Books by Julia Troche
"Death, Power, and Apotheosis in Ancient Egypt" explores the perceived agency of esteemed dead in... more "Death, Power, and Apotheosis in Ancient Egypt" explores the perceived agency of esteemed dead in ancient Egyptian social, political, and religious life, during the Old through Middle Kingdoms (c. 2700-1650 BCE). In particular it investigates the phenomenon of apotheosis—the process through which one becomes
deified—and argues that in certain instances, such as near the end of the Old Kingdom, certain dead were mobilized to subvert royal power. This is not one more book on the Egyptian afterlife. Rather, it is a uniquely focused treatise that considers how power was constructed, maintained, and challenged in ancient Egypt, through the particular lens of mortuary culture and apotheosis. Beyond their role as ancestor, there are few monograph length studies that explore the social or political impacts of the dead.
This project is, further, distinct from other studies that consider power in ancient Egypt, which tend to focus on the king, in a top-down historical approach. Instead, this book considers both the king and non-royals (specifically the non-royal dead) as actors who, together, negotiated power. A wide range of evidence is compiled to assess these research questions: epigraphic and literary sources (with original translations), visual and material artifacts, and monumental remnants. This book thus contributes to current scholarship, relevant to scholars of antiquity (historians, art historians, archaeologists, religious studies scholars), not only in its collection and presentation of data, but also through novel argumentation, which adds to the larger academic conversation about power negotiation and the perceived agency of the dead in ancient Egypt.
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Research (Articles published, in-prep projects) by Julia Troche
The Palgrave Handbook of African Education and Indigenous Knowledge. , 2020
This chapter focuses on Pre-Hellenistic Egypt and Nubia, c. 3200 - 300 BCE. There is currently no... more This chapter focuses on Pre-Hellenistic Egypt and Nubia, c. 3200 - 300 BCE. There is currently no comprehensive study of ancient Egyptian and Nubian education. This is partly due to a dearth of evidence (notably, there is no evidence for an indigenous Kerman writing system and Meroitic remains enigmatic), but also due to the general lack of formal educational institutions upon which we can focus our inquiry. The notable exception are scribal schools, which have largely been the focus of previous education-related studies. A recent scholarly trend focusing on settlement archaeology, however, has allowed scholars to better understand ancient Egyptian (and to a lesser degree Nubian) households, which provides a window into daily life and informal systems of knowledge production and maintenance. This chapter draws on Butler’s theory of gender performance and Bell’s discussion of ritualization as a framework to investigate informal systems of education in ancient Egypt and Nubia, including literacy/scribal training, and moral and social education.
Julia Troche. “Ancient African Education: Egypt and Nubia.” In *The Palgrave Handbook of Africa Education and Indigenous Knowledge.* Edited by Jamaine Abidogun and Toyin Falola, 35-56. New York: Palgrave, 2020.
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Despite corporeal demise, the dead in ancient Egypt remained very much alive as members of social... more Despite corporeal demise, the dead in ancient Egypt remained very much alive as members of social networks. These networks connected the workmen within Deir el-Medina to an 'outside,' but integral, supernatural community composed primarily of the dead and the gods. Knowledge was transferred between the community of living workmen, their families and the local dead through a variety of processes that often engaged objects as intermediaries or aides. These ephemeral processes can be accessed through the textual and archaeological traces they left behind. For the site of Deir el-Medina, two corpora stand out as nodes of living-dead interactions: Ax iqr n Ra stelae and anthropoid busts. Through an analysis of these two oft-cited corpora, this paper will first approximate the processes of interaction that existed between New Kingdom inhabitants of Deir el-Medina and the dead. In doing so, I will briefly unpack and complicate scholarship (e.g. Demarée 1983; Friedman 1985; Lesko 1994; Robins 1997; Plater 2001; Meskell 2002; Exell 2009; Harrington 2014) that uses this evidence to argue for ancestor worship and/or domestic (aka household, family, private) religious practice at Deir el-Medina. Second, this paper will situate these living-dead interactions within larger socio-religious systems that negotiated these actions. I will argue that, beginning in the Old Kingdom, a scale of distinction emerged in which the living marked certain dead as notably efficacious (iqr) and knowledgeable (apr), with others receiving the august distinction of being divinized. I will show how evidence, notably the Ax iqr n Ra stelae and anthropoid busts, from Deir el-Medina can be understood within this framework.
