Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 12:11:20 +1300 Subject: Re: AEL Dynasty 18 Pens with Brass Nibs From: Teresa Ronayne To: Ancient Egyptian Language List I'm left-handed and there is *absolutely *no way I could write with those pens - or, in fact, any of the various scribal equipment. I wonder if there actually were left-handed scribes back then! Teresa On Sun, Mar 7, 2010 at 3:53 PM, sonofthemummy wrote: > > http://www.abdn.ac.uk/virtualmuseum/index.php?page=object_detail&prefix=ABDUA&num=24269&firstview=true&mt=&sign=&viewnumber=&resultsperpage=9 > > Hi; > Does anyone know more about this kind of equipment? I have long suspected > that the scribe of the House of Life had special tools, from the look of the > illuminated papyri. But, I never suspected that they had brass nibbed pens. > > Bob ============================================================================== Date: Mon, 8 Mar 2010 00:25:36 -0800 (PST) From: sonofthemummy Subject: Re: AEL Dynasty 19 Pens with Bronze Nibs To: Ancient Egyptian Language List Thanks; I rather surmised that the museum, with such a unique object that was not previously more widely publicized, may have simply used "brass" instead of "bronze", until the object receives more careful scrutiny and contextual analysis. I took a magnified look at the image, and it seems that these tools may function more along the lines of tiny palette knives than pens, depending upon whether the tips are bifurcated. But, I have never before seen a kit that would have been used by an artist-scribe to work fine polychrome images. The brushes I have seen in collections, previously, seem to be too coarse to have been used in such fine work as we see in certain BD copies. Bob ============================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 09:30:22 -0800 (PST) From: sonofthemummy Subject: Re: AEL Dynasty 18 Pens with Brass Nibs To: Ancient Egyptian Language List --- On Sun, 3/7/10, Rob Persson wrote:A great outline of this is by Jack Ogden in Nicholson and Shaw's /Ancient Egyptian Materials and Technology/. PS; I was recently looking at this book, and there is a new one coming out by Shaw on similar subjects, soon. Yet, we still find in the section that mentions the dynastic writing tool the words, "like a brush" or something like that. So I'm thinking, yeah, in the case of these ancient manga pens, a brush that is sharp and made of metal. I know we need a solid grounding in all the chemical concerns of archaeology to establish provenance in time and space. But, putting human creativity into context ultimately requires an effort more along the lines of Schama and Spivey. But before we can do that with Egyptian script, I would love to see more scholars compare and contrast the linear glyphs (written with a brush in wax-based paint on gessoed wood) with the written glyphs (written with carbon/gum ink with a rush marker on papyrus or bare wood). I mean, it is interesting to get endless views of the intellectual adventure of the modern man looking back at Egypt. But, when do we get a better view of the actual intellectual adventure of the literate and artistically able Egyptians, themselves? As long as people keep looking at manuscripts that may well have been worked with a metal tool and keep reciting "brush", it makes me wonder when looking will somehow become seeing. Bob ============================================================================== Date: Tue, 9 Mar 2010 21:55:16 -0800 (PST) From: Neoklis Kyriazis Subject: AEL Colored and outline hieroglyphs To: AEL List Hi all, I have recently uploaded a set of colored and outline hieroglyph images, in both PNG and SVG format, to my website: http://www.qsl.net/5b4az/pages/egypt.html and http://5b4az.chronos.org.uk/pages/egypt.html The outline images are in "normal" and "bold" weights suitable for convertion to TTF font files. The hieroglyphs in this collection are those of the Gardiner list + the additional hieroglyphs suggested in the NewGardiner font by Mark-Jan Nederhof. They were all originally extracted as individual images from the fine Aegyptus.otf font file and then edited in the Gimp image editor to make the outlines more uniform and to add color. I would like to try and convert the SVG format hieroglyphs to a TTF font file so they may be used in an editor like JSesh, however I don't really know how. I have heard that the "fontforge" software can be used to do this but I don't know how to write the necessary scripts to do this. I wonder if anyone could kindly help me with this by providing me with scripts etc (for the Linux platform) to merge the SVG outlines to the TTF font file. My thanks in advance. Regards Neoklis Ham Radio Call: 5B4AZ QTH: KM64MR ============================================================================== To: AEgyptian-L@rostau.org.uk Subject: Re: AEL Dynasty 18 Pens with Brass Nibs Date: Tue, 09 Mar 2010 14:15:35 -0500 From: ahatnakht@aol.com As long as people keep looking at manuscripts that may well have been work= ed with a metal tool and keep reciting "brush", it makes me wonder when lo= oking will somehow become seeing. Bob Bob, A couple of