Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 11.djvu/845

Rh HIEROGLYPHICS 807 3. m. f f. 8 ___, fi; ,(?). fl Plural ! 1 I Yi-Y O ton A*VWV( AAlVWV, I)) (I) /WWV AAAAAA 3. M It will be remarked that all the phonetic forms but one are written with alphabetic signs, that the introduction of ideographs, either as determinatives or independent symbols, gives the common first person singular a feminine in writing but not in sound, and farther confuses this feminine and the true feminine of the second person singular when represented by the same symbol only. The principle of writing an ideograph to determine the use of the pronoun, phonetically expressed or only represented by that symbol, is carried farther in the first person singular than the table shows, there being special signs for a god, &c. In the case of the articles and the pronouns of more common use alphabetical signs are employed with ideographic signs for the pro nouns when the necessity occurs. Syllabic signs are used for some of the less common pronouns, and ideographs for substantives employed as pronouns. The fuller forms of pronouns are produced by alphabetic signs ; the same is usually the case with the compounds that intro duce no new element. The verbal root, identical with that of the noun, is expressed in every mode in which hieroglyphics can be used. It is, however, otherwise with the derivative forms, the inflexions, and the substantive verb, which in its various expressions is really an inflexional word employed in tense-formation. The derivative forms are produced by prefixes which are always alphabetic or by repetition of the radicals (reduplication, sometimes afterwards apocopated). The inflexions are formed by the pronominal affixes for the persons and other prefixes and affixes, these affixes being almost always placed before the pronominal ones, for the moods and tenses; here again the expressionis alphabetic with the exceptions afforded by the pronominal affixes as already shewn. The forms of the substantive verb are phonetic, either alphabetic, [] pu, rarely This mode of writing leads to the identity of some forms of this verb and of other parts of speech : thus pa is the same in form as the definite article, and pui with the affixes as the possessive article, and pu as the demonstrative article. These identical forms are here cited as evidence of the result of tho use of alphabetic writing. The radical particles shew the same phenomena. The pre positions are expressed phonetically, the majority, including nearly all the most common, alphabetically. The simple adverbs, in cluding the negatives, are written phonetically, with perhaps about an equal use of alphabetic and syllabic forms. The few interjections are written alphabetically. In consequence of this mode of writing, particles of different sense are sometimes identical inform. Thus 1, %m, is both &quot;in&quot; and &quot;not,&quot; but most apparent instances or this kind are due to the use of a particle as both preposition and conjunction or adverb. The bearing of these results on the problems of the formation of the Egyptian hieroglyphic writing, and the growth ami origin of the language is significant. The earliest Egyptian writings, which are hieroglyphic, shew a predominant use of ideographic signs. The phonetic signs gradually grow in importance until the full development of the character and language. We are thus led to ask whether there was a period in Egyptian writing when it was wholly ideographic, the supposed first stage of all such systems, when the figure of each object conveyed its name or names and nothing more. A stage of pure picture-writing would express a language in the condition which is supposed to have been the earliest in the case of all monosyllabic languages, the condition before grammar. It is pre cisely to such a condition that the linguistic phenomena of Egyptian seem to point. Eor its simple necessities ideographs alone would be sufficient, and the phonetic signs wanted for grammatical machinery would be introduced when a higher condition was reached, It may be farther enquired whether the growth of Egyptian was wholly internal, or whether it was influenced from without; in other words, whether there is any reason to assign the roots which serve the purposes of grammar, and even the verbal roots to more than one source. The basis of the inquiry by which this question might be answered lies in the undoubted identity of the personal pronouns in Egyptian and Semitic. The inquiry is beyond the scope and limits of this article. It requires an exhaustive comparison of the Egyptian vocabulary, including the structural words, and of the system of grammar, with the Semitic and with the families of language which geographical and ethnological considerations would lead us to include in the category of possible cognates to the Egyptian. The leading results of a limited examination may, however, be stated. In the verbal roots a certain small number occur apparently common to Egyptian and Semitic. Of these roots a good proportion arc proper to civiliza tion, and thus belong to a stage above that of barbarism. In the pronominal roots the personal pronouns are undoubtedly Semitic, whereas the articles seem to be identical in source with a non-Semitic form of the substantive verb. The roots of particles fall into two classes, those which are purely metaphysical, probably including Semitic equivalents, though in the case of practical^ uniliteral forms the comparison ; hazardous, and such as have become particles by the diversion of substantives to a tropical sense. It would thus appear that the Egyptian language was originally purely monosyllabic without inflexion and written by ideographic signs, that the first stage towards inflexion was the use of substantives in tropical senses for prepositions and adverbs, the primitive ideographic signs being still sufficient for the purposes of writing, and that the second stage was attained by borrowing from Semitic, so far as was necessary, grammatical forms and particles, with perhaps some verbal roots needed in a civilized condition, and that at this time phonetic signs became absolutely necessary. The importance of the phonetic bigns for expressing grammatical forms vould tend to their prevalent use for the whole category, except where the radical sense was dominant in the tropical, as in our own use of the word &quot; head&quot; in such prepositional phrases as &quot;at the head of&quot; the table, the army, the administration, &c. This view is put forward as a mere hypothesis, to be sustained or refuted by the study which the subject deserves. The importance of the question is great as its solution will mainly tend to determine whether the Egyptian belongs to an early stage of Semitic, as has been conjectured on very insufficient grounds. In the previous remarks it is assumed that such a view may at present be set aside, otherwise we could not speak of borrow ing from Semitic. THE SUPPOSED DERIVATION OF THE PHOENICIAN FROM THE EGYPTIAN ALPHABET. M. de Rouge endeavoured to shew that the Phoenician alphabet was derived from the Egyptian in its hieratic form. The hypothesis has been accepted by M. Francois Lenormant in his Essai sur la Propagation de t Alphabet Phenicien, 2d ed., of which the first Plate presents a comparative table of hieratic and archaic Phoenician letters. The method leaves nothing to be desired. The conclusion is, however, scarcely established. It must be remembered that the Egyptian alphabet presents one or more alternative forms of more than half its letters. Most of these correspond to a single Phoenician letter. Thus there is in half the Phoenician alphabet a choice between two or more hieratic forms. This diminishes the effect of the comparison. Again the hieratic forms vary, like all cursive forms of writing, with the hand of each scribe. Consequently the writer who desires to establish their identity with Phoenician can scarcely avoid straining the evidence. Any one who will compare M. Lenormant s plate with M. de Rouge s hieratic alphabets in the Chrestomathie, Pis. I. seqq., will see that the signs chosen for comparison by M. Lenormant do not agree throughout with any of the three types given without that object by M. de Rouge. It may be remarked in illustration that if we endeavoured to connect the demotic in iis latest form