Some scholars have differentiated between the functions of the Ax iqr n Ra stelae and anthropoid busts by postulating that the stelae represent specific, identified ancestors, whereas, the busts represent an universal, anonymous ancestor (Friedman 1985, 97 and Robins 1997, 189). I hope, however, to push against the assumption that all Ax iqr n Ra stelae and anthropoid busts were invoking ancestors as part of a household religious practice of ancestor worship. Instead, I suggest these corpora should be understood as evidence of "local religious practice," in which esteemed local dead (who were sometimes ancestors of local inhabitants, as well) were venerated as divine intermediaries. For example, the discovery of an Ax iqr n Ra stela dedicated to Khamuy and Pennub in the house of Khabekhnet (House S.O. V), who is not an attested familial descendent of either Khamuy or Pennub, complicates the notion that the Ax iqr n Ra stelae are associated with ancestor worship. Although the dedication of an Ax iqr n Ra stela to an ancestor may have been preferable, it is seemingly not compulsory. Instead, Khamuy and Pennub were local dead who were distinguished as notably effective, evidenced by the four Deir el-Medina stelae dedicated to the pair. Thus, rather than framing their veneration in discussions of family religion or ancestor worship, their invocation should be understood as engaging in a socio-religious phenomenon, in which local dead are marked as unique from "average" dead through their emplacement along a scale of distinction that ranged from akh iqr to netjer.
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Brown University is home to several seldom-used study collections of broken and unprovenanced anc... more Brown University is home to several seldom-used study collections of broken and unprovenanced ancient Egyptian objects. In a new exhibition focused on the research process and the people who make it happen, these items feature as keys to the behind-the-scenes world of archaeological study. In this how-to, we demonstrate how educators can mobilize fragmentary artifacts as new tools for hands-on education.
Each section of the exhibition focuses on an active research project that employs a modern investigative technology (e.g. XRF Analysis), and introduces visitors to researchers at all levels of study. This not only humanizes the archaeological process, but also invites the viewer to actively participate in the interpretation of museum research. Two hands-on elements further cultivate an environment of accessibility to archaeology: an iPad interface updated regularly based on visitor feedback, which welcomes visitors to explore the exhibition’s objects and research technologies in greater depth; and a pre-existing experiential learning program, CultureLab, where visitors can handle objects from the collection and be researchers themselves. Visitor feedback suggests that openly presenting the realities of archaeological research and subsequently encouraging visitors to assume the role of researcher is a highly effective model for visitors and educators alike.
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Available here: https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6bh8w50t
Letters to the Dead is the contempor... more Available here: https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6bh8w50t
Letters to the Dead is the contemporary conventional name for a collection of ancient Egyptian texts that petition the recently deceased, typically for assistance with problems of inheritance, illness, or fertility. They are known from the Old Kingdom through the Late Period and have been preserved upon ceramic vessels and figurines, stone stelae, papyrus, and linen. The letters were written by male and female petitioners and are addressed to both male and female dead. Though only a few dozen Letters to the Dead have been identified, they are important artifacts for better understanding interactions between the living and the dead in ancient Egypt. Notably, they illuminate the quotidian, social networks that existed between the living and the dead, help us understand how the ancient Egyptians conceived of and interacted with the dead, and expand upon our knowledge of mortuary culture and popular religious practices in ancient Egypt.
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This research, which will be presented at the 2016 ARCE Annual Meeting and will hopefully be publ... more This research, which will be presented at the 2016 ARCE Annual Meeting and will hopefully be published soon after, investigates the corpus known as "funerary cones" through an analysis of two hereto unpublished funerary cones from the collection of the Department of Egyptology and Assyriology at Brown University. These cones are currently on display, until May 2016, in an exhibition I co-curated at the Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology ("Uncovering Ancient Egypt: Modern Crafts, Ancient Technologies"). One funerary cone belongs to Senenmut, dating to the reign of Hatshepsut (New Kingdom, Dynasty 18), and the second cone belongs to Horsaaset, dating to the reign of Apries (Late Period, Dynasty 26).
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This research was presented at the annual meeting of the AIA in San Francisco, January 2016 and I... more This research was presented at the annual meeting of the AIA in San Francisco, January 2016 and I am currently working to shape it into an article.
Abstract: Augustus’ imperial campaigns were memorialized throughout the empire in his Res Gestae. In the Res Gestae, Augustus boasts that the army he sent into Nubia (Ethiopia) not only captured, but crushed the Nubian enemies (Res Gestae 26). The scene described is of a single, crushing Roman victory over Lower Nubia as far as the site of Napata. Some scholars, such as László Török, have aptly taken issue with the validity of Augustus’ claims and points out that Augustus condensed multiple years of numerous campaigns into a single event within a monumental, political narrative (e.g. Török, Between Two Worlds: The Frontier Region Between Ancient Nubia and Egypt 3700 BCE – 500 AD [Leiden 2009]). Though the later accounts of Strabo (17.54) and Pliny the Elder (HN 6.35) provide slightly more nuanced narratives -- Strabo uniquely including a description of Meroitic retaliation -- the accounts remain favorable to the Romans and describe interactions at the frontier as one primarily concerned with territorial acquisition. In this paper, I highlight archaeological evidence from the Nubian sites of Talmis, Meroë, and Qasr Ibrim, three of the sites described as being conquered by Augustus, in order to provide a more refined interpretation of interactions at the frontier.
