Hieroglyphics
The Egyptian system of writing appears at first glance to be highly complicated, but it is in reality far simpler than it looks. It is a combination of the phonetic — alphabetic and syllabic — and ideographic systems, to which is added a system of determinatives. The alphabet consists of twenty-two consonants — vowels are, as in all other old Semitic languages, not written. The alphabetic and syllabic signs are by far the oldest, the most ancient texts being purely phonetic, containing neither ideograms nor determinatives.
Owing to the fact that the vowels were not written, confusion early arose among words having the same consonants but different significations, and, in all probability, pronounced with different vowels. To obviate this difficulty, the Egyptians early invented a system of determinatives. A determinative is the picture of an object placed after the word signifying the object in question. Determinatives are either generic or specific. The generic determinative is the picture of some object which is characteristic of a group. Thus, after the names of animals is frequently found the picture of a piece of skin; after abstract words and verbs are found the picture of a papyrus roll; and after the names of foreign countries is found the picture of a range of hills. The specific determinative is the picture of the object that the word denotes. Thus; after the word hetra, signifying "horse," the picture of a horse was often placed; after the word abu, denoting " panther," is often found a picture of that animal; after the word romet, "man," is found the picture of a man, as also after the names of males; after the word suten, "king," is found the picture of a king; after the word himet, "woman," the names of females and goddesses, is found the picture of a woman; and after the names of cities is found the plan of a city.
From these determinatives arose in course of time ideograms, or word-pictures. Thus the plan of a city, originally the determinative of the word nut, "city," came with time to stand for the word itself, which is never written phonetically; the picture of a bee, originally the determinative of the word afet, "honey," came with time to be used as the ideogram for that word; the figure of a man walking with a long staff, originally the determinative of the word ser, "prince," later on was used as an ideogram. Many other examples could be given, but these will illustrate the general principle. In Ptolemaic times the ideograms were greatly multiplied, many texts being written almost entirely in ideograms. It must, however, always be borne in mind that the writing was originally phonetic, and not ideographic.
The writing, too, has a history of its own. In the oldest times the writing was purely hieroglyphical. Hieroglyphics were written as early as 4000 BC, if not earlier, and continued in use far into the times of the Roman emperors. These hieroglyphics were originally finely executed in every detail, and this remained the custom on all government monuments so long as hieroglyphics were used. But it was early found that the full hieroglyphics, while admirably adapted for inscriptions on stone, were too cumbersome for writing on papyrus or mummy-bands (which were of linen), so an abridged or cursive form, that we call linear hieroglyphics, was invented. These linear hieroglyphics are merely the characteristic outlines of the full signs. They remained in use all through Egyptian history for religious texts written on papyrus and mummy-bands.
About 1700 BC a new method of writing came into vogue for profane writings. This new method, which still further abridged the hieroglyphics, is called Hieratic. The older form of this hieratic still in some measure resembles the linear hieroglyphical writing from which it was derived. Some four hundred years this method seems to have been in use, when a new system came into being, which is also called hieratic, but differs materially from the older style, from which it is abridged, in that it is far less cumbersome, omitting many of the details found in the older hieratic, and being thus far more suitable for rapid writing. From this newer hieratic was derived the Phoenician alphabet, from which the Greek alphabet was derived. This form of the hieratic is thus the ancestor of our alphabet. This style of writing remained in fashion many hundred years as the cursive script used on papyrus, and sometimes even on mummybands.
The last stage in the development of Egyptian script was reached in the Demotic in the fifth century before the Christian era. This was a still further abridgment of the new hieratic, but it eliminated so many details that very many letters and syllabic signs that had been kept distinct in hieratic became one and the same sign, a fact that renders the reading of Demotic very difficult. The new system had, however, the advantage of being very rapid, and thus it quickly supplanted the hieratic; it remained in use up to the Christian times, when it was supplanted by the Coptic script, which was modeled after the Greek. The reader must not, however, imagine that these changes were sudden; one led gradually to the other. Thus the old, full hieroglyphics were abridged in the linear hieroglyphics, from these was developed the old hieratic, from this the new hieratic, and this, becoming gradually more and more cursive, led over to the Demotic.
Already in the Middle Ages men like Athanasius Kircher attempted to decipher the "mysterious picturewriting " of ancient Egypt; but their interpretations, proceeding from an utter misconception of the true nature of the hieroglyphics, were fantastical and utterly useless. The results attained by these men discredited the study of hieroglyphics, and scholars turned rather to Coptic, the liturgic language of the Christian Church of Egypt, a descendant of the Egyptian tongue, and at the time still a living language. The results attained in this study were later on of great value to the decipherers of the ancient tongue.
In August 1799, there was unearthed at Rosetta a block of black basalt bearing a decree of Ptolemy Epiphanes in Greek, hieroglyphics, and demotic — the celebrated "Rosetta stone." Immediately scholars set to work at deciphering the inscription. Thomas Young, an English mathematician, and Francois Champollion, a French savant, working independently of one another, succeeded at about the same time in deciphering the royal names in the hieroglyphical part, and, to the surprise of all, it was found that the writing was largely phonetic. Champollion's results were by far the more important, and when, ten years after his first great discovery, he died in 1832, he had already correctly given the contents of entire inscriptions and papyri, and had laid down the elements of a grammar.
Ten years later Richard Karl Lepsius, the great German Egyptologist, carried further the work so ably begun by Champollion, and through him the final proof was given that the results so far attained were correct. He discovered in 1867 at Tanis a trilingual inscription — the so-called "Decree of Canopus" — the study of which document finally confirmed the results hitherto obtained from the study of the Egyptian texts. Thus the stage of decipherment came to a close. Since then able scholars in all parts of Europe have been adding to knowledge of Egyptian matters.
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