AEL - Grammar Reference Database

Grammar Reference Database

Index
Introduction
Database of references to the Westcar Papyrus
Database of references to the Shipwrecked Sailor
Database of references to the Story of Sinuhe

References

Introduction

This is intended for all students of Egyptian grammar. The motivation behind its creation is to offer additional assistance to those who are studying on their own and maybe don't have access to a teacher of ancient Egyptian.

In Latin and Greek, I use, like everyone, commentaries where the commentator takes it as part of the job to explain interesting or difficult grammatical points. Such commentaries tend to be rare for Egyptian, apparently. One unfortunate effect is that Gardiner's extraordinary range of references is underused, almost inaccessible to an undirected student. I have had considerable fun going through Gardiner, reading mainly the margins, and finding answers to problems which I couldn't solve when I was reading the Egyptian. For example, if you were puzzled, by the colophon to Sh. S., would you think of looking it up under Virtual noun clauses as predicate with pw as subject? I doubt it. I am aware of course that thinking about the Egyptian verbal system, particularly, has moved on since Gardiner, but it remains a core textbook, mainly because of its wealth of references, to be combined with more modern grammars, as here.

In Column 1 I have given an abbrieviation to indicate the grammar where the quoted phrase is referenced. These are indicated as follows:

EG	Gardiner's Egyptian Grammar
JPA	J.P.Allen, Middle Egyptian
AL	A.Loprieno, Ancient Egyptian
MAC	M.A.Collier, Middle Egyptian Course 1995-96 *

* An undergraduate course-book, not formally published. However there are quite a few around now, and we all hope it will be published in due course.

Under Topic I have summarised the grammatical topic under which the reference is filed in the grammar.

As for Transliteration, the different authors transliterate systematically differently. I have made some decisions across the board.

I use i, not j.
I use = before suffix pronouns.
I don't put a . before number/gender endings.
I use s for both s and z.

There are also other systematic differences between authors, for example: The tyw bird (Gardiner G4) is tiw in Allen and tw in Collier; in fact Allen does not write y unless he sees two flowering reeds, as far as I can see. Not even for nisbes, not for two oblique strokes either. rdi is rDi for Loprieno and rd for Collier. I have retained these and some other idiosyncrasies.

Under Translation, Gardiner tends to give several examples for a single point, and translates only the first. I have given translations for the others, often using Parkinson or Lichtheim, but occasionally making alterations to stress a grammatical point. For the other three grammars I have in general used the authors' translations.

The first two databases, the Shipwrecked Sailor and Westcar, are now available. If this is thought to be a useful exercise, the Eloquent Peasant and Sinuhe, which will be much bigger files, will come out in 2006.

[UPDATE March 2007: The database for the Story of Sinuhe is now available.]

I shall be interested in any reactions, comments, criticism or advice.

With best wishes, Ken Saunders February 23rd 2005