Following Alexander the Great’s conquest of Egypt, Greek became the language of the ruling class while the local population continued to speak Egyptian. A thousand years later, Greek was replaced by Arabic, but Coptic remained the common language of the country for centuries.
The papyri reveal the dynamic exchange between the linguistic and cultural groups, since it is language that creates identity, forms and defines community, marks the social and political elite, and shapes cultural memory. The exhibition presents a panoramic picture of multilingual ancient Egypt while also addressing changes in the language groups and the significance of bilingual texts as an expression of the assimilation processes that shaped Egypt over centuries.
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