{{Short description|Cursive writing system used in ancient Egyptian}} {{Infobox writing system | name = '''Hieratic''' | type = Logographic | typedesc = with consonants | time = c. 3200 BCE – 3rd century CE | caption = Transcribed papyrus, c. 1500 BCE | languages = Egyptian language | fam1 = Egyptian hieroglyphs | children = Demotic<br /> possibly inspired Byblos syllabary | unicode = [https://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U13000.pdf U+13000–U+1342F] {{nobr|(unified with Egyptian hieroglyphs)}} | iso15924 = Egyh | sample = A page from the Ebers Papyrus, written circa 1500 B.C. Wellcome M0008455.jpg | direction = mixed }}
'''Hieratic''' ({{IPAc-en|h|aɪ|ə|ˈ|r|æ|t|ɪ|k}}; {{langx|grc|ἱερατικά|hieratiká|priestly}}) is the name given to a cursive writing system used for Ancient Egyptian and the principal script used to write that language from its development in the third millennium BCE until the rise of Demotic in the mid-first millennium BCE. It was primarily written in ink with a reed brush on papyrus.{{sfn|McGregor|2015|p=306}}
Hieratic should not be confused with cursive hieroglyphs. The two were indistinct during the Old Kingdom but separated into different writing systems during the First Intermediate Period.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Davies |first1=Vanessa |title=The Oxford Handbook of Egyptian Epigraphy and Palaeography |last2=Laboury |first2=Dimitri |date=2020 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-060465-3 |location=Oxford |trans-title=898}}</ref>{{sfn|Gardiner|1929}}
==Etymology== In the second century, the term ''hieratic'' was used for the first time by the Greek scholar Clement of Alexandria to describe this Ancient Egyptian writing system.<ref>{{harvtxt|Goedicke|1988|p=vii}}; {{harvtxt|Wente|2001|p=2006}}. The reference is made in Clement's ''[http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/clement-stromata-book5.html Stromata]'' 5:4.</ref> The term derives from the Greek for 'priestly writing' ({{langx|grc-x-koine|γράμματα ἱερατικά}}) because at that time, for more than eight and a half centuries, hieratic had been used traditionally only for religious texts and literature.
''Hieratic'' can also be an adjective meaning 'of or associated with sacred persons or offices; sacerdotal'.<ref>[https://www.thefreedictionary.com/hieratic Definition of hieratic], Free Online Dictionary. Retrieved 2011-10-23.</ref>
==Development== Hieratic developed as a cursive form of hieroglyphic script in the Naqada III period of Ancient Egypt, roughly 3200–3000 BCE.<ref>Friedhelm Hoffmann (2012), '' Hieratic And Demotic Literature'', OUP.</ref> Although handwritten printed hieroglyphs continued to be used in some formal situations, such as manuscripts of the Egyptian Book of the Dead, noncursive hieroglyphic script became largely restricted to monumental inscriptions.
Around 650 BCE, the more cursive Demotic script developed from hieratic.{{sfn|McGregor|2015|p=306}} Demotic arose in northern Egypt and replaced hieratic and the southern shorthand known as abnormal hieratic for most mundane writing, such as personal letters and mercantile documents. Hieratic continued to be used by the priestly class for religious texts and literature into the third century CE.
==Uses and materials== [[File:Heratic script limestone.jpg|right|thumb|One of four official letters to vizier Khay copied onto fragments of limestone, an ostracon, held at the Royal Ontario Museum]] Through most of its long history, hieratic was used for writing administrative documents, accounts, legal texts, and letters, as well as mathematical, medical, literary, and religious texts. During the Greco-Roman period, when Demotic, and later, Greek, had become the chief administrative script, hieratic was limited primarily to religious texts. In general, hieratic was much more important than hieroglyphs throughout Egypt's history, being the script used in daily life. It was also the writing system first taught to students, knowledge of hieroglyphs being limited to a small minority who were given additional training.{{sfn|Baines|1983|p=583}} It is often possible to detect errors in hieroglyphic texts that came about due to a misunderstanding of an original hieratic text.
Most often, hieratic script was written in ink with a reed brush on papyrus, wood, stone, or pottery ostraca. During the Roman period, reed pens (''calami'') were also used. Thousands of limestone ostraca have been found at the site of Deir al-Madinah, revealing an intimate picture of the lives of common Egyptian workers. Besides papyrus, stone, ceramic shards, and wood, there are hieratic texts on leather rolls, although few have survived. There are also hieratic texts written on cloth, especially on linen used in mummification. There are some hieratic texts inscribed on stone, a variety known as lapidary hieratic. These are particularly common on stelae from the twenty-second dynasty.
