For my understanding of what is spoken in The Mummy films I must doff my hat to one man. If you watch the end credits both films credit Dr Stuart Tyson Smith of University College Los Angeles in the USA with role of Egyptology Adviser in the films. He is the gentleman who has translated some of the script into the ancient language so Imhotep and his cronies can speak to each other in their original tongue. I have communicated with the learned gentleman by e-mail – he was polite enough to respond to my request for information with a very interesting reply which has given me a lot of things to think about and more to research.
As he told me, and as I have read as I have researched the subject, to make things complicated for starters Egyptian developed over many centuries, was not written with any vowels anyway and is now a dead language. It stopped being spoken when the Arabic language got a grip in Egypt in the early 7th century CE. All of these things make for problems for the person trying to find out.
? The researchers look at how other cultures who were living at the time (eg the Greeks) wrote Egyptian words and names – this is how early Egyptologists started to learn how to ready hieroglyphs.
? We can also research the Coptic language, this was the language used by Egyptian Christians and is preserved in their music and services that are said and sung in moderd day. We can use it to us an idea what the language sounded like at the timeChristianity arrived in Egypt, very late in their history but still valid in the history of the language, and to help us it is written with the Greek script so we can understand. I’m learning Coptic as we speak; I’ll keep you posted on that as to how I get on!
? There is also a chance to learn things by listening to other languages from the same area in Africa. An Ethiopian runs my local Cybercafe in Kilburn in London and when I first heard him talking to his friends I thought I should have understood what they were saying. They used exactly the same vocalisation as the actors were taught to use in The Mummy Returns – more than a little spooky but it proves my point.
Having digested all this information you are now ready to understand about the Ancient Egyptian spoken in The Mummy and The Mummy Returns.
When I e-mailed Dr Smith he was very clear in telling me how he had translated a lot of the script into Egyptian for TM, but the team on the film had decided themselves what to do with his offerings and whether they should be used or not. As far as it goes (and as far as I can see) they seemed to do exactly what they wanted and didn’t pay much attention to the learned Doctor. For starters they put in a load of old rubbish in which just sounded good; you will have read my pages about the line ‘Hootash im Amenophis” earlier in this site, this is NOT ancient Egyptian and like a lot in TM and something made up. Dr Smith did actually translate correct dialogue to be used in this place in the film – to make sure the mummy soldiers behaved and helped our heroes instead of hindering them – but the director did not use it in his finished version of the film. Gobbledegook like this was used all over the script in TM and that includes the spell from the Book of the Dead to wake Imhotep up for the first time, this was also despite Dr Smith providing something suitable for that situation too. He quoted the Ceremony of the Opening of the Mouth and Cannibal Texts from the Pyramid Texts to me. I am on the trail of these as we speak.
The other problem with the spoken Egyptian in The Mummy is that when it does turn up - and it does - it does not (in my humble amateur opinion) follow proper Egyptian language rules as taught by Mr Gardiner in his Grammar or any of the other books written about the subject. Let me explain.