After a brief introduction to the theoretical discourse surrounding frontiers, I describe evidence for reconstructing Roman and Nubian emic conceptions of frontiers. I then present the Roman frontier narrative and compare this narrative with archaeological evidence from Talmis, Meroë, and Qasr Ibrim. Through this study, I suggest a nuanced reconstruction of the frontier zone between Roman Egypt and Nubia, at the time of its formation during the reign of Augustus. Specifically, I show that the frontier can be best described as a dynamic zone of interaction, which at various times was characterized by militaristic aggression, peaceful negotiations, and productive cultural exchange.
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Parts of this research project were presented at the Joukowsky Institute for Archaeology and the ... more Parts of this research project were presented at the Joukowsky Institute for Archaeology and the Ancient World at Brown University's Brown Bag Series, and it was also presented with co-author and presenter Jeffery Jacobsen at the XXXVIII Computer Applications and Quantitative Methods in Archaeology Conference in Granada, Spain (2010).
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Media and Outreach by Julia Troche
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Media coverage of ibis scan in Dig April 2016
http://cricketmedia.com/blog/on-divination
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Review of museum exhibition co-curated with Jen Thum at the Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology e... more Review of museum exhibition co-curated with Jen Thum at the Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology entitled Uncovering Ancient Egypt: Ancient Crafts, Modern Technologies.
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Discussion of CT scan and X-ray performed on ibis mummy in the Joukowsky Institute for Archaeolog... more Discussion of CT scan and X-ray performed on ibis mummy in the Joukowsky Institute for Archaeology's collection.
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PublicVR's Virtual Egyptian temple: http://publicvr.org/html/pro_egypt.html
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Classes, Instructor of Record by Julia Troche
Equivalent of 1 year of instruction in Middle Egyptian Hieroglyphs. Co-taught with Michael Chen.
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This graduate seminar will examine aspects of “personal piety” (a term we will quickly problemati... more This graduate seminar will examine aspects of “personal piety” (a term we will quickly problematize) from our earliest extant evidence until c. 250 CE. In this course, we will investigate both the available archaeological and textual evidence for reconstructing personal piety in ancient Egypt, and the various theories and methodologies used to access the often ephemeral and enigmatic traces associated with pious practice. For the Pharaonic period will consider topics including: cults to deified dead and local gods, votive stelae and other forms of public pious display, and how religious piety may have changed over the course of Egyptian history. For later periods, we will add additional layers of inquiry by including greater considerations of cross-cultural influences, assimilation, and the manners in which Egyptian religion was experienced outside of Egypt.
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This course will familiarize students with ancient Egyptian visual culture, including objects and... more This course will familiarize students with ancient Egyptian visual culture, including objects and architecture, from the Predynastic Period to the beginning of the New Kingdom. The second half of Egyptian history (New Kingdom through Roman Period) is covered in the Winter (Art History 110b/Ancient Near East 101b). Throughout this course we will also investigate the technologies of craft production, the ideologies behind the visible iconography, and how Egyptian art influenced/was influenced by ancient Egyptian politics, society, and religion. We will examine the tools for visual recognition of an artifact’s type, style, and date. In an attempt to better understand the possible functions and purpose of ancient Egyptian art, we will not only place artifacts and architecture in its historical context, but will also consider the spatial context of ancient Egyptian art, including provenance, and its physical and cultural settings. The course will cover ancient Egyptian art chronologically, but also topically, looking at topics such as “funerary art” and “temple architecture.”
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In this class we will reconstruct aspects of ancient Egyptian civilization through an analysis of... more In this class we will reconstruct aspects of ancient Egyptian civilization through an analysis of the archaeological and textual traces the ancient Egyptians left behind. Specifically, we will focus on the first half of ancient Egyptian history (note: the second half will be covered in ANE M103b), from prehistory through the Second Intermediate Period. The foundation of this course is Egypt’s political, elite history, but we will balance and interrupt this narrative by exploring, when possible, the lives of non-royal, “average” ancient Egyptians. We will do this by examining ancient Egyptian religion, and by investigating the mechanisms and systems that motivated continuity and change in ancient Egyptian society. We will punctuate the Egyptian historical narrative with discussions of varied topics, such as mechanisms of early state formation, the early development of ancient Egyptian kingship, and the emergence of Egyptian religious institutions.
Much of the broad strokes of Egyptian history will be offered in lecture and through assigned readings, while TA led discussion sections will give students opportunities to investigate primary and secondary sources in greater detail and to problematize the methodological and historiographical challenges that confront scholars of ancient Egypt.
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Books by Julia Troche
deified—and argues that in certain instances, such as near the end of the Old Kingdom, certain dead were mobilized to subvert royal power. This is not one more book on the Egyptian afterlife. Rather, it is a uniquely focused treatise that considers how power was constructed, maintained, and challenged in ancient Egypt, through the particular lens of mortuary culture and apotheosis. Beyond their role as ancestor, there are few monograph length studies that explore the social or political impacts of the dead.
