Rosetta Stone Research Paper

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The Rosetta Stone Ancient Egypt is full of mysteries that archaeologists have sought to uncover. One of the most mysterious is the writing of hieroglyphics on many ancient pyramids and papyrus. The understanding of hieroglyphics was lost during the many occupations of Egypt by other cultures, especially when they were conquered by Alexander the Great. During the invasion of Egypt by Napoleon in 1798-1799, a group of soldiers discovered a black basalt rock with three forms of writing contained on it, including Greek. Given the name “Rosetta Stone” by the discoverers because of its location, it was the key to unlocking the mystery of ancient hieroglyphics. The Rosetta stone tablet contained three forms of script, or writing; Hieroglyphs, Demotic, and Greek (Egyptian Hieroglyphs, 2009). Hieroglyphs were symbols that made words or sounds and were the language of the Egyptian priests. Demotic was a more common form of Egyptian language for the general population, and Greek was the language of the conquerors during the creation of the stone. The French scholars who traveled with Napoleon tried to decipher the stone. They surmised that each of the scripts said the same phrases and since they could read Greek, they should be able to…show more content…
Across the English Channel, a French scholar, Jean Champollion, was using prints of the tablet to try and decipher the languages also. Although Champollion had many setbacks, he was able to decipher the cartouche for the name Ramses, which was the name of a well-known Pharaoh. Using the idea of starting with the most recent Egyptian language known as Coptic, Champollion found symbols that were similar and then drew a graph that traced the symbol through the earlier Egyptian languages all the way back to the hieroglyphs. Jean Champollion shared his findings with the world in 1822 and won the title of “decipherer of the Rosetta
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