Hieroglyphs (22 page)

Tombs, Amice Calverley and Myrtle Broome at Abydos, and the Chicago House Epigraphy Project at Medinet Habu. The publications were, however, expensive and difficult to reproduce cost-effectively. Peter Der Manuelian has been able to copy tomb scenes and all their texts by scanning good photographs into a drawing application and then drawing in the lines of the carving or painting. The technique requires an enormous amount of skill and expert judgement, but once the result has been fine-tuned it can be repeated
ad infinitum
, stored or made electronically accessible at

will.9
In addition, the computer-based format is more versatile in that the walls of a building can be joined together in a virtual environment so that the visitor to the tomb can move around it and have an impression of the scenes and texts in the context of the original setting.

If this is the aim, there are already virtual-reality reconstructions
Hi

of the Tomb of Nofretari and the T
emple of Abu Simbel.10

eroglyp

hs in th

Modern hieroglyphs and Egyptian

e modern w

With the prospect of Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs being scanned directly from original location to personal computer, will all the available texts be read one day? At the moment this seems to be a
orl

long way off, but it may be a more attainable goal than could have
d

been imagined even twenty years ago. In the event that scholars might run out of texts to study, modern writers of hieroglyphs could start to create new texts. Fakers of antiquities have already been doing this for a couple of hundred years, but sometimes these objects have texts copied from other objects, completely invented texts, or very poor pastiches. An inscribed object would have brought a better price on the market, so in some cases uninscribed but authentic objects were ‘enhanced’ with a text. Bearing in mind the possibility that the Egyptians could sometimes have been less than careful about the copying of texts, an ushabti in Cleveland Museum does have other factors going against it. In this case the text on the front of the ushabti is a
Dd mdw in Wsir
. . . ‘Words spoken by Osiris . . .’ formula rather than the usual ‘Illuminating the Osiris . . .’ formula. This in itself is known on other ushabtis but, 109

taken together with a mixture of stylistic details indicating different dates, it is felt on balance not to be genuine. On the other hand, a stela showing a Hathor cow and her calf has a main text of three lines of terrible hieroglyphs, reading in various directions and not really making sense, though obviously based on a real text. On that basis alone, it must be a forgery – or is it just inept?
11

Other objects could be more seriously dangerous, such as the (in)famous scarab of Nekau II, the second king of Dynasty 26.

The limestone scarab itself is not particularly noteworthy, but its inscription tells of the circumnavigation of Africa by Phoenician sailors in the employ of the king. This scarab could commemorate such an event at this time and it seems to corroborate the information from the Greek historian Herodotus (
Histories
IV, 42) about this event. In this case, Herodotus seems to have come first and the scarab was carved by the Egyptologist, Urbain Bouriant, as a birthday surprise for a colleague.
12 L
ooking carefully at the scarab,
phs

it is the seated-man determinatives that give it away, as they are in
ogly

the style of the printed versions of this sign of the modern day.

Hier

Happily other attempts to produce hieroglyphic texts are obviously not genuine, such as some of the words which issue from the mouth of Kleopatra and the Egyptians in
Asterix and Cleopatra
.
13
There are also modern attempts to hear Ancient Egyptian. Parts of Philip Glass’s opera
Akhnaten
are sung in Egyptian, including a love poem, and there are attempts to have some characters speak clear Middle Egyptian, sometimes anachronistically, in various films – for example,
The Mummy’s Shroud
(1967) and
Sphinx
(1980).
The Mummy
(1999) and
Stargate
(1994), in addition, made great efforts to render Egyptian accurately and credited the Egyptologist Stuart Tyson Smith for his efforts. In each case, these are genuine attempts to create something in a dead tongue for modern ears, and Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs may turn out not to record such a dead language after all. Perhaps, then, we really will be able to think in Ancient Egyptian and begin to recreate a clear image of the past. But will it be in our image or in theirs?

110

Notes

Chapter 1: The origins of writing in Egypt

1 H. Winkler,
The Rock Inscriptions of Southern Upper Egypt, I–II
, London: Egypt Exploration Society, 1938–9.

2 B. Midant-Reynes,
The Prehistory of Egypt
, Oxford: Blackwell, 2000, 149–50 Gilf Kebir/Uweinat.

3 For boats on pottery, see G. P. Gilbert, ‘Some Notes on Prehistoric Decorated Vessels with Boat Scenes’,
The Bulletin of the Australian
Centre for Egyptology
, 10, 1999, 19–37 and personal communication.

