EULOGY ON THOMAS YOUNG. 129 



he was making near Eosetta a large stone covered with inscriptions in 

 three kinds of characters quite distinct. 



One of the series of chiirocters was Greek. This, in spite of some 

 mutihitions, made clearly known that the authors of the monument had 

 ordained that the same inscription should be traced in three different 

 sorts of characters, viz, in the sacred characters or Egyptian hieroglyph- 

 ics, in the local or vulgar characters, and in Greek. Thus, by an unex- 

 pected good fortune, the philologists found themselves in possession of 

 a Greek text, having also before them its translation into the Egyptian 

 language, or at least a transcription in two sorts of characters anciently 

 in use on the banks of tlie Isile. 



This Eosetta stone, since so celebrated, and which M. Boussard pre- 

 sented to the Institute of Cairo, was taken from that body at the period 

 when the French army evacuated Egypt. It was preserved, however, 

 in the British Museum, where it figured, as Thomas Young said, as a 

 monument of British valor. Putting valor out of the question, the cele- 

 brated philosopher might have added, without too much partiality, that 

 this invaluable trilingual monument thus bears some witness to the 

 advanced views which guided all the details of the memorable expedition 

 into Egypt, as also to the indefatigable zeal of the distinguished savants 

 whose labors, often carried on nnder the fire of the forts, have added so 

 much to the glory of their country. The importance of the Eosetta 

 stone struck them, in fact, so forcibly, that, in order not to abandon 

 this precious treasure to the adventurous chances of a sea voyage, they 

 earnestly applied themselves, from the first, to reproduce it by copies, 

 by impressions taken in the way of printing from engravings, by molds 

 in plaster or sulphur. We must add that antiquaries of all countries 

 became first acquainted with the Eosetta stone from the designs given 

 by the French savants. 



One of the most illustrious members of the institute, M. Silvestre de 

 Sacy, entered first in 1802 on the career which the trilingual inscription 

 opened to the investigations of philologists. He only occupied himself 

 on the Egyptian text in common characters. lie there discovered the 

 groups which represent the different proper names, and their phonetic 

 nature. Thus, in one of two inscriptions, at least, the Egyptians had 

 the signs of sounds, or true letters. This important result found no 

 opponents after a Swedish man of science, M. Akerblad, in completing 

 the labors of our fellow-countryman, had assigned, with a probability 

 bordering on certainty, the phonetic value of each of the different char- 

 acters employed in the transcription of the proper names which the 

 Greek text disclosed. There remained all along the purely hieroglyphic 

 part of the inscription, or what was supposed such ; this remained un- 

 touched ; no one had ventured to attempt to decipher it. It is here 

 that we find Young declaring, as if by a species of inspiration, that in 

 the multitude of sculptured signs on the stone representing either entire 

 animals, or fantastic forms, or again instruments, products of art, or 

 geometrical forms, those of these signs which were found inclosed in 

 elliptic borders corresponded to the proper names in the Greek iuscrip- 

 tion, in particular to the name of Ptolemy, the only one which in the 

 hieroglyi)hic inscription remains uninjured. Immediately afterward 

 Young said that in the special case of the border or scroll, the signs 

 included represented no longer ideas, but sounds. In a word, he sougijt 

 by a minute and refined analysis to assign an individual hieroglyphic 

 to each of the sounds which the ear receives in the name of Ptolemy in 

 the Eosetta stone, and in that of Berenice in another monument. Thua^ 

 •^•e see, unless I mistake, in the researches of Young on the graphic sya- 

 9s 



