134 ANCIENT EGYPT. 



attempts were made during the 17 th and i8th centuries to 

 translate the ancient writings, but generally with absurd 

 results, and it was reserved to Dr. Thomas Young to find a 

 key or rather clue, which, though very partial, still achieved 

 enough to make further progress comparatively easy. He 

 made the initial discovery that the characters inscribed on an 

 oval ring or cartouche represented a royal name. 



Champollion is often credited with the finding of a key, but 

 Young would seem to have been the first to lift a corner of 

 the veil, and he sent a copy of his translation of the inscription 

 on the Rosetta stone to the French savant, who sometime 

 afterwards issued a version in his own name, and with but a 

 slight acknowledgment of the labours of Dr. Young. Cham- 

 pollion, however, definitely settled the phonetic values of 

 several hieroglyphs, and saw the importance of seeking the 

 aid of Coptic, a language which he had thoroughly mastered. 

 The history of the decipherment of the hieroglyphics is a 

 long one, but I must confine my remarks this evening mainly 

 to the initial discoveries. Several letters were established by 

 comparing the three paragraphs on the tablet, which is in- 

 scribed with trilingual texts, written in hieroglyphic, demotic, 

 and Greek characters; and the Greek version of the text 

 served as a translation of the other two writings, at least of 

 the demotic, which section is entire, and of the hieroglyphic 

 part of the inscription left on the stone, for it is a piece of the 

 latter that has been broken off. In 1866 another stone was found 

 with the inscription complete. The word Ptolemaos occurs 

 several times in the paragraph written in Greek on the Rosetta 

 stone, and on the small obelisk at Philae, from which Cham- 

 pollion obtained a few more alphabetic signs to add to those 

 yielded by the Rosetta stone. First the letters P, T, O, L 

 were traced through the other two writings, and a comparison 

 of the cartouche of Ptolemy with that of Cleopatra, in which 

 these letters also appear, definitely established them both in 

 hieroglyphic and demotic ; and with such a beginning you will 

 readily understand that the discovery of the whole alphabet 

 was merely a matter of time, comparison, and industry. 