During the late sixth dynasty, hieratic was sometimes incised into mud tablets with a stylus, similar to cuneiform. About five hundred of these tablets have been discovered in the governor's palace at Ayn Asil (Balat),{{sfn|Soukiassian|Wuttmann|Pantalacci|2002}} and a single example was discovered from the site of Ayn al-Gazzarin, both in the Dakhla Oasis.{{sfn|Posener-Kriéger|1992}}{{sfn|Pantalacci|1998}}<ref>[http://www.ucl.ac.uk/archaeology/calendar/articles/20120514 Scribes and craftsmen: the noble art of writing on clay.] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160529113814/http://www.ucl.ac.uk/archaeology/calendar/articles/20120514/ |date=2016-05-29 }} Feb 29, 2012; UCL Institute of Archaeology</ref> At the time the tablets were made, Dakhla was located far from centers of papyrus production.{{sfn|Parkinson|Quirke|1995|p=20}} These tablets record inventories, name lists, accounts, and approximately fifty letters. Of the letters, many are internal letters that were circulated within the palace and the local settlement, but others were sent from other villages in the oasis to the governor.
==Characteristics== [[File:Scribe's exercise tablet 1.jpg|right|thumb|An exercise tablet with a hieratic excerpt from ''The Instructions of Amenemhat'' (dated to the eighteenth dynasty reign of Amenhotep I, {{nowrap|{{circa|1514}}–1493 BCE}}) reads: "Be on your guard against all who are subordinate to you... Trust no brother, know no friend, make no intimates."]] Hieratic script, unlike inscriptional and manuscript hieroglyphs, reads from right to left. Initially, hieratic could be written in either columns or horizontal lines, but after the twelfth dynasty (specifically during the reign of Amenemhat III), horizontal writing became the standard.
Hieratic is noted for its cursive nature and use of ligatures for a number of characters. Hieratic script also uses a much more standardized orthography than hieroglyphs; texts written in the latter often had to take into account extra-textual concerns, such as decorative uses and religious concerns that were not present in, say, a tax receipt. There are also some signs that are unique to hieratic, although Egyptologists have invented equivalent hieroglyphic forms for hieroglyphic transcriptions and typesetting.{{sfn|Gardiner|1929}} Several hieratic characters have diacritical additions so that similar signs could easily be distinguished.
Hieratic is often present in any given period in two forms, a highly ligatured, cursive script used for administrative documents, and a broad uncial bookhand used for literary, scientific, and religious texts. These two forms can often be significantly different from one another. Letters, in particular, used very cursive forms for quick writing, often with large numbers of abbreviations for formulaic phrases, similar to shorthand.
A highly cursive form of hieratic known as "Abnormal Hieratic" was used in the Theban area from the second half of the twentieth dynasty until the beginning of the twenty-sixth dynasty.{{sfn|Wente|2001|p=210}}{{sfn|Malinine|1974}} It derives from the script of Upper Egyptian administrative documents and was used primarily for legal texts, land leases, letters, and other texts. This type of writing was superseded by Demotic—a Lower Egyptian scribal tradition—during the twenty-sixth dynasty, when Demotic was established as a standard administrative script throughout a re-unified Egypt.
==Influence== Hieratic has had influence on a number of other writing systems. The most obvious is that on Demotic, its direct descendant. Related to this are the Demotic signs of the Meroitic script and the borrowed Demotic characters used in the Coptic alphabet and Old Nubian.
Outside of the Nile Valley, many of the signs used in the Byblos syllabary apparently were borrowed from Old Kingdom hieratic signs.{{sfn|Hoch|1990}} It is also known that early Hebrew used hieratic numerals.{{sfn|Aharoni|1966}}{{sfn|Goldwasser|1991}}
==Unicode== The Unicode standard considers hieratic characters to be font variants of the Egyptian hieroglyphs, and the two scripts have been unified.<ref name="Unicode">The Unicode Standard, Version 5.2.0, Chapter 14.17, ''Egyptian Hieroglyphs'' [https://www.unicode.org/versions/Unicode5.2.0/ch14.pdf]
''"The hieratic forms are not separately encoded; they are simply considered cursive forms of the hieroglyphs encoded in this block."''</ref> Hieroglyphs were added to the Unicode Standard in October 2009 with the release of version 5.2.
With regards the possibility of including a dedicated hieratic font, the [https://www.unicode.org/versions/Unicode5.2.0/ch14.pdf Unicode Standard, Version 5.2] states:<blockquote>"In the years since Champollion published his decipherment of Egyptian in 1824, Egyptologists have shown little interest in typesetting hieratic text. Consequently, there is no tradition of hieratic fonts in either lead or digital formats. Because hieratic is a cursive form of the underlying hieroglyphic characters, hieratic text is normally rendered using the more easily legible hieroglyphs. In principle a hieratic font could be devised for specialist applications, but as for fonts for other cursive writing systems, it would require very large ligature tables—even larger than usual, because of the great many hieroglyphic signs involved."</blockquote>Some work towards developing a dedicated hieratic font was made by Gosline (2002) and the ''Hieratic Font Project''.<ref>{{Citation |last=Gosline |first=Sheldon Lee |title=Hieratic paleography. 3a: Late Egyptian Letters, Signs A1-D60 |date=2001 |place=Warren Center, Pa |publisher=Shangri-La Publ |isbn=978-0-9714683-0-6}}</ref> Currently Egyptologists must first transcribe hieratic into hieroglyphs before typesetting and translating.{{sfn|Gardiner|1929}}<ref>{{Cite web |last=Project |first=Hieroglyphs Everywhere |date=2016-06-07 |title=Hieroglyphs Everywhere Project: Transcription of Hieratic into Unicode Hieroglyphic: Part 1 |url=https://hieroglyphseverywhere.blogspot.com/2016/06/transcription-of-hieratic-into-unicode.html |access-date=2025-09-02 |website=Hieroglyphs Everywhere Project}}</ref>
==See also== * Cuneiform * Hieroglyphs * Cursive Hieroglyphs * Demotic * Georg Möller an imporant scholar of hieratic paleography * Caoshu
==References== {{Reflist|20em}}
===Bibliography=== {{refbegin}} *{{cite journal |last=Aharoni |first=Yohanan |year=1966 |title=The Use of Hieratic Numerals in Hebrew Ostraca and the Shekel Weights |journal=Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research |volume=184 |pages=13–19 |doi=10.2307/1356200 |issue=184 |jstor=1356200 |s2cid=163341078 }} *{{cite journal |last=Baines |first=John R. |author-link=John Baines (Egyptologist) |year=1983 |title=Literacy and Ancient Egyptian Society |journal=Man: A Monthly Record of Anthropological Science |volume=18 (new series) |pages=572–599 |url=http://eprints.ouls.ox.ac.uk/archive/00001055/ |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061009200956/http://eprints.ouls.ox.ac.uk/archive/00001055/ |archive-date=2006-10-09 }} *{{cite book |last=Betrò |first=Maria Carmela |year=1996 |title=Hieroglyphics: The Writings of Ancient Egypt |publisher=Abbeville Press (English); Arnoldo Mondadori (Italian) |location=New York; Milan |pages=[https://archive.org/details/michelangelovati00deve/page/34 34]–239 |isbn=978-0-7892-0232-1 |url-access=registration |url=https://archive.org/details/michelangelovati00deve }} *{{cite book |last=Fischer-Elfert |first=Hans-Werner |author-link=Hans-Werner Fischer-Elfert |year=2021 |title=Grundzüge einer Geschichte des Hieratischen |series=Einführungen und Quellentexte zur Ägyptologie |volume=14 |publisher=Lit |location=Berlin }} *{{cite journal |last=Gardiner |first=Alan H. |author-link=Alan Gardiner |year=1929 |title=The Transcription of New Kingdom Hieratic |journal=Journal of Egyptian Archaeology |volume=15 |pages=48–55 |doi=10.2307/3854012 |issue=1/2 |jstor=3854012 }} *{{cite book |last=Goedicke |first=Hans |year=1988 |title=Old Hieratic Paleography |publisher=Halgo, Inc. |location=Baltimore }} *{{cite journal |last=Goldwasser |first=Orly |year=1991 |title=An Egyptian Scribe from Lachish and the Hieratic Tradition of the Hebrew Kingdoms |journal=Tel Aviv: Journal of the Tel Aviv University Institute of Archaeology |volume=18 |pages=248–253 }} *{{cite journal |last=Hoch |first=James E. |year=1990 |title=The Byblos Syllabary: Bridging the Gap Between Egyptian Hieroglyphs and Semitic Alphabets |journal=Journal of the Society for the Study of Egyptian Antiquities |volume=20 |pages=115–124 }} *{{cite journal |last=Janssen |first=Jacobus Johannes |year=2000 |title=Idiosyncrasies in Late Ramesside Hieratic