This article is about the languages spoken in ancient Egypt. For the language spoken in modern Egypt, see Egyptian Arabic. For the language that is the modern descendant of the Egyptian language, see Coptic language. For the book by Alan Gardiner, see Egyptian Grammar (book).
Egyptian
r n km.t[1][nb 1]
Ebers Papyrus detailing treatment of asthma
Region
Originally, throughout Ancient Egypt and parts of Nubia (especially during the times of the Nubian kingdoms)[2]
Ethnicity
Ancient Egyptians
Era
Late fourth millennium BC – 19th century AD[nb 2] (with the extinction of Coptic); still used as the liturgical language of the Coptic Orthodox and Coptic Catholic Churches
Language family
Afro-Asiatic
Egyptian
Dialects
Upper?[3][4] †
Lower?[3][4] †
Coptic dialects †
Writing system
Hieroglyphs, cursive hieroglyphs, Hieratic, Demotic and Coptic (later, occasionally, Arabic script in government translations and Latin script in scholars' transliterations and several hieroglyphic dictionaries[5])
Language codes
ISO 639-2
egy (also cop for Coptic)
ISO 639-3
egy (also cop for Coptic)
Glottolog
egyp1246
Linguasphere
11-AAA-a
This article contains Coptic text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Coptic letters.
The Egyptian language or Ancient Egyptian (r n km.t)[1][6] is an extinct branch of the Afro-Asiatic languages that was spoken in ancient Egypt. It is known today from a large corpus of surviving texts, which were made accessible to the modern world following the decipherment of the ancient Egyptian scripts in the early 19th century. Egyptian is one of the earliest known written languages, first recorded in the hieroglyphic script in the late 4th millennium BC. It is also the longest-attested human language, with a written record spanning over 4,000 years.[7] Its classical form is known as "Middle Egyptian." This was the vernacular of the Middle Kingdom of Egypt, and it remained the literary language of Egypt until the Roman period. By the time of classical antiquity, the spoken language had evolved into Demotic, and by the Roman era it had diversified into the Coptic dialects. These were eventually supplanted by Arabic after the Muslim conquest of Egypt, although Bohairic Coptic remains in use as the liturgical language of the Coptic Church.[8][nb 2]
^ abErman & Grapow 1926–1961.
^"Ancient Sudan~ Nubia: Writing: The Basic Languages of Christian Nubia: Greek, Coptic, Old Nubian, and Arabic". ancientsudan.org. Archived from the original on 5 January 2009. Retrieved 9 March 2017.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)
^ abAllen 2000, p. 2.
^ abLoprieno 1995, p. 8.
^Budge, E. A. Wallis (1920). Egyptian Hieroglyphic Dictionary(PDF). London: Harrison and sons. Archived (PDF) from the original on 12 December 2017.
^Loprieno 1995, p. 7.
^Grossman, Eitan; Richter, Tonio Sebastian (2015). "The Egyptian-Coptic language: its setting in space, time and culture". 'Egyptian-Coptic Linguistics in Typological Perspective. De Gruyter Mouton. p. 70. doi:10.1515/9783110346510.69. ISBN 9783110346510. The Egyptian-Coptic language is attested in a vast corpus of written texts that almost uninterruptedly document its lifetime over more than 4,000 years, from the invention of the hieroglyphic writing system in the late 4th millennium BCE, up to the 14th century CE. Egyptian is thus likely to be the longest-attested human language known.
^Layton, Benjamin (2007). Coptic in 20 Lessons: Introduction to Sahidic Coptic with Exercises & Vocabularies. Peeters Publishers. p. 1. ISBN 9789042918108. The liturgy of the present day Coptic Orthodox Church in Egypt is written in a mixture of Arabic, Greek, and Bohairic Coptic, the ancient dialect of the Delta and the great monasteries of the Wadi Natrun. Coptic is no longer a living language.
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letters. The Egyptianlanguage or Ancient Egyptian (r n km.t) is an extinct branch of the Afro-Asiatic languages that was spoken in ancient Egypt. It is known...
Egyptians speak a continuum of dialects. The predominant dialect in Egypt is Egyptian Colloquial Arabic or Masri/Masry (مصرى Egyptian), which is the vernacular...
