From Pharoah's Lips

by Youssef

• ISBN13: 9789774247088
• ISBN10: 9774247086
• Edition: Bilingual
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2004-10-11
• Publisher: The American University in Cairo Press

Summary

From the most distant past to the modern day, some things never change - including words. The modern Egyptian Arabic dialect is one of the most distinctive in the Arabic-speaking world precisely because of its illustrious heritage from the country's ancient past. Ahmad Abdel-Hamid Youssef spends a day in the Egyptian countryside, taking note of the many expressions that once fell from the lips of the ancient Egyptians and that continue to be heard on the tongues of the modern Egyptians in their everyday speech. His charming tale of Bayoumi, a farmer, his wife Sawsan and their baby provides the backdrop for tracing the persistence of these words and phrases. What these average Egyptians do, what tools they use, what they eat, how they organize their life, even how they all interact - all can be described with words that hark back to the age of pharaohs such as Khufu and Rameses II. In telling his story, Youssef integrates the ancestry of these common expressions, with the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs and Coptic and Arabic words appearing alongside transliterations and translations into English. Both entertaining and instructive, this volume includes a series of glossaries in Egyptian, Coptic and Arabic.

Author Biography

Ahmad Abdel-Hamid Youssef is professor of Egyptology at al-Azhar University in Cairo.

Table of Contents

Introduction	vii
Fayza Haikal
The Past Remains Alive	1	(20)
The Ancient Egyptian Alphabet	12	(3)
The Coptic Alphabet	15	(3)
The Arabic Alphabet	18	(3)
Bayumi	21	(10)
Sawsan	31	(12)
What's for Dinner?	43	(10)
Neighborhood Characters	53	(8)
Celebration!	61	(14)
Wisdom of Old	75	(8)
Glossaries	83	(47)
Mary Knight
Egyptian	83	(16)
Coptic	99	(16)
Arabic	115	(15)
Sources	130