A lot of the time, the pieces that catch my eye in the museums are the unassuming limestone 𓇋𓈖𓈙𓌉 fragments that contain colorful hieroglyphs 𓊹𓌃𓏪. Once upon a time, most Egyptian reliefs were as colorful as this piece, however with the passage of time, most of the colors faded. It’s so cool to almost catch a glimpse of what the colors were like thousands 𓏲𓏲𓏲 of years ago!
Let’s read some (very fragmented) hieroglyphs 𓊹𓌃𓏪 – or at least examine the symbols that we can! We are going to start from the left, since the symbols are pointing to the left!
𓁟 – the “ibis headed god” symbol is both an ideogram and determinative for “Thoth” and is associated with the sound “ḏḥwtj.”
𓎟 – the “basket 𓎟” symbol is a biliteral phonogram that has the sound “nb” (pronounced like “neb”). Can be used to represent the words Lord, All, Every, and many others!
𓊹𓉼 – This word means “Great God.” “𓊹” is the triliteral symbol for God and has the sound “ntr” which would be pronounced like “neter.” “𓉼” is the symbol for “Great,” which is a biliteral phonogram and has the sound of “ˁ3” which would be pronounced like “ah.”
𓂧𓏏𓏥 – the first symbol 𓂧 looks like the uniliteral phonogram “d,” the second symbol 𓏏 is the uniliteral phonogram “t” and then the third symbol 𓏦 is the “three strokes” symbol which can be used to make a word plural, but can also mean they, them, their, of, three, and much more. This word might mean “hands,” or “handful,” but I don’t have a full inscription so I don’t know!
𓎛𓏭𓅱 – this word means “would that” or “please” and can also be written as “𓎛𓅱𓏭.” It is associated with the sound “hwy.”
𓀭𓀭 – the “seated god” symbol acts as a determinative for the words God or King, and can even be used as the pronoun “I” when the God or King is speaking!
𓏃 – the “water jars in a rack 𓏃” symbol is most commonly used as a triliteral phonogram, and is associated with the sound ḫnt. This symbol usually is used for the prepositional phrase “In Front Of” but can also be used to mean “First.”
This relief is from an 18th-19th Dynasty tomb wall. The 18th-19th Dynasty was part of the New Kingdom Period of ancient Egypt, and is my favorite time period to study!