STUDY GUIDE FOR KAMRIN
CHAPTER ONE
LESSONS 7 and 8
LESSON 7
Pages 33 - 37
Suffix pronouns
Egyptian pronouns do not work like English pronouns. The type you're going to learn here are attached
directly onto the end of a word. So instead of saying "my house" Egyptian says "housemy". All one
word. Later on you'll see that exactly the same pronouns can serve as the subjects of verbs and they go
in exactly the same place: at the end of the word. Instead of "I see" Egyptian says "seeI". All one
word. In this sense, they are rather like adjectives, really, so it's consistent that they would appear at
the end of the word.
Even though suffix pronouns are attached directly to the end of the word, it is regular practice in
transliteration to separate them out. Kamrin, others, and I use a dot, e.g.: st.k, as seen on the bottom of
page 33. I hope you do, too.
Memorize the suffix pronouns on the top of page 34. They are dirt common in Egyptian.
For the first person singular ("I", "my"), many more glyphs than the ones shown can appear. But for
now, just learn these. I will say that the first sign, the reed leaf, does not appear all that often as a
pronoun. But I've seen on a few occasions.
Note that Egyptian pronouns differ between singular and plural, masculine and feminine, just like
English pronouns do.
Study the examples in the middle of page 34.
For right now you will encounter suffix pronouns operating as possessive pronouns but they have
additional uses.
The determinatives on pages 34 and 35 will be seen often later on in the book.
Take the lesson given in the important note on the bottom of page 35 to heart. There is no standard
spelling in Egyptian. I might add: nor among Egyptologists. Spelling, usage of transliteration symbols
and schemes, all differ. You just have to get used to it.
I'll do the MdC of the vocabulary once more and after that you can figure it out on your own:
it
= "father"
a
= "arm"
wiA
= "sacred bark" The vocabulary word for 'bark' refers to a ship or boat, not a dog's bark. The
god Re does not have a sacred yelp, he has a sacred boat, often called a 'bark' or even 'barque'.
r
= "mouth" - note the stroke beneath the glyph for mouth.
Hnqt
= "beer" - this is a barley or wheat beer. Sometimes transliterated as H(n)qt to indicate the
(assumed) presence of 'n' in the word.
Xt
= "body"
snb
= "health"
S
= "pool"
t
= "bread"
Not all of the vocabulary words have a determinative, and one of them has more than one!
In addition to not usually supplying a word for "and", the Egyptians also did not normally provide the
word "or". English translations have to supply those words based upon the translator's (your)
interpretation of the intention of the original author.
Homework: Exercise 5 on pages 36 and 37, post as HW05. Write each item in MdC and translate into
English. Again, we're not quite ready for full sentences.
LESSON 8
Pages 37 - 38
Dual and Plural
Some, but not most, Egyptologists put dots before the dual and plural endings, i.e. Apd.y, Apd.w, st.y,
s.wt
, but I've never seen s.w.t. Anyway, Kamrin doesn't do it, most Egyptologists don't, and neither do
I. I hope you don't either.
The suffix pronoun comes after the dual or plural ending: swt.i = "My women".
Homework: Exercise 6 on page 38, post as HW06. Write each item in MdC and translate into English.