been studied with an excessively Semito-centric approach; or, as G. W. Tsereteli suggests, Afroasiatic is an allogenetic rather than a genetic group of languages. History The Egyptian language can be grouped thus: Earlier Egyptian, Older Egyptian or Classical Egyptian Old Egyptian Early Egyptian, Early Old Egyptian, Achaic Old Egyptian, Pre-Old Egyptian or archaic Egyptian standard Old Egyptian Middle Egyptian Later Egyptian Late Egyptian Demotic Coptic The Egyptian language is conventionally grouped into six major chronological divisions: Archaic Egyptian (before 2600 BC), the reconstructed language of the Early Dynastic Period, Old Egyptian (c. 2600 – 2000 BC), the language of the Old Kingdom, Middle Egyptian (c. 2000 – 1350 BC), the language of the Middle Kingdom to early New Kingdom and continuing on as a literary language into the 4th century, Late Egyptian (c. 1350 – 700 BC), Amarna period to Third Intermediate Period, Demotic (c. 700 BC – AD 400), the vernacular of the Late Period, Ptolemaic and early Roman Egypt, Coptic (after c. 200 AD), the vernacular at the time of Christianisation, and the liturgical language of Egyptian Christianity. Old, Middle, and Late Egyptian were all written using both the hieroglyphic and hieratic scripts. Demotic is the name of the script derived from hieratic beginning in the 7th century BC. The Coptic alphabet was derived from the Greek alphabet, with adaptations for Egyptian phonology. It was first developed in the Ptolemaic period, and gradually replaced the Demotic script in about the 4th to 5th centuries of the Christian era. Old Egyptian The term "Archaic Egyptian" is sometimes reserved for the earliest use of hieroglyphs, from the late fourth through the early third millennia BC. At the earliest stage, around 3300 BC, hieroglyphs were not a fully developed writing system, being at a transitional stage of proto-writing; over the time leading up to the 27th century BC, grammatical features such as nisba formation can be seen to occur. Old Egyptian is dated from the oldest known complete sentence, including a finite verb, which has been found. Discovered in the tomb of Seth-Peribsen (dated c. 2690 BC), the seal impression reads: {| |- | d:D n:f || N19:n || G38:f || M23*L2:t*t || O1:F34 s:n |- |d(m)ḏ.n || || || nsw.t-bj.t(j) || -.sn(j) |- |unite..he || land.two for || son.his || sedge-bee || house-heart.their |- |colspan=6 | "He has united the Two Lands for his son, Dual King Peribsen." |} Extensive