[Egyptian] Unicode Technical Committee (UTC) documents about Egyptian Hieroglyphic (May 2017)

Sat Jun 3 20:31:11 BST 2017

Dear all Egyptological yod interested ones,

I have gone through the "lively" discussion, which revealed some 
interesting historical information (Lepsius,...) -- thank you Michael.

However, the thread started with the question whether Egyptologists 
would be happy with the proposal, in order to prevent any disturbances 
for the process. And, if I followed the discussion correctly, some 
encoding oriented people were happy with it while three or four 
Egyptologists said they are not. So that's at least the answer to the 
initial question. Consequently, it would be fair (indeed I ask you) *not 
name Egyptology as a supporter*. Since there is already resistance 
against it now the chances are high that if you want to go through with 
the "... WITH SPIRITUS LENIS" characters as they are now, Egyptologists 
*would not start using* it (indeed I -- as a print publishing author -- 
would stick to U+0131+0357 since the shape is better). Then the whole 
point of the well-meant endeavor is lost.

*Encoders*, if it was just for the easy encoding one could simply use
ỉ U+1EC9 LATIN ... LETTER WITH HOOK ABOVE
It looks vaguely like Egyptological Yod -- indeed like an "i" with a 
glottal stop ;) -- and it is not composed.

The main point for a long-term acceptance in Egyptology is that the 
character shape *looks like the character in contemporary Egyptology*. 
Indeed, the "half circle" above the Egyptological yod does NOT look like 
the "spiritus lenis" the latest proposal. The "spiritus lenis" is 
designed like a RIGHT SINGLE QUOTATION MARK (bubblish at the top), while 
the Egyptological form is more like a mirrored "c", like the 
Egyptological alef (*no bubble* at the top, sometimes styled a little 
thicker but not bubblish).
http://wwwuser.gwdg.de/~dwernin/temp/EgyptologicalYod.pdf
Both shapes are admittedly similar -- and may have originally started as 
one(?) --, but SIMILAR, today, is not enough to get it accepted in the 
field FOR which it is meant (right?).
If it was the shape of the contemporary Egyptological Yod but a 
misleading or historically outdated name ("spiritus lenis") -- probably o.k.
If it was a non-perfect shape but a unique name "EGYPTOLOGICAL YOD" - 
probably o.k.
But only similar shape (RIGHT SINGLE QUOTATION MARK-ish) and 
misleading/outdated name (spiritus lenis) -- no broad acceptance to be 
expected.

If you are willing to design the shape in a revision of the proposal 
less RIGHT SINGLE QUOTATION MARK-like and more mirrored-"c" like (like 
the upper part of the EGYPTOLOGICAL ALEF), I personally would not bother 
too much with the name "... WITH SPIRITUS LENIS" iff(!) Ugaritic studies 
would prefer it over "... WITH GLOTTAL STOP" (I would refer "... WITH 
GLOTTAL STOP" or actually "... WITH ALEF"). (Question is whether 
Ugaritic studies could live with the Egyptological shape.)
Note, BTW, that the COPTIC COMBINING SPIRITUS LENIS looks completely 
different -- the argument that one could not call it "... WITH GLOTTAL 
STOP" because the linguistic "GLOTTAL STOP" looks different is, 
therefore, not striking, I believe.
What about "I/A/U WITH SEMITIC(!) GLOTTAL STOP" or "I/A/U WITH ALEF"? 
(depending on what Ugaritic studies could better live with) -- But 
again: first of all, *the shape must appear correct to contemporary 
Egyptologists* to make it a success.

All the best,
Daniel
https://www.archaeologie.hu-berlin.de/de/assoziiert/daniel_werning

Am 01.06.2017 um 08:44 schrieb Stéphane polis:
> Hi guys,
> 
> I definitely agree with Daniel.
> Best wishes,
> 
> St.
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------
> Chercheur qualifié F.R.S.-FNRS
> 
> Université de Liège
> Service d'Égyptologie
> Département des sciences de l’Antiquité
> Place du 20-Août,
> B-4000 Liège
> 
> http://www.egypto.ulg.ac.be
> ------------------------------------------------------
> 
> 
> 
>> Le 31 mai 2017 à 21:04, Daniel Werning <daniel.werning at topoi.org> a écrit :
>>
>> Dear Bob,
>> (Dear Michel Suignard,)
>>
>> Actually, I like the earlier proposal L2/17-076 for an "LATIN ... LETTER EGYPTOLOGICAL YOD" much more.
>>
>> The new proposal L2/17-076R2 calls the "half circle" above the "i" a "... WITH SPIRITUS LENIS" and the shape of the half circle looks more like a "quotes" sign -- like there is a dot in the upper part (future encoders will certainly design it that way due to the name "... WITH SPIRITUS LENIS"). But this is not how it is supposed to look like. It is supposed to look like half an "EGYPTOLOGICAL ALIF". Compare
>> http://wwwuser.gwdg.de/~dwernin/temp/EgyptologicalYod.pdf (with scan from Gardiner, Egyptian Grammar, and others).
>>
>> Therefore, I take issue with the new proposal as far as it aims at Egyptological encoding (*wrong shape, misleading name*).
>>
>> Greetings,
>> Daniel (Werning)
>> https://www.archaeologie.hu-berlin.de/de/assoziiert/daniel_werning
>>
>> Am 31.05.2017 um 19:27 schrieb Bob Richmond:
>>> Hi All
>>> I posted a note on recent documents (and developments) on Unicode and hieroglyphic on http://hieroglyphseverywhere.blogspot.co.uk/.
>>> I expect there will be plenty to discuss in weeks and months to come.
>>> Hopefully the Yod issue is settled once and for all but if anyone has a problem with the two characters proposed please speak up now so we don’t waste a year or two as happened with hieroglyph format controls.
>>> Bob
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> Egyptian mailing list
>>> Egyptian at evertype.com
>>> http://evertype.com/mailman/listinfo/egyptian_evertype.com
>>
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