Hieroglyphs

Egyptian hieroglyphs were the formal writing system used in ancient Egypt. This system used logographic, syllabic, and alphabetic elements to write the Egyptian language and comprised over 100 different characters. Handwritten hieroglyphs on papyrus and wood were used for religious texts and laid the foundation for later hieratic and demotic Egyptian writing systems. The origin of Egyptian hieroglyphic writing can be traced back to proto-writing symbol systems of the Early Bronze Age, developing around the 33rd century BCE (Naqada III period). The earliest decipherable sentence written in the Egyptian language was found on a seal impression dating to the Second Dynasty (28th century BCE). Egyptian hieroglyphs evolved into a mature writing system for monumental inscriptions in the Classical language of the Middle Kingdom period, utilizing approximately 900 different signs. The use of this writing system continued through the New Kingdom and Late Period, even into the Persian and Ptolemaic periods. Surviving examples of hieroglyphic usage extend into the Roman period and lasted until the 4th century CE. After the closure of pagan temples in Egypt in the 5th century CE, knowledge of hieroglyphic writing was lost. Throughout the Middle Ages and early modern period, the script remained undeciphered. The decipherment of hieroglyphic writing was finally achieved in the 1820s by Jean-François Champollion with the help of the Rosetta Stone. Today, the total number of words in all known Ancient Egyptian texts is approximately around 5 million, and if repeated texts (such as the Book of the Dead and the Coffin Texts) are counted separately, this number approaches 10 million. The most comprehensive dictionary of Ancient Egyptian, the Wörterbuch der ägyptischen Sprache, contains between 1.5 and 1.7 million entries.

The word "hieroglyph" is derived from the Greek adjective ἱερογλυφικός. In English, "hieroglyph" as a noun was recorded in 1590 and was originally derived from its adjectival usage (in the 1580s, with plural hieroglyphics), referring to the hieroglyphic characters themselves. In Egypt, hieroglyphs were termed "the god's words" in Greek as "τὰ ἱερογλυφικὰ [γράμματα]." The Egyptian hieroglyphic script emerged from proto-writing symbol systems used in Egypt. For instance, there are claims of writing resembling hieroglyphs on Gerzean pottery dating to around 4000 BCE. The first complete sentence known to be written, with mature hieroglyphs, is found in a seal impression from the tomb of Seth-Peribsen, dating to the Second Dynasty (28th or 27th century BCE). About 800 hieroglyphs are dated to the Old Kingdom, Middle Kingdom, and New Kingdom periods. By the Greco-Roman period, over 5,000 hieroglyphs were known.