4 Tomb 100: J. E. Quibell and F. W. Green,
Hierakonpolis II
, London: Quaritch, pls. LXXV–LXXIX; dating by B. J. Kemp,
Ancient Egypt:
Anatomy of a Civilization
, Cambridge University Press, 1989, 40–1.

5 Naqada IIIa2 around 3200 bc: G. Dreyer,
Umm el-Qaab I Das
prädynastische Königsgrabe U-j und seine frühen Schriftzeugnisse
, Mainz am Rhein: Phillip von Zabern, 1998.

6 Den: W. M. F. Petrie,
The Royal Tombs of the First Dynasty 1900,
I
, London: Egypt Exploration Fund, 1900; the re-excavation is published by G. Dreyer
et al
., ‘Nachuntersuchungen im frühzeitlichen Königsfriedhof 9/10 Vorbericht’,
Mitteilungen des
deutschen archäologisches Instituts in Kairo
54, 1998, 141–64; G. Dreyer
et al
., ‘Nachuntersuchungen im frühzeitlichen Königsfriedhof 11/12 Vorbericht’,
MDAIK
56, 2000, 97–118.

The seal-box is now in the British Museum, EA 35.552.

111

Chapter 2: Hieroglyphic script and Egyptian language
1 All fragments of the stone are conveniently published by T. A. H.

Wilkinson,
Royal Annals of Ancient Egypt: The Palermo Stone and
its Associated Fragments
, London and New York: Kegan Paul International, 2000.

2 Inflection is where the spelling and pronunciation of a word is changed to show different roles or uses in a sentence. It is obvious in Latin: for example in
canis latrarat
‘the dog barks’
canis
is the subject (the one who does the action), but in
canem homo calcitrat

‘the man kicks the dog’,
canem
with a different spelling is now the object and suffers from the action of the subject.

3 Pseudo-verbal constructions are so called because they involve verbs which are used as if they were adverbs. The term is now a little outdated but is used in the main Egyptian grammar books.

4 J. P. Allen,
The Inflection of the Verb in the Pyramid Texts
, Malibu: Udena Publications, 1984 has useful comments on epigraphic peculiarities and the verb.

phs

5 Meroitic Hieroglyphs after F. Ll. Griffith,
Meroitic Inscriptions,
ogly

Part I: Sôba to Dangêl
: London: Egypt Exploration Fund, 1911: No.

Hier

60, pl. XXXII and pp. 82–3. Cursive Meroitic after F. Ll. Griffith,
Meroitic Inscriptions, Part II: Napata to Philae and Miscellaneous
, London: Egypt Exploration Fund, 1912: No. 85, pl. VII and pp. 13–14.

Chapter 3: Hieroglyphs and art

1 Hieroglyphs orientation: H. Fischer, ‘L’inversion de l’écriture égyptienne’, in
L’écriture et l’art de l’Égypte ancienne
, Paris: Presses Universitaires de France, 1986, 51–93.

2 Sabine Kubisch, ‘Die Stelen der 1 Zwischenzeit aus Gebelein’,
MDAIK
56 (2000), 239–65, see Abb. 1 p. 246; Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, ‘The Adventure of the Dancing Men’, from
The Return of
Sherlock Holmes
, London: John Murray, 1905.

Chapter 4: ‘I know you, I know your names’

1 Translation from A. G. McDowell,
Village Life in Ancient Egypt
, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999, 118–20.

112

2 For a parallel version of the text see W. Murnane and C. C. Van Siclen III,
The Boundary Stelae of Akhenaten
, New York and London: Kegan Paul International, 1993, text VII:B, 95–6.

3 Originally published by J. E. Quibell,
The Ramesseum
, London: Egypt Exploration Fund, 1896. Contents listed by R. B. Parkinson,
The Tale of the Eloquent Peasant
, Oxford: Griffith Institute and Ashmolean Museum, 1991, xi–xiii.

4 British Museum no. 498, trans. M. Lichtheim,
Ancient Egyptian
Literature, Volume I: The Old and Middle Kingdom
, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973, 51–7.

5 Trans. M. Lichtheim,
Ancient Egyptian Literature, Volume III: The
Late Period
, Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980, 125–38.

6 S. Sauneron,
Le Temple d’Esna
, Cairo: IFAO, 1963, 126. Crocodile readings: J.-C. Goyon,
Valeurs phonétiques des signes
hiéroglyphiques d’époque gréco-romaine
, Montpellier: Service des Publications de la Recherche de l’Université de Montpellier, 1988, ii. 350–1.

No

7 J. Zandee,
An Ancient Egyptian Crossword Puzzle
, Leiden: Ex
te

Oriente Lux, 1966; H. M. Stewart, ‘A Crossword Hymn to Mut’,
s

Journal of Egyptian Archaeology
, 57 (1971), 87–104; R. B.

Parkinson,
Cracking Codes: The Rosetta Stone and Decipherment
, London: British Museum, 1999, 84–5.

8 Louvre C12, E. Drioton, ‘Recueil de cryptographie monumentale’,
Annales du Service des Antiquités de l’Égypte
, 40 (1940), 306–427.

9 Kenneth Williams as Julius Caesar, in
Carry On Cleo
, scripted by Talbot Rothwell and directed by Gerald Thomas, 1965.

Chapter 5: Scribes and everyday writing

1 For the transcription see J. Cěrný,
Late Ramesside Letters
, Brussels: Fondation Égyptologique Reine Élisabeth, 1939, no. 28, pp. 44–8; translation after E. Wente,
Letters from Ancient Egypt
, Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1990, 194–5.

2 Listed by A. G. McDowell,
Village Life in Ancient Egypt: Laundry
Lists and Love Songs
, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999, 134–5, based on the work of P. W. Pestman, ‘Who were the Owners in the ‘‘Community of Workmen’’ of the Chester Beatty Papyri?’, in 113

R. J. Demarée and J. J. Janssen (eds.),
Gleanings from Deir el-Medina
, Leiden: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten, 1982, 155–72.

3 K. Ryholt,
The Story of Petiese, son of Petetum and 70 Other Good
and Bad Stories
, Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press, 1999.

4 T. G. H. James,
The Letters of Hekanakhte and Other Early Middle
Kingdom Documents
, New York: Metropolitan Museum of New York, 1962; see also for extracts and discussion R. B. Parkinson,
Voices from Ancient Egypt
, London: British Museum Press, 1991, 101–7.

5 P. Anastasi I, P. Koller, and A. H. Gardiner,
Egyptian Hieratic Texts:
Literary Works of the New Kingdom, Part I
, Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs, 1911; E. Wente,
Letters from Ancient Egypt
, 98–110.

6 From preserved texts Annie Gasse has put together a top six texts, but also points out that the preservation of texts is extremely uneven. A. Gasse, ‘Les ostraca hiératiques de Deir el-Medina: nouvelles orientations de la publication’, in R. J. Demarée and
phs

A. Egberts (eds.),
Village Voices
, Leiden: CNWS, 1992, 51–70.

ogly

7 F. Ll. Griffith and W. Petrie,
Two Hieroglyphic Papyri from Tanis
,
Hier

London: Egypt Exploration Society, 1889.

8 A. H. Gardiner,
Ancient Egyptian Onomastica
, 3 vols., Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1947.

9 G. Robins and C. Shute,
The Rhind Mathematical Papyrus
, London: British Museum Press, 1998.

10 Bakhenkhons: texts Munich, Staatlicher Sammlung Ägyptische Kunst, Gl. WAF 38 and Karnak, Cairo CGC 42155 and in K. A.

Kitchen,
Ramesside Inscriptions, III
, 295–9.

11

D. Wildung,
Egyptian Saints: Deification in Pharaonic Egypt
, New York: New York University Press, 1977.

Chapter 6: The decipherment of Egyptian

1 G. Boas,
The Hieroglyphics of Horapollo
, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993.

2 A self-survey of the state of Egyptian language studies was undertaken by Egyptologists in 1972: S. Sauneron (ed.),
Textes et
langages de l’Égypte pharaonique: Cent cinquante années de
114

recherches 1822–1972. Hommage à Jean-François Champollion
, 2

vols., Cairo: IFAO, 1972.

3 J. Johnson, ‘Focusing on Various ‘‘Themes’’ ’, in P. Frandsen and G. Englund (eds.),
Crossroad: Chaos or the Beginning of a New
Paradigm. Papers from the Conference on Egyptian Grammar
1986
, Copenhagen: Carsten Niebuhr Institute of Ancient Near Eastern Studies, 401–10.

4 The translations by J. A. Wilson (Egyptian) and A. Goetze (Hittite) can be compared in J. Pritchard (ed.),
Ancient Near Eastern Texts
Relating to the Old Testament
, Princeton University Press, 1950

(and later editions), 199–203; also see K. A. Kitchen,
Pharaoh
Triumphant
, Warminster: Aris & Phillips, 1982, 75–9.

5 W. L. Moran,
The Amarna Letters
, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1992.

6 The 2002 catalogue of the Institut Français d’Archéologie Orientale shows the early typesetting process and font (p. 3).