Rosetta Stone
Item Ptolemaic Period

Rosetta Stone

Current location
British Museum, Room 4 (Egyptian Sculpture) — London, England, since 1802
Discovered
Fort Julien, Rashid, Egypt, 1799

The Rosetta Stone is a granodiorite stele inscribed with three versions of a decree issued in Memphis, Egypt, in 196 BCE during the Ptolemaic dynasty. The decree appears in three scripts: Egyptian hieroglyphs, Demotic, and Ancient Greek. Discovery by French soldiers in 1799 and decipherment by Jean-Francois Champollion in 1822 unlocked the reading of Egyptian hieroglyphs.

Provenance Trail

Fort Julien, Rashid, Egypt

Rosetta

British Museum, Room 4 (Egyptian Sculpture) — London, England, since 1802

Articles

The Rosetta Stone: Unlocking the Secrets of Ancient Egypt
Article

The Rosetta Stone: Unlocking the Secrets of Ancient Egypt

The story of the Rosetta Stone is one of empires, egos, and the enduring power of language. Its journey from the sands o...

Ptolemaic Period

Sep 8, 2025

Mainstream Alternative Mythological

Related Subjects

Place Modern

Rosetta

Rosetta Stone located in Rosetta

appears in 1 article

A port city in the Nile Delta of Egypt (modern Rashid), where the Rosetta Stone was discovered in 1799.

Civilization

Ancient Egypt

co-cited in 1 article

appears in 7 articles

Dynastic civilization along the Nile from early unification through the Ptolemaic period.

Event Contemporary

Rosetta Stone Discovery

linked to Rosetta Stone

appears in 1 article

French soldiers discovered the Rosetta Stone near the town of Rosetta (Rashid) in July 1799 during Napoleon's Egyptian campaign. The trilingual decree would eventually become the key to deciphering Eg...

Place Old Kingdom

Saqqara

co-cited in 1 article

appears in 3 articles

Saqqara is the vast necropolis of ancient Memphis, home to the Step Pyramid of Djoser and tombs spanning from the Early Dynastic Period to the Ptolemaic and Roman eras.

Place Ancient

Egypt

co-cited in 1 article

appears in 7 articles

Ancient Egypt was a civilization of ancient Northeastern Africa, concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in what is now the modern country of Egypt. This civilization emerged around 310...

Figure Old Kingdom

Khufu

co-cited in 1 article

appears in 3 articles

Khufu succeeded his father, Sneferu, and ruled Egypt in the 26th century BCE. His reign is characterized by significant architectural achievements, including the construction of the Great Pyramid. Des...

Place Old Kingdom

Great Pyramid of Giza

co-cited in 1 article

appears in 1 article

The Great Pyramid of Giza, an emblem of ancient Egypt, stands as the oldest and largest pyramid within the Giza pyramid complex. Constructed during the Old Kingdom era, it is a testament to the advanc...

Place Ancient

Greece

co-cited in 1 article

appears in 1 article

Ancient Greece, flourishing from the 8th to the 1st century BCE, was a cradle of Western civilization, known for its diverse city-states or polis, each with distinct governance and cultures. This peri...

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Cited Sources

AI, Tavily. "Mainstream Synthesis: Hieroglyphics Decoded".

Decoding Hieroglyphics

Unknown author · Website

"Decoding Hieroglyphics". Available at: https://girlstart.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Decoding-Hieroglyphics.pdf

Maya script

Unknown author · Website

"Maya script". Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_script

Ensoniq ASR-10

Unknown author · Website

"Ensoniq ASR-10". Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ensoniq_ASR-10

Museo Egizio

Unknown author · Website

"Museo Egizio". Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Museo_Egizio

Roswell incident

Unknown author · Website

"Roswell incident". Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roswell_incident

"How Egyptian hieroglyphs were decoded, a timeline to ...". Available at: https://www.britishmuseum.org/exhibitions/hieroglyphs-unlocking-ancient-egypt/egyptian-hieroglyphs-decipherment-timeline

"Decoding the Secrets of Egyptian Hieroglyphs". Available at: https://www.amazon.com/Decoding-Secrets-Egyptian-Hieroglyphs-Brier/dp/1629973300

View all 38 →

Other Sources

"How We Decoded The Hieroglyphs Of Ancient Egypt". Available at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lG5z47xIe8A

The Rosetta Stone

E.A. Wallis Budge · Book

Budge, E.A. Wallis. (1913). "The Rosetta Stone". British Museum. Available at: https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/Y_EA24

"Decoding Hieroglyphics | About the Episode | Secrets of ...". Available at: https://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/decoding-hieroglyphics-preview-7jqfn5/6330/

"How Hieroglyphs Were Deciphered 200 Years Ago". Available at: https://coinsweekly.com/how-hieroglyphs-were-deciphered-200-years-ago/

"How we deciphered Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs". Available at: https://www.sciencefocus.com/science/ahow-we-deciphered-ancient-egyptian-hieroglyphsthe-meaning-of-egyptian-hieroglyphs

"Rosetta Stone: The race to decipher Egypt's hieroglyphs". Available at: https://www.dw.com/en/rosetta-stone-deciphering-mysterious-egyptian-hieroglyphs/a-63268251

"Deciphering the History, Symbols and Sounds of Egyptian ...". Available at: https://history.howstuffworks.com/world-history/hieroglyphics.htm

"Decipherment of ancient Egyptian scripts". Available at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Decipherment_of_ancient_Egyptian_scripts

View all 30 →

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