Editing Egyptian hieroglyphs (section)

==History and evolution==
===Origin===
{{see also|History of writing|List of Egyptian hieroglyphs}}
[[File:Ägyptisches Museum Berlin 057.jpg|thumb|upright=0.8|Paintings with symbols on [[Naqada II]] pottery (c.&nbsp;3500–3200&nbsp;BC)]]
Hieroglyphs may have emerged from the preliterate artistic traditions of Egypt. For example, symbols on [[Gerzean]] pottery from {{Circa|4000 BC}} have been argued to resemble hieroglyphic writing.<ref>{{Cite dictionary |last=Joly |first=Marcel |title=Sayles, George(, Sr.) |date=2003 |publisher=Oxford University Press |dictionary=Grove Music Online |series=Oxford Music Online |doi=10.1093/gmo/9781561592630.article.j397600}}</ref>

[[File:Design of the Abydos token glyphs dated to 3400-3200 BCE.jpg|thumb|left|Designs on tokens from [[Abydos, Egypt|Abydos]], carbon dated to {{cx|3400–3200&nbsp;BC}}.<ref name="CS">{{cite book |last1=Scarre |first1=Chris |last2=Fagan |first2=Brian M. |title=Ancient Civilizations |date=2016 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1317296089 |page=106 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=xAy4CwAAQBAJ&pg=PA10}}</ref><ref name="Mitchell1999" /> They are similar to [[:File:Limestone pendant plaque, maybe Uruk, c. 3000 BC.jpg|contemporary tags]] from [[Uruk]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Conference |first1=William Foxwell Albright Centennial |title=The Study of the Ancient Near East in the Twenty-first Century: The William Foxwell Albright Centennial Conference |date=1996 |publisher=Eisenbrauns |isbn=978-0931464966 |pages=24–25 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3hc1Yp0VcjoC&pg=PA24}}</ref>]]
[[Proto-writing]] systems developed in the second half of the 4th millennium&nbsp;BC, such as the clay labels of a [[Predynastic Egypt|Predynastic]] ruler called "[[Scorpion I]]" ([[Naqada IIIA]] period, {{Cx|33rd century BC}}) recovered at [[Abydos, Egypt|Abydos]] (modern [[Umm el-Qa'ab]]) in 1998 or the [[Narmer Palette]] ({{Cx|31st century BC}}).<ref name=Mattessich>{{cite journal |author=Richard Mattessich |year=2002 |title=The oldest writings, and inventory tags of Egypt |journal=Accounting Historians Journal |jstor=40698264 |volume=29 |issue=1 |pages=195–208 |doi=10.2308/0148-4184.29.1.195 |s2cid=160704269 |url=https://aprendeenlinea.udea.edu.co/revistas/index.php/cont/article/viewFile/25609/21149 |access-date=2016-08-27 |archive-date=2018-11-19 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181119082926/https://aprendeenlinea.udea.edu.co/revistas/index.php/cont/article/viewFile/25609/21149 |url-status=dead}}</ref>

The first full sentence written in mature hieroglyphs so far discovered was found on a seal impression in the tomb of [[Seth-Peribsen]] at Umm el-Qa'ab, which dates from the [[Second dynasty of Egypt|Second Dynasty]] (28th or 27th century&nbsp;BC). Around 800 hieroglyphs are known to date back to the [[Old Kingdom]], [[Middle Kingdom of Egypt|Middle Kingdom]] and [[New Kingdom of Egypt|New Kingdom]] Eras. By the [[Greco-Roman]] period, there were more than 5,000.<ref name=Loprieno12/>