This project is, further, distinct from other studies that consider power in ancient Egypt, which tend to focus on the king, in a top-down historical approach. Instead, this book considers both the king and non-royals (specifically the non-royal dead) as actors who, together, negotiated power. A wide range of evidence is compiled to assess these research questions: epigraphic and literary sources (with original translations), visual and material artifacts, and monumental remnants. This book thus contributes to current scholarship, relevant to scholars of antiquity (historians, art historians, archaeologists, religious studies scholars), not only in its collection and presentation of data, but also through novel argumentation, which adds to the larger academic conversation about power negotiation and the perceived agency of the dead in ancient Egypt.
Research (Articles published, in-prep projects) by Julia Troche
Julia Troche. “Ancient African Education: Egypt and Nubia.” In *The Palgrave Handbook of Africa Education and Indigenous Knowledge.* Edited by Jamaine Abidogun and Toyin Falola, 35-56. New York: Palgrave, 2020.
Some scholars have differentiated between the functions of the Ax iqr n Ra stelae and anthropoid busts by postulating that the stelae represent specific, identified ancestors, whereas, the busts represent an universal, anonymous ancestor (Friedman 1985, 97 and Robins 1997, 189). I hope, however, to push against the assumption that all Ax iqr n Ra stelae and anthropoid busts were invoking ancestors as part of a household religious practice of ancestor worship. Instead, I suggest these corpora should be understood as evidence of "local religious practice," in which esteemed local dead (who were sometimes ancestors of local inhabitants, as well) were venerated as divine intermediaries. For example, the discovery of an Ax iqr n Ra stela dedicated to Khamuy and Pennub in the house of Khabekhnet (House S.O. V), who is not an attested familial descendent of either Khamuy or Pennub, complicates the notion that the Ax iqr n Ra stelae are associated with ancestor worship. Although the dedication of an Ax iqr n Ra stela to an ancestor may have been preferable, it is seemingly not compulsory. Instead, Khamuy and Pennub were local dead who were distinguished as notably effective, evidenced by the four Deir el-Medina stelae dedicated to the pair. Thus, rather than framing their veneration in discussions of family religion or ancestor worship, their invocation should be understood as engaging in a socio-religious phenomenon, in which local dead are marked as unique from "average" dead through their emplacement along a scale of distinction that ranged from akh iqr to netjer.
Each section of the exhibition focuses on an active research project that employs a modern investigative technology (e.g. XRF Analysis), and introduces visitors to researchers at all levels of study. This not only humanizes the archaeological process, but also invites the viewer to actively participate in the interpretation of museum research. Two hands-on elements further cultivate an environment of accessibility to archaeology: an iPad interface updated regularly based on visitor feedback, which welcomes visitors to explore the exhibition’s objects and research technologies in greater depth; and a pre-existing experiential learning program, CultureLab, where visitors can handle objects from the collection and be researchers themselves. Visitor feedback suggests that openly presenting the realities of archaeological research and subsequently encouraging visitors to assume the role of researcher is a highly effective model for visitors and educators alike.
Letters to the Dead is the contemporary conventional name for a collection of ancient Egyptian texts that petition the recently deceased, typically for assistance with problems of inheritance, illness, or fertility. They are known from the Old Kingdom through the Late Period and have been preserved upon ceramic vessels and figurines, stone stelae, papyrus, and linen. The letters were written by male and female petitioners and are addressed to both male and female dead. Though only a few dozen Letters to the Dead have been identified, they are important artifacts for better understanding interactions between the living and the dead in ancient Egypt. Notably, they illuminate the quotidian, social networks that existed between the living and the dead, help us understand how the ancient Egyptians conceived of and interacted with the dead, and expand upon our knowledge of mortuary culture and popular religious practices in ancient Egypt.
Abstract: Augustus’ imperial campaigns were memorialized throughout the empire in his Res Gestae. In the Res Gestae, Augustus boasts that the army he sent into Nubia (Ethiopia) not only captured, but crushed the Nubian enemies (Res Gestae 26). The scene described is of a single, crushing Roman victory over Lower Nubia as far as the site of Napata. Some scholars, such as László Török, have aptly taken issue with the validity of Augustus’ claims and points out that Augustus condensed multiple years of numerous campaigns into a single event within a monumental, political narrative (e.g. Török, Between Two Worlds: The Frontier Region Between Ancient Nubia and Egypt 3700 BCE – 500 AD [Leiden 2009]). Though the later accounts of Strabo (17.54) and Pliny the Elder (HN 6.35) provide slightly more nuanced narratives -- Strabo uniquely including a description of Meroitic retaliation -- the accounts remain favorable to the Romans and describe interactions at the frontier as one primarily concerned with territorial acquisition. In this paper, I highlight archaeological evidence from the Nubian sites of Talmis, Meroë, and Qasr Ibrim, three of the sites described as being conquered by Augustus, in order to provide a more refined interpretation of interactions at the frontier.
After a brief introduction to the theoretical discourse surrounding frontiers, I describe evidence for reconstructing Roman and Nubian emic conceptions of frontiers. I then present the Roman frontier narrative and compare this narrative with archaeological evidence from Talmis, Meroë, and Qasr Ibrim. Through this study, I suggest a nuanced reconstruction of the frontier zone between Roman Egypt and Nubia, at the time of its formation during the reign of Augustus. Specifically, I show that the frontier can be best described as a dynamic zone of interaction, which at various times was characterized by militaristic aggression, peaceful negotiations, and productive cultural exchange.
