Show LETTER FROM TURKEY JL will no doubt please the wera of the NEWS to learn that the 1106 uproar made throughout tur tw csome key some months ago to the effect alleged mormons cormons Mor t mons were being ported in chains to be ban etc ec was a false la 18 rumor in beaded ht eted ja for gullible people every S goes on smoothly and there assigns 0 of f molestation I 1 perhaps owe your readers an vwe ay for an impression which I 1 V T hilve have conveyed in my letter d cairo with respect to an in eption usually called a cartouche on n a lately uncovered surface of ue 8 pyramid of the char 4 mso are of the kind generally faed oled A hieratic bratic beautifully and daftly carved into the limestone w pleasing it would be to hear talt the y t we ile cartouche had dissipated ue nays tery which for ages en buds 4 this stupendous pile gag of no developments develop mente the awin iwan government was consult glattly gla tely in the matter the answer J lette ter r eap exp explains ins that a commission antiquarians atiq ua ns and savants savanis sent bent i 7 b frederick r erick william I 1 IV V of ho to explore and copy aloyed levers wedges and ibris b I 1 in n demolishing a part of the HOB ding ain in order to clear a surface ate alch which to carve in ancient to t a bombastic their regal patron thus we are ot aS the wiser in this matter e allent pyramid retains its it secret luay puzzle the readers 1 11 04 0 4 to understand how an in intelli III in hie hieroglyphics rog ato be 0 gotten up now days a d ay s the ai ut arises from the erroneous rl inmost universal notion that the n characters are only ideo g graphic ali c 1 i e written pictures or ll p picture i writing merely which is the most primitive method devised by man for conveying ideas graphically when the spaniards first landed on the shores of america the event was heralded to tribes of different languages by rough drawings of men weapons of war ships etc some specimens of which are preserved to our own times our utes navajos cavajos Nava jos and apaches carve their rude annals likewise as the sandstone rocks of southern utah and ArI arizona arizoca ZODa still attest but on the banks of the nile this simple expedient of ician man to embody his thoughts in external signs soon gave way to more practical methods of which egypto monuments from their extreme durability supply a history which we have nowhere else found of the gradual steps taken by mankind in the art of writing the earliest egyptian characters known to us have been called hieroglyphic t e sacred carvings A hieroglyph was a complete picture of some well known object whick which had in an allegorical or sacred manner some connection with the idea it was intended to conveyor convey or recall As AB as instance of a sacred one we can notice the dove the emblem of the holy ghost which as a written symbol seems coeval with the most moat ancient human notions of theology and from oue one of the gems dated january 29 1843 we learn that even before the orea creation tion of the world it was an established symbol or sign some hieroglyphics characteristic of a full writing may be found in the pearl of great price especially no 4 and the four figures of the earth under no 6 in the or disc from frem the book of abraham also the first cut or plate from the same book nos 1 5 6 7 8 and 9 the inconvenience inseparable from such picture writing soon suggested the idea of a reduced reci delineation called hieratic substituting a sword for an armed man a banner for an invading army and a curved line for a ship as most of the writings in plate 3 or cr no 7 of the where a reduced picture a doves head foot and a few strokes takes the place of the full symbol and of such are the majority of the characters within the band or circles of the latter facsimile fac simile in the earlier stages of that contracted writing A the abbreviated forms would still retain a faint resemblance to the original figure but in course of time the reduced symbol would assume more and more the character of a mere conventional mark where each sign however would continue to be word to those who have gone to chinatown san francisco or even pondered in salt lake over the strange sign boards of chinese laundrymen let it be known that the literature of china used a writing which presented resented the aspect just described thus they have an amazingly long set of signs or marks expressive of certain ideas becoming of course more intricate as the thoughts thought sto to be bea conveyed are more numerous or subtle and requiring at length a great degree of very painful and unprofitable study to comprehend their full import the next step taken in egypt was to analyze the written speech into its alphabetical elements to reach this at first was sufficiently awkward but it was attained when a number of pictures were employed the initial letters or sounds of which when pronounced would form the sounds required following this scheme of initial notation f nothing better would have suggested itself to the ingenuity of the egyptian philologist than to spell the name of joseph smith for example than by placing side by side the pictures of a jay an oak a seal an egg and a phoenix etc the initials and first and second letters of the last of which taken together would form joseph etc the direction which the figures look determining whether one should read from right to left vwe vice versa or upwards and downwards this was a great st step ep in advance it meant the discovery of a phonetic writing by its means any inscription can b be 6 carved about as grammatically as in days of old and so probably d d those savants savanis who in in other respects seemed to care so little for archee etiquette in the course of time certain easily written pictures were retained in preference to more complex ones the number of which in the hands of less boastful or literary nations dwindled as in english to twenty six and in hebrew to twenty two these pictures through frequent use became exclusively identified with the sound or phonetic value and not the idea they may at any time have been intended to convey thus in the psalm by skipping eight verses at a time the reader will find the names of the letters of the hebrew alphabet the original form of these letter bore a resemblance to the objects they were used to express aleph beth gimel which in the common language of the country denoted an oxa axa hou bou seand a camel jacamel were at first pictures or rude likenesses of a dwelling and the two animals named the same is true of the alphabet of cognate tongues as arabic alef bet gimel and greek alpha beta gamma our A B C for far that matter has no more noble or origin in thus our own alphabets and ang all others perhaps are merely lists of the names of various objects the initial sounds of which are used phonetically I 1 shall probably write another letter on this score illustrating a few instances in proof of the broad assertion made if I 1 find nothing moie interesting to impart we are delighted to hear that more elders are coming here C U L AiN turkey june 7 1889 1880 |