To deal with this subject, we need to define a number of concepts and issue a few methodological warnings.
The term "multilingualism" is an ambiguous one, covering two very different notions:
1. Multilingualism at the collective level, which can cover several types of macro-linguistic situations:
- where the use of several languages has long been the norm - which is not the case in Egypt ;
- where several varieties of the same language prevail - this was partly the case in Egypt, where Egyptian had several dialects, some more highly valued than others, and used in more advanced written forms ;
- where colonization imposed an official language that had to coexist with the native language(s) - Egypt was in this position after the Greek and then Arab conquests ;
- that brought about by the momentary or prolonged immigration of minorities who had to learn the language of the country of arrival - during our period, minorities left papyrological evidence of their language: Gothic, Old Nubian, Meroitic, Hebrew, Aramaic, Syriac, Armenian, Middle Persian alongside Greek, Latin and Arabic, which left deeper traces.
2. Multilingualism at the individual level - some recommend the use of the term plurilingualism - i.e. the ability of a given individual to speak one or more languages in addition to his or her own.