Media and Outreach by Julia Troche
https://blogs.missouristate.edu/history/2017/11/15/professor-julia-troche-consults-for-assassins-creed-origins-media-team/?utm_source=feed&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=feed
Information on the exhibit: https://www.brown.edu/research/facilities/haffenreffer-museum/index.php?q=uncovering-ancient-egypt-ancient-crafts-modern-technologies
Interactive online exhibition: https://www.brown.edu/research/facilities/haffenreffer-museum/sites/brown.edu.research.facilities.haffenreffer-museum/files/multimedia/Egypt%20Exhibit%20PowerPoint.pdf
Watch here: http://news.missouristate.edu/2015/12/08/egypt/
Classes, Instructor of Record by Julia Troche
Much of the broad strokes of Egyptian history will be offered in lecture and through assigned readings, while TA led discussion sections will give students opportunities to investigate primary and secondary sources in greater detail and to problematize the methodological and historiographical challenges that confront scholars of ancient Egypt.
deified—and argues that in certain instances, such as near the end of the Old Kingdom, certain dead were mobilized to subvert royal power. This is not one more book on the Egyptian afterlife. Rather, it is a uniquely focused treatise that considers how power was constructed, maintained, and challenged in ancient Egypt, through the particular lens of mortuary culture and apotheosis. Beyond their role as ancestor, there are few monograph length studies that explore the social or political impacts of the dead.
This project is, further, distinct from other studies that consider power in ancient Egypt, which tend to focus on the king, in a top-down historical approach. Instead, this book considers both the king and non-royals (specifically the non-royal dead) as actors who, together, negotiated power. A wide range of evidence is compiled to assess these research questions: epigraphic and literary sources (with original translations), visual and material artifacts, and monumental remnants. This book thus contributes to current scholarship, relevant to scholars of antiquity (historians, art historians, archaeologists, religious studies scholars), not only in its collection and presentation of data, but also through novel argumentation, which adds to the larger academic conversation about power negotiation and the perceived agency of the dead in ancient Egypt.
Julia Troche. “Ancient African Education: Egypt and Nubia.” In *The Palgrave Handbook of Africa Education and Indigenous Knowledge.* Edited by Jamaine Abidogun and Toyin Falola, 35-56. New York: Palgrave, 2020.
Some scholars have differentiated between the functions of the Ax iqr n Ra stelae and anthropoid busts by postulating that the stelae represent specific, identified ancestors, whereas, the busts represent an universal, anonymous ancestor (Friedman 1985, 97 and Robins 1997, 189). I hope, however, to push against the assumption that all Ax iqr n Ra stelae and anthropoid busts were invoking ancestors as part of a household religious practice of ancestor worship. Instead, I suggest these corpora should be understood as evidence of "local religious practice," in which esteemed local dead (who were sometimes ancestors of local inhabitants, as well) were venerated as divine intermediaries. For example, the discovery of an Ax iqr n Ra stela dedicated to Khamuy and Pennub in the house of Khabekhnet (House S.O. V), who is not an attested familial descendent of either Khamuy or Pennub, complicates the notion that the Ax iqr n Ra stelae are associated with ancestor worship. Although the dedication of an Ax iqr n Ra stela to an ancestor may have been preferable, it is seemingly not compulsory. Instead, Khamuy and Pennub were local dead who were distinguished as notably effective, evidenced by the four Deir el-Medina stelae dedicated to the pair. Thus, rather than framing their veneration in discussions of family religion or ancestor worship, their invocation should be understood as engaging in a socio-religious phenomenon, in which local dead are marked as unique from "average" dead through their emplacement along a scale of distinction that ranged from akh iqr to netjer.
Each section of the exhibition focuses on an active research project that employs a modern investigative technology (e.g. XRF Analysis), and introduces visitors to researchers at all levels of study. This not only humanizes the archaeological process, but also invites the viewer to actively participate in the interpretation of museum research. Two hands-on elements further cultivate an environment of accessibility to archaeology: an iPad interface updated regularly based on visitor feedback, which welcomes visitors to explore the exhibition’s objects and research technologies in greater depth; and a pre-existing experiential learning program, CultureLab, where visitors can handle objects from the collection and be researchers themselves. Visitor feedback suggests that openly presenting the realities of archaeological research and subsequently encouraging visitors to assume the role of researcher is a highly effective model for visitors and educators alike.
Letters to the Dead is the contemporary conventional name for a collection of ancient Egyptian texts that petition the recently deceased, typically for assistance with problems of inheritance, illness, or fertility. They are known from the Old Kingdom through the Late Period and have been preserved upon ceramic vessels and figurines, stone stelae, papyrus, and linen. The letters were written by male and female petitioners and are addressed to both male and female dead. Though only a few dozen Letters to the Dead have been identified, they are important artifacts for better understanding interactions between the living and the dead in ancient Egypt. Notably, they illuminate the quotidian, social networks that existed between the living and the dead, help us understand how the ancient Egyptians conceived of and interacted with the dead, and expand upon our knowledge of mortuary culture and popular religious practices in ancient Egypt.
