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Lead book review

The tug of war over the Rosetta Stone

The decipherment of the Rosetta Stone led to bitter feuding – but there was mutual curiosity and collaboration too, says Elizabeth Frood

12 December 2020

9:00 AM

12 December 2020

9:00 AM

The Riddle of the Rosetta: How an English Polymath and a French Polyglot Discovered the Meaning of Egyptian Hieroglyphs Jed Z. Buchwald and Diane Greco Josefowicz

Princeton, pp.575, 34

The Rosetta Stone is the icon of decipherment. As one of the most popular objects in the British Museum, its irregular shape and the once white-on-black of its three scripts — hieroglyphic, demotic, Greek — are distinctive enough to sell countless socks, keyrings and nail files in the museum shop.

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