Egyptian Hieroglyphs for Everyone: An Introduction to the Writing of Ancient Egypt [Library Binding]

Henry Joseph Scott (Author), Lenore Scott (Author)

Product Details

• Library Binding
• Publisher: Ty Crowell Co (May 1990)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0690047533
• ISBN-13: 978-0690047530
• Product Dimensions: 9.2 x 6.1 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,214,538 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great Introduction to Egyptian Hieroglyphs, November 3, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Egyptian Hieroglyphs for Everyone: An Introduction to the Writing of Ancient Egypt (Library Binding)

This book is a wonderful introduction to the hieroglyphic writing of Ancient Egypt. It includes the alphabet, a few pictographs, in which direction to read the writing, vocabulary, sentences, numbers, etc. It also recommends some literature to further your knowledge. The best thing about this book is that it conveys the information in an easy to read manner, so that you don't have to be a scholar to understand.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great basic introduction, June 9, 2003

By 

FrKurt Messick "FrKurt Messick" (Bloomington, IN USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Egyptian Hieroglyphs for Everyone: An Introduction to the Writing of Ancient Egypt (Library Binding)

'Egyptian Hieroglyphs for Everyone', by Joseph and Lenore Scott, is perhaps the perfect book for the basic amateur who wants a fast introduction to this ancient language. In 76 pages, a great deal is covered in an interesting and systematic way. This small book contains basic vocabulary and grammar, interestingly arranged by theme as well as grammar principle (chapters on calendar and time-language, cartouches, the gods, etc.). They do not use the transliteration system much (save for basic pronunciation).

The authors introduce the basic steps to study, which include the following:

- learning the basic alphabet
- recognising the direction of writing
- learning special linguistic items (bilaterals, determinatives)
- pronunciation
- basic vocabulary
- beginning grammar and basic sentences

One note about pronunciation -- ancient Egyptian languages are 'dead' languages, and have been for thousands of years. Hence, no one really knows how words were pronounced. The best guesses scholars have are introduced here, but don't expect to be easily understood if you travel back in a time machine!

There are pictures of sites and artifacts in this book that show hieroglyphs in their original settings and forms.

This book is intended to whet the appetite, rather than provide a thorough education. The purpose the authors have is to motivate the reader on to more study, and for most, that will probably prove to be the case. To this end, they mention several sources, including the great 'Egyptian Grammar' by Gardiner, used in university courses in Egyptology.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An excellent introduction to the fascinating realm of Egyptian Hyroglyphs, April 20, 2007

By 

TheoGnostus "Encycoptic" (Sketes,Theognostic America) - See all my reviews

"This book... is an excellent introduction to the fascinating realm of Egyptian Hyroglyphs. ... As Egyptologists know, and this book points out, hieroglyphs may be readily interpreted by persons who take the time and make the effort to study them." Curator, Egyptian Museum



Egyptian Hieroglyphs:
Generally called Hieroglyphics was a writing system used by the Ancient Egyptians, that contained a combination of logographic and alphabetic elements. The variety of brush-painted hieroglyphs used on papyrus and (sometimes) on wood for religious literature is known as cursive hieroglyphs; Cartouches were also used by the Egyptian scribes.
The word hieroglyph comes from words such as (hieroglyphos 'one who writes hieroglyphs', (hierós 'sacred') and (glęphein 'to carve' or 'to write',In typography, a glyph is the shape given in a particular typeface to a specific grapheme or symbol. Hieroglyphs developed from pictorial representations of gods, people and objects encountered by the ancient Egyptians in every day life. Later on, developed pictographs, then came to have specific meanings, and were used to convey distinctive symbolic graphics to express a spoken language, of words or sentences, in a written form, and the the Egyptians thus used a system that combined phonograms (sound-signs), spelling out the word in an alphabetic system, and ideograms (sense-signs), that when added to the spelled-out word depicted its meaning. Hieroglyphic language had its precise syntax, vocabulary and grammar.

Words of the gods:
Hieroglyphs were called by the ancient Egyptians, "the words of the gods," and were used for religious and formal secular purposes, mainly by the priests and scribes. These painstakingly drawn symbols were great for decorating the walls of temples. This was a handwriting in which the picture signs were abbreviated to the point of abstraction. This script is today known as hieratic and was widely used until about 800 BCE for business, literary and religious texts. By about 700 BCE another script today called demotic had evolved from the hieratic. Business, legal and literary inscriptions were written in demotic.
By the end of the fifth century ACE, knowledge of how to read and write the old scripts was extinct. The hieroglyphs were fully surrendered to the larger myth of ancient Egypt, the land of strange customs ad esoteric wisdom nurtured in belief by classical writers. The belief that the hieroglyphs were somehow symbolic and imbued with secret meaning had become well-rooted before Diodorus Siculus visited Egypt in the first centiry BCE.

Coptic deciphers hieroglyphs:
The ancient Egyptian language could not have been understood without knowledge of Coptic, which was written using Greek letters and a few signs derived from demotic, and was used in translations of the Bible, liturgies and other writings of Christianity. In the 17th century AD, Athanasius Kircher, a Jesuit linguist made a break through when he recognized the linguistic derivation of Coptic from the language of the hieroglyphics, though he took this to be a symbolic writing. A linguist of great ability, Kircher's translations of hieroglyphics were based entirely on these preconceived notions as to their symbolic functioning. Kircher does however hold an honored place in Egyptological circles, since he authored the first Coptic grammar and vocabulary. Knowledge of Coptic, the Liturgical language of the Egyptian Church, since the Rosetta Stone was discovered, has prove to be a vital element in eventually deciphering the hieroglyphs. Jean Barthelemy suggested that the cartouches surrounding some hieroglyphs contained divine and royal names.

The Worthwhile Book:
In enthusiastic agreement with M. Abdul-Rahman, Chief Curator, Egyptian Museum, Cairo, this attractive book, well designed, and easily displayed is not only accessible but is a cultural appetizer to the language, pronunciation, its grammar, and the scribes who inscribed it. The writers recount how its mystery was deciphered after the discovery of the Rosetta Stone. This book revised about four decades ago, utilized the classic of Sir Alan Gardiner, 'Egyptian Grammar,' with various hieroglyphic signs, words, and sentences. The reader friendly book goes on explaining about writing topics, changing hieroglyphs, and cartouche reading. Other than numerous well selected photos and inscription illustrations, it concisely introduces Eternity, Egyptian Gods, calendar, and numbers. The closing tables on Concise Chronology, beauiful brief introduction to Egyptian gods, and an Egyptological map, to learn more.