ẖt

See also: ḫt, ht, ␉, HT, hT, .ht, ht., h/t, and ḥt

Egyptian

Etymology

Has been compared with Proto-Central Chadic *ḫway- (“stomach, belly, intestines”), which would imply a tentative Proto-Afroasiatic *ḫVwVy- (“stomach”).^[1]

Pronunciation

(reconstructed) IPA^(key): /ˈçuːwat/ → /ˈçuːjaʔ/ → /ˈçuːja/ → /ˈçeːjə/

(modern Egyptological) IPA^(key): /çɛt/
- Conventional anglicization: khet

Noun

f

abdomen, belly
- c. 2000 BCE – 1900 BCE, Tale of the Shipwrecked Sailor (pHermitage/pPetersburg 1115) lines 136–138:
  
  wn.k(w) r.f dmꜣ.kw ḥr ẖt.j dmj.n.j zꜣtw m bꜣḥ.f
  At that I was stretched out on my belly, having touched the ground before him.
stomach, belly as the place where eaten food goes
(figuratively) desire for food, hunger, gluttony
- c. 1900 BCE, The Instructions of Kagemni (pPrisse/pBN 183) lines 1.6–1.7:
  
  ẖz pw ḥnt n ẖt.f swꜣ tr smḫ.n.f wstn ẖt m pr.sn
  He who is greedy for the sake of his belly when the proper time passes, having forgotten those in whose house his belly roams free, is a wretch.^[3]
trunk, torso
trunk of the body as the seat of breath, life-force (ka), thoughts, emotions, etc.
womb
body, corpse [Late Period and Greco-Roman Period]
belly or bowels of a ship
underside of a body part
section of a building [Late Period]
individual mass or batch of a substance [Greco-Roman Period]
The meaning of this term is uncertain. Possibilities include: [22nd Dynasty]
1. copy or transcript of a document
2. wording of a document

Inflection

Declension of ẖt (feminine)

singular	ẖt
dual	ẖtj
plural	ẖwt

Alternative forms

Alternative hieroglyphic writings of ẖt

ẖt

[since the New Kingdom]

Derived terms

nṯrj-ẖt
ẖt.f (“evening, p.m.”)
ẖtj (“string of an amulet”)
sḫm-ẖt

Descendants

Akhmimic Coptic: ⳉⲉⲓ (xei)
Bohairic Coptic: ϧⲏⲧ⸗ (xēt⸗)
Sahidic Coptic: ϩⲏ (hē), ϩⲏⲧ⸗ (hēt⸗)

Noun

f

group of people or (especially) gods, body, corporation
group more generally, e.g. of stars, jackals, etc.
generation of people

Inflection

Declension of ẖt (feminine)

singular	ẖt
dual	ẖtj
plural	ẖwt

Alternative forms

Alternative hieroglyphic writings of ẖt

ẖt

Derived terms

smr-ẖt

Noun

f

Alternative form of ḥrst (“carnelian”) [Book of the Dead]

Inflection

Declension of ẖt (feminine)

singular	ẖt
dual	ẖtj
plural	ẖwt

References

“ẖ.t (lemma ID 122080)” and “ẖ.t (lemma ID 122120)”, in Thesaurus Linguae Aegyptiae‎^[1], Corpus issue 18, Web app version 2.1.5, Tonio Sebastian Richter & Daniel A. Werning by order of the Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften and Hans-Werner Fischer-Elfert & Peter Dils by order of the Sächsische Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Leipzig, 2004–26 July 2023
Erman, Adolf, Grapow, Hermann (1929) Wörterbuch der ägyptischen Sprache‎^[2], volume 3, Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, →ISBN, pages 356.3–358.10, 358.15
Faulkner, Raymond Oliver (1962) A Concise Dictionary of Middle Egyptian, Oxford: Griffith Institute, →ISBN, page 200

^ Orel, Vladimir E., Stolbova, Olga V. (1995) Hamito-Semitic Etymological Dictionary: Materials for a Reconstruction (Handbuch der Orientalistik; I.18), Leiden, New York, Köln: E.J. Brill
^ Loprieno, Antonio (1995) Ancient Egyptian: A Linguistic Introduction, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 41
^ The latter part of this sentence is ambiguous and can be interpreted in numerous ways. Both swꜣ tr (“(when) the proper time passes”) and smḫ.n .f wstn ẖt m pr .sn (“he has forgotten/having forgotten…, etc.”) may be taken either as adverbial clauses (as rendered here) or main clauses. Furthermore, if wstn is taken as a participle rather than a relative form, the phrase it introduces could mean ‘he whose belly roams free at home’ rather than ‘those in whose house his belly roams free’; in this case the preceding perfect verb form smḫ.n demands a different interpretation. One possible solution is to read it with a counterfactual meaning ‘would that he forgot…’ instead of ‘he has forgotten…’; this is substantially the tack taken in Simpson 2003, The Literature of Ancient Egypt. Such counterfactual uses of the bare perfect are, however, rare. Another solution is that taken in Allen 2015, Middle Egyptian Literature, who reinterprets smḫ.n.f as smḫ nf (“those forget…”), taking nf as a pronoun referring to the “multitude” mentioned several sentences prior. This proposed antecedent is, however, far enough removed as to make such an interpretation doubtful.

[1] Orel, Vladimir E., Stolbova, Olga V. (1995) Hamito-Semitic Etymological Dictionary: Materials for a Reconstruction (Handbuch der Orientalistik; I.18), Leiden, New York, Köln: E.J. Brill

[2] Loprieno, Antonio (1995) Ancient Egyptian: A Linguistic Introduction, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 41

[3] The latter part of this sentence is ambiguous and can be interpreted in numerous ways. Both swꜣ tr (“(when) the proper time passes”) and smḫ.n .f wstn ẖt m pr .sn (“he has forgotten/having forgotten…, etc.”) may be taken either as adverbial clauses (as rendered here) or main clauses. Furthermore, if wstn is taken as a participle rather than a relative form, the phrase it introduces could mean ‘he whose belly roams free at home’ rather than ‘those in whose house his belly roams free’; in this case the preceding perfect verb form smḫ.n demands a different interpretation. One possible solution is to read it with a counterfactual meaning ‘would that he forgot…’ instead of ‘he has forgotten…’; this is substantially the tack taken in Simpson 2003, The Literature of Ancient Egypt. Such counterfactual uses of the bare perfect are, however, rare. Another solution is that taken in Allen 2015, Middle Egyptian Literature, who reinterprets smḫ.n.f as smḫ nf (“those forget…”), taking nf as a pronoun referring to the “multitude” mentioned several sentences prior. This proposed antecedent is, however, far enough removed as to make such an interpretation doubtful.

[1]

[2]

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