HIEROGLYPHICS (Gr. iepos, sacred, and'yXv ni,

See also:

• CARVING

carving)  , the term used by Greek and Latin writers to describe the sacred characters of the ancient Egyptian language in its classical phase . It is now also used for various systems of writing in which figures of objects take the place of conventional signs . Such characters which symbolize the idea of a thing without expressing the name of it are generally styled " ideographs " (Gr. ib&a, idea, and ypa4eiv, to write), e.g. the Chinese characters . See EGYPT, Language; CUNEIFORM; INSCRIPTIONS and WRITING .