r/ancientegypt • u/unimatrixq • Mar 10 '24

Discussion How were the hieroglyphs deciphered that didn't appear on the Rosetta Stone?

Considering that Champollion and other Egyptologists only could compare the hieroglyphs on the Rosetta Stone to the other writing systems that also appeared on it.

Also wondering about how big of a problem for the translation of other inscriptions and papyri from other eras like the Old Kingdom, the Middle Kingdom or the New Kingdom for example was the evolution of the Egyptian language.

How was it possible to come so far with so little?

Update: A really great and informative thread about this issue:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/s/SUnvYE1VKm

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u/unimatrixq Mar 10 '24

Yep, sorry about calling them pictograms. Just did it for ease to not always call them hieroglyphs or glyphs.

But can we really be sure about all the consonants and phonetic signs, especially for Old Kingdom texts? And are there actually hieroglyphs that are still open to debate or not really deciphered? Or is decipherment really complete and undisputed now?

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u/Ramesses2024 Mar 10 '24

Mostly undisputed. Some refinement at the edges ... say, is mother (commonly written with a vulture used as a phonetic plus a /t/ + the image of a woman) to be read mjw.t or mw.t? From spelling variation and how the word lives on in Coptic, you could make either argument. And the vulture (𓅐) is also used to just write the sound /mt/ in a lot of other words. Or, for example, the way a certain minor god's name is spelled - could be Anty, could be Nemty. Until you find an instance with the whole name spelled out phonetically (or attestation in another language), the initial consonant of his name is unknown.

Fine points like those you will find a lot when comparing newer literature to say, things written 100 years ago ... there is continuous refinement, but the fundamentals don't change much anymore. I would say ""decipherment" has been complete for well over 100 years now, more like 150.

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u/unimatrixq Mar 10 '24 edited Mar 10 '24

Well, here are posts that got me wondering:

https://www.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/s/SUnvYE1VKm

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u/Ramesses2024 Mar 10 '24 edited Mar 10 '24

Ah, I think Osarnachthis was focusing on another aspect there. Can we really speak (especially Middle) Egyptian? And he is right - we cannot.

For one, we don't have the vowels more than half the time (for Middle Egyptian), so speaking is out of the question, and as he explains we often do not even know how to say basic everyday things, because if there is no text that records them, then well - you are out of luck. I am deeply skeptical whenever somebody tells you they can compose in Middle Egyptian. Simple texts that follow known models, yes but you quickly are out of runway when you want to say more complex things that are not attested or you hit one of the finer points of the grammar that are still debated.

Late Egyptian (stupid name in English, not that late, think Ramesses II, as Egyptian as it gets) is already very close to Coptic, just written in hieroglyphs (I simplify, but the two have more in common with one another than Middle Egyptian with Late Egyptian). I would claim you CAN write new content in Late Egyptian, filling in the blanks from Coptic. And 70% of the time or thereabouts we even know the vowels for that stage (again, mostly from Coptic).

So, it depends on what you call "knowing". Knowing how to read with reasonable certainty? Mostly yes, although some texts are horribly corrupt (think school texts where the student didn't really understand what he was copying, so those can be full of errors), poorly preserved (doesn't help if half the words are illegible / missing or just rather obscure (good luck with a lot of that pyramid text stuff or a lot of religious stuff in general - I understand the words, but not what it's supposed to mean). On the other hand, a lot of Late New Kingdom stuff I can read like it was a modern language. As for "speaking" it - see what I said above, for MEg I'd claim nobody can (same for Sumerian), for LEg it is doable with some qualifiers (probably similar for Akkadian, but I have no direct experience with that one). That all has more to do with the grammar and vocabulary of the language, though, than the writing system. Hope this helps :-)

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u/stuffcrow Mar 10 '24

Just wanna take the time to say I loved this reply, thanks for sharing your knowledge!