Scholars have long debated whether hieroglyphs were developed independently of any other script, or derived from [[cuneiform]], the earliest writing system in human history that developed to write [[Sumerian language|Sumerian]] in southern [[Mesopotamia]] during the late 4th millennium&nbsp;BC. Scholars like Geoffrey Sampson argued that Egyptian hieroglyphs "came into existence a little after [[Sumerian script]], and, probably, [were] invented under the influence of the latter",<ref name=b1>{{cite book |first=Geoffrey |last=Sampson |title=Writing Systems: A Linguistic Introduction |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=tVcdNRvwoDkC&pg=PA78 |access-date=31 October 2011 |year=1990 |publisher=Stanford University Press |isbn=978-0-8047-1756-4 |page=78}}</ref> and that it is "probable that the general idea of expressing words of a language in writing was brought to Egypt from Sumerian [[Mesopotamia]]".<ref>{{cite book |first=Geoffrey W. |last=Bromiley |title=The international standard Bible encyclopedia |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6OJvO2jMCr8C&pg=PA1150 |access-date=31 October 2011 |date=1995 |publisher=Wm. B. Eerdmans |isbn=978-0-8028-3784-4 |page=1150}}</ref><ref>Iorwerth Eiddon Stephen Edwards, et al., The Cambridge Ancient History (3d ed. 1970) pp. 43–44.</ref> Further, Egyptian writing appeared suddenly, while Mesopotamia had a long evolutionary history, with antecedent signs use in tokens for agricultural and accounting purposes as early as {{Cx|8000 BC}}.

While there are many instances of early [[Egypt–Mesopotamia relations]], the lack of direct evidence for the transfer of writing means that "no definitive determination has been made as to the origin of hieroglyphics in ancient Egypt".<ref>{{cite book |first=Robert E. |last=Krebs |first2=Carolyn A. |last2=Krebs |title=Groundbreaking scientific experiments, inventions, and discoveries of the ancient world |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0H0fjBeseVEC&pg=PA91 |access-date=31 October 2011 |year=2003 |publisher=Greenwood |isbn=978-0-313-31342-4 |page=91}}</ref> Since the 1990s, the above-mentioned discoveries of glyphs at [[Abydos, Egypt|Abydos]], dated between 3400 and 3200&nbsp;BC, have shed further doubt on the classical notion that the Mesopotamian symbol system predates the Egyptian one. A date of {{cx|3400 BC}} for the earliest Abydos glyphs challenges the hypothesis of diffusion from Mesopotamia to Egypt, pointing to an independent development of writing in Egypt.<ref name=Mitchell1999>"The seal impressions, from various tombs, date even further back, to 3400 B.C. These dates challenge the commonly held belief that early logographs, pictographic symbols representing a specific place, object, or quantity, first evolved into more complex phonetic symbols in Mesopotamia."{{cite web |last=Mitchell |first=Larkin |title=Earliest Egyptian Glyphs |url=https://archive.archaeology.org/9903/newsbriefs/egypt.html |work=Archaeology |publisher=Archaeological Institute of America |access-date=29 February 2012}}</ref>

[[Rosalie David]] has argued that the debate is moot since "If Egypt did adopt the idea of writing from elsewhere, it was presumably only the concept which was taken over, since the forms of the hieroglyphs are entirely Egyptian in origin and reflect the distinctive flora, fauna and images of Egypt's own landscape."<ref name="David">{{cite book |last1=David |first1=Rosalie |title=The Experience of Ancient Egypt |year=2002 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-1-134-96799-5 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AaEYv_4fA4cC&dq=if+egypt+did+flora+fauna+elsewhere&pg=PT86 |access-date=18 April 2022}}</ref> Egyptian scholar Gamal Mokhtar argued further that the inventory of hieroglyphic symbols derived from "fauna and flora used in the signs [which] are essentially African" and in "regards to writing, we have seen that a purely Nilotic, hence African origin not only is not excluded, but probably reflects the reality."<ref>{{cite book |title=Ancient Civilizations of Africa |volume=2 |series=Unesco General History of Africa |date=1990 |publisher=J. Currey |location=London |isbn=0852550928 |pages=11–12 |edition=Abridged}}</ref>

<gallery widths="200" heights="200" perrow="4">
File:Labels from the tomb of Menes.jpg|Labels with early inscriptions from the tomb of [[Menes]], c.&nbsp;3200–3000 BC
File:Ebony plaque of Menes in his tomb of Abydos (photograph).jpg|Ivory plaque of Menes, c.&nbsp;3200–3000 BC
File:IvoryLabelOfDen-BritishMuseum-August19-08.jpg|An ivory label with [[Den (pharaoh)|King Den’s]] name on it, c.&nbsp;2985&nbsp;BC
File:Peribsen.JPG|The oldest known full sentence written  in mature hieroglyphs. Seal impression of [[Seth-Peribsen]], [[Second Dynasty]] {{Cx|28th–27th centuries BC}}
</gallery>

