DOI Seite / Zitierlink:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.3720#0213
19G HIEROGLYPHS.
only by a comparison of the three kinds of writing that he traced
the name of Ptolemy up in his own way, from the demotic into
hieratic, into hieroglyphs. His translations, however, are below
criticism, being as unfounded as those of Kircher. How far
even,in the decipherment,he proceeded correctlymaybe doubted;
but by this means he arrived at the, to him at least, important
fact, that the first hieroglyph in Ptolemy was the equivalent of
the demotic or vernacular form, and so on with the rest.1 As the
one was assumed to be phonetic, the others must be so too. The
name of Ptolemy on the Eosetta stone is written ( "{] *=||| Jl
and Young did not succeed in assigning to all the hieroglyphs
their true value. The third character he strangely supposed
superfluous; and the lion he read OLE. He selected also
from the inscriptions of the description of Egypt the name of
Berenice without the aid of any trilingual monument, and
attempted its analysis by giving what he supposed the phonetic
value of each hieroglyph. Here, also, he failed in detail.
Altogether he made out the value of five characters, but was
unable to analyse by his results more than these- two names.
All his other attempts were utterly unsuccessful; for he mis-
took Autocrator for Arsinoe, and Ccesar for JZuergetcs. On the
whole, he had some success with the interpretation of certain
groups, which he published in his vocabulary; but even here
there is much too incorrect in principle to be of real use:
much of it is beneath criticism. In this branch Young had
adopted an inductive mode of research. Following up the
whole labours of Young, neither his subsequent essay, nor the
analysis of the Eosetta inscription, nor the protocols of demotic
1 See Young (Thos.), Account of Discoveries in Hieroglyplrical Literature,
8vo, London, 1823.
2 Encyclopaedia Britannica, 4th cd. iv. 1st Part
only by a comparison of the three kinds of writing that he traced
the name of Ptolemy up in his own way, from the demotic into
hieratic, into hieroglyphs. His translations, however, are below
criticism, being as unfounded as those of Kircher. How far
even,in the decipherment,he proceeded correctlymaybe doubted;
but by this means he arrived at the, to him at least, important
fact, that the first hieroglyph in Ptolemy was the equivalent of
the demotic or vernacular form, and so on with the rest.1 As the
one was assumed to be phonetic, the others must be so too. The
name of Ptolemy on the Eosetta stone is written ( "{] *=||| Jl
and Young did not succeed in assigning to all the hieroglyphs
their true value. The third character he strangely supposed
superfluous; and the lion he read OLE. He selected also
from the inscriptions of the description of Egypt the name of
Berenice without the aid of any trilingual monument, and
attempted its analysis by giving what he supposed the phonetic
value of each hieroglyph. Here, also, he failed in detail.
Altogether he made out the value of five characters, but was
unable to analyse by his results more than these- two names.
All his other attempts were utterly unsuccessful; for he mis-
took Autocrator for Arsinoe, and Ccesar for JZuergetcs. On the
whole, he had some success with the interpretation of certain
groups, which he published in his vocabulary; but even here
there is much too incorrect in principle to be of real use:
much of it is beneath criticism. In this branch Young had
adopted an inductive mode of research. Following up the
whole labours of Young, neither his subsequent essay, nor the
analysis of the Eosetta inscription, nor the protocols of demotic
1 See Young (Thos.), Account of Discoveries in Hieroglyplrical Literature,
8vo, London, 1823.
2 Encyclopaedia Britannica, 4th cd. iv. 1st Part