Editing Egyptian language (section)

== Writing systems ==
Most surviving texts in the Egyptian language are written on stone in [[Egyptian hieroglyphs|hieroglyphs]]. The native name for Egyptian hieroglyphic writing is {{Transliteration|egy|zẖꜣ n mdw-nṯr}} ("writing of the gods' words").<ref>{{Cite book |last=Schiffman |first=Lawrence H. |url={{google books URL|4eZvdVOvaU4C|q="writing of the gods' words"}} |title=Semitic Papyrology in Context: A Climate of Creativity: Papers from a New York University Conference Marking the Retirement of Baruch A. Levine |date=2003-01-01 |publisher=BRILL |isbn=978-9004128859 |language=en}}</ref>
In antiquity, most texts were written on the quite perishable medium of [[papyrus]] though a few have survived that were written in hieratic and (later) demotic.<ref>{{Cite web |title=The Edwin Smith Surgical Papyrus, Volume 1: Hieroglyphic Transliteration, Translation, and Commentary {{!}} Institute for the Study of Ancient Cultures |url=https://isac.uchicago.edu/research/publications/oip/edwin-smith-surgical-papyrus-volume-1-hieroglyphic-transliteration |access-date=2024-07-18 |website=isac.uchicago.edu}}</ref> There was also a form of [[cursive hieroglyphs]], used for religious documents on papyrus, such as the ''[[Book of the Dead]]'' of the [[Twentieth Dynasty of Egypt|Twentieth Dynasty]]; it was simpler to write than the hieroglyphs in stone inscriptions, but it was not as cursive as hieratic and lacked the wide use of [[typographic ligature#History|ligatures]]. Additionally, there was a variety of stone-cut hieratic, known as "lapidary hieratic".<ref>{{cite book |last1=Shaw |first1=Ian |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6okIEAAAQBAJ&pg=PA1119 |title=The Oxford Handbook of Egyptology |last2=Bloxam |first2=Elizabeth |publisher=Oxford University Press |year=2020 |isbn=9780192596987 |page=1119 |access-date=June 14, 2024}}</ref>
In the language's final stage of development, the [[Coptic alphabet]] replaced the older writing system.

Hieroglyphs are employed in two ways in Egyptian texts: as [[ideogram]]s to represent the idea depicted by the pictures and, more commonly, as [[phonogram (linguistics)|phonograms]] to represent their [[phonetics|phonetic]] value.

As the phonetic realization of Egyptian cannot be known with certainty, Egyptologists use a system of [[Transliteration of Ancient Egyptian|transliteration]] to denote each sound that could be represented by a uniliteral hieroglyph.{{sfn|Allen|2000|p=13}}

Egyptian scholar Gamal Mokhtar noted that the inventory of hieroglyphic symbols derived from "fauna and flora used in the signs [which] are essentially African", reflecting the local wildlife of North Africa, the Levant and southern Mediterranean. In "regards to writing, we have seen that a purely Nilotic, hence [North] African origin not only is not excluded, but probably reflects the reality" that the geographical location of Egypt is, of course, in Africa.<ref>{{cite book |url=https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000184265 |title=Ancient Civilizations of Africa |date=1990 |publisher=J. Currey |isbn=0852550928 |edition=Abridged |volume=2 |location=London |pages=11–12}}</ref>