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Unicode Dicks

revk.uk

51–60 of 110 posts

Re: Unicode Dicks

#52

On my mac os Mojave, those glyph do not show up (aka, they show up as square boxes). Anybody else experiencing this on mac os mojave or is it something wrong on my end? edit: they don't show up in chrome and won't work in slack, they do work in iMessage. edit2: safari happily displays them

They work in GroupMe

Re: Unicode Dicks

#53
Other semi-risque hieroglpyphics:

𓂑 U+13091 small breast

𓂒 U+13092 large breast

𓁒 U+13052 giving birth

𓁔 U+13054 breastfeeding

𓁤 U+13064 the god min

𓄡 U+13121 animals belly showing teats and tail

𓐍 U+1340D possibly the placenta, though could be a sieve

Re: Unicode Dicks

#55
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The most common use is probably as a determinative. Ancient Egyptian, much like many Semitic languages, omits the vowels in a word in writing. Determinatives are ideograms that disambiguate between several words with the same consonants but different meanings. That's an interesting fact. As someone with no knowledge of how languages are formed it makes me wonder why have a written language that purposefully omits vow…

In the same way their written language couldn't express vowels, the english written language cannot adequately express the full range of tones and pauses we have when speaking. People have attempted to convey some portions of spoken tone with thing like the " " tag, and commas/ellipses/etc all convey some level of pauses, but they are not substitutes for the full nuance of spoken english. Asking "Why did their writte…

An even more direct comparison might be something like "I read that book," which has two different meanings that are pronounced differently but spelled the same.

Re: Unicode Dicks

#56
post #4

Ah, I wondered when this would be come up, so to speak. It's just the Egyptian Hieroglyph Unicode block. Apparently the ancient Egyptians were not aware of the comedic value of this symbol to future generations.

I just checked a middle egyptian dictionary I just happen to have on my computer. There are 330 words that use D52 (the phallus or the phallus with the folded cloth). D52 was used to make the sound "mt". A sampling words that use D52 include: ancestors, bull, to appear, ox, men, impregnate, midday, fame, witness, discuss, artery, watermelon, without, to be thick, friend, husband, donkey, boom (or a ship), gateway, erection, sexual abuse, to plan, urine, etc.

The other one, D53 (phallus with liquid issuing), could be used to make the "bAh" sound. There are 200 words in my dictionary that use this sign. Some words include: boy, to know a woman sexually, Bull of Bulls, sperm, uncircumsized, virgin, to escape, lustful, poison, venom, in the presence of, masturbator, ejaculation, flood, virility, genitals, flaccid penis, to become erect, to sicken, seed, to pour forth, begotten one, male, son, profusion, discharge, sexually excite, homosexual, to commit adultery, repeated copulation, coward, unmanly, sissy, to sleep with, divine seed, to bear witness to the truth, sin, evil, to take a woman's virginity, etc.

Re: Unicode Dicks

#57
post #38

I was hoping an HN reader would be able to comment on what the purpose of the middle (𓂹) symbol is. Anyone? Googling the symbol hasn't provided any leads.

The folded cloth was used by itself or in combination with many other signs, for example:

𓋴 U+132F4 folded cloth

𓄸 U+13138 folded cloth and intestines

𓋵 U+132F5 folded cloth and horned viper

𓋶 U+132F6 folded cloth and sickle

𓌭 U+1332D folded cloth and knife sharpener

𓌯 U+1332F folded cloth and butcher's knife sharpener

There are other signs that they also combined like this, for example,

𓌌 U+1330C cobra with mace

Both the cobra and the mace are also standalone signs, just as all the signs above are standalone signs in addition to being combined with the folded cloth. Why did the egyptians combine signs like this? I'm not sure. I've never read an explanation for it.

Re: Unicode Dicks

#58
post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The most common use is probably as a determinative. Ancient Egyptian, much like many Semitic languages, omits the vowels in a word in writing. Determinatives are ideograms that disambiguate between several words with the same consonants but different meanings. That's an interesting fact. As someone with no knowledge of how languages are formed it makes me wonder why have a written language that purposefully omits vow…

They didn't "remove vowels" as much as started out without them! We're talking times when writing itself was utter novelty, a curiosity performed by a handful of scribes primarily for accounting purposes, and of no great importance to daily life at all. By contrast, cuneiform (of Sumer origin -- a traditional rival power to ancient Egypt) did have vowels. A surprising amount of history—writing, speaking, war, splitti…

When were the Sumerians a rival power to the Egyptians? The civilizations that followed the Sumerians in Mesopotamia (e.g., Assyrians, Babylonians, etc.) were definitely competitors with Egypt, but I don't recall ever reading about the Sumerians competing with Egypt. Do you have a source for that?

Re: Unicode Dicks

#59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The most common use is probably as a determinative. Ancient Egyptian, much like many Semitic languages, omits the vowels in a word in writing. Determinatives are ideograms that disambiguate between several words with the same consonants but different meanings. That's an interesting fact. As someone with no knowledge of how languages are formed it makes me wonder why have a written language that purposefully omits vow…

They didn't remove em, it just never occured to them to have them. There's still an interesting question about why old languages from that region didn't have vowels, if this is true of other ancient written languages from other regions, when vowels were added/why/etc.

They didn't need them. If you remove the vowels from your sentence you will find that you will probably still be able to read it. Modern Hebrew and Arabic get along just fine without vowels. Children's books in Hebrew do have the vowels since the kids don't know yet how to pronounce the words, but gradually they kids grow up and the vowels are gradually dropped out until they can read without them just like adults.

Re: Unicode Dicks

#60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The most common use is probably as a determinative. Ancient Egyptian, much like many Semitic languages, omits the vowels in a word in writing. Determinatives are ideograms that disambiguate between several words with the same consonants but different meanings. That's an interesting fact. As someone with no knowledge of how languages are formed it makes me wonder why have a written language that purposefully omits vow…

They didn't remove em, it just never occured to them to have them. There's still an interesting question about why old languages from that region didn't have vowels, if this is true of other ancient written languages from other regions, when vowels were added/why/etc.

Still strange, given the rebus principle of phonetic hieroglyph use mentioned above: why would I use a pictures of a bee and a rock to form the sound baroque? Why not a bar and a rock (or a ba, whatever that would be)?

If you take existing, drawable words you implicitly get the vowels with the consonants, unless explicitly ruled out by convention. Maybe the answer is dialects, that there was much wider consensus over the spoken consonants than over the spoken vowels. Lacking audio recordings we will never find out (it's crazy enough that we can reconstruct those languages to the point where so many translations turn out somewhat plausible)

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