Following on from the last post about ancient languages, the Emperor Claudius was supposed to have written a large history of Etruria using in the Etruscan language. It doesn't survive so the language is lost.
Many far more ancient languages have been rediscovered. Akkadian survived because it was written on clay tablets. Clay was used for practical reasons as the writing could be smeared off and reused. When ancient cities were destroyed, they were burned when both fire-hardened and buried the tablets ironically protecting them for future generations to uncover and decipher.
Deciphering a language is a case of having enough material, looking for patterns, and taking clues from known and surviving languages. For example finding known names in Greek or Hebrew and using the sounds to provide a clue as to how the language sounded.
Some languages I know have been deciphered are: Akkadian, Assyrian, and Babylonian; Sumerian; Hittite; Old Persian. There's even a Mycenean Linear B Dictionary online (for those interested).
Many more recent languages (Etruscan, Palmyrene, Gothic) have been lost forever because of better and newer materials being used that just don't have the resilience of clay tablets.
Much of the information about our society (e.g. this text) would be lost if we lost the ability to produce electricity.
Clay tablets hold a tiny amount of information, whereas a hard drive (how long do they last and it needs special equipment and power to use) holds incredible volumes of information and they are both about the same size. The survivability of an information system seems to be inversely proportional the the density of information that it can hold.
Go and get those digital photos printed...
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