Summary Although personal names have limited value for studying language history, a corpus-based study of them can contribute meaningfully to research on language change. Personal names of the 18th dynasty before Amarna display the extinction or diminishment of several language features associated with Middle Egyptian (nominal sentences with the copula pw , adverbial sentences of possession with the preposition n , sḏm.tj⸗fj form, relative and predicative sḏm.n⸗f forms) and the emergence of features characteristic of Late Egyptian in the Ramesside period (proclitic pronouns of the First Present, prothetic j ). Compared to the previous period, the names of the early 18 th Dynasty demonstrate quantitative and qualitative changes in the use of the definite article. While names exhibit new language features comparable to those found in contemporary everyday texts (such as letters and administrative documents), they depart from Middle Egyptian to an even greater extent by more thoroughly avoiding its characteristic features. Evidence from names suggests that the abundance of Middle Egyptian features in 18th dynasty letters is partly due to scribal conventions.
Alexander Ilin-Tomich (Tue,) studied this question.