Horapollo
Horapollo(fromHorusApollo;Greek:Ὡραπόλλων) is the supposed author of a treatise, titledHieroglyphica,onEgyptian hieroglyphs,extant in aGreektranslation by one Philippus, dating to about the 5th century.
Life
[edit]Horapollo is mentioned by theSuda(ω 159) as one of the last leaders of theEgyptian priesthoodat a school inMenouthis,nearAlexandria,during the reign ofZeno(AD 474–491).
According to the Suda, Horapollo had to flee because he was accused of plotting a revolt againstthe Christians,and his temple toIsisandOsiriswas destroyed. Horapollo was later captured and after torture converted to Christianity. Another, earlier, Horapollo alluded to by the Suda was a grammarian fromPhanebytis,underTheodosius II(AD 408–450). To this Horapollo theHieroglyphicawas attributed by most 16th-century editors, although there were more occult opinions, identifying Horapollo withHorushimself, or with apharaoh.
Horapollo wrote commentaries onSophocles,Alcaeus of MytileneandHomer,and a work (Ancient Greek:Τεμενικά) on places consecrated to the gods.Photius(cod. 279), who calls him a dramatist as well as agrammarian,ascribes to him a history of the foundation and antiquities ofAlexandria(unless this is by an Egyptian of the same name, who lived in the reign ofZeno,474–491).[1]Timotheus of Gaza,whose treatises on animals impacted Byzantine and Arabic scientific literature, was one of his pupils.[2]
Hieroglyphica
[edit]The text of theHieroglyphicaconsists of two books, containing a total of 189 explanations ofEgyptian hieroglyphs.The books profess to be a translation from an Egyptian original into Greek by a certain Philippus, of whom nothing is known. The inferior Greek of the translation, and the character of the additions in the second book point to its being of late date; some have even assigned it to the 15th century.[1]The text was discovered in 1419 on the island ofAndros,and was taken toFlorencebyCristoforo Buondelmonti(it is today kept at the Biblioteca Laurenziana, Plut. 69,27). By the end of the 15th century, the text became immensely popular among humanists and was translated into Latin byGiorgio Valla(in ms.Vat. lat. 3898). The first printed edition of the text appeared in 1505 (published byManuzio), and was translated into Latin in 1517 byFilippo Fasanini,initiating a long sequence of editions and translations. From the 18th century, the book's authenticity was called into question, but modern Egyptology regards at least the first book as based on real knowledge of hieroglyphs, although confused, and with baroque symbolism and theological speculation, and the book may well originate with the latest remnants of the Egyptian priesthood of the 5th century.[3]
Though a very large proportion of the statements seem absurd and cannot be accounted for by anything known in the latest and most fanciful usage, there is ample evidence in both books, in individual cases, that the tradition of the values of the hieroglyphic signs was not yet extinct in the days of their author.[1]
This approach of symbolic speculation about hieroglyphs (many of which were originally simplesyllabicsigns) was popular duringHellenism,whence the early Humanists, down toAthanasius Kircher,inherited the preconception of the hieroglyphs as a magical, symbolic, ideographic script. In 1556, the Italian humanistPierio Valeriano Bolzanipublished a vastHieroglyphicaatMichael Isengrin's printing press inBasel,which was originally planned as an exegesis of Horapollo's. It was dedicated toCosimo I de' Medici.
The second part of book II treats animal symbolism and allegory, essentially derived fromAristotle,Aelian,PlinyandArtemidorus,and is probably an addition by the Greek translator.
Editions by C. Leemans (1835) and A. T. Cory (1840) with English translation and notes; see also G. Rathgeber in Ersch and Gruber'sAllgemeine Encyclopädie;H. Schafer,Zeitschrift für ägyptische Sprache(1905), p. 72.[1]
Select editions
[edit]- Aldus Manutius,Venice 1505 (editio princeps)
- George Boas, New York 1950 (English translation), reprinted 1993ISBN0-691-00092-1.
- Orapollo,I geroglifici,Rizzoli, Milan 1996ISBN88-17-16997-8.
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^abcdOne or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain:Chisholm, Hugh,ed. (1911). "Horapollon".Encyclopædia Britannica.Vol. 13 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 691.
- ^Johnson, Scott Fitzgerald (15 May 2017).Languages and Cultures of Eastern Christianity: Greek.Routledge.ISBN978-1-351-92323-1.Retrieved7 January2024.
- ^Eco U., (1993)La Ricerca della Lingua Perfetta nella Cultura Europea(The Search for the Perfect Language, Fontana Press (1997),ISBN0-00-686378-7), chapter 7: The Perfect language of Images
- Jan Assmann.Moses the Egyptian: The Memory of Egypt in Western Monotheism.ISBN978-0-674-58739-7.
- Dorman, Peter F.; Brunner, Hellmut."hieroglyphic writing".Encyclopædia Britannica.Encyclopædia Britannica.Retrieved28 April2017.
External links
[edit]- A translation of Horapollo's entry in Suda
- The Hieroglyphics of Horapollo, tr. Cory 1840
- Horapollo(studiolum.com)
- Horapollo, Delli segni hierogliphici, Venecia 1547etext of Ferrari's edition (studiolum.com)
- ΙΕΡΟΓΛΥΦΙΚΑ
