Friedrich Junge's pioneering introduction to the grammar of Late
Egyptian, the language of the New Kingdom, principally of the Ramessid
Period (ca. 1350-1000 BCE), fills a longstanding gap in teaching works
for Ancient Egyptian. This English translation of the second German
edition makes the work available to a wide audience. The author devotes
special attention to the language of papyri and ostraca texts and
documents of everyday life without neglecting the style and language of
belles lettres and monumental inscriptions. Through copious examples,
exercises, and bibliographical information, the reader is familiarized
with all the major text categories. The book assumes some knowledge of
Middle Egyptian. The presentation moves from the distinctive features of
Late Egyptian writing and orthography, through morphology and the
structures of the simple and compound clauses and sentences, to larger
linguistic units. Throughout, the forms of Late Egyptian are set in
context in the history of the language, relating them to Middle Egyptian
forms on the one hand and to Demotic and Coptic forms on the other.
Detailed comments are given both for the examples and for the exercises
that close the main chapters. An appendix offers a preliminary synthesis
of formulas in oaths and letters, units of value including weights and
measures, and the organization of the necropolis administration at Deir
el-Medina, the workmen's village at Thebes from which vast numbers of
sources were recovered. An extensive apparatus of bibliography,
vocabulary, and indexes provides easy access to the content of the
grammar and to factual information. In this second English edition the
author has made numerous corrections to the text while incorporating
where possible points raised by reviewers.
