Ancient
Egyptian Cartouche Lesson
Design
an Ancient Egyptian Cartouche
A
cartouche
is an oval frame which surrounds the hieroglyphs that
make up the name of an Egyptian
God or royal person.
Illustration
1 - shows the three elements used to create the cartouche:
the oval frame; the stand; and the rope which binds
the other two together.
Illustration
2 - shows the three parts combined to form a basic cartouche
frame.
Illustration
3 - shows the frame of the cartouche decorated with
small hieroglyphs.
Adding
your name to the Cartouche
Hieroglyphs
are word pictures which represent the sounds of the
Ancient Egyptian language.
In
this cartouche we have enclosed the hieroglyphs that
spell out the sounds of the name 'Michael'.
Note
that although there are seven letters in the name 'Michael',
there are only four basic sounds 'M - I - K - L'. Therefore
we only need to use the hieroglyphs that represent those
sounds.
A
more detailed explanation of this translation process
is given on our hieroglyphics
pages.
Hieroglyphs
should be arranged to create interesting designs rather
than the straight lines that we use to arrange our letters
and sentences.
Cartouches
are usually positioned vertically but they can also
be positioned horizontally to make them fit more comfortably
into a design. The arrangement of the hieroglyphs inside
is then reorganized to accommodate the horizontal layout.
Coloring
the Cartouche
Once
the cartouche and hieroglyphs are drawn, you are ready
to apply color.
In
contrast to the ageing process we used in our
Egyptian Art Lesson, this technique gives a fresh
look to your images - the sharp clean look that Ancient
Egyptian paintings would have had when they were first
painted.
These
images were colored using designer's gouache, an opaque
watercolor paint which is ideal for applying flat areas
of color. The
black line work was done afterwards with a felt pen.
Some
More Examples
These
two cartouches of the names David and Louise were also
created using our Hieroglyphic
Alphabet
Displaying
your Work
Good
presentation will really enhance the look your finished
artwork.
To
complete our design, the cartouches were cut out and
arranged on a green background to display them more
effectively.
