Hieroglyphs
Hieroglyphs or
hieroglyphics can be
* characters of a writing system based on pictures, which can include
alphabetic,
logographic and
ideographic symbols. Such characters are commonly, but not necessarily, found carved in stone and belong to
dead languages which have had to undergo
decipherment in order to be understood. Varieties of hieroglyphic scripts include:
**
Egyptian hieroglyphs**
Anatolian hieroglyphs (also known as
Luwian hieroglyphs)
**
Cretan hieroglyphs**
Mayan hieroglyphs (the best known of about half a dozen documented
Mesoamerican writing systems)
**
Mi'kmaq hieroglyphic writing* any
handwritten characters which are difficult to read or decipher. (For example:
"Bob, can you tell me what you've written here? I can't understand your hieroglyphics").
The word
hieroglyph derives from the
Greek words (
hierós 'sacred') and γλύφειν (
glúphein 'to carve' or 'to write', see
glyph), and was first used to describe
Egyptian hieroglyphs. The Greeks who came to Egypt prior to and during the
Ptolemaic Period (
305 BC -
30 BC) observed that while
demotic script was employed for secular documents, pictorial characters were frequently found in religious contexts - carved on temple walls and funerary structures, as well as on official monuments.
The word "hieroglyphics" is derived from the fact that the Greeks called Egyptian hieroglyphs 'hieroglyphic letters'; however, they sometimes simply dropped the "letters" part, calling them 'the hieroglyphics' ('letters' being understood). While the
adjective "hieroglyphics" is today still used by some as a
noun and can add a humorous and informal tone to remarks about the unreadability of a person's handwriting, this practice is
technically incorrect.
