Here Queften, monkey, is spelled out in full, but the picture of a monkey is added as a determinative; second, Qenu, cavalry, after being spelled, is made unequivocal by the introduction of a picture of a horse; third, Temati, wings, though spelled elaborately, has pictures of wings added; and fourth, Tatu, quadrupeds, after being spelled, has a picture of a quadruped, and then the picture of a hide, which is the usual determinative of a quadruped, followed by three dashes to indicate the plural number.*
* Another illustration of the plural number is seen in the
sign Pau, on page 298, where the plural is indicated in the
same manner.
These determinatives are in themselves so interesting, as illustrations of the association of ideas, that it is worth while to add a few more examples. The word Pet, which signifies heaven, and which has also the meaning up or even, is represented primarily by what may be supposed to be a conventionalised picture of the covering to the earth. But this picture, used as a determinative, is curiously modified in the expression of other ideas, as it symbolises evening when a closed flower is added, and night when a star hangs in the sky, and rain or tempest when a series of zigzag lines, which by themselves represent water, are appended.
As aids to memory such pictures are obviously of advantage, but this advantage in the modern view is outweighed by the cumbrousness of the system of writing as a whole.
Why was such a complex system retained? Chiefly, no doubt, because the Egyptians, like all other highly developed peoples, were conservatives. They held to their old method after a better one had been invented. But this inherent conservatism was enormously aided, no doubt, by the fact that the Egyptian language, like the Chinese, has many words that have a varied significance, making it seem necessary, or at least highly desirable, either to spell such words with different signs, or, having spelled them in the same way, to introduce the varied determinatives.
Here are some examples of discrimination between words of the same sound by the use of different signs: