Meroitic : a phonological investigation
This thesis is a study into certain areas of Meroitic phonology. The Meroitic language was spoken in an area that encompasses modern day Nubia (southern Egypt to northern Sudan). Evidence for the Meroitic language is only known through the survival of its inscriptions, whereby two forms are used to write these: hieroglyphic and cursive, both heavily borrowed from the Ancient Egyptian writing system. The Meroitic language has only been partially deciphered; Griffith (1911) established approximations for the signs' sound values, along with identifying a handful of lexical items. Progress into the decipherment of the language has been seriously hampered by the lack of any bilingual texts, and more importantly, a lack of evidence for a genetic affiliation with an existing language or language family. This thesis concentrates on investigating the traditional representations given for the phonemic values of the Meroitic signs. The methods used for investigating this are: firstly, through analysing the correlative phonemic values of signs taken from transcriptions from languages such as Ancient Egyptian, Coptic and Greek, where equivalent forms with Meroitic ones are evidenced. These transcriptions from other languages
Rowan, Kirsty
Meroitic : a phonological investigation. This thesis is a study into certain areas of Meroitic phonology. The Meroitic language was spoken in an area that encompasses modern day Nubia (southern Egypt to northern Sudan). Evidence for the Meroitic language is only known through the survival of its inscriptions, whereby two forms are used to write these: hieroglyphic and cursive, both heavily borrowed from the Ancient Egyptian writing system. The Meroitic language has only been partially deciphered; Griffith (1911) established approximations for the signs' sound values, along with identifying a handful of lexical items. Progress into the decipherment of the language has been seriously hampered by the lack of any bilingual texts, and more importantly, a lack of evidence for a genetic affiliation with an existing language or language family. This thesis concentrates on investigating the traditional representations given for the phonemic values of the Meroitic signs. The methods used for investigating this are: firstly, through analysing the correlative phonemic values of signs taken from transcriptions from languages such as Ancient Egyptian, Coptic and Greek, where equivalent forms with Meroitic ones are evidenced. These transcriptions from other languages
phonological investigation study certain_area phonology language_speak area encompasses modern_day nubia southern egypt northern sudan evidence language know survival inscription whereby form use write hieroglyphic heavily borrow ancient_egyptian write_system language partially decipher establish approximation sign sound value along identify handful lexical_item progress decipherment language seriously hamper lack bilingual text importantly lack_evidence genetic affiliation exist language language family concentrate investigate traditional representation give phonemic value sign method_use investigating firstly analyse correlative phonemic value sign take transcription languages ancient_egyptian coptic greek equivalent form evidence transcription language