The Myth of Egypt and Its Hieroglyphs in European Tradition

Abstract

Erik Iversen describes the powerful effect of the myth of - particularly Egyptian hieroglyphs - on European literature, art, religion and philosophy. It explains how an erroneous interpretation of the traditions of ancient Egypt became a rich source of inspiration for Europeans from ancient times through the medieval and Renaissance periods to the Baroque era. The misguided notion that hierogylphs were allegorical, and that they constituted a sacred writing of ideas, exerted a dynamic influence in almost all fields of intellectual and artistic endeavour, as did conceptions of Egypt as the venerable home of true wisdom and of occult and mystic knowledge. Iversen begins by discussing the nature of Egyptian writing. Then he explains, with illustrations and quotations, the ways in which Europeans tried to understand and use the hieroglyphs. A final chapter sets Jean Francois Champollion's decipherment of the hieroglyphs into a reconstructed historical context.

Cite this work

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 137 citations exist upstream.