What is a career that i could study that would have to do with translating ancient texts?

Question

What career would i study and where would i work?

Answer 1

Linguistic Anthropology or even Religious Studies. But I think either way you'd have to go the Linguistic Anthro. route.

Note very few people can read ancient Mayan, so you may be able to find it very lucrative if you studied that.

Answer 2

Linguistic Anthropology- most undergrad programs have only anthro as a major but you can minor or double major in linguistics, and then get a masters or phd in Linguistic Anthro. A history degree would also probably work, depends on what texts your looking to translate.

Answer 3

that is a highly specialized degree. epigraphy is the study of ancient writing and scripts. there is no program that i know of to become an epigraphist. you would have to concentrate in either near eastern or classical languages to study the texts.

I would like to add that linguistic anthropology woul not help much in the way of translating texts as it focuses on linguistics rather than writing. Depending on the region such as greece or the aegean you will need a solid background in the greek language (all dialects) as well as mycenean. For the near east and anatolian region you will have to concentrate on learning the various cuneiform scripts to study hittite, sumerian, akkadian, persian, elamite, luwian, etc. For egyptian hierogylphics you will have to study egyptology and learn the hierogylphics for the early, middle, and new kingdom periods as well as demotic, hieratic, and possily coptic. for the roman period you will need to study the roman classics and learn latin from the archaic period to the roman period. it will also beheave you to take classes in etruscan and oscan/umbrian. for studying mayan hieroglyphics you will have to take courses in mesoamerican archaeology. you have to take courses in the history and archaology of whatever region in addition to the languages themselves. It makes no sense to know the languages without knowing anything about the people that spoke them.

Answer 4

archaeology...linguistic anthro

stuff like that

and you also might want to look into cryptography

Answer 5

like in the movie the mummy? thats defenitly a specialty.  try anthropogy, history or archiology infact you may have to study a little of each i wanted to do the same career once

Answer 6

Philology.  There are very few jobs in this apparently waning discipline, but you should talk to people in a college-level Classics or Classical Archaeology department.

If you are interested in New World ancient languages, you should look into art history and iconography.

Linguistic anthropologists generally do not do this sort of thing, and only a small percentage of archaeologists (primarily working in the old world) do.  

Anthropology is not necessarily going to help you with this quest