Ancient Egyptian was one of the first 'picture languages,' employing beautiful images to express consonants, syllables and whole words. When Biblical Hebrew was born, Egyptian writing was already 2000 years old, a language rich in religious and secular literature. To discover its secrets is to travel millennia into the past, allowing you to speak with pyramid builders, commanding generals, and great story tellers. In our class, we'll develop basic sight-reading skills and introduce some of the basic grammar of classical Middle Egyptian. Based on enrollment, this course may be continued in subsequent semesters. PS: coffee, tea and cookies served.

Required text: Mark Collier and Bill Manley, How to Read Egyptian Hieroglyphs Rev. ed. (Berkeley: Univ. of California Press, 2003.