The Demotic Dictionary of the Oriental Institute
of the University of Chicago
Janet H. Johnson, editor
2001 The University of Chicago
https://oi.uchicago.edu/research/publications/demotic-dictionary-oriental-institute-university-chicago
Introduction to The Demotic Dictionary of the
Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago
The Demotic Dictionary of the Oriental Institute
of the University of Chicago (CDD) is a lexicographic tool for reading texts written
in a late stage of the ancient Egyptian language and in a highly cursive script
known as Demotic. In use from ca. 650 B.C. until the middle of the fifth
century A.D., Demotic served as the medium for a wide variety of text types.
These include “documentary” texts, such as business and legal documents,
private letters and administrative inscriptions, and “literary” texts,
including not only works of literature per se, for example, narrative texts and
pieces of wisdom literature, but also religious and magical texts and
scientific texts dealing with topics such as astronomy, mathematics, and
medicine. Demotic texts thus not only provide important witnesses for the
development of ancient Egyptian linguistic and paleographical traditions but
also constitute an indispensable source for reconstructing the social,
political, and cultural life of ancient Egypt during a fascinating period of
its history.
The CDD is intended to supplement and update W.
Erichsen’s Demotisches Glossar, which was published in 1954 and has been the
only large-scale dictionary of Demotic available to the scholarly world. The
CDD is formatted in a way to make it as compatible with Erichsen’s Glossar as
possible and is based mainly on texts published during the first twenty-five
years after the Glossar appeared (i.e., 1955–1979). The coverage of texts
published between 1955 and 1979 is intended to be comprehensive. In addition,
the CDD contains some vocabulary from texts published before 1955, especially
gleanings from Wilhelm Spiegelberg’s manuscript dictionary. The CDD also
includes a few items from texts published after 1979, especially new studies of
texts that were originally published between 1955 and 1979, but no systematic
attempt has been made to include words from all texts published after the
latter date. Whenever possible, references to more recent secondary literature
(i.e., that published in 1990 or later) have been incorporated into the
dictionary’s entries, though coverage of such references is not complete. The
CDD includes both new meanings or significant new orthographies for words cited
by Erichsen and words that are absent from the Glossar. It also contains far
more extensive examples of compounds, title(-string)s, and idiomatic
expressions than the Glossar. Otherwise, if the CDD does not have significant
new information to add to that adduced by Erichsen, a reference is given to the
appropriate page(s) in the Glossar.
This preliminary publication of the CDD, an
online version, is offered as a series of PDF files—one for each letter.
Further letters will be added as they are completed.
Prologue
Days
Months
Numbers
Problematic
Entries
Problematic
Entries 2
The Chicago Demotic Dictionary (CDD)
Introduction
Demotic is a very cursive script and reflects
extensive differences in handwriting; these differences, in turn, reflect
different types of texts (private letters, economic and legal documents,
administrative documents, religious, literary and scientific texts, etc.),
different proveniences of texts (especially noticeable are differences between
texts from the Fayum and area around Cairo and those from the Thebaid), and
different dates of texts (Demotic was used for a thousand years from the 7th
century B.C. until the 3rd century of our era [occasional graffiti occur even
later]). Thus, the Dictionary must show actual orthography for words cited.
Originally we had intended to make hand copies of every example of every word
cited in the Dictionary (there are approximately 10-15 words per page and there
will be about 1000 pages). These would then have had to be manually inserted on
the printed copy of the manuscript. However, the use of an Apple Scanner has
allowed us to replace hand copies with scans, which can be inserted directly
into the Microsoft Word document. This new procedure allows the entire
manuscript (both text and graphics) to be included in the same document (a
document which can be circulated electronically as well as in printed fashion)
and it avoids the time and possible errors involved in manually attaching all
the hand copies to the printed document. The final version of the Dictionary
will be printed on tabloid paper on the 1200dpi Laser printer in the
Publications Office and it will be printed at approximately 90%, in order to
produce a volume approximately the same size as Erichsen’s Demotisches Glossar,
to which it is intended to be a supplement.
