Knowing the Things: Where to Start with Hieroglyph

Before jumping into the waters of Egyptian Hieroglyph, it is important to understand the roots of Egyptian written communication. Although it has not been definitively determined as to exactly when and where written forms of communication began, the most common theories surrounding hieroglyph point to the Mesopotamians. It has also been suggested that due to the complexity and precision applied to the writing, much like the stylized art of Ancient Egypt, that the written language was not formed by a large group, but by one or two individuals who tailored it intentionally. (Silverman, 2011, p. 203)

There are five key terms that appear when discussing hieroglyphic art and its origins: phonetic, ideographic, hieratic script, and demotic script. Phonetic writing is used to represent sound closely in regards to the way a word is spoken. This is frequently used when attempting to pronounce a word which is not spelled in a manner that indicates the sound correctly. For example, a phonetic spelling of the word “Laugh” may be presented as “laf.”

Ideographic writing is defined as pictorial symbolism that, while not implicitly understood as an exact word, denotes an idea related to the word that is intended. It is noted that “not all significant areas of experience were covered by their own distinctive hieroglyph” (Kemp, 2005, p. xiv) rather, one symbol or sign could represent several words, depending on the addition of a determinative, “added to the end of a noun or a verb to place that word into a more general category.” (Kemp, 2005, p. x) Hieratic Script refers to writing that was used primarily for everyday communications. Demotic script relied less on the pictograms that are used heavily in Hieratic Script, and were used to “…writ[e] business, legal, scientific, literary and religious documents.” (Ager, 2015)

References

Ager, S. (2015). Ancient Egyptian Scripts. Retrieved from Omniglot: http://www.omniglot.com/writing/egyptian_demotic.htm

Kemp, B. (2005). 100 Hieroglyphs Think Like an Egyptian. New York: Penguin Group.

Silverman, D. P. (2011). Text and Image and the Origin of Writing in Ancient Egypt. In D. C. Patch, Dawn of Egyptian Art (pp. 203-209). New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.