The Nedj Nedj databases 7 Supplementaries 7.4: Gender / 7.5: Determinatives

7.4 Gender

A common marker for the feminine gender is the suffix -et.

Fig. 7.41 Records with known gender, which is shown in the small black field

This can be seen in the first of the above two records, where seKHet is a feminine noun; shesep by contrast is masculine. Adjectives agree with nouns, so a feminine adjective would have the -et suffix attached to it, as in KHet nebet below:

Fig. 7.42 KHet nebet Adjective neb(et) agrees with feminine noun KHet

In the two records shown in Fig. 7.41, the gender is marked in the small black field towards the right. While this field is for the most part blank, where one of the principal authorities has indicated the gender of a word, this has been recorded in the database, as in the case of the next examples:

Fig. 7.43 Words where gender has been stated, and so marked in the black {gender} field

7.5 Determinatives

Across the lower centre portion of the Overview screen are to be found the headings for the records, and various other items. Among these are the determinative identifiers, with provision for up to three. 

Fig. 7.51 The three determinative fields, showing two in use

Many words in Ancient Egyptian apparently had the same sound: they were homophones. Or at least to a reader of the hieroglyphs they appear to be such. Perhaps they did not sound the same, but as the vowel sounds were often omitted, the similarity was there visually at least. It might have been for this reason that a means was adopted for differentiating words, to show which of the possible words the sight-reading actually intended to represent. The scribes added a hieroglyph or several to give these additional indications. They were later called determinatives. For example if the word was a bird, then there would be a picture of a bird at the end.

It is conceivable that the Ancient Egyptians had kites, the objects flown in the wind for pleasure. They certainly had kites of a sort. But which sort? There are four ‘kite’ records:

transliteration / respelt	English	EngJSM	source	page / line	glyph names	glyphs
(ḳdt: qedet)	"kitĕ"		Gardiner	[616.2:17]	<stilt bun stone>
(dryt: djerit)	"kite"		Faulkner Concise	[323:13.11]	<skip: bow mouth reeds bun duck>
(drt: djeret)	"kite"		Faulkner Concise	[323:13.12]	<skip: bow mouth bun hawk>
(drt: djeret)	"kite"		Faulkner Concise	[323:13.13]	<cobra-J mouth bun duck: spread>

Table 17 ‘kite’ and its diacritics

In the first example, Gardiner has given the word kitĕ, in italics with an overscoop on the final /e/. It is not clear what this word might be. But the next three ‘kite’ examples that Faulkner provides are plainly not a recreational item for a windy day but the hawk-like bird of prey, given that each is marked with a picture of a bird as the determinative.

So what does qedet in Gardiner’s example actually mean? The occurrences panel for this record reveals . . .

Fig. 7.52a qedet: ‘measure’

. . . that qedet is a measure

while a search in the searcher panel for qed shows . . .

Fig. 7.52b qed: ‘build’

. . . that qed is about constructing or building, and that qed-et is a relative form, ‘build what is’, giving the meaning ‘measure (of weight), no doubt a requirement of builders of the day.