The Collaborative International Dictionary
Hieroglyphic \Hi`er*o*glyph"ic\, Hieroglyphical \Hi`er*o*glyph"ic*al\, a. [L. hieroglyphicus, Gr. ?; "iero`s sacred + gly`fein to carve: cf. F. hi['e]roglyphique.]
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Emblematic; expressive of some meaning by characters, pictures, or figures; as, hieroglyphic writing; a hieroglyphic obelisk.
Pages no better than blanks to common minds, to his, hieroglyphical of wisest secrets.
--Prof. Wilson. Resembling hieroglyphics; not decipherable. ``An hieroglyphical scrawl.''
--Sir W. Scott.of or pertaining to hieroglyphs. [WordNet sense 1]
Wiktionary
a. hieroglyphic: related to or resembling hieroglyphs
WordNet
adj. resembling hieroglyphic writing [syn: hieroglyphic]
written in or belonging to a writing system using pictorial symbols [syn: hieroglyphic]
Usage examples of "hieroglyphical".
Chinese language is clearly related to the Chaldean, and that both the Chinese characters and the cuneiform alphabet are degenerate descendants of an original hieroglyphical alphabet.
That the Atlanteans, or Mayas, when they sought to simplify their letters and combine them with others, took from the centre of the ornate hieroglyphical figure some characteristic mark with which they represented the whole figure.
According to a passage in Manetho, much suspected, however, of being an interpolation, Thoth, or Hermes Trismegistus, had himself, before the cataclysm, inscribed on stelæ, in hieroglyphical and sacred language, the principles of all knowledge.