How to Read Egyptian Hieroglyphics
Obtain a visual chart of the Egyptian hieroglyphic alphabet., Learn how to pronounce the hieroglyphs., Learn the difference between an ideogram and a phonogram., Create your own sentences with hieroglyphs.
Step-by-Step Guide
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Step 1: Obtain a visual chart of the Egyptian hieroglyphic alphabet.
Because hieroglyphics are images and not letters, like we use in modern English, it’s quite difficult to describe how to read them if you can't visually see them.
Start your learning process by obtaining a visual alphabet chart from the internet.
Print the chart out and keep it with you while you learn.The following list of URLs all offer visual charts of the Egyptian hieroglyphs translated into the English alphabet: http://www.egyptianhieroglyphs.net/egyptian-hieroglyphs/lesson-1/ http://www.ancientscripts.com/egyptian.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Egyptian_hieroglyphs_by_alphabetization The glyphs found in these alphabet charts are also referred to as ‘unilateral’ because most have only one symbol. -
Step 2: Learn how to pronounce the hieroglyphs.
Even though some glyphs can be translated into a letter from the English alphabet, they don’t all sound exactly the same as the English letter.
The URL where you obtained the glyph alphabet should also contain a chart that shows what each glyph’s pronunciation sounds like.
Print this chart off as well and keep it with you as reference.For example, the bird-like hieroglyph translates to what looks like a three, ‘3,’ but is pronounced as ‘ah.’ Technically speaking, the pronunciations are a guess from Egyptologists.
Since the Egyptian hieroglyphs are a dead language, there is no one around to demonstrate how the sounds are pronounced.
Instead, Egyptologists had to make educated guesses based on a later form of the Egyptian language called Coptic. , Egyptian hieroglyphics have two main types: ideograms and phonograms.
Ideograms were drawings that directly represented the object being written about.
Phonograms were drawings that represented sounds.
Since the Ancient Egyptians didn’t write vowels, phonograms mostly represent consonant sounds.Phonograms can represent one sound or multiple sounds.
Refer to the glyph alphabet you downloaded for specific examples.
Ideograms, in addition to having a literal translation (e.g. a glyph that’s a pair of legs might mean movement or walking), may also have a not-so-literal translation (e.g. the same leg glyph combined with other glyphs might actually refer to giving directions).
Egyptian hieroglyphs were normally created with phonograms at the start of a word and ideograms at the end of a word.
In this case, the hieroglyph is also referred to as a determinative. , Hieroglyphs represent sounds, not letters.
As such, there are no glyphs that are silent like there are letters in the English language that are silent.
In order to spell a word using hieroglyphs, you need to be sure each sound in the word is represented by a glyph.For example, the word ‘freight’ is spelled using seven letters, but only contains four sounds.
The sounds are ‘f,’ ‘r,’ ‘long a,’ and ’t.’ Therefore, in order to spell the word freight using hieroglyphs, you need to use the glyphs for each of the four sounds.
In this case it would be the horned viper plus a lion laying down plus an arm plus a bread loaf.
Not all sounds that are found in the English language have an associated sound (and therefore glyph) in ancient Egyptian.
Because a lot of vowels are silent in the English language, they aren’t used when spelling a word in ancient Egyptian.
This means it can be hard to decipher what word is being spelled because there could be more than one possible translation.
This is where determinatives come in.
Use a determinative glyph after spelling a word in hieroglyphics in order to help describe the word properly. -
Step 3: Learn the difference between an ideogram and a phonogram.
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Step 4: Create your own sentences with hieroglyphs.
Detailed Guide
Because hieroglyphics are images and not letters, like we use in modern English, it’s quite difficult to describe how to read them if you can't visually see them.
Start your learning process by obtaining a visual alphabet chart from the internet.
Print the chart out and keep it with you while you learn.The following list of URLs all offer visual charts of the Egyptian hieroglyphs translated into the English alphabet: http://www.egyptianhieroglyphs.net/egyptian-hieroglyphs/lesson-1/ http://www.ancientscripts.com/egyptian.html https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Egyptian_hieroglyphs_by_alphabetization The glyphs found in these alphabet charts are also referred to as ‘unilateral’ because most have only one symbol.
Even though some glyphs can be translated into a letter from the English alphabet, they don’t all sound exactly the same as the English letter.
The URL where you obtained the glyph alphabet should also contain a chart that shows what each glyph’s pronunciation sounds like.
Print this chart off as well and keep it with you as reference.For example, the bird-like hieroglyph translates to what looks like a three, ‘3,’ but is pronounced as ‘ah.’ Technically speaking, the pronunciations are a guess from Egyptologists.
Since the Egyptian hieroglyphs are a dead language, there is no one around to demonstrate how the sounds are pronounced.
Instead, Egyptologists had to make educated guesses based on a later form of the Egyptian language called Coptic. , Egyptian hieroglyphics have two main types: ideograms and phonograms.
Ideograms were drawings that directly represented the object being written about.
Phonograms were drawings that represented sounds.
Since the Ancient Egyptians didn’t write vowels, phonograms mostly represent consonant sounds.Phonograms can represent one sound or multiple sounds.
Refer to the glyph alphabet you downloaded for specific examples.
Ideograms, in addition to having a literal translation (e.g. a glyph that’s a pair of legs might mean movement or walking), may also have a not-so-literal translation (e.g. the same leg glyph combined with other glyphs might actually refer to giving directions).
Egyptian hieroglyphs were normally created with phonograms at the start of a word and ideograms at the end of a word.
In this case, the hieroglyph is also referred to as a determinative. , Hieroglyphs represent sounds, not letters.
As such, there are no glyphs that are silent like there are letters in the English language that are silent.
In order to spell a word using hieroglyphs, you need to be sure each sound in the word is represented by a glyph.For example, the word ‘freight’ is spelled using seven letters, but only contains four sounds.
The sounds are ‘f,’ ‘r,’ ‘long a,’ and ’t.’ Therefore, in order to spell the word freight using hieroglyphs, you need to use the glyphs for each of the four sounds.
In this case it would be the horned viper plus a lion laying down plus an arm plus a bread loaf.
Not all sounds that are found in the English language have an associated sound (and therefore glyph) in ancient Egyptian.
Because a lot of vowels are silent in the English language, they aren’t used when spelling a word in ancient Egyptian.
This means it can be hard to decipher what word is being spelled because there could be more than one possible translation.
This is where determinatives come in.
Use a determinative glyph after spelling a word in hieroglyphics in order to help describe the word properly.
About the Author
George Ferguson
Brings years of experience writing about cooking and related subjects.
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