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Great Egyptologist's fascinating account of the discovery of the linguistic keystone that enabled scholars to decipher ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics. Work of Young, Champollion, other scholars; implications for biblical scholarship, history of ancient Near East, much more. Clear, concise, accessible to layman. 23 photographs. Bibliography.
User reviews
LibraryThing member keylawk
The author is the prolific English anthropologist who careered in the British Museum. As an Egyptologist, he specialized in Religion and Magic, and against the Aryanists, maintained that Osiris emerged from the indigenous African people. (Compare, Frazer/Golden Bough incorporates this idea.)
Budge
The Rosetta was a key to unlocking the historiography not only of Egypt, but also of the parallel stories of the Jews and the Copts.
Preface: "In the ninth year of the reign of Ptolemy V Epiphanies, who reigned from 203-181 b.c., the priests of all the gods of Upper and Lower Egypt assembled at Memphis...". The occasion was the accession of the 12 year old King to the throne, after 6 years under his Greek directors under whose guidance the kingdom had prospered. And the privileges and revenues of the priests were increased.
At the Council, one of the first acts of the priests was to celebrate The Festival of the Tail, done to renew the King's life with and as one of the gods. The highly symbolic ceremonies invoke physical and spiritual "power" to enable the King to rule with justice and righteousness.
"This solemn Office having been performed, the Council of Priests proceeded to review the good works which the boy King had performed, and they decided that the services which he had rendered to Egypt and to the clergy and laity were so valuable that additional honours should be paid to him in all the principal temples of the country."
Hence, they drafted a Decree in which the good deeds of the king and the honors they proposed to pay him, were enumerated, in both the contemporary language and script of Egypt (Demotic) as well as in the ancient language and script (hieroglyphs). 196 b.c.
In 1798, a French soldier digging down a ruined wall of fort St. Julien at Rosetta on the eve of an attack by Turkish forces, dislodged a slab of basalt which he immediately recognized as potentially useful. The Decree at Memphis was itself not more important than the many other inscriptions devoted to sycophancy and magic. But no one had deciphered the hieroglyphs. Of the Greek, there was not much doubt. But of the Demotic and the Hieroglyphs, decipherers knew little about their contents.
The author also tells the story of how the stone was discovered, removed to Cairo, and "how the Rosetta Stone came to London", and with plates and details, gives the early, running, and current translations and transliterations of each of the three versions.
The author credits the early work of Thomas Young in establishing a method of decipherment, and then Jean Champollion, as the translator who actually developed the alphabet [224].
Budge
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was one of the first 'liberal' believers (Unitarian), and the best of the translators of the texts - his great work being the translation of The Book of the Dead (Papyrus of Ani). We all know that most of the "translations" by so many other "scholars" are nonsense. [188]The Rosetta was a key to unlocking the historiography not only of Egypt, but also of the parallel stories of the Jews and the Copts.
Preface: "In the ninth year of the reign of Ptolemy V Epiphanies, who reigned from 203-181 b.c., the priests of all the gods of Upper and Lower Egypt assembled at Memphis...". The occasion was the accession of the 12 year old King to the throne, after 6 years under his Greek directors under whose guidance the kingdom had prospered. And the privileges and revenues of the priests were increased.
At the Council, one of the first acts of the priests was to celebrate The Festival of the Tail, done to renew the King's life with and as one of the gods. The highly symbolic ceremonies invoke physical and spiritual "power" to enable the King to rule with justice and righteousness.
"This solemn Office having been performed, the Council of Priests proceeded to review the good works which the boy King had performed, and they decided that the services which he had rendered to Egypt and to the clergy and laity were so valuable that additional honours should be paid to him in all the principal temples of the country."
Hence, they drafted a Decree in which the good deeds of the king and the honors they proposed to pay him, were enumerated, in both the contemporary language and script of Egypt (Demotic) as well as in the ancient language and script (hieroglyphs). 196 b.c.
In 1798, a French soldier digging down a ruined wall of fort St. Julien at Rosetta on the eve of an attack by Turkish forces, dislodged a slab of basalt which he immediately recognized as potentially useful. The Decree at Memphis was itself not more important than the many other inscriptions devoted to sycophancy and magic. But no one had deciphered the hieroglyphs. Of the Greek, there was not much doubt. But of the Demotic and the Hieroglyphs, decipherers knew little about their contents.
The author also tells the story of how the stone was discovered, removed to Cairo, and "how the Rosetta Stone came to London", and with plates and details, gives the early, running, and current translations and transliterations of each of the three versions.
The author credits the early work of Thomas Young in establishing a method of decipherment, and then Jean Champollion, as the translator who actually developed the alphabet [224].
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LibraryThing member MrsLee
I bought this book to use in schooling my children. Now that I’ve read it, I’m rather glad I never got around to assigning it to them to read. It is not a narrative tale, but rather a comparative study of the three different forms of writing on the Rosetta Stone. Aside from a short introduction
It is interesting, because the author gives the translation of each language on the stone. I learned that there are only two languages, Greek and Egyptian, but that the Egyptian is written in two forms, hieroglyph and a form of cursive hieroglyph. The story of how the translators came to understand the meanings and sense of the hieroglyph is interesting, but more suited to a linguist or someone familiar with the study of languages. The only way I was able to pursue was to pretend I was Daniel Jackson from SG1, digging into the depths of the unknown and mysterious.
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of the finding of the stone, the power-plays involved in who got to possess the stone and the amusing criticisms the various translators of the stone had for each other; it is simply a comparative translation of the writing. It is interesting, because the author gives the translation of each language on the stone. I learned that there are only two languages, Greek and Egyptian, but that the Egyptian is written in two forms, hieroglyph and a form of cursive hieroglyph. The story of how the translators came to understand the meanings and sense of the hieroglyph is interesting, but more suited to a linguist or someone familiar with the study of languages. The only way I was able to pursue was to pretend I was Daniel Jackson from SG1, digging into the depths of the unknown and mysterious.
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Original publication date
1929
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