The Rosette ProjectThe Objectives

– To provide assistance in the reading and translating of ancient Egyptian texts

Recognition of hieroglyphics, through to lexical analysis and final publishing of graphic text

– To facilitate the collection of translated and documented texts

Provision of a freely available Internet service to all, in several languages, and using any browser

The Means by which they can be achieved – A multidisciplinary, international team of

benevolent volunteers – A legal association protecting our copyright– An Internet forum and daily discussions on MSN– Frequent meetings, in Paris and elsewhere

History Rosette

• Launched on August 17th, 2004

• Prototype MS-Access: September 7th, 2004

• An approach to Wiki: December 2004

• First version PHP / SQL: March 2005

• Migration on a dedicated website: January 2006

• A Presentation to I&E at Oxford: August 2006

• Version V2.1 : September 2007

• A Presentation to the AUC: October 2007

• International Congress Rhodos : May 2008

The Catalogue• 3200 + hieroglyphic signs recognised • Conforms to EGPZ standard, set down in Unicode• Available in three fonts (Inscribe, and 2 Rosette fonts)

• Each hieroglyph is described and documented • Displays the phonetic value (using transliteration font)

• Holds a collection of paleographic images • Multi Search facility • Direct access from any hieroglyph of the application

The Dictionary• 6 000 phonetic entries• 12 000 semantic variants

• 12 200 graphic representations

• All English entries from "Faulkner" (© Griffith Institute) and French counterpart (© Association Medjat od amateurs)

• Multi-critical search facility (using Transliteration, Gardiner-code, Keyword : French or English, semantic type, ...)

• Thematic lists under construction: including kings, gods, military titles, geographic names, eulogistic formulae...

The Text EditorSimilar to most hieroglyphic text-editing programs • Compliant with the "Manuel du Codage 1988" • Offering additional functions

(adjustable positioning of signs, creation of sign-groups...)

• At-hand lexical analysis from the dictionary

Among the many improvements planned: • Compatibility format-exchange with WinGlyph, GOT,

Inscribe, JSesh, WikiHiéro ... • Export to printer and / or to PDF, Word, ... formats • Interface with the Corpus of texts (see after)

• Semantic analysis

The Corpus of texts

• More than 90 texts are available • With MdC-code, transliteration and translation • Associated source photographs in high-resolution • Bibliographic reference• Characteristics of the artefacts in the MET standard• Lexical analysis from the dictionary • Allows editing on-line by team members• A "blog" is available, for comments/ corrections

• Current project: White Chapel of Senusret Ist

Four years experience

• Information technology can definitely be a real and effective aid

• The database structure offers virtually unlimited capacity.

• But the user must make choices on his own at different stages of translation ; the final interpretation remains with the human being.

• The monitoring of standards (such as MdC, MET, Unicode, XHTML...) is a guarantee of durability.

• The contribution of volunteers is a viable alternative to the lack of budget.

The Future of Rosette

• The growing capabilities of servers are offering more and more powerful functions.

• Internet allows a collaborative approach. With a validation by a "referee", the Wiki approach may open a direct capture by visitors.

• The desire for a common and standardized storage has been made on many occasions:

– Rosette proposes both a format and an infrastructure in which the text-collection can immediately begin.

– If a standard ultimately gets established, everything that has been capitalized by Rosette can readily be converted and used under the GNU-GPL!