Egyptian Arabic, locally known as Colloquial Egyptian (Arabic: اللغة العامية المصرية, [el.ʕæmˈmejjæ l.mɑsˤˈɾejjɑ]), or simply Masri (also Masry) (مَصرى)...
Egyptian hieroglyphs (/ˈhaɪrəˌɡlɪfs/, /ˈhaɪroʊˌɡlɪfs/) were the formal writing system used in Ancient Egypt for writing the Egyptianlanguage. Hieroglyphs...
Timetremǹkhēmi) is a group of closely related Egyptian dialects, representing the most recent developments of the Egyptianlanguage, and historically spoken by the...
Egyptology, transliteration of Ancient Egyptian is the process of converting (or mapping) texts written as Egyptianlanguage symbols to alphabetic symbols representing...
those of shorthand for various languages including Hebrew, Demotic (Egyptian), Hieratic (Egyptian), Coptic (Egyptian), Mayan/Olmec, and Irish ogham ciphers...
most recent stage of the ancient Egyptianlanguage and is still used in prayers along with Egyptian Arabic. Egyptians have received several names: 𓂋𓍿𓀂𓁐𓏥𓈖𓆎𓅓𓏏𓊖...
community in Egypt. Although there are no official statistics on the number of deaf people or the number of people who use Egyptian Sign Language as their...
six branches: Berber, Chadic, Cushitic, Egyptian, Semitic, and Omotic. The vast majority of Afroasiatic languages are considered indigenous to the African...
the country Egypt. Ancient Egyptian civilization followed prehistoric Egypt and coalesced around 3100 BC (according to conventional Egyptian chronology)...
Copts, the ethnic Egyptian Christian minority Coptic language or Coptic Egyptian, the latest stage of the Egyptianlanguage, spoken in Egypt until the 17th...
quality uncertain) but became e by Late Egyptian.[citation needed] EgyptianlanguageEgyptian mathematics "Egyptian numerals". MacTutor - School of Mathematics...
Ancient Egyptian literature was written with the Egyptianlanguage from ancient Egypt's pharaonic period until the end of Roman domination. It represents...
the Egyptian vernacular. Egyptian novelist Naguib Mahfouz was the first Arabic-language writer to win the Nobel Prize in Literature. Many Egyptian books...
elements in Egyptian, such as particles and auxiliary verbs, that did not exist in Coptic, and he argued that the sounds of the Egyptianlanguage were similar...
The Egyptian pyramids are ancient masonry structures located in Egypt. Sources cite at least 118 identified "Egyptian" pyramids. Approximately 80 pyramids...
evil. The reformed Egyptian calendar continues to be used in Egypt as the Coptic calendar of the Egyptian Church and by the Egyptian populace at large...
formerly belonging to the Egyptian monarchy. The division between the rural life of the villages, where the Egyptianlanguage was spoken, and the metropolis...
Ramesses II (/ˈræməsiːz, ˈræmsiːz, ˈræmziːz/; Ancient Egyptian: rꜥ-ms-sw, Rīꜥa-masē-sə, Ancient Egyptian pronunciation: [ɾiːʕamaˈseːsə]; c. 1303 BC – 1213...
and monuments, giving insight into the ancient Egyptian afterlife beliefs. The ancient Egyptianlanguage had no word for "art". Artworks served an essentially...
the Coptic language, a direct descendant of the Demotic Egyptian that was spoken in late antiquity. Following the Muslim conquest of Egypt in 639–646...
roles in different contexts. Egyptian texts refer to words 'bꜣk' and 'ḥm' that mean laborer or servant. Some Egyptianlanguage refers to slave-like people...
found in several Egyptian words, including the terms for "mirror", "floral bouquet", and "life". The symbol often appeared in Egyptian art as a physical...
Egyptian word wꜣḏ signifies blue, blue-green, and green. The first recorded use of "Egyptian blue" as a color name in English was in 1809. Egyptian blue...
in official Egyptian narratives.[citation needed] The title is reconstructed to have been pronounced *[parʕoʔ] in the Late Egyptianlanguage, from which...
Egyptian deity of the Sun. By the Fifth Dynasty, in the 25th and 24th centuries BC, he had become one of the most important gods in ancient Egyptian religion...
the king represented in the Great Sphinx of Giza, native Egyptian pharaoh Tutankhamun, Egyptian Queen Tiye, and Greek Ptolemaic queen Cleopatra VII.[citation...