What was the name of the basalt slab that became the key for deciphering ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics?
History of archaeology to carry out a full study of the ancient civilisation. The work of Jean-François Champollion in deciphering the Rosetta stone to discover the hidden meaning of hieroglyphics proved the key to the study of Egyptology. However, prior to the development of modern techniques excavations tended to be haphazard; the importance of concepts such as stratification and context were completely overlooked. For instance, in 1803, there was widespread criticism of Thomas Bruce, 7th Earl of Elgin for removing the Elgin Marbles from the Parthenon in Athens. The marble sculptures themselves, however, were valued by his critics only for their aesthetic qualities,
Hieroglyphics: The Writings of Ancient Egypt Hieroglyphics: The Writings of Ancient Egypt Hieroglyphics: The Writings of Ancient Egypt is a primer on Egyptian hieroglyphics by Maria Carmela Betrò, later professor for Egyptology at Pisa University (published in Italian as "Geroglifici" in 1995; English translation 1996). The standard version of analytic Egyptian hieroglyphs is based upon the 26 categories of the Gardiner's Sign List, (about 700 signs). That categorization is still the basic standard. The approach in "Hieroglyphics: The Writings of Ancient Egypt" is to use some of the Gardiner sign categories, to focus on specific major-use signs. The end of a thematic chapter then has synoptic