Who makes Hierolyte.

Hierolyte is made by Lucas Young, an independent developer and filmmaker. It began as a simple idea: that ancient Egyptian writing is learnable by anyone, five minutes a day, if the signs are presented beautifully and honestly - one glyph at a time rather than as a firehose.

The result is an iPhone and iPad app in which a new hieroglyph unlocks every day, each rendered by JSesh, the typesetting system Egyptologists themselves use. Flashcards with spaced repetition, progressive articles on how the script actually works, and two structured courses - reading royal cartouches and reading real Egyptian words - build from the first sign towards genuinely reading inscriptions.

Everything in the app is cross-referenced against the standard Egyptological references: Sir Alan Gardiner's Egyptian Grammar and sign list, James P. Allen's Middle Egyptian, and James Hoch's Middle Egyptian Grammar. Where the app simplifies (as the free Spell Your Name tool does, using the museum phonetic alphabet), it says so plainly.

Discoveries, the news section of this site, reports new finds, exhibitions, and research from the world of ancient Egypt. Stories are drafted with AI assistance from cited institutional sources, reviewed by a human before anything is published, and every story lists exactly where it came from. The full process is described in our editorial policy.