===Mature writing system===
{{Further|Middle Egyptian language}}
[[File:Minnakht 01.JPG|thumb|Hieroglyphs on stela in [[Louvre]], {{cx|1321 BC}}]]
[[File:Artist's Scaled Drawing of Hieroglyphs.jpg|thumb|Artist's scaled drawing of hieroglyphs {{cx|1479–1458 BC}}, meaning 'life', 'stability', and 'dominion'. The grid lines allowed the artist to draw the hieroglyphs at whatever scale was needed.<ref>{{cite web |title=Artist's Scaled Drawing of Hieroglyphs ca. 1479–1458 B.C. |url=https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/545148 |website=metmuseum.org |access-date=4 November 2022}}</ref>]]
Hieroglyphs consist of three kinds of glyphs: phonetic glyphs, including single-consonant characters that function like an [[alphabet]]; [[logograph]]s, representing [[morpheme]]s; and [[determinative]]s, which narrow down the [[semantics|meaning]] of logographic or phonetic words.

===Late period ===
{{Further|Late Egyptian}}
As writing developed and became more widespread among the Egyptian people, simplified glyph forms developed, resulting in the [[hieratic]] (priestly) and [[Demotic Egyptian|demotic]] (popular) scripts. These variants were also more suited than hieroglyphs for use on [[papyrus]]. Hieroglyphic writing was not, however, eclipsed, but existed alongside the other forms, especially in monumental and other formal writing. The [[Rosetta Stone]] contains three parallel scripts{{snd}}hieroglyphs, demotic, and the Greek alphabet.

===Late survival===
Hieroglyphs continued to be used intermittently under Persian rule in the 6th and 5th centuries&nbsp;C, as well as during the ensuing [[Ptolemaic dynasty|Ptolemaic]] and [[Ancient Rome|Roman]] periods that followed after [[Alexander the Great]]'s conquest of Egypt. It appears that the misleading quality of comments from Greek and Roman writers about hieroglyphs came about, at least in part, as a response to the changed political situation. Some believed that hieroglyphs may have functioned as a way to distinguish 'true [[Egyptians]]' from some of the foreign conquerors. Another reason may be the refusal to tackle a foreign culture on its own terms, which characterized Greco-Roman approaches to Egyptian culture generally.{{citation needed|date=November 2016}} Having learned that hieroglyphs were sacred writing, Greco-Roman authors imagined the complex but rational system as an allegorical, even magical, system transmitting secret, mystical knowledge.<ref name="Last hieroglyph" />

By the 4th century&nbsp;AD, few Egyptians were capable of reading hieroglyphs, and the "myth of allegorical hieroglyphs" was ascendant.<ref name="Last hieroglyph" /> Monumental use of hieroglyphs ceased after the closing of all non-Christian temples in 391 by the Roman Emperor [[Theodosius I]]; the last known inscription is from [[Philae]], known as the [[Graffito of Esmet-Akhom]], from 394.<ref name="Last hieroglyph" /><ref>The latest presently known hieroglyphic inscription date: [https://web.archive.org/web/20070815135548/http://academic.memphis.edu/egypt/l0039.gif Birthday of Osiris], year 110 [of Diocletian], dated to August 24, 394</ref>

The ''{{lang|la|Hieroglyphica}}'' of [[Horapollo]] (c.&nbsp;5th century) appears to retain some genuine knowledge about the writing system. It offers an explanation of close to 200 signs. Some are identified correctly, such as the 'goose' hieroglyph ({{tlit|egy|zꜣ}}) representing the word for 'son'.<ref name="Last hieroglyph" />

A half-dozen Demotic glyphs are still in use, added to the Greek alphabet when writing [[Coptic alphabet|Coptic]].