Abstract: Augustus’ imperial campaigns were memorialized throughout the empire in his Res Gestae. In the Res Gestae, Augustus boasts that the army he sent into Nubia (Ethiopia) not only captured, but crushed the Nubian enemies (Res Gestae 26). The scene described is of a single, crushing Roman victory over Lower Nubia as far as the site of Napata. Some scholars, such as László Török, have aptly taken issue with the validity of Augustus’ claims and points out that Augustus condensed multiple years of numerous campaigns into a single event within a monumental, political narrative (e.g. Török, Between Two Worlds: The Frontier Region Between Ancient Nubia and Egypt 3700 BCE – 500 AD [Leiden 2009]). Though the later accounts of Strabo (17.54) and Pliny the Elder (HN 6.35) provide slightly more nuanced narratives -- Strabo uniquely including a description of Meroitic retaliation -- the accounts remain favorable to the Romans and describe interactions at the frontier as one primarily concerned with territorial acquisition. In this paper, I highlight archaeological evidence from the Nubian sites of Talmis, Meroë, and Qasr Ibrim, three of the sites described as being conquered by Augustus, in order to provide a more refined interpretation of interactions at the frontier.
After a brief introduction to the theoretical discourse surrounding frontiers, I describe evidence for reconstructing Roman and Nubian emic conceptions of frontiers. I then present the Roman frontier narrative and compare this narrative with archaeological evidence from Talmis, Meroë, and Qasr Ibrim. Through this study, I suggest a nuanced reconstruction of the frontier zone between Roman Egypt and Nubia, at the time of its formation during the reign of Augustus. Specifically, I show that the frontier can be best described as a dynamic zone of interaction, which at various times was characterized by militaristic aggression, peaceful negotiations, and productive cultural exchange.
https://blogs.missouristate.edu/history/2017/11/15/professor-julia-troche-consults-for-assassins-creed-origins-media-team/?utm_source=feed&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=feed
Information on the exhibit: https://www.brown.edu/research/facilities/haffenreffer-museum/index.php?q=uncovering-ancient-egypt-ancient-crafts-modern-technologies
Interactive online exhibition: https://www.brown.edu/research/facilities/haffenreffer-museum/sites/brown.edu.research.facilities.haffenreffer-museum/files/multimedia/Egypt%20Exhibit%20PowerPoint.pdf
Watch here: http://news.missouristate.edu/2015/12/08/egypt/
Much of the broad strokes of Egyptian history will be offered in lecture and through assigned readings, while TA led discussion sections will give students opportunities to investigate primary and secondary sources in greater detail and to problematize the methodological and historiographical challenges that confront scholars of ancient Egypt.
In this class we will engage with primary sources (in translation) and ancient artifacts in order to investigate the art, architecture, religion and social networks of ancient Egypt. Class format will be a mixture of lecture and discussions, trips to local museums, presentations, videos, and tours through virtual temples. In addition to daily discussions and small presentations, students will be assessed on a semester-long research project that will culminate in either an artifact re-creation (experimental archaeology) or a research paper in which students will examine and evaluate an ancient Egyptian object of daily life.
There are no prerequisites.
This class is perfect for anyone interested in ancient Egypt, ancient history, art history or archaeology of the ancient world.
COURSE OBJECTIVES
I. This course will provide students with an overview of ancient Egyptian art, architecture, major sites, and material culture. Emphasis will be placed on the archaeology and contexts of the artifacts and how this context informs our reconstruction of ancient Egyptian political, social and religious histories. To get a hands on understanding of Egyptian material culture we will look at online collections and possibly take a trip to the RISD museum where many significant ancient Egyptian artifacts are held.
II. This object-based approach will provide students with analytical skills relevant to a variety of studies, including the Humanities and Physical Sciences.
III. This course is designed to familiarize students with Egyptian material culture. Upon completion of this course, students will be able to identify objects by name, situate them within their historic period, and comment on their cultural significance. Issues of archaeological context, re-use, artistic freedom, access, style and decorum will be dealt with in detail.
We will begin by reading secondary literature outlining the basics of Egyptian history, in order to situate you within the historical landscape of ancient Egyptian religion, "who did what, when and where." We will ask ourselves "what is religion?!" There will be discussions addressing where in the archaeological record we can find evidence of this dynamic, unique and complex belief system. We will then thematically cover concepts each day including (but not limited to) creation myths, kingship, temples, magic, family and household religion, the Amarna period of Atenism, death and the afterlife, the tomb, mummification, and how the Greek and subsequent Roman conquests of Egypt affected and interpreted Egyptian religion.
Course Objectives
I. Basic understanding of ancient Egyptian religion and culture and the ability to communicate these incredible and often complex concepts to others.