Publications
- 1994
Article: Computers, Graphics, and Papyrology
- SAOC 45: Thus Wrote
‘Onchsheshonqy - Online Version
- Biography:
Wilhelm Spiegelberg
2014–2015 Annual Report
2013-2014
Annual Report
2012-2013 Annual Report
- 2011-2012 Annual Report
- 2010-2011 Annual Report
- 2009-2010 Annual Report
- 2008-2009 Annual Report
- 2007-2008 Annual Report
- 2006-2007 Annual Report
- 2005-2006 Annual Report
- 2004-2005 Annual Report
- 2003-2004 Annual Report
- 2002-2003 Annual Report
- 2001—2002 Annual Report
- 2000–2001 Annual Report
- 1999–2000 Annual Report
- 1998–1999 Annual Report
- 1997–1998 Annual Report
- 1996–1997 Annual Report
- 1995–1996 Annual Report
- 1994–1995 Annual Report
- 1993–1994 Annual Report
- 1992–1993 Annual Report
- 1991–1992 Annual Report
- 1990-1991 Annual Report
- 1989-1990 Annual Report
- 1988-1989 Annual Report
- 1987-1988 Annual Report
- 1986-1987 Annual Report
- 1985-1986 Annual Report
- 1984-1985 Annual Report
- 1983-1984 Annual Report
- 1982-1983 Annual Report
- 1981-1982 Annual Report
- 1980-1981 Annual Report
- 1979-1980 Annual Report
- 1978-1979 Annual Report
- 1977-1978 Annual Report
- 1976-1977 Annual Report
Oriental Institute Demotic Ostraca Online (O.I.D.O.O.)
The Oriental Institute Museum houses a large
collection of nearly 900 Demotic ostraca, pottery sherds upon which ancient
scribes recorded a wide variety of text types. The vast majority of the corpus
concerns economic matters and consists of receipts, contracts, memos, and
lists, but there is a small selection of other genres such as votive and
astrological texts. With few exceptions, the material derives from the environs
of Thebes and over half of the collection derives from the Oriental Institute
excavations at Medinet Habu. Attested dates in the documents range from the
early Ptolemaic Period (circa 285 B.C.E.) to the early Roman Period (circa 80
C.E.). Less than one third of the corpus has been published:
- 160 ostraca in Miriam Lichtheim, Demotic
Ostraca from Medinet Habu, Oriental Institute Publications 80 (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1957)
- 61 ostraca in Brian P. Muhs, Tax
Receipts, Taxpayers, and Taxes in Early Ptolemaic Thebes, Oriental
Institute Publications 126 (Chicago: The Oriental Institute of the
University of Chicago, 2005)
- Several dozen ostraca have been published in the articles of Ursula
Kaplony-Heckel and Otto Neugebauer
The O.I.D.O.O database was developed as both a
scholarly research tool and a means for the publication of the unpublished
Oriental Institute Demotic ostraca. It is our aim to make available all of the
Demotic ostraca in this collection, both published and unpublished, to scholars
worldwide in a format that will allow for complex searching and sorting
criteria as well as quick and easy updating. This will be accomplished through
periodic updates as additional texts are edited and entered into the database.
- Click here to access the Oriental Institute Demotic Ostraca Online
(O.I.D.O.O.).
On the following page, select "guest" and click "login." - In order to view the Demotic transliteration fonts correctly,
download the O.I.D.O.O. Font and place it in the fonts folder on your computer.
- In order to view the Greek transliteration fonts correctly,
download and install the New Athena Unicode Font available online
Articles
- Foy Scalf and Jacqueline Jay,
"Oriental Institute Demotic Ostraca Online (OIDOO): Merging Text
Publication and Research Tools," in Mark Depauw and Yanne Broux
(eds.), Acts of the Tenth International Congress of Demotic
Studies, Orientalia Lovaniensia Analecta 231 (Leuven: Peeters, 2014),
243-261
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario