Rosetta Stone

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Rosetta Stone an inscribed stone found near Rosetta on the western mouth of the Nile in 1799. Its text, a decree commemorating the accession of Ptolemy V (reigned 205–180 bc), is written in three scripts: hieroglyphic, demotic, and Greek; the deciphering of the hieroglyphs by Jean-François Champollion in 1822 led to the interpretation of many other early records of Egyptian civilization. The Rosetta Stone is sometimes taken as the type of a mysterious cryptogram which, when decoded, will unlock other mysteries.

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