II. Background for further research: It is not expected that you memorize everything we talk about in class, but by the end of this course you should be familiar enough with the sources so that you can do further research if interested. Additionally, you will be able to walk into a museum with an Egyptian collection and feel comfortable talking about most of the artifacts on display.
III. Develop critical thinking skills and modes of analysis : A key goal of this course is to exercise your critical thinking skills. The intent is not to have you memorize facts, but to enable you to think critically about secondary literature, analyze artifacts, texts, etc., develop your own interpretations and effectively communicate your argument.
Director: Elizabeth Frood (Oxford University) in collaboration with CFEETK under the directorship of Christophe Thiers
Research: I am particularly interested in the tensions, or lack thereof, between secondary inscriptions and the Ptah Temple's primary decorative program. I am especially interested in scenes involving deified dead as it is the topic of my dissertation. Additionally, I am working on a project addressing the 'pilgrim groves' present at the Ptah Temple.
Excavator (2012)
Directors: Sue Alcock (Brown University) and Christopher Tuttle (Associate Director Amman ASOR; Visiting Scholar, Brown University)
Director: Laurel Bestock (Brown University)
Research: Although my excavations at Abydos include buildings/material dating from the Early Dynasty Period through Ptolemaic Period of varying contexts (funerary, sacred, domestic), my research interest is primarily the Middle Kingdom activity in the area known as the 'northern cemetery.'
Tension exists in the scholarship against identifying these distinguished dead as "real" gods, with preferences given to terms like "saints," "heroes," or "demi-gods." A dynamic mortuary cult in which "average" dead are provided offerings and are invoked by the living further complicates this identification. I argue, however, that certain dead possess markers of "real" divinity and as such should be understood as having undergone apotheosis. Because these markers of divinity were not consistently applied or preserved due to concerns of decorum and incomplete archaeological records, I suggest that only one of the following conditions need to be fulfilled in order to indicate that someone who has died has become a god: (1) The identification of the dead as "god" (netjer). (2) The invocation of the name of the deceased in epigraphic formulae otherwise reserved for gods. (3) The inclusion of the dead in divine mythologies (that are distinct from the Osirian associations of "average" dead) and/or divine pedigree. (4) The establishment of a shrine, separate from the tomb and, thus, distinguished from the mortuary cult, dedicated to the cult of the dead in his divinized form. (5) The establishment of a priesthood charged with the upkeep of the cult, especially one that is locally financed and/or independent from any mortuary cult donations. (6) The dead as a principal actor in festival. Through select case studies, this paper elaborates and justifies these markers of apotheosis and shows how this framework can be successfully implemented.
dead networks in ancient Egypt, we must first understand the agents involved. I suggest that the active agent of the dead within these networks is the supernatural aspect akh. This paper will look at the earliest terms used to modify “akh” in non-royal contexts—iqr (“excellent”), apr (“equipped”)— in order
to understand the original, socio-religious significance of these terms. Thus, I limit this survey to non-royal texts of the Old through Middle Kingdoms: notably the Coffin Texts and the corpora known as“appeals to the living,” and “letters to the dead.”
Although recent scholarship (e.g. N. Harrington, 2013) has investigated interactions between the living and dead, a systematic analysis of the terminology used to qualify the akh has yet to be performed. A more developed understanding of how the akh is qualified, and in which contexts modification occurs, will enable scholars to better reconstruct these dynamic networks. This paper will investigate attestations of the terms Akh apr and Akh iqr (and variations thereof) within private contexts. Through an analysis of terminology, I will qualify and modify our current understanding of living-dead relations. In doing so, I will situate this research historically within a dynamic period in which the role
of the dead was evolving and terminology of the dead became increasingly significant as markers distinguishing efficacious intermediaries from local deified dead.
This session seeks to discuss how ancient peoples visualized and enacted institutionalized religious behaviors—such as that found in “state” religion—within local settings. Often, these localized embodiments of religion left even fewer vestiges in the historical record than those institutionalized practices that informed them. As such, accessing them demands a multifaceted theoretical approach. Scholars can only attempt to reconstruct these everyday religious practices through ephemeral material remains and rare glimpses of textual evidence. Although these practices were profoundly influenced by the variables of time and geography, we can still find similar phenomena across a number of discrete cultural and temporal contexts. These phenomena include (inter alia): practices of underrepresented household members such as women, slaves, and children; the cult of the dead and family funerary rites; personal piety; participation in festivals; construction of local shrines and cults; the worship of deified dead; magic; divination; and household cults. By employing religious and archaeological theory, we can bridge these cultural, geographic, and temporal divides and engage in a cohesive discussion of “local” religion.
This hour and a half session will consist of four (4) papers slotted at 15 minutes, with 5 minutes of discussion following each paper. Please email your 300 word abstract to Julia Troche or Bryan Brinkman at TAGAbstract2013@gmail.com by March 1, 2013 to be considered.
to display the King’s royalty to the largely illiterate public, to memorialize him as King for eternity in his funerary monuments, and to emplace him within the trajectory of maat, eternal order.
