The

ancient Egypt Ancient Egypt () was a cradle of civilization concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in Northeast Africa. It emerged from prehistoric Egypt around 3150BC (according to conventional Egyptian chronology), when Upper and Lower E ...

ian Hill-country or "Foreign land" hieroglyph (𓈉) is a member of the sky, earth, and water hieroglyphs. A form of the hieroglyph in color, has a ''green line''-(banding) at the base of the hieroglyph. The hieroglyph refers to the hills, and mountains, on both sides of the

Nile River The Nile (also known as the Nile River or River Nile) is a major north-flowing river in northeastern Africa. It flows into the Mediterranean Sea. The Nile is the longest river in Africa. It has historically been considered the longest river i ...

, and thus the green references the verdant black farming land adjacent to the river proper. It is coded N25 in Gardiner's sign list, and U+13209 in

Unicode Unicode or ''The Unicode Standard'' or TUS is a character encoding standard maintained by the Unicode Consortium designed to support the use of text in all of the world's writing systems that can be digitized. Version 16.0 defines 154,998 Char ...

. It is a determinative hieroglyph, simply conveying a meaning, and has no phonetic value. Various colors, and patterning, may adorn the rest of the hieroglyph when the bottom is green.

Three major uses

The

ancient Ancient history is a time period from the beginning of writing and recorded human history through late antiquity. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, beginning with the development of Sumerian cuneiform script. Ancient h ...

language Language is a structured system of communication that consists of grammar and vocabulary. It is the primary means by which humans convey meaning, both in spoken and signed language, signed forms, and may also be conveyed through writing syste ...

hilly land hieroglyph has three major uses: :1 – hill country, or hills :2 – a reference to arid, ''desert land'' :3 –

Determinative A determinative, also known as a taxogram or semagram, is an ideogram used to mark semantic categories of words in logographic scripts which helps to disambiguate interpretation. They have no direct counterpart in spoken language, though they ...

, for foreign lands The language meaning of the hieroglyph is as an

ideogram An ideogram or ideograph (from Ancient Greek, Greek 'idea' + 'to write') is a symbol that is used within a given writing system to represent an idea or concept in a given language. (Ideograms are contrasted with phonogram (linguistics), phono ...

or a determinative in the word ''khast'' (khaset), and is often translated as hilly land, desert, foreign land, or district.

Use as determinative

One major use of the hill-country hieroglyph is as the determinative for land, but especially the names of foreign lands. For example in the

Merneptah Stele The Merneptah Stele, also known as the Israel Stele or the Victory Stele of Merneptah, is an inscription by Merneptah, a pharaoh in ancient Egypt who reigned from 1213 to 1203 BCE. Discovered by Flinders Petrie at Thebes, Egypt, Thebes in 1896, i ...

, foreign lands are mentioned, including the name of Hatti.

Partial list with land determinative

List of uses of the ''foreign land''

determinative A determinative, also known as a taxogram or semagram, is an ideogram used to mark semantic categories of words in logographic scripts which helps to disambiguate interpretation. They have no direct counterpart in spoken language, though they ...

: *

Ashkelon Ashkelon ( ; , ; ) or Ashqelon, is a coastal city in the Southern District (Israel), Southern District of Israel on the Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean coast, south of Tel Aviv, and north of the border with the Gaza Strip. The modern city i ...

Canaan CanaanThe current scholarly edition of the Septuagint, Greek Old Testament spells the word without any accents, cf. Septuaginta : id est Vetus Testamentum graece iuxta LXX interprets. 2. ed. / recogn. et emendavit Robert Hanhart. Stuttgart : D ...

* Hatti *

Retjenu Retjenu (''wiktionary:rṯnw, rṯnw; Reṯenu, Retenu''), later known as Khor, was the Ancient Egyptian name for the wider Syria (region), Syrian region, where the Semitic languages, Semitic-speaking Canaanites lived.Georg Steindorff, Steindorff, ...

Parthia Parthia ( ''Parθava''; ''Parθaw''; ''Pahlaw'') is a historical region located in northeastern Greater Iran. It was conquered and subjugated by the empire of the Medes during the 7th century BC, was incorporated into the subsequent Achaemeni ...

𓊪𓃭𓍘𓇋𓍯𓈉, ''p-rw-t-i- wꜣ'' *

Kingdom of Kush The Kingdom of Kush (; Egyptian language, Egyptian: 𓎡𓄿𓈙𓈉 ''kꜣš'', Akkadian language, Assyrian: ''Kûsi'', in LXX Χους or Αἰθιοπία; ''Ecōš''; ''Kūš''), also known as the Kushite Empire, or simply Kush, was an an ...

𓎡𓄿𓈙𓈉, ''kꜣš'' File:Darius I statue Parthia.jpg, Parthia (𓊪𓃭𓍘𓇋𓍯𓈉, ''P-rw-t-i- wꜣ''), as one of the 24 subjects of the Achaemenid Empire, in the Egyptian Statue of Darius I. File:Darius I statue Bactria.jpg, upright=0.5, Darius I statue Gandhara.jpg, Darius I statue India.jpg,

The Nine bows (foreigners or rebels)

One spelling of the foreign peoples, the

Nine bows The Nine Bows is a visual representation in Art of ancient Egypt, Ancient Egyptian art of foreigners or others. Besides the nine bows, there were no other generic representations of foreigners. Due to its ability to stand in for any nine enemies ...

, is represented by the Hill country hieroglyph, ''"t"'', and nine single strokes. The nine foreign lands used for the ''Nine Bows'' are also iconographically shown inside of

cartouche upalt=A stone face carved with coloured hieroglyphics. Two cartouches - ovoid shapes with hieroglyphics inside - are visible at the bottom., Birth and throne cartouches of Pharaoh KV17.html" ;"title="Seti I, from KV17">Seti I, from KV17 at the ...

s, with their names. The cartouches are the 'bodies' of the "prisoner", or " captive", arms tied behind the back, the name of the land/city inside the cartouche. File:Scarab of king Tut-E 22807-Egypte louvre 148.jpg, Pharaonic ring File:KAnana.gif,

-(K-a-n-a-n-a) File:Sarcophagus of Ankhnesneferibre.jpg,

Sarcophagus A sarcophagus (: sarcophagi or sarcophaguses) is a coffin, most commonly carved in stone, and usually displayed above ground, though it may also be buried. The word ''sarcophagus'' comes from the Greek language, Greek wikt:σάρξ, σάρξ ...

inscribed for Ankhnesneferibre, Divine Adoratrice of Amun
''God's Wife of Amun''

References

*Betrò, Maria Carmela. '' Hieroglyphics: The Writings of Ancient Egypt,'' c. 1995, 1996-(English), Abbeville Press Publishers, New York, London, Paris (hardcover, ) *Budge. ''An Egyptian Hieroglyphic Dictionary,'' E.A.Wallace Budge, (Dover Publications), c 1978, (c 1920), Dover edition, 1978. (In two volumes) (softcover, ) Egyptian hieroglyphs: sky-earth-water

Three major uses

Use as determinative

Partial list with land determinative

The Nine bows (foreigners or rebels)

See also

References