The rosetta stone in the british museum. The rosetta stone is the important historical document that allows the modern understanding of egyptian hieroglyphs. The rosetta stone is a granodiorite stele rediscovered in the western world in 1799 inscribed with three versions of a decree issued at memphis egypt in 196 bc during the ptolemaic dynasty on behalf of king ptolemy v the top and middle texts are in ancient egyptian using hieroglyphic script and demotic scripts respectively while the bottom is in ancient greek.
As the first ancient egyptian bilingual text recovered in modern times the rosetta stone aroused widespread public interest with its potential to decipher this hitherto untranslated ancient language. It was rediscovered there in 1799 by a soldier pierre françois bouchard of the napoleonic expedition to egypt. Dated to the 2nd century bc the stone contained the same inscription in three different languages including ancient greek which allowed historians to translate egyptian hieroglyphics.
In 1799 one of napoleon s soldiers found a peculiar stone near the egyptian port city of rosetta. Napoleon was famously interested in antiquities while occupying italy he sent an excavation team to pompeii but in this case it was an accidental find his soldiers were robbing stones to bolster nearby fort. The block was found near the town of rosetta now el rashid egypt in 1799 ironically enough by the french emperor napoleon s failed military expedition to conquer the country.
Army engineers who were part of napoleon bonaparte s egyptian campaign discovered the stone slab in 1799 while making repairs to a fort near the town. The rosetta stone tablet was found in egypt in the 19th century the rosetta stone helped scholars at long last crack the code of hieroglyphics the ancient egyptian writing system. Greek egyptian hieroglyphics and egyptian demotic.
The irregularly shaped stone contained fragments of passages written in three different scripts. The stone was found north of rosetta. It was to change history and was allow the modern world to understand the language and the world of ancient egypt.
On this day in 1799 during napoleon s invasion of egypt a french soldier discovers a black basalt stone that was inscribed with writing. The rosetta stone is a granodiorite stele inscribed with three versions of a decree issued in memphis egypt in 196 bc during the ptolemaic dynasty on behalf of king ptolemy v epiphanes the top and middle texts are in ancient egyptian using hieroglyphic and demotic scripts respectively while the bottom is in ancient greek the decree has only minor differences between the three versions. On july 19 1799 during napoleon bonaparte s egyptian campaign a french soldier discovers a black basalt slab inscribed with ancient writing near the town of rosetta about 35 miles east of.
