Egyptian hieroglyphs

Ancient Writing Systems

Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs were a formal writing system for the Egyptian language. They combined ideographic, logographic, syllabic and alphabetic elements, using more than 1,000 distinct characters. Developed from proto-literate symbols in the Early Bronze Age, they were used into the Roman period. Hieroglyphic writing later gave rise to hieratic, demotic and Proto-Sinaitic scripts. Its decipherment was accomplished in the 1820s by Jean-François Champollion with help from the Rosetta Stone.

Type: Formal writing system
Character types: Ideographic, logographic, syllabic and alphabetic
Decipherment: Accomplished in the 1820s by Jean-François Champollion

Sources and credits

Article: Egyptian hieroglyphs (English Wikipedia)
Wikidata: Q132659
Text: Card text is adapted from the English Wikipedia article by an automated summary. Wikipedia content is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for its contributors. CC BY-SA 4.0 · Article history and contributors
Illustration: By unknown Egyptian scribe. Copyrighted free use · File page on Wikimedia Commons
unknown Egyptian scribe, The British Museum (http://www.egyptarchive.co.uk/html/british_museum_29.html (Jon Bodsworth) - https://www.egyptarchive.co.uk/)
Modifications: Resized and converted to WebP
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