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Sentences with a nominal or pronominal predicate

A) Subject (noun) + predicate (noun)

mHt.i mHt wrt

My flood (is) the great flood.

Smt.i Smwt Inpw

My steps are the steps of Anubis.

Predicate precedes the subject in the following cases:

· Noun logical predicate + noun (subject if the subject is rn.f preceded by a personal name).

snbi rn.f

Senby is his name.

· When the logical predicate is an interrogative pronoun.

ptr rn.k

What is your name?

B) Subject (independent pronoun) + predicate (noun)

I am your father.	ink it.k
You are my lord.	ntk nb.i

C) The in sentence

The nominal construction preceded by the non-enclitic particle in was used in Middle Egyptian to express the participle statement, which is either formed by in + noun + present participle, or Independent pronoun + present participle. It corresponds in meaning to the English ‘it is he who’. The participle is invariable in number and gender. The active participle distinguishes two tenses; perfective and imperfective: for instance iri refers to the past (perfective) and irr refers to an action which was repeated, or the continuous (imperfective). However, the construction in + noun + sDm.f (sDmfy.fy) refers to the future. The continuous active participle is usually expressed by resonating the ending. Therefore, iri becomes irr. The singular masculine irr does not have an ending and does not agree with the pervious in number and gender.

It is Djedy who shall bring it to me (future).	in Ddi in.f n.i sy
It is Djedy who brings it to me (present).	in Ddi inn n.i sy
It is Djedy who brought it to me (perfective).	in Ddi in n.i sy

If the preceded subject is pronoun, it is expressed by the independent pronoun and the article in is omitted.

I am one who shall bring it to you (future).	ink in.i n.k sy
I am one who brings it to you (present).	ink inn n.k sy
I am one who brought it to you (past).	ink in n.k sy

Note:

When in is followed by the integrative

m it means ‘who’?

in-m irf in.f n.i sy

Who indeed will bring it to me?

D) The pw sentence

Originally, pw was a demonstrative pronoun (pw, tw, nw) but with time, it lost this use in the Egyptian language in the Middle Kingdom period, and was treated as the third person pronoun in number and gender.

1)	it.k pw	He is your father.
2)	sn.i pw sS	He is my brother namely the scribe.
3)	tA pw nfr Kmt	It is a good land namely Egypt.
4)	sxty pw n sxt HmAt	He is a farmer of Wadi el-Natrun.
5)	sDm.f pw	It means: He hears.
6)	prt pw ir.n.i	It is a going out which I have done.

pw usually takes the second position in a sentence; it can stand at the end of sentences as in ex. 1 or between the nominal subject and nominal predicate as in ex.2.

In ex. 3, 4, pw takes a second place in ex 3: it stands between the adjective and its noun and ex. 4 it precedes the genitival adj. n. In ex. 5 again, it is in the second place following sDm.f form. In ex. 6 it follows an infinitive followed by a relative form.

Note

There is a sentence which is rare in Ancient Egyptian, where the independent pronoun is a logical predicate. Here, pw is a logical subject. This use is only limited to the first person independent pronoun.

ink pw

It is me.

The m of predication

Letter m is a simple preposition used as the m of predication: it separates between the subject and predicate only when the predicate is nominal. Sometimes it is translated ‘as’ and sometimes is without a translation.