the.com/hieroglyph
a picture that moonlights as a sound, a word, and a small act of worship.
means a symbol in ancient egyptian writing that can represent an object, an idea, or a sound, often all at once.
from from greek hieroglyphika, sacred carvings, coined because greeks saw them mostly on temple walls and assumed they were priestly code rather than ordinary writing.
decoded when1822, by jean-francois champollion, using the rosetta stone
sign countover 1000 distinct hieroglyphic signs existed
no vowelsegyptian writing mostly recorded consonants, not vowels
direction variescould be written left-right, right-left, or top-down
for instance
rosetta stone — 196 bc decree in three scripts, cracked the code in 1822
book of the dead — funerary spells written in cursive hieroglyphic hieratic script
temple of karnak — walls covered in hieroglyphs praising amun-ra, built over 2000 years