Hieratic

Hieratic (haɪəˈrætɪk; hieratiká) is the name given to a cursive writing system used for Ancient Egyptian and the principal script used to write that language from its development in the third millennium BC until the rise of Demotic in the mid-first millennium BC. It was primarily written in ink with a reed pen on papyrus. In the second century, the term hieratic was used for the first time by the Greek scholar Clement of Alexandria to describe this Ancient Egyptian writing system. The term derives from the Greek for "priestly writing" (γράμματα ἱερατικά) because at that time, for more than eight and a half centuries, hieratic had been used traditionally only for religious texts and literature. Hieratic can also be an adjective meaning "[o]f or associated with sacred persons or offices; sacerdotal." Hieratic developed as a cursive form of hieroglyphic script in the Naqada III period of Ancient Egypt, roughly 3200–3000 BC. Although handwritten printed hieroglyphs continued to be used in some formal situations, such as manuscripts of the Egyptian Book of the Dead, noncursive hieroglyphic script became largely restricted to monumental inscriptions. Around 650 BC, the even more-cursive Demotic script developed from hieratic. Demotic arose in northern Egypt and replaced hieratic and the southern shorthand known as abnormal hieratic for most mundane writing, such as personal letters and mercantile documents. Hieratic continued to be used by the priestly class for religious texts and literature into the third century BC. Through most of its long history, hieratic was used for writing administrative documents, accounts, legal texts, and letters, as well as mathematical, medical, literary, and religious texts. During the Græco-Roman period, when Demotic (and later, Greek) had become the chief administrative script, hieratic was limited primarily to religious texts. In general, hieratic was much more important than hieroglyphs throughout Egypt's history, being the script used in daily life.