Cracking the Egyptian Code: The Revolutionary Life of Jean-François Champollion

In this first biography in English of the Frenchman who unlocked the secret of the hieroglyphs, the author describes how Champollion started with Egyptian obelisks in Rome and papyri in European collections, sailed the Nile for a year, studied the tombs in the Valley of the Kings, and carefully compared the three scripts on the Rosetta Stone to penetrate the mystery of the hieroglyphic text. This extensively illustrated book also brings to life the rivalry between Champollion and the English scientist Thomas Young, who claimed credit for launching the decipherment, which Champollion hotly denied. There is much more to ChampollionÕs life than the Rosetta Stone, and the author gives equal weight to the many roles the Frenchman played in his tragically brief life, from a teenage professor in Revolutionary France to a curator at the Louvre.