Date: Mon, 3 Sep 2001 16:19:47 +0200 (MET DST) From: Mark-Jan Nederhof Subject: AEL translation To: AEgyptian-L@rostau.demon.co.uk Dear Dr. Allen, Thank you very much for your lengthy and enlightening explanation of five principles that play a role in translation, in your posting on the AEL list from August 27th. I found this very well motivated, and you seem to have captured very well some common intuitions about the requirements that a good translation should satisfy. I have a few remarks: > First, a single Egyptian lexeme (dictionary entry) should always be > translated by a single English lexeme, insofar as possible. For example, > jj/jw as "come" and jnj as "get" or "fetch": thus, j.n.f jn.n.f nbw "he came > back having gotten gold" rather than the looser "he returned bringing gold." I found it remarkable that as the most preferable translation you did not propose the most literal one, which is "he came back after he had gotten gold". What this seems to indicate is that some lexemes are less important than others. In this case, having the pronoun "he" once or twice in the translation seems to be such a minor difference for English that we are often not even aware that there is any change at all with regard to the lexemes in the original. Note also that the translation above requires insertion of "after", which strictly speaking does not correspond to a lexeme in the original, a fact that will probably bother no one, since this is related to a typical difference between Egyptian and English. > [...] movie [...] Movies and movie titles seem to be on the far side of the spectrum of free versus literal translation. One can often observe that say puns, or other language-specific expressions that cannot be translated literally, are replaced in subtitles by other puns that may have nothing in common with the original other than that they are both (hopefully) funny. This is of course understandable from the perspective that the purpose of movies is foremost to entertain; the accurate rendering of the original text to a foreign audience is of secondary imporance. I wonder however whether similar treatment of puns and other untranslatable text would be considered to be allowable for translations from Egyptian, even if these translations are not intended solely for a scholarly audience. Would it in such a case not be preferable to translate a phrase literally, and then to add a footnote explaining the wordplay? However, I can well imagine that footnotes carry in them the danger that the translator will use them to escape from the obligation to *translate* in the strictest sense of the word, and will instead give lengthy comments on the meaning of Egyptian phrases in footnotes. Translations with too many footnotes also become tedious to read. Furthermore, the availability of footnotes amounts to yet another parameter of translation, next to the already difficult choice of how literal or how free the translation should be. Best regards, Mark-Jan ============================================================================== From: "James P. Allen" To: AEgyptian-L@rostau.demon.co.uk Subject: AEL Feminine endings/pronouns Date: Mon, 3 Sep 2001 09:19:58 -0400 I thank Aayko and Jerome Colburn for their considered responses to my posting about feminine endings, and I assure the latter that I did not take offense at his initial response. With regard to the origin of Neith, as Aayko guessed, I did not mean to suggest that njtj (in njtj-mry = Merineith) was in fact a masculine nisbe, only that it looked like one, and that given the fact that Neith is feminine the final dual-strokes *may* have represented a vocalic ending, from original *njtt, rather than the ending of a true masculine nisbe. I think it's possible for Greek NEith to come from an original njtt = *nIyti(t) or *nUyti(t) (capital letters representing stressed vowels), just as Coptic thAut "Thoth" comes from original DHwtj = *DHAwti. Despite the fact that one is feminine and the other masculine, both have the same phonological sequence of stressed vowel-semivowel-t-unstressed vowel (i), and I suspect this feature was the governing one, overriding the normal distinction between masculine and feminine endings. Interestingly, Greek -mouthis "Mut" suggests a similar sequence, since mjwt "mother" is Coptic maau < *mu?we(t): i.e., perhaps mjwtt "the motherly one" = *mu?Uwti(t). It's true that feminine nisbes regularly have final unstressed -e in Coptic, but there are exceptions: embO/mbO "Ombos" < nbwt = *nvbAwi(t) "the golden", arshAn "lentigo" < *'arshInye (feminine nisbe of arSnj "lentil" > arshIn). < ?te is a (purely) phonological process, you would have to show that ?? > ?te in other environments where there was no 2nd feminine suffix pronoun involved and where neither of the two glottal stops involved originated from t or T.