Writing |journal=Journal of Egyptian Archaeology |volume=86 |pages=51–56 |doi=10.2307/3822306 |jstor=3822306 }} *{{cite book |last=Malinine |first=Michel |year=1974 |chapter=Choix de textes juridiques en hiératique ‘anormal’ et en démotique |title=Textes et langages de l'Égypte pharaonique: Cent cinquante années de recherches 1822–1972; Hommage à Jean-François Champollion |volume=1 |pages=31–35 |publisher=Imprimerie de l’Institut français d’archéologie orientale du Caire |location=Cairo }} *{{cite book |last=McGregor |first=William B. |author-link=William B. McGregor |year=2015 |title=Linguistics: An Introduction |publisher=Bloomsbury Publishing |isbn=978-0-567-48339-3 |page=306 |url={{google books URL|d-twBgAAQBAJ|p=306}} }} *{{cite book |last=Möller |first=Georg Christian Julius |year=1927–1936 |title=Hieratische Paläographie: Die aegyptische Buchschrift in ihrer Entwicklung von der Fünften Dynastie bis zur römischen Kaiserzeit |edition=2nd |publisher=J. C. Hinrichs’schen Buchhandlungen |location=Leipzig |url=http://www.egyptology.ru/lang.htm#Moeller }} 4 vols. *{{cite book |last=Möller |first=Georg Christian Julius |year=1927–1935 |title=Hieratische Lesestücke für den akademischen Gebrauch. |edition=2nd |publisher=J. C. Hinrichs’schen Buchhandlungen |location=Leipzig }} 3 vols. *{{cite journal |last=Pantalacci |first=Laure |year=1998 |title=La documentation épistolaire du palais des gouverneurs à Balat–{{Transliteration|ar|DIN|ˤAyn Asīl}} |journal=Bulletin de l'Institut Français d'Archéologie Orientale |volume=98 |pages=303–315 }} *{{cite book |last1=Parkinson |first1=Richard B. |last2=Quirke |first2=Stephen G. J. |year=1995 |title=Papyrus |publisher=British Museum Press |location=London }} *{{cite book |last=Posener-Kriéger |first=Paule |year=1992 |chapter=Les tablettes en terre crue de Balat |title=Les Tablettes à écrire de l'Antiquité à l'époque moderne |editor=Élisabeth Lalou |publisher=Brepols |location=Turnhout |pages=41–49 }} *{{cite book |last1=Soukiassian |first1=Georges |last2=Wuttmann |first2=Michel |last3=Pantalacci |first3=Laure |year=2002 |title=Le palais des gouverneurs de l'époque de Pépy II: Les sanctuaires de ka et leurs dépendances |publisher=Imprimerie de l’Institut français d’archéologie orientale du Caire |location=Cairo |isbn=978-2-7247-0313-9 }} *{{cite book |last=Verhoeven |first= Ursula |year=2001 |title=Untersuchungen zur späthieratischen Buchschrift |publisher=Uitgeverij Peeters and Departement Oriëntalistiek |location=Leuven }} *{{cite book |last=Wente |first=Edward Frank |year=2001 |chapter=Scripts: Hieratic |pages=206–210 |editor=Donald Redford |editor-link=Donald Redford |title=The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt |volume=3 |publisher=Oxford University Press and The American University in Cairo Press |location=Oxford, New York, and Cairo }} *{{cite book |last=Wimmer |first=Stefan Jakob |year=1989 |title=Hieratische Paläographie der nicht-literarischen Ostraka der 19. und 20. Dynastie |publisher=Harrassowitz Verlag |location=Wiesbaden }} {{refend}}
==External links== {{Commons category}} *[http://www.omniglot.com/writing/egyptian_hieratic.htm Ancient Egyptian scripts – hieratic] *[https://www.digitalegypt.ucl.ac.uk/writing/hieratic.html The Hieratic Script] *{{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161121003150/http://www.ancientscripts.com/egyptian.html |date=21 November 2016 |title=Egyptian scripts}} *[https://www.egyptologyforum.org/bbs/Stableford/StablefordMoeller.html Resources for transcribing Hieratic] into Hieroglyphs by Georg Möller *[https://moeller.jinsha.tsukuba.ac.jp/ Hieratische Paläographie Database] hosted by Tsukuba University, based on Georg Möller's work *The [https://aku-pal.uni-mainz.de/ AKU Project] of Mainz University, aimed at demonstrating the diachronic evolution of hieratic graphemes
{{Ancient Egypt topics}} {{list of writing systems}} {{Authority control}}
Category:4th-millennium BC establishments Category:Ancient Egyptian language Category:Egyptian languages Category:Writing systems Category:Obsolete writing systems Category:Writing systems of Africa Category:Egyptian inventions Category:Bronze Age writing systems Category:Naqada III