years ago I had a conversation with a calligraphist (whose nam= e I have, unfortunately, forgotten), who was experimenting with hieratic= writing on papyrus. His opinion was that there was no way that papyri= were written with "brushes" - he said the ink flow and therefore appearan= ce of the writing would have been totally different. As far as I recall= he was thinking more along the lines of a sharp, flat reed nib (like a qu= ill). I suppose this may well have been the cheap option for scribes who= couldn't afford those metal nibs! Tilly ============================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 17:46:57 +0100 (CET) From: "omezzab@tin.it" To: AEgyptian-L@rostau.org.uk Subject: AEL last line of Amenemhat's teachings Dear AEL members, I am trying to get some sense out of the last line of The Teaching of King Amenemhat I. The Sallier II. source gives a complete line (I follow Wolfgang Helck's transcription published by Otto Harrassowitz), which runs like this: Hr-nty nn mr.n=f sw r-gs Hm=f a.w.s. (Helck amends it and gives: Hr-ntt n mr.n=i st r-gs Hm=k a.w.s. using the first part of Sallier II. [and reads "n" (D35 / negation) instead of "nn" ] and the last part of Deir-el-Medineh 1093 [reading "sw" as "st"] and translates it: "weil ich nicht wuensche, dass sie [Menschen - of previous line] in der Umgebung deiner Majestaet sein" [since I do not wish that they stand besides your Majesty] ) If I stick to Sallier II. is it correct to translate it as: " since there is none who loves the Majesty besides whom he stands " ? Meaning "there is no trustworthy courtier". Where "mr.n =f" is seen as a noun (one who does not love) doubling the negative "nn sw". Or could "nn mr.n =f sw" be a negated perfect, where "sw" anticipates "Hm = f" ? (n mr.n =f should be better, but Allen says a form "nn sDm.n =f" may be found as well) I am a little bit confused. There are other translations, but they seem quite puzzling to me. http://www.digytalegypt.ucl.ac.uk gives this: (Hr-ntt nn mr.n.f sw r-gs Hm.f anx wDA snb ) "For there is none I (?) love beside your (?) Agency" [their question marks] [but where does "I" come from? Probably should be "mr.n =i"] [and "Agency" ??? - is it a typo? ] R.B. Parkinson translates: "for you loved him beside your Majesty" and that's really hard to follow. But since I don't have his transliteration I stick to Wittgenstein (Tractatus .7): "Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darueber muss man schweigen." [which sounds quite Egyptian in its "three-tempoed" measure! :)) ] Any help will be highly appreciated. Thank you Orlando Mezzabotta ============================================================================== Date: Wed, 10 Mar 2010 13:29:46 -0800 (PST) From: sonofthemummy Subject: Re: AEL Dynasty 18 Pens with Brass Nibs To: Ancient Egyptian Language List --- On Tue, 3/9/10, ahatnakht@aol.com wrote: Bob, A couple of years ago I had a conversation with a calligraphist (whose name I have, unfortunately, forgotten), who was experimenting with hieratic writing on papyrus. His opinion was that there was no way that papyri were written with "brushes" - he said the ink flow and therefore appearance of the writing would have been totally different. As far as I recall he was thinking more along the lines of a sharp, flat reed nib (like a quill). I suppose this may well have been the cheap option for scribes who couldn't afford those metal nibs! Tilly == Hi; I am really grateful for these words because they are a more succinct and articulate expression of what I have been muddling on about. Yeah, I have seen later BD copies in hieratic where the ratio of thin and thick lines clearly indicates a tool trimmed somewhat like a modern qalam. The script is very regular, and the effect is pretty dramatic. Dr. Gosline uses a brush (I think), but he teaches in China and has broken hieratic down into like 12 linear and 12 curved sub-components for digital reduction. So, I think he is possibly using modern methods to broaden his analysis. When I write Egyptian, I use something like a Roman Period reed, which didn't appear until Persian times. It's just easier for my conditioned hand to work with than a slim little rush. I have come across one calligraphist who works in hieratic, but his is in Germany and I don't think he really speaks much English, so I am out of luck, there. Recently, a lot more high resolution photos of both papyri and aryw have become available. One gsty in Tut's collection clearly contains an ary with a cleanly beveled nib, so I am hoping that the rushes in the pic are native to the kit. I am by no means certain that the bronze pens in the Aberdeen collection were used to form glyphs. But they were evidently used to apply color in a more precise way. So, I am thinking that some BD scribes may have used bronze nibs for the calligraphy, itself. And, when it comes to left handed scribes, I think a brush might have been used. There are a few examples of softer edged calligraphy on papyri, but not a huge proportion, from what I have thus seen. Sincerely, Bob ==============================================================================