>> I don't this is necessarily a counter-argument. Note, for example, the exceptional vocalizations of th in some English dialects: muvver (mother) and bruvver (brother), but fadder (father) rather than *favver. Cases like taate actually follow the same principle as in hOOte and kaate: djt.k = *dIytek > *dI?tek > *dI??ek > taak; thus, djt.T > *dI??e > taate (for *taa?e). In other words, I'm arguing that 2fs *-vT/-vt > -e is apparently an inflexible rule in Egyptian > Coptic (as also for the feminine ending *-vt > -e), and that the occasional 2fs -te after vv in Coptic actually represents a secondary vocalization of 2fs -e where this follows a final stressed double vowel: i.e., thus, hOOte < *hOO-e, kaate < *kaa-e, and taate < *taa-e. The t in such cases has nothing to do with the original feminine morpheme t; instead, it's epenthetic, like the b in English nimble (< Middle English nimel). Interestingly, the original feminine t itself may also have been epenthetic: there are reasons to believe that the original morphological marker of feminine nouns was a final vocalic *-a, and that the t arose from the hiatus between this ending and the original case endings: e.g., snt "sister" = (nominative) *sana-u > *sanatu > *sanat (when the case endings were lost). A similar argument has been made for Akkadian. James P. Allen, Curator Department of Egyptian Art Metropolitan Museum of Art ============================================================================== Date: Tue, 4 Sep 2001 09:55:23 -0700 (PDT) From: Raven Morgan Leigh Subject: AEL Hello, I am new here.. To: AEgyptian-L@rostau.demon.co.uk ...And I am a rank beginner. I look forward to learning from all of you-- I can see that I'm a bit out of my depth; I don't even understand the terminology used in linguistics.. could someone direct me to a source to learn? Thanks, Raven ============================================================================== Date: Tue, 4 Sep 2001 11:08:52 +0800 To: Ancient Egyptian Language List From: Rose Subject: Re: AEL Hello, I am new here.. Well, I'm new here also, so you're not alone. I just started with the Collier and Manley book, and I'm currently at the end of chapter one. I was wondering if somebody could give me some advice. Should I memorize words in their transliterated or hieroglyphic form? Or does it matter? Also, what syllable of the word does the stress go on? Does anybody know/care? --Rose rhinemouse@att.net ============================================================================== From: "Patrick Hurley" To: "Ancient Egyptian Language List" Subject: Re: AEL heiroglyphic font Date: Tue, 4 Sep 2001 15:42:55 -0400 I thank all of you for the input on the heiroglyphic font! I think I will take a look at Wynglyph and see how it works. Thanks again! Donna Hurley p.s. for those that did not get my intro letter, I would like to introduce myself. I am a new member to the list, and I am interested in learning heiroglyphic writings for the historical and archiological purposes. I am not an archiologist, nor am I an Egyptologist. I am just a person who has been caught by the "Egyptology Bug" and wish to learn all I can about Ancient Egypt. :-) ============================================================================== From: "A.K. Eyma" To: "Ancient Egyptian Language List" Subject: Re: AEL Feminine endings/pronouns Date: Tue, 4 Sep 2001 21:49:20 +0200 Dr Allen wrote: >>I think it's possible for Greek NEith to come from an original njtt = *nIyti(t) or *nUyti(t) (capital letters representing stressed vowels), just as Coptic thAut "Thoth" comes from original DHwtj = *DHAwti. << It seems her name was occassionaly written with an strange r: Nr.t which perhaps suggests: nVrtVC > nV3tVC > nVytVC ? That is IF the r was original (not certain AFAIK), then according to the normal rules it would have to come at the end of a syllable to disappear. And one would not get it there if the names was nVrVt / nVyVt, I think. So this also seems to me an argument why the t could not have been last? Greek has nEit, Coptic (S) nEth, and those long vowels puzzle me, as they would suggest open syllables after all... The Coptic only appears in tanEth "she of Neith", which perhaps shows nV3tV > nV:t ? so with some compensatory lengthening? Greek has further NitOkris, which seems to me from unstressed *n@yt- But the long vowel in nEith...? Etymology of such names is generally pretty impossible, and always risky. Her name is often linked with the n.t "red crown", but as she was firstly the goddess of war and hunt, "opener of the ways" before the army, perhaps a link with nri "to bring fear" would be more fitting?? She is a tough lady to crack ;) kind regards, Aayko Eyma ============================================================================== Date: Tue, 4 Sep 2001 20:19:38 -0400 (EDT) From: Yado King Subject: Re: AEL Hello, I am new here.. To: Ancient Egyptian Language List I'm new too, I am currently struggling through Hoch's Chapter 10, though i may also try allen quite soon. It is extremely important to remember in full both transliteration and the hieroglyphs. As we don't have any completely accurate reference for the spoken language, either pronounce all symbols equally, base the stresses on another language, or just say what sounds right. -Andrew C. --- Rose wrote: > > Well, I'm new here also, so you're not alone. I just > started with the > Collier and Manley book, and I'm currently at the > end of chapter one. > > I was wondering if somebody could give me some > advice. Should I > memorize words in their transliterated or > hieroglyphic form? Or does > it matter? Also, what syllable of the word does the > stress go on? > Does anybody know/care? > > --Rose > rhinemouse@att.net ============================================================================== From: "Rohan Fenwick" To: AEgyptian-L@rostau.demon.co.uk Subject: Re: AEL Hello, I am new here.. Date: Wed, 05 Sep 2001 06:16:21 Hi Raven, Don't worry about being out of your depth - there are a lot of beginners here who sort of float around the edges, just trying to gain more insight into the language or culture of Ancient Egypt (I know I am one of them :) The best site I know of that gives explanations of linguistic terms is http://www.sil.org/linguistics/glossary/ Best regards, Rohan Fenwick rfenwick18@hotmail.com ============================================================================== Date: Wed, 05 Sep 2001 05:12:50 +0100 From: "Ciaran Ebbs" To: AEgyptian-L@rostau.demon.co.uk Subject: AEL Help : Serket Hello All, I'm currently drawing out all the major Egyptian Gods,and Im having trouble trying to find Serkets Cartouche,I can write it out but I am unsure of how the cartouche is actually laid out,if anyone has any pictures or descriptions I'd be very greatful. Regard's Ciar=E1n Ebbs. ============================================================================== From: ritagaskin@supanet.com To: AEgyptian-L@rostau.demon.co.uk Subject: AEL Another newcomer. Date: Thu, 6 Sep 2001 16:40:12 +0100 I am yet another new member to the list,there seems to be rather a lot a present.. I have been greatly interested in all things Ancient Egyptian for many years now, and I know '"a little" about the hieroglyphs, I have used the the Gardiner Egyptian Grammer, and I enjoyed the short exercises in it etc.,but I found myself getting very 'bogged-down' in the grammer..then I tried 'How to Read Egyptian Hieroglyphs'..which was okay, but I ended up preferring the Gardiner...so lets see how I get along here...RitaG. ritagaskin@supenet.com ============================================================================== Date: Wed, 5 Sep 2001 21:57:29 -0700 (PDT) From: Buzzy To: Ancient Egyptian Language List Subject: Re: AEL Hello, I am new here.. Hi Andrew, > any completely accurate reference for the spoken > language, either pronounce all symbols equally, base > the stresses on another language, or just say what > sounds right. > I am fairly new here too! I have checked different references on the actual pronounciation of hieroglyphs. At my job, I work with many nationalities including many arabic co-workers. I have tried to adopt some of the sounds of their language within my interpretation of the AE language, probably because the area is very similar and near. I'm sure that there must be a kind of "standard" within the linguistic and egyptologists world (perhaps when they are together and talk about it!), but it is very hard to tell with so few of these fine people in my area! I am in the middle of Collier's and Manley "How to Read Egyptian Hieroglyphs" (ISBN 0-520-21597-4)and just starting Allen's "Middle Egyptian" (ISBN 0-521-65312-6). Eric Eaton ============================================================================== From: "Ionescu Sinziana" To: "Ancient Egyptian Language List" Subject: RE: AEL Hello, I am new here.. Date: Fri, 7 Sep 2001 23:28:33 +0300 try this web site:if you speak spanish http://www.egiptomania.com/jeroglificos/gramatic/default.htm if you don't and you live in London, you can try any book printed by The British Museum, they are all very good sinziana -----Original Message----- From: owner-AEgyptian-L@rostau.demon.co.uk [mailto:owner-AEgyptian-L@rostau.demon.co.uk]On Behalf Of Raven Morgan Leigh Sent: Tuesday, September 04, 2001 7:55 PM To: AEgyptian-L@rostau.demon.co.uk Subject: AEL Hello, I am new here.. --- See http://www.rostau.demon.co.uk/AEgyptian-L/ for AEL resources. --- Copyright in the following belongs to the undersigned. --- To reply privately, send to golanv1@yahoo.com ..And I am a rank beginner. I look forward to learning from all of you-- I can see that I'm a bit out of my depth; I don't even understand the terminology used in linguistics.. could someone direct me to a source to learn? Thanks, Raven ============================================================================== Date: Fri, 7 Sep 2001 21:51:32 -0400 (EDT) From: Yado King Subject: AEL Nubian Thutmose III Stela To: AEgyptian-L@rostau.demon.co.uk My Egyptian study group and I were discussing this, and have yet to come to a conclusion. In a Nubian temple stela, I think an epithet of Tuthmose III, many of the usual sections of it end with "di ankh djed waser (then i think Amun's name) then Khery. What is the meaning of this Khery at the end of so many sections? ============================================================================== Date: Fri, 7 Sep 2001 10:00:18 -0400 To: Ancient Egyptian Language List From: john campana Subject: AEL help with a word. I've looked everywhere for the meaning of the word h (kh)(placenta) ery (sorry, I'm not up on the Manuel de Codage) and had no luck at all. I've seen the word on two separate stele, and would assume that it is an adjective and most likely part of the funerary nomenclature. On one stela it was followed by "mi Re"; on the other, it ended a column of writing. Any help would be appreciated. John Campana -- ==============================================================================