While a wealth of research can be found on the institution of Egyptian kingship and on specific motifs of kingship from the Old Kingdom onwards, no one has yet to systematically analyze the attestations of royal iconography during the period of state formation (the Early Dynastic Period).
Thus, the goal of this paper is to examine the earliest attestations of motifs of Egyptian kingship which, by the Old Kingdom, develop into a codified assemblage of royal iconography, in order to access the cultural context which motivated the emergence of these motifs. Through a diachronic analysis, this paper will draw together a timeline which will indicate three distinctive spouts of directed innovation and codification of royal imagery during the Early Dynastic Period (Dynasty 0 – King Djoser). The first, at the onset of state formation, dates to the reigns of King Scorpion and Narmer . The second occurs midway through the First Dynasty during the reign of King Den. Finally, a third program occurs under the
direction of King Djoser.
Although scholars have examined the distinctive character of the akh in the New Kingdom and the role of the akh in mortuary literature, there has been little discussion of the akh in the Old and Middle Kingdoms and of the akh as a social agent. This paper will outline the Old and Middle Kingdom evidence (i.e. Pyramid Texts, Appeals to the Living, Letters to the Dead, False Doors), which suggests that the akh was the uniquely active agent of the dead. I will then comment on the loci of interactions between living and akh. And finally, I will conclude that the dead were, indeed, active members of dynamic social networks which may be reconstructed by applying archaeological, textual and visual evidence in conjunction with theoretical tools of analysis.
Ancient Egyptian temples were constructed as divine microcosms and their architectural forms were representations of the cosmos. Their purpose was to protect and house the god’s statue in which its life force was embodied. Through ritualized performance, Egyptian priests provided the god’s life forces (the ka and ba) with sustenance, clothes and a purified living space. Although these measures were demanded in order for the god to continue its life within the statue, it was also a means of appeasing the god and attaining maat. Maat is the most important universal force in ancient Egypt. It can be translated as justice or truth, but also refers more generally to the cosmic balance between good (maat) and evil (isfet). The primary responsibility of Egyptian priests was to protect this delicate balance through a series of rituals and festivals which engage the temple as a main actor. The temple’s explicit differentiation of space, every architectural element, and each inscription were consciously planned and formulated to provide a sacred place for rituals and festivals.
The virtual temple appears as a coherent entity rather than a decontextualized collection of images and artifacts. For example, the student experiences changes in light and space while moving along the temple’s axis, ascending to the holiest of holies – the sanctuary of the divine statue. As a (virtual) occupant of the architectural space, the student can see the structural features, inscriptions, and depictions in their proper alignment and context. We can also change the temple to reflect developing ideas within the academic field and adjust to diverse instructional approaches. Furthermore, the inclusion of religious or everyday objects and reenactments of Egyptian ritual can be programmed to deepen the learning experience, but this is beyond the scope of this paper. Here, we will describe the central features of the virtual temple, their basis in the source literature, and why we constructed them as shown.
The virtual Egyptian temple is the centerpiece of a collection of materials intended for curricula for all ages on this important culture. It is free to the public for all purposes, as long as the project is properly credited. For more information, go to http://publicvr.org.
Stacy Davidson is an Egyptologist and Adjunct Assistant Professor of History at Johnson County Community College in Overland Park, KS. She established an Egyptology specialization in the Continuing Education Department at JCCC to further her goal of making Egyptology accessible to any who wish to learn. She is a co-founder and first President of the American Research Center in Egypt, Missouri Chapter (ARCE-MO) and also serves as the Team Lead of the Egyptology State of the Field Project.
Julia Troche holds a PhD in Egyptology, is Assistant Professor of Ancient History at Missouri State University, and serves as co-founder and Vice President of the American Research Center in Egypt, Missouri Chapter. Her book Death, Power, and Apotheosis in Ancient Egypt: The Old and Middle Kingdoms will be published by Cornell University Press at the end of this year.
Abstract:
What can we learn about ancient Egyptian akhu through an analysis of Force Ghosts from Star Wars? In this paper, we argue that popular culture and manufactured, real or imagined, realities can help students and researchers explore remote, ancient concepts and practices. From a pedagogical perspective, Science Fiction universes are often more relatable, accessible, and rounded than our ancient archaeological and textual records. They further promote creative and innovative approaches that expand the types of questions and methodologies used to explore ancient concepts. To make this point, we consider as a case study the akhu (ancient Egyptian "effective dead" spirits) in tandem with Star Wars Force Ghosts (manifestations of the essence of deceased Force-sensitives). In our analysis, we focus on evidence for akhu dating primarily to the New Kingdom (e.g. letters to the dead and akh iqr n Ra stelae) as well as Force Ghosts from Episodes IV-VI, The Clone Wars, and Rebels animated series. We investigate the processes by which the dead become Force Ghosts and akhu respectively and the modes of communication employed by these supernatural entities. Further, we offer novel lines of inquiry that confirm the effectiveness of this exercise.