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Introduction to Egyptian MythologyMr. Henderson
3rd Period
Egyptian Hierogyphs
• Hieroglyph (and its adjective form “hieroglyphic”) refer to a class of writing systems, that are both pictographic and used primarily by the priestly class of a given society.
• Hieroglyph comes from the Greeks words “hieros” (sacred) and “glyphos” (writing).
• The earliest Egyptian hieroglyphic writing dates to around 3200 BC.
About Hieroglyphs
• Being a pictographic language, most symbols represents a word rather than a sound, nevertheless the language was fairly small.
• At the beginning of their usage, they were around 500 characters; this number grew to around 800 by the third century B.C.
• Certain characters could also represent sounds, these characters were drawn inside boxes to represent proper names.
The Hieroglyphic Alphabet
About Hieroglyphic Writing• Hieroglyphs could be written left to right or right
to left.• Generally hieroglyphic symbols that have a
definite front or back (such as animals) will face the direction in which the script is meant to be read.
• They could also be written vertically.• Hieroglyphic writing did not have a system of
punctuation. Artistic arrangement was often used to indicate a break in thought.
The Rosetta Stone
• Used as a piece of building material for a fortress near the town of Rosetta (Rashid).
• Rediscovered in 1799 by a French soldier, it later came into the possession of the British.
• Contains the same text in three different scripts.• The text was written in 196 B.C. and is a royal
decree establishing the cult of Ptolemy V.
The Rosetta Stone
The Morality of Egyptian Myth
• Egyptian mythology does not have the same intrinsic concept of “good” and “evil” that exists in modern western religion.
• Instead there is a cosmic struggle between order and chaos.
• The sun-god Amum-Ra, chief deity of the pantheon, represents the order and light that the rising sun brings to earth each day.
The Morality of Egyptian Myth
• This concept of “order versus chaos” is partly informed by Egypt’s place in the Nile Valley, which is surrounded by desert.
• The Egyptians viewed their civilization as a literal oasis in an otherwise inhospitable world.Outside peoples were viewed by the Egyptians as being less civilized and cultured.
