Decoding Hieroglyphics is a documentary film which premiered on US television (PBS) in 2022.
It is an episode of the long-running program Secrets of the Dead.
The timing is significant. This film premiered in 2022 in order to commemorate the 200-year anniversary of the historical moment when the young French scholar Jean François Champollion cracked the code of the Egyptian hieroglyphs.
For more than 1,000 years not a single person in the world had been able to read Egyptian hieroglyphs. But in 1822, Champollion discovered the key. He was able to read and understand inscriptions written with hieroglyphs.
In this film, we learn how he did it and we learn how the discovery he made 200 years ago is used to study the history of ancient Egypt in our own time.
Here is some basic information about this film:
** Writer and director: Patrick Cabouat
** Narrator: Jay O. Sanders
** Language: English
** Subtitles: English
** Run time: 55 minutes
Many persons are interviewed in this film.
Most of them are Egyptologists.
Some are members of a special group whose purpose is to explore and study an ancient Egyptian tomb known as TT33, while others are members of the French Institute for Oriental Archaeology (IFAO).
Here are the names of the participants (listed in alphabetical order):
** Christophe Barbotin – curator, the Louvre Museum
** Elizabeth Bettles – Egyptologist
** Laurent Coulon – Egyptologist (IFAO)
** Sylvia Einaudi – Egyptologist, TT33
** Salima Ikram – Egyptologist, the American University in Cairo
** Cedric Larcher – Egyptologist, Deir El-Medina (IFAO)
** Simone Nannucci – Egyptologist
** Gaël Pollin – photographer (IFAO)
** Federici Poole – curator, the Egyptian Museum in Turin (Italy)
** Eve Ramboz – visual effects supervisor
** Isabelle Régen – Egyptologist, TT33
** Claude Traunecker – Egyptologist, TT33
The film is divided into four chapters.
Chapter # 1 is devoted to the ancient Egyptian tomb known as TT33. The two letters stand for the Theban Tomb # 33, which is the tomb of Padiamenope, a royal scribe and an important priest, who lived and worked around the year 700 BC. This is the end of the 25th dynasty and the beginning of the 26th dynasty.
His tomb has 22 rooms over three levels. It is one of the largest tombs from ancient Egypt, even though the man who was buried here was not a pharaoh.
Chapter # 2 is devoted to Deir El-Medina which is the village of the workers, not far from TT 33. The workers who constructed the ancient tombs in the Valley of the Kings and other locations in this part of Egypt lived in this village.
Chapter # 3 is devoted to the Egyptian Museum in Turin (Italy) which was opened in 1824. This museum has a large collection of ancient Egyptian artifacts.
Chapter # 4 is devoted to the life and career of the famous French scholar Jean-François Champollion. His life and career can be summed up in the following three points:
(A) In 1822, he cracked the code of the hieroglyphs. He had worked on this topic for several years.
(B) In 1824, he was invited to visit the newly-opened Egyptian Museum in Turin. He stayed there for eight months, because he wanted to study all the items which had inscriptions written with hieroglyphs.
(C) In 1828, he travelled to Egypt. He was the leader of a scientific expedition to Egypt which visited many ancient sites over a period of 18 months.
Secrets of the Dead has been running for more than twenty years. Most episodes of this program have a high quality. This episode is no exception.
The topic is fascinating and the participants who are interviewed in the film are well-chosen.
If you are interested in the history of the ancient world – in particular the history of ancient Egypt – this film is definitely something for you.
It is highly recommended.
REFERENCES
Pharaoh’s Workers:
The Villagers of Deir El Medina
edited by Leonard H. Lesko
(1994)
Cracking the Egyptian Code:
The Revolutionary Life of Jean-François Champollion
by Andrew Robinson
(2012) (2022)
My Journey to Egypt:
Reinventing Ancient Egypt:
Diaries and Letters
by Jean-François Champollion
(edited by Joyce Tyldesley and Richard Lebeau)
(2019)
The Writing of the Gods:
The Race to Decode the Rosetta Stone
by Edward Dolnick
(2021) (2022)
*****
On this blog
My review of
The Champollion Adventure
(2022)
*****
This sign marks the entrance to TT33
The tomb of Padiamenope
*****
Deir El-Medina
The village of the workers
*****
This picture shows the entrance to
the Egyptian Museum in Turin (Italy)
*****
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