Wilkinson, John Gardner; Birch, Samuel [Contr.]: The Egyptians in the time of the pharaohs: being a companion to the Crystal Palace Egyptian collections (London, 1857)

SYLLABLES ENDING IN CONSONANTS.

237

that of h and sh often represented by the same hieroglyph.
This alphabet was of universal application, appearing through-
out all the successive periods of the monarchy ; and the fifteen
letters of which it is composed may be considered the remains
of the original sounds used by the inhabitants of the Nile.1
It was, however, not the entire phonetic system in use,
because coeval with it another syllabarium was employed, which
consisted—

1. Of syllables consisting of an initial vowel and a con-
sonant.

2. Syllables composed of two consonants.

It has been already shown how certain syllables had hiero-
glyphs of their final sounds attached to them, in order to aid
the memory in keeping their true sound; but there was also
another principle in use even for the universal syllables : some-
times the initial sound was expressed before it by a hieroglyph
having the same value ; thus—

Xk"

was written

aWpA

H su

\\\ &U i

IV kha

J)

@<1\ KHkhA'i
Q A ^V kh A



Here by casting the eye on the table it will be at once evident
that pa is =pupu, su is = su su, and leha = Mii, Ma, Mia. This mode

1 Bunsen, Egypt's Place, p. 554 ; Lepsius, Lettre, 1. c.; Dr. Hincks, on the
Power of tlie Alphabet, 1. c.