How are hieroglyphic symbols similar to alphabetic letters?

Answer 1

The modern western alphabet is largely derived entirely from hieroglyphs, but with a very long and complex development over time. It is often extremely difficult to trace the connection.

Two reasonably clear links are the letters N and M. In hieroglyphs the sound n could be expressed with a short, horizontal zig-zag line indicating water - this evolved into the modern N which is simply a part of that zig-zag. The sound m in hieroglyphs could be expressed by the picture of an owl with its head turned towards the viewer - the top of the owl's head is shaped like the modern letter M because it is an owl with "ears", showing its ancient origin.

In general terms, hieroglyphs are a far more complex and sophisticated writing system than any modern alphabet.

Answer 2

Hieroglyphics are ideograms. That is, each hieroglyphic represents the meaning of its word, not the sound. Egyptian hieroglyphics also employed a complicated set of signs to indicate sounds, which resulted in some words or parts of words being spelled out twice or more every time the words were written. An alphabet, by contrast, uses signs to indicate the sounds of a word - the sounds that were pronounced when the spelling was established, not necessarily the sounds of the word as it is spoken today. Check out the Rosetta Stone, the key to the decipherment of Egyptian Hieroglyphics.

Answer 3

Egyptian hieroglyphics are virtually UNLIKE the Latin Alphabet for English in almost every way. The only one similarity is that there was a subset of 24 hieroglyphics, called unilaterals that were used to represent 24 consonants. This was sort of a proto-alphabet.

However, these unilaterals were never used on their own. They were always mixed in with other hieroglyphics representing words and other multi-laterals (symbols respresenting two or three consonants). In fact, they weren't always even written in the order they were pronounced; sometimes the "letters" were written according to how asthetic they looked next to each other.

Answer 4

The English alphabet is a variation of the Latin alphabet, containing 26 letters with upper and lower case forms. These 26 letter can be used to write all of the words in English.

Egyptian Hieroglyphics had no alphabet as we know it, They had a 4 systems of symbols: uniliterals, biliterals, triliterals, and logographs:

1. 24 uniliterals (symbols that stood for single consonants, much like English letters but with no vowels).
   
2. 112+ common biliterals (symbols which represented a specific sequence of two consonants, two vowels, or combination of both).
   
3. 50+ common triliterals (symbols which represented a specific sequence of three consonants).
   
4. symbols representing concepts rather than sounds
   

The common use Egyptian hieroglyphs, including all of the above, numbered between 650-700 including variants. By late Ancient Egyptian time, including the Ptolemaic Egypt, the number of hieroglyphs became in the multiple thousands.

Answer 5

they are symbols and not letters cool right go to YouTube.com/thediamondminecart

Answer 6

Hieroglyphics are actually the Egyptian alphabet. They use pictures and symbols, just like we use letters.

Answer 7

there were 24 uniliterals, which were the closest equivalent to modern alphabetic letters. Uniliterals represented single consonants.

Answer 8

Ancient Egyptian letters i think