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HIEROGLYPHIC WRITING
61
of them is still obscure; in a few cases more than one origin may be suspected; in other cases we do not know whether acrophony (the use of a word-sign to represent the first consonant of the name of the object), played any considerable part; in the majority of cases, single consonants came to be denoted by symbols representing certain objects whose names (some of which had already fallen into disuse in very ancient times)
J
Soldier (army) eye
mountain
to beat
LIX
to dominate, to govern
corner
#
to fly
to direct
giraffe
sh
foot
to eat
hom wwallow
I A
8
7 7 7 9
Upper Egypt, South
0
aandal
כם
to go to fight
k-a
to find
arch
beetle
MA
A
plough
3.
to row
flower
old age
4 19
0
O
BUD
O
bread
C
to weep
fresh
J
Fig 27-1-3, Hieroglyphic word-signs
1, Symbols representing things shown. 2, Ideographs representing actions associated with things shown. 3, Symbols representing abstract ideas. 4. Hieroglyphic bi-consonantal signs
contained prominently the consonant in question or, for reasons of phonetic decay, were reduced to one syllable only. However that may be, the hieroglyphic writing contained (Fig. 29) 24 uni-consonantal signs, increased later by homophones to about 30, which covered the whole range of Egyptian consonantal sounds. It is therefore commonly believed that the Egyptians possessed the world's earliest alphabet.
We cannot, however, exclude a different opinion; in a true alphabet each sign generally denotes one sound only, and each sound is represented by a single, constant symbol, whereas in the Egyptian writing there existed
