Most adverbial sentences (The Adverbial Sentence) in Middle Egyptian texts begin with a small introductory word. The two you will meet constantly are jw and mk. They take pronouns differently, which is where the pronoun sets of Dependent Pronouns pay off.
Key idea
| Person | with jw | with mk | Meaning |
|---|---|---|---|
| I | jw=j m pr | mk wj m pr | I am in the house |
| you (man) | jw=k m pr | mk ṯw m pr | you are in the house |
| he | jw=f m pr | mk sw m pr | he is in the house |
| she | jw=s m pr | mk sj m pr | she is in the house |
| they | jw=sn m pr | mk sn m pr | they are in the house |
What jw does
jw has no English equivalent. It marks the sentence as a statement in its own right, often of a fact or a situation that matters to what follows. Grammarians still discuss its exact force, but for translation the rule is simple: usually leave it out. jw=f m pr is “he is in the house” (or “he was in the house”).
mk, on the other hand, is a real word: “look!, see!”, used to draw a listener’s attention. It agrees with the person addressed: mk to a man, mṯ to a woman, mṯn to several people. In translation “look,” or “see,” is fine, or sometimes “now,” at the start of a speech.
Why it works
Common mistake
Worked example: Choose the pronoun
- jw takes a suffix pronoun.
- She: =s.
Answer: jw=s m njwt
Worked example: Choose the pronoun
- mk takes a dependent pronoun.
- I: wj.
Answer: mk wj ḥnꜥ=k