Hieroglyphics, << `hy` uhr uh GLIHF ihks, >> is a form of writing in which picture symbols represent ideas and sounds. The word hieroglyphics comes from two Greek words that mean sacred carving. Hieroglyphics usually refers to the writing of ancient Egypt. However, forms of picture writing were used in other ancient cultures as well, notably by the Hittites, who lived in the region that is now Turkey, and by the Maya and Aztec Indians of Central America.
The ancient Egyptians used hieroglyphic writing for more than 3,000 years. They used hieroglyphic writing primarily for religious inscriptions on temples and stone monuments and to record the words and deeds of royalty. In fact, the Egyptians called their writing the words of God. The inscriptions were written or carved by highly trained men who were called scribes.
After the A.D. 300’s, the Egyptians replaced their other forms of writing with a simpler alphabet that was borrowed mainly from Greek. Knowledge of the meaning of hieroglyphic symbols was soon lost and remained a mystery until the early 1800’s, when scholars deciphered the writing.
Development of hieroglyphic writing.
The ancient Egyptians borrowed the idea of hieroglyphic writing from Mesopotamia about 3000 B.C. Egyptian hieroglyphics generally included about 800 symbols. However, by about 300 B.C., there were more than 6,000 symbols. The symbols have the elegant, stiff quality typical of ancient Egyptian art.
The earliest hieroglyphs (symbols) contained many pictorial characters known as pictograms, pictographs, or ideograms. These characters were literal representations of ideas. For example, Egyptians who wished to express the idea of a woman drew a picture of a woman.
The earliest writings of the Egyptians also included phonetic hieroglyphs, also called phonograms. Such hieroglyphs, like the characters of modern alphabets, represented the sounds of the language. Some represented only one sound. Others represented combinations of two or three sounds that formed syllables. But the phonetic symbols represented only the sounds of consonants. The Egyptians did not write the vowels. Thus, scholars remain unsure of how the ancient Egyptian language was pronounced.
Egyptian hieroglyphs included determinatives. Determinatives indicated the class of object to which the preceding hieroglyphs belonged. An example of a determinative might be the symbol for water placed after the name of a specific lake. Such symbols helped explain and emphasize the meaning of other hieroglyphs.
Some hieroglyphic texts are read from right to left and others from left to right, depending on the direction the hieroglyphs face. Scribes also wrote in columns, which were read from top to bottom. Hieroglyphs often served as decoration. Sometimes, the symbols were painted with brilliant colors or covered with gold.
As writing became more common, the need developed for a material that was easier than stone to write on, store, and transport. For this purpose, the Egyptians invented papyrus, a paperlike material made from a reed plant. Scribes wrote on papyrus with brushes made of reeds. The tips of the reeds were softened and shaped into a point. Soot mixed with water served as ink.
The Egyptians used this simplified cursive (connected) script called hieratic writing for writing quickly on papyrus. Hieratic writing resembled hieroglyphic writing in much the same way that modern longhand resembles printing. Scribes used hieratic script for both religious and nonreligious purposes.
Later, about 700 B.C., a script called demotic became popular. It was simpler and could be written faster than hieratic writing. Scribes also used the script for correspondence and record-keeping. Demotic writing was widely used for about 1,000 years.
Deciphering hieroglyphic writing.
The Egyptians eventually stopped using their own writing systems, replacing them with an essentially Greek alphabet. The phonetic values and other uses of the hieroglyphs were forgotten. People came to believe that the hieroglyphs really represented a secret and magical code used by Egyptian priests.
In 1799, a French officer in the army of Napoleon I discovered a stone tablet near the mouth of the Nile River near Rosetta, Egypt. The tablet, named the Rosetta stone, carried an inscription in three scripts–Egyptian hieroglyphic, Egyptian demotic, and Greek. By reading the Greek portion of the stone, scholars learned that the text consisted of a decree, issued in 196 B.C., honoring King Ptolemy V.
Scholars attempted to translate the Egyptian script using methods that were similar to modern cryptography. In 1814, Thomas Young, an English physician and scholar, discovered that some hieroglyphics were phonetic signs. In addition, scholars learned that hieroglyphs enclosed in an oval ring, called a cartouche, represented names of individuals.
In 1822, a French scholar named Jean Francois Champollion achieved a breakthrough in deciphering the hieroglyphs of the Rosetta stone. By studying the position and repetition of proper names in the Greek script, he picked out the same names in the Egyptian scripts. In addition, Champollion’s knowledge of Coptic, the last stage of the ancient Egyptian language written with mostly Greek letters, helped him recognize many ancient Egyptian words in the hieroglyphic part of the text. Eventually, he deciphered the entire text.
Today, grammars and dictionaries enable scholars to read Egyptian hieroglyphic writing easily. Knowledge of ancient Egyptian history would be nearly impossible to obtain without the ability to read hieroglyphics.
Other hieroglyphic writing.
In Central America, the earliest examples of Maya hieroglyphs date from about A.D. 250. Maya hieroglyphs consisted of a combination of ideograms that represented entire ideas or words and phonetic hieroglyphs that represented syllables. The Maya carved hieroglyphs on buildings and on large stone monuments called stelae. These carvings frequently recorded important historical events in the lives of Maya rulers. In addition, the Maya painted hieroglyphs on pottery and wrote on paper made from fig tree bark. The Maya are the only ancient American people known to have developed a writing system that could express all the words in their language.
Aztec hieroglyphs consisted of pictographs, which also had a phonetic value. The Aztec combined the symbols of several objects to form the sound or name of an object or abstract idea not represented by a pictograph. These symbols resemble rebus writing (see Rebus ). 
The Hittites developed a hieroglyphic writing system about 1500 B.C. Some Hittite symbols represented words. Others represented phonetic syllables.
