Write like an Egyptian (Book Review)

The New Criterion ^ | March 2022 | John Steele Gordon

[ProtectOurFreedom]

It was the greatest puzzle in the world. For three thousand years the ancient Egyptians covered the walls and ceilings of their temples and tombs with a form of writing known as hieroglyphs. More, the bone-dry climate of Egypt had preserved vast quantities of this hieroglyphic text written on papyrus. And in 1800, no one on earth could read a word of it.

When Egypt became Christian in the fourth century A.D., the use of these hieroglyphs, associated with paganism, died out. The last known hieroglyphic inscription was chiseled into stone in the year 394. Within a generation, the last person literate in hieroglyphic writing was dead. Nothing was known of the ancient Egyptian language (Egyptians spoke Arabic after the Arab conquest in the seventh century), so translation was impossible. While it would eventually be known that Coptic—the liturgical language of Egypt’s Coptic Church—was descended from ancient Egyptian, it was at least as different from its ancestor as Italian is from classical Latin.

As a result, almost nothing about Egyptian history or culture was known, except what could be found in foreign sources, including the works of the “father of history,” Herodotus, who had visited Egypt and marveled at its wealth and splendor.

When Napoleon Bonaparte invaded Egypt in 1798, however, it was more than just a military enterprise, for he brought along one hundred sixty “Savants,” among the most brilliant scientists, artists, and scholars in France. In time they produced twenty-nine oversized volumes detailing all aspects of Egyptian life, natural history, landscape, and architecture, one of the most remarkable works of scholarship ever printed. It set off a decades-long craze for all things Egyptian that became known as “Egyptomania.”

The hieroglyphs, however, remained silent.

[Monkey Face]

I tried to copy and pasted mine but it didn’t work. So, how’d you do that???

[null and void]

As an image. Right click. Copy image link. Add the image HTML:

< img src="https://everythingfonts.com/testdrive/rsQre1SNgrpbs3pJyYmQrAeF?text=Who%20will%20remember%20us%20in%205000%20years%3F" >

[Adder]

Let us go, Brandon?

So let it be written.
So let it be done.

[SunkenCiv]

The hieroglyph and cuneiform scripts are about the same age, and were in use for a similar length of time.

Sumerian and Akkadian and a number of other languages were written using cuneiform, and the older Sumerian system was cracked using Akkadian, an extinct Semitic language, which made it possible to pronounce the symbols, and by the 20th c, the language isolate, Sumerian, was read for the first time in thousands of years. The writing system was versatile and in use for over 3000 years.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cuneiform#Decipherment

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akkadian_language#Decipherment

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sumerian_language#Historiography

[SunkenCiv]

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When Bob's around, whatever you do, *don't* call them "hieroglyphics". ;^)

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Ancient Egyptian civilization is undoubtedly one of the most fascinating chapters in human history. While remnants of the culture like temples, obelisks, and sarcophagi continue to mystify us, you can unlock their true meaning if you know how to read hieroglyphs.

To the untrained eye, this ancient writing system looks like artful decoration, a random scattering of stylized ducks, suns, eyes, hands, chairs, and feathers. But to Egyptologists like Dr. Bob Brier of LIU Post—a noted public educator known as “Mr. Mummy” and a popular Great Courses professor—hieroglyphs are the gateway to understanding ancient Egypt, from its religious beliefs to its cosmological ideas to the legacies of its great pharaohs.

Decoding the Secrets of Egyptian Hieroglyphs | Ancient Egyptian Alphabet | The Great Courses | December 12, 2016 | Wondrium

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Bob Brier explains the complexity of the word Donkey 𓉼𓂸𓃘 “ˁ3” and also lean about onomatopoeia is used by the ancient Egyptian.

Onomatopoeia in Ancient Egyptian Hieroglyphs | May 19, 2021 | EgyptologyLessons

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[Pilsner]

[Monkey Face]

I wasn’t able to make it behave. I’ll think about it and see if I can get it to connect later on. :o[

[Rebelbase]

In all their success the French did not discover "A condo made of stona".

[JeanLM]

“he hieroglyph and cuneiform scripts are about the same age”

I think there is a dispute among experts as to which is older.

In any case the Sumerian language was a phonetic invention which to my mind is more complex than a language developed from pictorgraphics. The sumerian language also bred literature and was used by more cultures so in that sense it was a more important development.,