Horapollo

Horapollo (from

Horus

Apollo

; grc-gre, Ὡραπόλλων) is the supposed author of a treatise, titled ''Hieroglyphica'', on Egyptian hieroglyphs, extant in a Greek translation by one Philippus, dating to about the 5th century.

Life

Horapollo is mentioned by the

Suda

(ω 159) as one of the last leaders of Egyptian priesthood at a school in Menouthis, near

Alexandria

, during the reign of Zeno (AD 474–491).

According to the Suda, Horapollo had to flee because he was accused of plotting a revolt against the Christians, and his temple to

Isis

and

Osiris

was destroyed. Horapollo was later captured and after torture converted to Christianity.
Another, earlier, Horapollo alluded to by the Suda was a grammarian from Phanebytis, under Theodosius II (AD 408–450). To this Horapollo the ''Hieroglyphica'' was attributed by most 16th-century editors, although there were more occult opinions, identifying Horapollo with

Horus

himself, or with a

pharaoh

.

Horapollo wrote commentaries on

Sophocles

, Alcaeus of Mytilene and

Homer

, and a work ( grc, Τεμενικά) on places consecrated to the gods. Photius (cod. 279), who calls him a dramatist as well as a grammarian, ascribes to him a history of the foundation and antiquities of

Alexandria

(unless this is by an Egyptian of the same name, who lived in the reign of Zeno, 474–491).

''Hieroglyphica''

The text of the ''Hieroglyphica'' consists of two books, containing a total of 189 explanations of Egyptian hieroglyphs. The books profess to be a translation from an Egyptian original into Greek by a certain Philippus, of whom nothing is known. The inferior Greek of the translation, and the character of the additions in the second book point to its being of late date; some have even assigned it to the 15th century. The text was discovered in 1419 on the island of

Andros

, and was taken to

Florence

by Cristoforo Buondelmonti (it is today kept at the Biblioteca Laurenziana, Plut. 69,27).
By the end of the 15th century, the text became immensely popular among humanists and was translated into Latin by Giorgio Valla (in ms. Vat. lat. 3898). The first printed edition of the text appeared in 1505 (published by Manuzio), and was translated into Latin in 1517 by Filippo Fasanini, initiating a long sequence of editions and translations. From the 18th century, the book's authenticity was called into question, but modern Egyptology regards at least the first book as based on real knowledge of hieroglyphs, although confused, and with baroque symbolism and theological speculation, and the book may well originate with the latest remnants of Egyptian priesthood of the 5th century. Eco U., (1993) '' La Ricerca della Lingua Perfetta nella Cultura Europea'' (The Search for the Perfect Language, Fontana Press (1997), ), chapter 7: The Perfect language of Images

Though a very large proportion of the statements seem absurd and cannot be accounted for by anything known in the latest and most fanciful usage, there is ample evidence in both books, in individual cases, that the tradition of the values of the hieroglyphic signs was not yet extinct in the days of their author.

This approach of symbolic speculation about hieroglyphs (many of which were originally simple syllabic signs) was popular during Hellenism, whence the early Humanists, down to

Athanasius Kircher

, inherited the preconception of the hieroglyphs as a magical, symbolic, ideographic script. In 1556, the Italian humanist

Pierio Valeriano Bolzani

published a vast ''Hieroglyphica'' at Michael Isengrin's printing press in Basle, which was originally planned as an exegesis of Horapollo's. It was dedicated to

Cosimo I de' Medici

.

The second part of book II treats animal symbolism and allegory, essentially derived from

Aristotle

, Aelian,

Pliny

and Artemidorus, and are probably an addition by the Greek translator.

Editions by C. Leemans (1835) and A. T. Cory (1840) with English translation and notes; see also G. Rathgeber in Ersch and Gruber's ''Allgemeine Encyclopädie''; H. Schafer, ''Zeitschrift für ägyptische Sprache'' (1905), p. 72.

Select editions

*

Aldus Manutius

, Venice 1505 (''editio princeps'')
* George Boas, New York 1950 (English translation), reprinted 1993 .
* Orapollo, ''I geroglifici'', Rizzoli, Milan 1996 .

See also

*

Athanasius Kircher

* Hermes Trismegistos

References

*Jan Assmann. Moses the Egyptian: The Memory of Egypt in Western Monotheism. .
*

External links

A translation of Horapollo's entry in Suda
(studiolum.com)

etext of Ferrari's edition (studiolum.com)



{{Authority control
5th-century books
Egyptian hieroglyphs
Egyptology
Hermeticism