Who are you?

When you meet someone new, how do you answer this question? You might start with your name, but after that, how do you describe yourself to a stranger? What aspects of yourself do you emphasize because they are important to how you self-identify?

Many of mine are relational: I’m a mother, wife, sister, daughter, cousin, aunt, and friend. Others are professional: I’m an archaeologist and teacher. Others are situational: I’m a light-skinned female of a certain generation, born in the USA. I could also list political or religious affiliations, favorite pastimes, and more. Nobody is just one thing; disparate statements of identity would each be equally true in stating who I am.

In English, each of the above statements is constructed the same way: I am this or I am that. In the ancient Egyptian language, though, different kinds of identity were marked in different grammatical ways to distinguish whether they described an aspect of self that was inherent to one’s being or pertained temporarily in certain situations.

Let me explain.

The ancient Egyptian language, like its Semitic cousins, Arabic and Hebrew, didn’t require a be-verb in most settings. Simply mashing two nouns together created a sentence. So writing I + mother created the sentence “I am a mother.” This noun + noun form of an identity statement emphasizes the interchangeability of the two words. Immutability is implied: this is a lasting description, a permanent part of one’s identity.

For the ancient Egyptians, the inherent roles included relationships and religiously determined roles like “king.” A king is still a king, even after death. I am a mother and I will always be a mother. Even if I die or my children die or never speak to me again, I am still their mother. It’s part of me. Noun + noun.

A second type of identity statement required one additional word. To say “I am a scribe” in ancient Egyptian, a person would add a preposition. The sentence would include the words I as scribe and, translated literally, would mean “I am as a scribe.” I might translate it more fully as “I am acting as a scribe” or, saying the unsaid parts out loud, “I am acting as a scribe in this setting, but it’s just a job, not an inherent part of my deepest, most essential self.” As described by the first great grammarian of ancient Egyptian, Alan Gardiner, the “M” of equivalence came into play when expressing “an acquired attribute rather than a permanent ‘property’.”

This second construction, known to scholars as the “M of equivalence” (or, less evocatively, as the “M” of predication), has fascinated me for a long time, because it makes a distinction that we don’t have in English. In translating an ancient Egyptian sentence, we learn how they thought about different aspects of our identities: was this particular thing inherent and permanent and lastingly meaningful, or was it a role in which one acted a part? “Are” you this kind of person or are you “acting as” it?

Naturally, grammarians of the past 100 years since the publication of Gardiner’s Egyptian Grammar have discovered exceptions and complications to this rule, but I find it a fascinating concept. The existence of the M of equivalence, taken metaphorically, invites […]