DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.18088#0011
I. THE SIGN PAPYEUS.
By F. Ll. Griffith.1
This papyrus is the first native list of hiero-
glyphics that has come down to us from
ancient times. It is at once highly interest-
ing and very disappointing. It is of the
highest interest as being the only document
bearing upon the system by which the Egyp-
tians arranged and taught their huge syllabary.
It is disappointing, because we find so little
system in it. "We should have expected a more
logical arrangement of the signs, and more
method in naming them; more indication of
a fixed order in the alphabetical signs, if not
some correspondence with the order of that
alphabet which the Phoenicians seem to have
borrowed from the Egyptians. From the con-
siderable care with which the list has been
prepared, and from its extent, we must suppose
that if any rigid method was customary it
would have been adopted here; and we are
driven to conclude that the Egyptians possessed
no such system.
Apart from its value in the history of
writing, the papyrus forms a kind of dictionary
which will give the philologist valuable hints
for determining the meaning of many doubtful
words.
The collection from which it was selected for
publication by Mr. Poole—who first detected
1 This memoir was written, and the plates drawn, in
Nov. 1885. I made some additions in 1886, when my
much-regretted friend, Mr. H. T. Talbot, read through the
proofs.
the parallel lists of hieroglyphics and hieratic
on its dark pages—is a very considerable one.
Some account of the discovery and condition of
these papyri, the first obtained in the Delta,
may be interesting.
In the spring of 1884, after the survey of
the temple area at San had been completed,
Mr. Petrie turned his attention to the remains
of the town encircling it. It struck him that
those houses which had been burnt would yield
the most profitable results. In case of fire, the
owner would snatch up his valuables, leaving
the mass of the household property to the flames.
The house falling in would cover them with
rubbish, from which the unfortunate man would
not care to disinter his burnt and broken jars,
tools, and papyri. The reddened earth and
bricks betray the site to the modern explorer,
and a few days' work in the friable and easily-
searched rubbish yields him all that the fire
has spared. Putting this theory into practice,
Mr. Petrie obtained a large collection of pottery
and other antiquities, together with a number
of papyri. In some cases the documents stowed
away in a corner of the house had been damaged
beyond recovery. Lying in a basket on the
mud-floor the damp had reached them, and
with the weight of rubbish on the top, had
reduced them to a mass scarcely distinguishable
from the clay beneath ; and although the writing
was still partly legible, it was found impossible
to remove even fragments of any value. Others,
although not actually burnt, had been baked
By F. Ll. Griffith.1
This papyrus is the first native list of hiero-
glyphics that has come down to us from
ancient times. It is at once highly interest-
ing and very disappointing. It is of the
highest interest as being the only document
bearing upon the system by which the Egyp-
tians arranged and taught their huge syllabary.
It is disappointing, because we find so little
system in it. "We should have expected a more
logical arrangement of the signs, and more
method in naming them; more indication of
a fixed order in the alphabetical signs, if not
some correspondence with the order of that
alphabet which the Phoenicians seem to have
borrowed from the Egyptians. From the con-
siderable care with which the list has been
prepared, and from its extent, we must suppose
that if any rigid method was customary it
would have been adopted here; and we are
driven to conclude that the Egyptians possessed
no such system.
Apart from its value in the history of
writing, the papyrus forms a kind of dictionary
which will give the philologist valuable hints
for determining the meaning of many doubtful
words.
The collection from which it was selected for
publication by Mr. Poole—who first detected
1 This memoir was written, and the plates drawn, in
Nov. 1885. I made some additions in 1886, when my
much-regretted friend, Mr. H. T. Talbot, read through the
proofs.
the parallel lists of hieroglyphics and hieratic
on its dark pages—is a very considerable one.
Some account of the discovery and condition of
these papyri, the first obtained in the Delta,
may be interesting.
In the spring of 1884, after the survey of
the temple area at San had been completed,
Mr. Petrie turned his attention to the remains
of the town encircling it. It struck him that
those houses which had been burnt would yield
the most profitable results. In case of fire, the
owner would snatch up his valuables, leaving
the mass of the household property to the flames.
The house falling in would cover them with
rubbish, from which the unfortunate man would
not care to disinter his burnt and broken jars,
tools, and papyri. The reddened earth and
bricks betray the site to the modern explorer,
and a few days' work in the friable and easily-
searched rubbish yields him all that the fire
has spared. Putting this theory into practice,
Mr. Petrie obtained a large collection of pottery
and other antiquities, together with a number
of papyri. In some cases the documents stowed
away in a corner of the house had been damaged
beyond recovery. Lying in a basket on the
mud-floor the damp had reached them, and
with the weight of rubbish on the top, had
reduced them to a mass scarcely distinguishable
from the clay beneath ; and although the writing
was still partly legible, it was found impossible
to remove even fragments of any value. Others,
although not actually burnt, had been baked