In antiquity, interpreting was dependent on specific situations and individual decisions. In ancient Egypt, interpreters mediated between resident Egyptians and Nubians, especially in the bilingual border region of Elephantine. Greeks considered interpreters as people who acted like Hermes, while the Latin term emphasized their role as human mediators between parties. Interpreters were constantly needed in administration to contact non-classical peoples like Egyptians, Syrians, and Germans. In Christianity, interpreting and translating in the synagogue provided a practical example that was significant, as linguistic mediators were required at religious services before major language changes.

1. INTERPRETING IN ANTIQUITY

2.  In antiquity as in other eras, interlingual
behaviour was determined by the specific
situation and, within it, by individual decision.

3. ANCIENT EGYPT
 Such was typically the case in Ancient Egypt,
where the honorary title of «man/human
being» was only bestowed on its own people,
foreign races being considered wretched
barbarians.

4.  The inscriptions which record the speeches
delivered when foreigners were received at
court are not their actual words, translated
from their own languages.

5.  Under such circunstances no real
communication could take place when it
came to talking to foreigners in everyday life,
and the interpreter, could not act as a
genuine interlingual mediator

6.  Interpreters appear more and more
frequently in the inscriptions of Aswan
Elephantine, whose provincial ruler often
bears the title «overseer of dragomans». The
bilingual border area of the first Cataract, the
Province of Elephantine, was the home not
only of the interpreters who mediated
between the resident Nubians and
Egyptians, but also of most leaders of famed
expeditions to Sudan.

7.  The Egyptians did not leave further testimony
about this oldest instance of interpreting in
the history of the world.
 The interpreter was thought of, rather
disparangingly, as «the speaker of strange
tongues»

8.  The foreign-language education of youth,
here reported for the period of the first
regular Egyptian-Greek relations, appears to
have been an old custom in the land of the
Nile

9. GREECE/ ROME
 For the greeks, the term «interpreter» or
«translator» meant « a person who acts like
Hermes»

10.  While the Greek concept emphasizes the
divine and, to a lesser extent, the intellectual
character, the latin equivalent defines the
down-to-earth situation of the person
interpreting.

11.  The word «interpres» is derived from «inter-
partes» or «inter-pretium», the term
designates the human mediator positiones
between two parties or values, performing far
more diverse activities than simply providing
linguistic mediation between parties
transacting business.

12.  When it came to practical interpreting in
interlingual communication in ancient times,
the language problem varied. While the
greeks were in every way on a par with the
Egyptians in terms of arrogance over the
barbarians, considering their language to be
the only one worthy of human beigns from
early colonization.

13.  Interpreters were constantly needed in the
administration, particulary for contacts with
the non-classical peoples: the Egyptians,
Syrians, Seythians, Germans, Celts, and so
on. Sometimes they were paid by the state.

14. THE CHRISTIAN LATE CLASSICAL PERIOD
 More than theorical considerations, what
proved significant to Christianity was the
practical example of interpreting and
translating in the synagogue.

15.  The language problem of the synagogue
applied to Jesus presching too. When, he
expunded «Moses and the prophets» to the
disciples, he could only have explained the
Hebrew written text in Armanic.

16.  Before the ocurrence of drastic languages
changes, such as the one carried out in
Rome under Poper Damasus I, linguistic
mediators were required at religious
services.