Rosetta stone By Nevine El-Aref The Rosetta stone The black basalt Rosetta stone was found in 1799, a year after the French expedition to Egypt began, in a fortress located on the outskirts of Rashid by a young French officer named Pierre-François Bouchard. It measured 113cms tall, 75.5cms long and 27cms thick, and contained three distinct bands of writing. The most incomplete was the top band containing hieroglyphics; the middle band was written in the demotic script and the bottom was in Greek. Studies carried out on the stone by scholars revealed that the stone was a royal decree which...