The Ancient

Ancient Egypt

Ancient Egypt was an ancient civilization of Northeastern Africa, concentrated along the lower reaches of the Nile River in what is now the modern country of Egypt. Egyptian civilization coalesced around 3150 BC with the political unification of Upper and Lower Egypt under the first pharaoh...

 Egyptian

Egyptian language

Egyptian is the oldest known indigenous language of Egypt and a branch of the Afroasiatic language family. Written records of the Egyptian language have been dated from about 3400 BC, making it one of the oldest recorded languages known. Egyptian was spoken until the late 17th century AD in the...

 phrase ankh, wedja, seneb meaning "life, prosperity, health" is an epithetic formula which often appears after the names of Egyptian kings

Pharaoh

Pharaoh is a title used in many modern discussions of the ancient Egyptian rulers of all periods. The title originates in the term "pr-aa" which means "great house" and describes the royal palace...

 or references to their household. The phrase comprises three hieroglyphs: the triliteral sign for ankh

Ankh

The ankh , also known as key of life, the key of the Nile or crux ansata, was the ancient Egyptian hieroglyphic character that read "eternal life", a triliteral sign for the consonants ʻ-n-ḫ...

, meaning "life", the biliteral

Egyptian biliteral signs

Biliteral Egyptian hieroglyphs are symbols which represent a specific sequence of two consonants, also two vowels, or combinational of both, in the language...

 sign wedj, and the alphabetic sign s.

The phrase's true grammatical form is difficult to reconstruct, though Gardiner suggests the symbols may represent verbs in the stative form.

English

English language

English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...

 translations of Egyptian often use the abbreviation "L.P.H." for "Life, Prosperity, Health".

The phrase represents the following Egyptian words-(and their concepts):

1. ankh: "Life"
2. wedja: "to be whole/intact"/"Endurance" (= "Prosperity")
3. seneb: "Health"

Ankh

Life:

"Ankh", "to live," "life," was associated with the gods of Egypt, and Egyptian kings (pharaohs) aspired to achieve their responsibilities of governing and protecting life in Egypt.

Wedja

Prosperity:

Wedja (written "utcha" in 19th century transcriptions

Transcription (linguistics)

Transcription in the linguistic sense is the systematic representation of language in written form. The source can either be utterances or preexisting text in another writing system, although some linguists only consider the former as transcription.Transcription should not be confused with...

) literally means "to be whole; to be intact," but also has the connotation of "prosperity" and "well-being."

Dominion is a second term that is implied with prosperity. The raising of the Djed

Djed

The djed symbol is a pillar-like ancient Egyptian symbol representing stability. It has been interpreted as the backbone of the Egyptian god Osiris, especially in the form Banebdjedet . Djedu is the Egyptian name for Busiris, a centre of the cult of Osiris...

 pillar was symbolic of the pharaoh

Pharaoh

Pharaoh is a title used in many modern discussions of the ancient Egyptian rulers of all periods. The title originates in the term "pr-aa" which means "great house" and describes the royal palace...

 creating, and maintaining his kingdom. It is the reason some pharaohs campaigned beyond the Egyptian border, leaving a legacy for the next pharaohs to deal with.

Seneb

Health:

Seneb has many translations: "to be well," "to be healthy," and "to have 'soundness'": "to be sound." Another word, also seneb has the determinative

Determinative

A determinative, also known as a taxogram or semagram, is an ideogram used to mark semantic categories of words in logographic scripts which helps to disambiguate interpretation. They have no direct counterpart in spoken language, though they may derive historically from glyphs for real words, and...

 of a wall and means "to build," but with the connotation of "to build (soundly)."

a.u.s. in the Rosetta Stone

Rosetta Stone

The Rosetta Stone is an ancient Egyptian granodiorite stele inscribed with a decree issued at Memphis in 196 BC on behalf of King Ptolemy V. The decree appears in three scripts: the upper text is Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, the middle portion Demotic script, and the lowest Ancient Greek...

 

For the actions by the pharaoh Ptolemy V of the Rosetta Stone (196 BC), the gods reward him by (line R5)

"....As a reward (for his deeds of kingship) these are given Him (by) the Gods (pictured with the Uraeus

Uraeus

The Uraeus is the stylized, upright form of an Egyptian spitting cobra , used as a symbol of sovereignty, royalty, deity, and divine authority in ancient Egypt.The Uraeus is a symbol for the goddess Wadjet, who was one of the earliest Egyptian deities and who...

 on the god-hieroglyphs (Ntr, Ntr, Ntr)):

Victory,

Strength (= Greek god Nike

Nike (mythology)

In Greek mythology, Nike was a goddess who personified victory, also known as the Winged Goddess of Victory. The Roman equivalent was Victoria. Depending upon the time of various myths, she was described as the daughter of Pallas and Styx and the sister of Kratos , Bia , and Zelus...

),

Life, Power (strength=prosperity), Health, (A.U.S.) and "Everything Good to the Fullest..."