The ancient Egyptian text was suddenly deciphered, must it be a forgery? Learn about the Rosetta Stone

I believe many people have heard such a rumor: Ancient Egyptian culture was forged by Westerners. If you don’t believe it, just look at the ancient Egyptian writing. How come such a mess was suddenly deciphered? Ancient Egyptian Writing Yes, it is indeed very, very difficult to decipher a lost writing, especially the confusing Ancient Egyptian writing. Europeans who are accustomed to alphabetic writing were really confused when they first encountered ancient Egyptian writing. They could only judge with normal thinking: these fancy writing must be "" hieroglyphics". Based on the appearance of the characters, they can Guess the meaning... For example, those birds that can be recognized at a glance must be related to birds; different character shapes must represent what they do or their identities; there are also snakes, "" ropes", and "" crutches" Wait, the images are all very clear... Yes, at the beginning, the Europeans did think so, so they made blind guesses at the ancient Egyptian characters. As a result, they were completely unable to understand what these strange symbols were put together. Meaning. Year after year, the mysterious ancient Egyptian text remained undecipherable until 1799, when things took a huge turn. A French expeditionary force officer in the Rosetta area of ??Egypt. , a black basalt stone tablet was discovered, with three paragraphs of text engraved on it. The first paragraph is ancient Egyptian text, the second paragraph is ancient Egyptian popular text, and the third paragraph is ancient Greek... Suppose you are squatting in a shopping mall. When I was in the toilet, I suddenly found a piece of paper taped next to me. There were three lines of text on it. The last line was written in Chinese: "" Come in a hurry, go in a rush! ” Do you think so: Ouch, this shopping mall has become old and fashionable, and you need to write a slogan in three languages... Yes, Europeans also quickly realized that the three paragraphs of text on this stone tablet are very... It may be recording the same thing. Since ancient Greek can be understood, wouldn't it be a matter of minutes to decipher the ancient Egyptian text? European scholars in the early 19th century were enjoying the huge benefits brought by colonial expansion. They are keen on all kinds of novel things. If they can decipher the ancient Egyptian text, they will definitely gain fame and fortune. Therefore, scholars from all walks of life have taken action and studied the three sections of the Rosetta Stone. Facts have proved that even with "" bilingual comparison", it is still difficult to understand those strange symbols in ancient Egypt. Therefore, this famous Rosetta Stone lies quietly in the British Museum, receiving countless Researchers. More than ten years have passed, and experts from all walks of life are still unable to do anything... Therefore, it is really not that easy to crack the text, even with the ""golden key"" Rosetta The stone tablet is not of much use. However, there is still some progress in the deciphering work, because there is a prodigy in this world. Thomas Young, the British doctor and physicist, was the one who came up with the "" double-slit interference experiment. "A magical figure who achieved certain results in deciphering ancient Egyptian texts. According to legend, Thomas Young began reading at the age of two, mastered Latin, Greek and Italian by the age of 13, and was able to make telescopes and Microscopes and other instruments; around the age of 20, he began to study Hebrew, Japanese, and Persian... We don't understand the world of child prodigies. In short, this person is very unusual. Thomas Young relies on his language talent. After studying day and night, some letters were indeed deciphered. However, because the stele was incomplete and the expeditionary force could not understand the ancient Egyptian writing, there were some errors in the copied symbols. Therefore, Thomas Young could not obtain it anyway. Greater progress... Champollion At the same time, another young genius in France, Jean Fran?ois Champollion, completely broke the embarrassing situation compared with Thomas Young. He can definitely be called a child prodigy. This handsome boy, who was born in 1790, learned Latin, ancient Greek, Hebrew, French, etc. with the help of his elder brother since he was a child. Later, in order to decipher ancient Egypt, He also learned Chinese... In short, this young genius learned things very quickly, so that at the age of 19, he became an assistant professor of ancient history at a university founded by Napoleon. He became a professor at the university at the age of 20, and he was a genius. The young Champollion decided to decipher ancient Egyptian writing. After all, he had a talent for languages, and he might succeed if he worked hard.

The name of the Pharaoh was circled. Of course, due to the political turmoil in France at that time, Champollion wandered for a while, and there was no major progress in the study of ancient Egyptian writing. It was not until 1821, when Champollion returned to Paris to join his brother that he stabilized and continued his research. The easiest thing to judge about ancient Egyptian writing is the name of the pharaoh. Because their names are surrounded by an oval frame, they are very easy to identify. Researchers have gradually mastered how to write some pharaohs' names by comparing them with ancient Egyptian texts. Champollion took this as a breakthrough and decided to boldly try new ideas. Before that, he had always thought that ancient Egyptian characters were "" ideographic," which meant that each Egyptian character was independent and had its own separate meaning. For example, the shape of a bird might represent " "flying" " means. Now, he changed his mind and found the names of two famous pharaohs: Ptolemy (Ptolmes) and Cleopatra (Cleopatra). Champollion thought this way: Because these two are both When the descendants of the Greeks recorded their names in ancient Egyptian writing, they might use symbols to correspond to each letter. Look at the two names above, which have p, o, l, and t. Do they really correspond in ancient Egyptian writing? What about the characters of . However, this little problem didn't matter. Champollion followed this idea and continued to study the names of the Egyptian pharaohs until September 14, 1822, when a French architect friend named Jean-Nicolas Huyot. Because he was exploring Egypt, he sent some information he found. He found the name of an unknown pharaoh, so he quickly tried to decipher it through the symbols he had deciphered before. Finally, he recognized it. This pharaoh: Ramses. This is a historical discovery. Ramses was not a pharaoh during the Greek or Roman rule, but an authentic ancient Egyptian. This means: when the Egyptians wrote the name of the pharaoh. , are all spelled out with hieroglyphs through " " pinyin". In other words, Egyptian hieroglyphs are not " " pictographs", but more like a phonetic script - a symbol represents a kind of Pronunciation. On September 27, 1822, Champollion announced his discovery at the French Academy, which shocked many scholars. After more than 10 years of research, he finally made progress in the comparison of ancient Egyptian texts. After researching other materials, Champollion discovered that ancient Egyptian writing was actually a complex system that integrated phonetics and meanings. Some symbols represented sounds and some represented meanings... In 1828, Champollion raised a sum of funds and finally arrived in Egypt, he conducted fieldwork and research to further enrich his theory. However, after he returned in 1832, he suffered a stroke due to long-term fatigue and physical weakness. His efforts enabled researchers to understand most of ancient Egypt. Writing, later generations of scholars finally had a strong foundation for their research on ancient Egyptian civilization. Therefore, the deciphering of ancient Egyptian writing did not happen "suddenly". From the discovery of the Rosetta Stone in 1799 to the Shang Dynasty in 1822. Bo Liang announced his discovery, and countless researchers put in a lot of effort...