Hieroglyphics (Greek for "sacred carvings") are a complex pictoral system of writing from archaic Egypt.
Each glyph served one of three or more functions:

• to represent the image of a thing or action;
• to stand for a sound or the sounds of one to as many as three syllables, or;
• to clarify the precise meaning of adjoining glyphs.

Writing hieroglyphs required some artistic skill, limiting the number chosen to learn it. Only those privileged with an extensive education (i.e. the Pharaoh, nobility and priests) were able to read and write hieroglyphs; others used simpler versions more suited for everyday handwriting: first the hieratic script, and later the demotic.