of the Phoenician alphabet and functions as an abjad, recording consonants with vowels inferred from context or later diacritic conventions.

From roughly the 10th to the 5th centuries BCE, Paleo-Hebrew appears in inscriptions and ostraca across the Levant, including the kingdoms of Israel and Judah, and among related groups such as the Samaritans. Notable examples include the Gezer Calendar and the Siloam tunnel inscription, both carved in this script. The script is closely related to Phoenician, sharing most letter shapes, and is read from right to left.

Over time, the Aramaic square script gradually displaced Paleo-Hebrew for Hebrew writing in the Persian and Hellenistic periods, though Paleo-Hebrew continued to be used in certain contexts and by some communities. The Samaritan alphabet, which survives today, is a direct derivative of Paleo-Hebrew and remains in liturgical use within the Samaritan community.

In modern scholarship, Paleo-Hebrew is studied as a key to understanding early Hebrew language, literacy, and sociopolitical history in ancient Israel and the broader Levant. It is primarily encountered in epigraphic corpora and is distinguished from the later Hebrew square script that became standard for most Hebrew texts.