Question

read the excerpt from the rosetta stone. egyptian scripts were replaced with coptic, which included six demotic characters. in the ninth century, arab scholar abu bakr ahmad ibn - wahshiyah was able to partly decipher the hieroglyphs by comparing them to coptic. but in the eleventh century, it too was replaced, by arabic. the link was once again severed. for centuries, western scholars tried to decipher the hieroglyphs, with little success. they were working under a false hypothesis, that the hieroglyphs were pictograms, with each symbol representing an object or an idea. which is the best summary of this paragraph? after coptic became the prominent script, it was replaced by arabic, which resulted in breaking societys connection to ancient times. for many centuries, people who spoke a variety of different languages tried to figure out the meaning of hieroglyphs. hieroglyphs are letters, not symbols representing a whole idea, which many scholars throughout history were not aware of. for a long time, scholars from different places tried to figure out the meaning of hieroglyphs, but they mistakenly believed each hieroglyph was a symbol.

Explanation:

The text details the replacement of Egyptian scripts over time (Coptic replacing Egyptian, then Arabic replacing Coptic), an Arab scholar's partial deciphering of hieroglyphs, and Western scholars' long - term but unsuccessful attempts to decipher hieroglyphs under a false hypothesis. The best summary should capture these key elements. The first option focuses mainly on script replacement and its disconnection from ancient times. The second option is too general about language speakers trying to decipher hieroglyphs. The third option misrepresents hieroglyphs. The fourth option correctly summarizes the long - term efforts of scholars from different places and their false assumption about hieroglyphs.

Answer:

For a long time, scholars from different places tried to figure out the meaning of hieroglyphs, but they mistakenly believed each hieroglyph was a symbol.