Hieroglyphs tutorial; Adjectives

An adjectives is a word which describes a noun. In the hieroglyphic language of Ancient Egypt the adjective "agrees" with the noun (i.e. an adjective for a female noun also has the ending "t", and adjectives for plural nouns are plural).

bin - evil

s bin

("a" or "the") evil man

st bint

("a" or "the") evil woman

Word Order

Unlike English, the adjective generally follows the noun it describes (as above, "s bin" translates as "evil man" not "man evil"). However, an adjective can also be used as a "predicate adjective" (e.g. "The cat is graceful") in which case the noun follows the adjective.

An adjective can also be used as a noun in which case it will have a determinative sign to shows that it is a noun.

Common Adjectives

	a'a	great, big
	wer	great, mighty
	nefer	good, beautiful, perfect
	nub, neb	all, every
	bin	evil, bad
	wab	pure

This

The word this also acts like an adjective and so it follows the noun and agrees with it in gender and number.

pn

this (masc)

tn

this (fem)

Hieroglyphs main page

Gardiner's sign list